Mate in 3: queen to g8 (h7·2)
c9-25059naming tag (square·N)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
Position on the board
White: king g2, queen h7, rook d1, knight b1 f3, pawn e2 h2 a3 g3 b5 d5 e6.
Black: king e8, rook a8, bishop e7, pawn c5 a6 b6 d6 g6.
12 white and 8 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 24.
Solution & explanation
Main line
24. Qg8+ Bf8 25. Qf7+ Kd8 26. Qd7#
Why it works
- Best move. queen to g8 is exactly what the engine plays (#2).
- Spot on — queen to f7 (#1).
- Precise: queen to d7 is the top choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Bf8, then Qf7+ and you stay on top.
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.
About this position
These pieces come from starting position #307.
SP-307 · ThroneGuard — A central king (d or e) and two knights tucked onto inner files: the family that holds the standard array, SP-518.
The king starts on e1, the rooks on d1 and f1, the queen on c1.
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.
The second rank carries 2 pawns with no defender at all: a2, h2.
The setup belongs to the ThroneGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 355.
The engine's main line opens with c4.
Morozov Balance Index: 28 of 100 — class C — noticeable edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +33 centipawns for White (depth 44, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #307Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 012 · SP-307
Similar puzzles
Free, no ads · Android 8.0+ · coming soon to Google Play