Winning blow: knight to g7 (h5·2)
c9-20805naming 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.
A fork made possible by the Chess960 piece placement.
Winning tactic: there is a move that gains a decisive advantage — find it.
Difficulty 1290 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.
A set-up fork needs one preparing move before the fork lands — a check that drives the king onto the forking square, or a capture that lines the targets up. Find the preparation first, then the fork it makes possible.
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 g1, queen g6, rook e1 f1, bishop f2, knight h5, pawn a2 d2 g2 h2 e5.
Black: king g8, queen d7, rook f5 e8, bishop d8, knight c4, pawn b4 e6 h6 a7 c7 g7.
11 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 27.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 1 points of material (30 against 31; 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 g8.
It is White to move on move 27, with 38 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: b, c.
The White king has 1 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
27. Nxg7 Qf7 28. Qxf7+ Kxf7 29. Nxf5
Why it works
- Great move! knight to g7 keeps the pressure (+3.7).
- Well found: queen to f7 (+3.6).
- Precise: knight to f5 is the top choice (+3.4).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qf7, then Qxf7+ and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 27. Nxg7 — knight to g7 (capture)
- Qf7 — queen to f7
- 28. Qxf7+ — queen to f7 (capture) with check
- Kxf7 — king to f7 (capture)
- 29. Nxf5 — knight to f5 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Setup fork
The random setup allows a fork that classical chess never sees.
A setup fork is a double attack that exists only because of the unusual starting squares — in classical chess these targets never stand side by side. Look for pairs of undefended pieces on your opponent's back rank and for squares from which a knight or pawn hits both at once. Such forks usually appear within the first moves, before the pieces disperse. In every new position, note right away which starting pieces are defended by no one.
Only move
Everything else loses — find the only move that holds.
An only move is a position where everything loses except one single continuation. You cannot play "by hand" here: run through fundamentally different defenses — run away, block, trade, counterattack — and discard the ones that fail. The hallmark of these puzzles is that the obvious moves lose quickly while the solution often looks strange. First understand exactly what the threat is — then the one saving move reveals itself.
Knight fork
One knight move attacks two targets at once — the opponent can only save one.
A fork is one move that attacks two targets at once, and no piece forks better than the knight. Look through the knight's eyes: it jumps in an L and never moves along straight lines, which is exactly why its threats get missed. Both victims of a knight fork always stand on squares of one color, while the knight strikes from the opposite color. Hunt for the square from which the knight hits the king and a heavy piece at once.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #13.
SP-13 · BastionGuard — The king starts one file off-centre, on c or f, with neither knight in a corner.
The king starts on f1, the rooks on e1 and h1, the queen on a1.
Castling ends where it always does: king to g1 and rook to f1 on the short side, king to c1 and rook to d1 on the long one.
The bishops stand on d1 and g1; their long diagonals reach h5 and a7 once the e- and f-pawns step aside.
The pawn on g2 is defended by the king alone — the same soft spot f2 is in the classical setup.
The setup belongs to the BastionGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 952.
The engine's main line opens with e4, putting a pawn straight into the centre.
Morozov Balance Index: 40 of 100 — class C — noticeable edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +29 centipawns for White (depth 47, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #13Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 009 · SP-13
Similar puzzles
In your browser or in the Android app. Nothing to install · Free, no ads