Mate in 3: bishop to c3
c9-22449Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Chess960 twist: use the unusual starting setup of the pieces.
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1630 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.
In a mate in three every move must be forcing; the defender should never get a free tempo. Find the check or threat that herds the king, calculate the single defence to each, and confirm the net closes on the third move.
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 d1, queen d7, rook c1 f1, bishop a1 f5, knight b5, pawn c2 d2 e2 h2 a3 b3 f3 g4.
Black: king f6, queen g8, rook e8 f8, bishop c3 a8, knight g2, pawn g5 c6 f7 h7.
15 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 17.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 4 points of material (36 against 32; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on d1, the black king on f6.
It is White to move on move 17, with 41 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 8 pawns, Black 4. No file is fully open, so the heavy pieces have to be pried in.
The White king has 0 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
17. Bxc3+ Re5 18. Bxe5+ Kxe5 19. Qd6#
Why it works
- Great move! bishop to c3 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: bishop to e5 (#1).
- Precise: queen to d6 is the top choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Re5, then Bxe5+ and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 17. Bxc3+ — bishop to c3 (capture) with check
- Re5 — rook to e5
- 18. Bxe5+ — bishop to e5 (capture) with check
- Kxe5 — king to e5 (capture)
- 19. Qd6# — queen to d6 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Supported queen mate
The queen delivers mate face to face, protected by a friend.
The supported queen mate is the most common pattern of all: the queen lands next to the king and mates because a friendly piece or pawn protects her. The king is helpless — capturing is impossible, and the queen covers every neighboring square herself. Hunt for a protected square beside the enemy king: a knight, bishop or pawn eyeing it turns her invasion into mate. Verify one thing — that the square really is defended, or the king eats her.
Mate in 3
A forced checkmate in three moves.
Mate in three is a forced staircase: each of your moves narrows the opponent's choices, and the third one ends the game. Look for the start among checks and sacrifices — quiet first moves are rare in mating problems, but deliciously sneaky. Keep the tree in your head: every defense gets its own branch. Do not stop calculating after move two — see the final mating picture with your own eyes.
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 #179.
SP-179 · ThroneGuard — King home on d or e, knights kept off the a- and h-files — the family of the standard starting array.
The king starts on e1, the rooks on c1 and f1, the queen on g1.
The kingside rook already stands on f1, so castling short moves only the king, from e1 to g1.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
One second-rank pawn starts with no defender at all: a2.
The setup belongs to the ThroneGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 771.
The engine's main line opens with g4.
Morozov Balance Index: 78 of 100 — class A — most balanced. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +18 centipawns for White (depth 46, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #179Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 012 · SP-179
Similar puzzles
In your browser or in the Android app. Nothing to install · Free, no ads