Mate in 2: bishop to f6 (g7)
c9-18974naming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Chess960 twist: use the unusual starting setup of the pieces.
Mate in 2: the first move creates an unstoppable threat, the second delivers mate.
Difficulty 1450 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
In Chess960 the pieces start on unfamiliar squares, so tactics appear earlier and from unusual angles. Do not trust classical patterns — read the actual lines of the bishops, the rooks and the queen from where they really stand in this position.
Mate in two usually opens with a forcing move — a check, a capture or an unstoppable threat — that strips the king of squares or defenders, so the follow-up mate becomes unavoidable. Look for the first move that leaves the opponent only losing replies.
General method: before you move, list the forcing candidates — every check, every capture, every direct threat — and calculate those first. The solution to a tactic is almost always among them.
Position on the board
White: king g1, queen g6, rook d1 h1, bishop f1 g7, knight h7, pawn a2 f2 h3 c4 c5.
Black: king e7, queen b3, rook d8, bishop g2, knight c7 f7, pawn h4 c6 e6 a7 d7.
12 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 20.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 5 points of material (33 against 28; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on g1, the black king on e7.
It is White to move on move 20, with 47 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): b, g — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: d, e.
White hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. The White king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
20. Bf6+ Ke8 21. Qg8#
Why it works
- Great move! bishop to f6 keeps the pressure (#1).
- Spot on — queen to g8 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Ke8, then Qg8# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 20. Bf6+ — bishop to f6 with check
- Ke8 — king to e8
- 21. Qg8# — queen to g8 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Mate in 2
A forced checkmate in two moves.
Mate in two: your move, any reply, then the mating blow. Start with the most forcing first moves — checks and sacrifices that shrink the opponent's options to almost nothing. Against every single reply you must have a mate ready, so check them all without exception. The common failure is analyzing the pretty defense and forgetting the boring one.
Royal fork
A fork with check: the king must move, and the second piece is lost.
A royal fork is a fork with check — one of the two targets is the king itself. The check must be answered first, so nobody is left to rescue the second piece. Look for squares where your piece gives check and simultaneously attacks an undefended queen or rook. It is the most reliable fork of all, because your opponent literally has no choice.
Counter-strike
Don't defend — answer the threat with a bigger one.
The counter-strike: instead of defending against the threat, you answer with a bigger threat of your own. While your opponent grabs a pawn, you deliver mate — the arithmetic favors you. Look for a counter when direct defenses fail: do you have a check, an attack on the queen, a mating threat? The beginner's error is meeting every threat with a reflexive defense without checking the counterattacking resources first.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #98.
SP-98 · RampartGuard — A b- or g-file king and two knights on inner files (b–g).
The king starts on g1, the rooks on d1 and h1, the queen on b1.
The king already stands on its castled square, so castling short moves only the rook, from h1 to f1.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
The pawn on f2 is defended by the king alone — the classic soft spot of the standard setup.
The setup belongs to the RampartGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 855.
The engine's main line opens with b4.
Morozov Balance Index: 83 of 100 — class A — most balanced. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +16 centipawns for White (depth 44, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #98Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 011 · SP-98
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