Mate in 2: queen to g7 (b2·2)
c9-23225naming 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.
Mate in 2: the first move creates an unstoppable threat, the second delivers mate.
A fork made possible by the Chess960 piece placement.
Difficulty 1320 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.
Mate in two usually opens with a forcing move — a check, a capture or an unstoppable threat — that strips the king of squares or defenders, so the follow-up mate becomes unavoidable. Look for the first move that leaves the opponent only losing replies.
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.
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 b2, rook e1 g1, bishop c2, knight c5 h5, pawn d2 e2 f2 h2 a4 b4 g4.
Black: king g8, queen b8, rook e7 f8, bishop a8 d8, knight e8 h8, pawn e6 g6 a7 c7 d7 f7 h7.
14 white and 15 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 15.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (35 against 38; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on f1, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 15, with 50 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 7 pawns, Black 7. No file is fully open, so the heavy pieces have to be pried in. Half-open for White: c.
Black hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. 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
15. Qg7+ Nxg7 16. Nf6#
Why it works
- Great move! queen to g7 keeps the pressure (#1).
- Well found: knight to f6 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Nxg7, then Nf6# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 15. Qg7+ — queen to g7 with check
- Nxg7 — knight to g7 (capture)
- 16. Nf6# — knight to f6 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Smothered mate
The king is buried under its own pieces — only a knight can reach it.
The smothered mate suffocates a king buried under its own army: every neighboring square is blocked by friendly pieces, and the knight — needing no open lines — delivers the blow. The classic mechanism: knight check, king hides in the corner, a queen sacrifice forces a rook to plug the last hole, and the knight mates. Look for a cornered king surrounded by its own pieces and a knight one hop away. Do not mourn the queen — she only opens the door.
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.
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.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #289.
SP-289 · BastionScout — A c- or f-file king with at least one knight out on the edge.
The king starts on f1, the rooks on e1 and g1, the queen on b1.
Castling short simply swaps the two pieces: the king on f1 and the rook on g1 trade places.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
The second rank carries 2 pawns with no defender at all: d2, h2.
The setup belongs to the BastionScout family; read right to left it becomes position 379.
The engine's main line opens with c4.
Morozov Balance Index: 10 of 100 — class D — largest edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +43 centipawns for White (depth 45, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #289Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 010 · SP-289
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