Discovered attack: rook to b7
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The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Difficulty 1687 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A discovered attack fires when one piece steps aside and unmasks the piece behind it. Look for your own units that block a rook, bishop or queen: moving the front piece — ideally with a threat of its own — springs two attacks in one 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 g1, queen c2, rook b1 f1, bishop g2 c3, knight e4, pawn f2 h2 a3 g3.
Black: king g8, queen c7, rook c8 f8, bishop b7 e7, knight d3, pawn c4 a7 f7 g7 h7.
11 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 24.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 1 points of material (32 against 33; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on g1, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 24, with 47 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): b, d, e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: c.
The White king has 1 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
24. Rxb7 Qxb7 25. Nf6+ Bxf6 26. Bxb7
Why it works
- Great move! rook to b7 keeps the pressure (+4.2).
- Well found: knight to f6 (+4.0).
- Strong! bishop to b7 is the sharp choice (+3.8).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qxb7, then Nf6+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 24. Rxb7 — rook to b7 (capture)
- Qxb7 — queen to b7 (capture)
- 25. Nf6+ — knight to f6 with check
- Bxf6 — bishop to f6 (capture)
- 26. Bxb7 — bishop to b7 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Sacrifice attack
Give up material to unleash a decisive attack.
A sacrificial attack gives up material on purpose to rip the king's shelter open and launch a decisive assault. The sac is sound when you get concrete assets in return: open lines to the king, tempi, pieces ready to pour in. The signs: a poorly sheltered king, your forces aimed at its home, defenders stranded far away. The iron rule is to calculate, not hope — once the material is gone, there is no way back.
Discovered attack
A piece steps aside and opens a second attack from the piece behind it.
A discovered attack works like a curtain: one piece steps off the line and unveils the long-range piece behind it. The beauty is that the moving piece can create a second threat of its own — two attacks in one move. Look for your stacked pairs: a bishop or rook behind a knight or pawn, aimed through them at something valuable. Send the front piece to the most aggressive square — a discovery without a second threat wastes half its power.
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.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 013
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