Winning blow: pawn to f7 (f6·10)
c9-23114naming 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 1250 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 e1, queen e7, rook f1, knight d1, pawn c2 e2 d3 h4 g5 f6.
Black: king c8, queen g8, rook b1 a8, knight d6, pawn e4 c6 c7 h7.
10 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 25.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (23 against 26; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on e1, the black king on c8.
It is White to move on move 25, with 28 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): a, b — natural highways for the rooks and queen.
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
25. f7 Nxf7 26. Rxf7 Qxf7 27. Qxf7
Why it works
- Great move! pawn to f7 keeps the pressure (+3.2).
- Well found: rook to f7 (+3.3).
- Strong! queen to f7 is the sharp choice (+3.5).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Nxf7, then Rxf7 and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 25. f7 — pawn to f7
- Nxf7 — knight to f7 (capture)
- 26. Rxf7 — rook to f7 (capture)
- Qxf7 — queen to f7 (capture)
- 27. Qxf7 — queen to f7 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Winning exchange
A forced series of captures on one square ends in your favour.
A winning exchange is a forced series of captures on one square that leaves you ahead in material. It is pure arithmetic: count the attackers and defenders of the square and note the value of every piece in the queue. Capture in the right order — cheap pieces first, expensive ones later — or a winning trade turns into a losing one. The classic error is stopping the count halfway and missing the opponent's final recapture.
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.
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?
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #467.
SP-467 · 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 b1 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: c2.
The setup belongs to the ThroneGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 675.
The engine's main line opens with b3.
Morozov Balance Index: 99 of 100 — class A — most balanced. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +2 centipawns for White (depth 49, 400 000 000 nodes).
In 50 self-play games White scored 51.0% (95% CI 37.6–64.3%).
Explore position #467Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 009 · SP-467
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