Winning blow: rook to e1 (a1·10)
c9-19546naming 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.
Winning tactic: there is a move that gains a decisive advantage — find it.
Difficulty 1700 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
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.
This position hides a concrete tactic that wins material or mates. Start with the most forcing candidate moves — checks, captures and threats — and calculate each to a clear end before choosing; the winning line is usually the one the opponent cannot meet.
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 f1, queen h7, rook a1 f2, knight d2, pawn b2 g3 a4 f6.
Black: king e8, queen c7, rook f5 a8, bishop b8, pawn c3 a5 d5 b7.
9 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 29.
The position in numbers
Material is level — 26 points of pieces on each side (pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9).
The white king stands on f1, the black king on e8.
It is White to move on move 29, with 39 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): e, h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: c, d.
The White king has 5 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
29. Re1+ Re5 30. f7+ Qxf7 31. Rxe5+ Bxe5 32. Qxf7+
Why it works
- Great move! rook to e1 keeps the pressure (#6).
- Spot on — pawn to f7 (#5).
- Precise: rook to e5 is the top choice (#4).
- Best move. queen to f7 is exactly what the engine plays (#4).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Re5, then f7+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 29. Re1+ — rook to e1 with check
- Re5 — rook to e5
- 30. f7+ — pawn to f7 with check
- Qxf7 — queen to f7 (capture)
- 31. Rxe5+ — rook to e5 (capture) with check
- Bxe5 — bishop to e5 (capture)
- 32. Qxf7+ — queen to f7 (capture) with check
Types in this puzzle
Win the pinned piece
The pinned piece cannot run — attack it again and win it.
A pinned piece cannot flee, which means you can win it outright by attacking it one more time. Count attackers against defenders: if you outnumber them, the piece is yours. The best extra attacker is a pawn, since it costs less than anything it might capture. Do not rush the capture — build up the pressure first, then harvest.
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.
Check chase
Every move is a check — the king is chased into losing ground.
In a check chase every one of your moves is a check, so the opponent never gets a free second. The king is herded across the board until it loses a piece or walks into a decisive blow. Such lines are the easiest to calculate: each check allows only a handful of replies, so try them all. Make it a habit to start calculating any sharp position with the checks — they are the most forcing moves on the board.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #472.
SP-472 · BastionGuard — Both knights begin inside the board while the king stands on c or f; a position and its mirror twin share this family.
The king starts on f1, the rooks on a1 and g1, the queen on h1.
Castling short simply swaps the two pieces: the king on f1 and the rook on g1 trade places.
The bishops stand on b1 and e1; their long diagonals reach h7 and a5 once the c- and d-pawns step aside.
Every pawn on the second rank is defended from the very first move.
The setup belongs to the BastionGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 685.
The engine's main line opens with d4, putting a pawn straight into the centre.
Morozov Balance Index: 10 of 100 — class D — largest edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +43 centipawns for White (depth 43, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #472Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 013 · SP-472
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