Mate in 2: rook to e7 (e1·2)
c9-27388naming 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.
Difficulty 1220 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.
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 h1, queen d2 g8, rook e1, bishop a1 f5, knight g3, pawn g2 h2 a4 d4.
Black: king c7, queen b8, bishop c4 b6, knight h3, pawn d5 c6 e7 h7.
11 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 26.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 14 points of material (36 against 22; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on h1, the black king on c7.
It is White to move on move 26, with 59 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): b, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: c, e.
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
26. Rxe7+ Kd6 27. Qe6#
Why it works
- Best move. rook to e7 is exactly what the engine plays (#1).
- Spot on — queen to e6 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Kd6, then Qe6# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 26. Rxe7+ — rook to e7 (capture) with check
- Kd6 — king to d6
- 27. Qe6# — queen to e6 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Ladder mate
Two heavy pieces climb line by line, cutting off every retreat.
The ladder mate uses two heavy pieces climbing rung by rung: one cuts the king off along a line, the other checks on the next line, driving him toward the edge. It is the classic two-rook technique — check, the king retreats one rank, the other rook checks, until mate on the last rank. The only danger is the king creeping close enough to attack one of your rooks. If it does, simply slide that rook to the far side of the same line.
Mate in 2
A forced checkmate in two moves.
Mate in two: your move, any reply, then the mating blow. Start with the most forcing first moves — checks and sacrifices that shrink the opponent's options to almost nothing. Against every single reply you must have a mate ready, so check them all without exception. The common failure is analyzing the pretty defense and forgetting the boring one.
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 #785.
SP-785 · ThroneScout — King in the middle of the rank, with a knight already committed to the corner.
The king starts on e1, the rooks on b1 and g1, the queen on c1.
Castling ends where it always does: king to g1 and rook to f1 on the short side, king to c1 and rook to d1 on the long one.
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 ThroneScout family; read right to left it becomes position 171.
The engine's main line opens with b4.
Morozov Balance Index: 6 of 100 — class D — largest edge. Engine evaluation of the starting position: +48 centipawns for White (depth 43, 400 000 000 nodes).
Explore position #785Provenance
Mined from the project's engine self-play games.
Pack 008 · SP-785
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