Pin: rook to e6 (e8)
li-01MhRnaming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Pin: a piece can't move without exposing something more valuable behind it.
Difficulty 2061 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A pin freezes a piece in front of a more valuable one behind it. Scan the ranks, files and diagonals your bishop, rook or queen controls: if an enemy piece cannot move without exposing its king or queen, it is pinned and can be piled on or bypassed.
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 g6, rook a1, bishop f1, knight c3 g3, pawn b2 g2 h2.
Black: king h8, queen b4, rook e1 e8, bishop g4, pawn g5 a6 c6 h6.
9 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 31.
The position in numbers
Material is level — 26 points of pieces on each side (pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9).
The white king stands on h1, the black king on h8.
It is Black to move on move 31, with 53 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 3 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d, e, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: b.
The Black king has 0 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
31... R8e6 32. Rxe1 Rxg6
Why it works
- Great move! rook to e6 keeps the pressure (+3.7).
- Well found: rook to g6 (+3.9).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Rxe1, then Rxg6 and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 31… R8e6 — rook to e6
- 32. Rxe1 — rook to e1 (capture)
- Rxg6 — rook to g6 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
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?
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 015
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