Winning blow: queen to h3 (g3)
c9-21823naming 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 1110 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.
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 g3, rook f1 c2, bishop b3, knight b1, pawn a2 f2 c3 d3 e4 g4.
Black: king g7, queen e2, rook c8, bishop d8 e8, knight a8 b8, pawn b4 h4 d6 a7 e7 f7 h7.
12 white and 14 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 15.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 2 points of material (31 against 33; 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 g7.
It is White to move on move 15, with 35 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 7. No file is fully open, so the heavy pieces have to be pried in. Half-open for White: b, h.
Black hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. The White king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
15. Qh3 Qxc2 16. Bxc2
Why it works
- Great move! queen to h3 keeps the pressure (+3.5).
- Well found: bishop to c2 (+3.4).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qxc2, then Bxc2 and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 15. Qh3 — queen to h3
- Qxc2 — queen to c2 (capture)
- 16. Bxc2 — bishop to c2 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Quiet move
No check, no capture — yet this modest move decides the game.
A quiet move gives no check and takes nothing — yet it decides the game by creating an unstoppable threat or stealing the king's last square. This is the hardest class of moves: the eye hunts for loud blows while a modest shift does the winning. The clue: every forcing try runs into a defense, so seek the move that strengthens the threat or takes squares away. Train yourself to ask: what if I neither capture nor check, but quietly improve?
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.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #89.
SP-89 · BastionScout — King shifted to c or f, with a knight committed to the corner from move one.
The king starts on f1, the rooks on c1 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 d1 and e1; their long diagonals reach h5 and a5 once the e- and d-pawns step aside.
The second rank carries 2 pawns with no defender at all: a2, b2.
The setup belongs to the BastionScout family; read right to left it becomes position 873.
The engine's main line opens with b4.
Morozov Balance Index: 61 of 100 — class B — balanced. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +23 centipawns for White (depth 42, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #89Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 007 · SP-89
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