Pin: queen to h5 (f5)
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The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Pin: a piece can't move without exposing something more valuable behind it.
Difficulty 2083 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
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.
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 b1, queen f5, rook f1 f3, knight a4, pawn a2 c2 b3 e4.
Black: king f7, queen e2, rook c6 g8, knight f6, pawn g3 b4 e5 a6 d6 e7.
9 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 34.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 2 points of material (26 against 28; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on b1, the black king on f7.
It is White to move on move 34, with 34 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): f, h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: d, g.
The White king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
34. Qh5+ Rg6 35. Rxf6+ exf6 36. Qxe2
Why it works
- Great move! queen to h5 keeps the pressure (+5.8).
- Well found: rook to f6 (+6.0).
- Strong! queen to e2 is the sharp choice (+6.1).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Rg6, then Rxf6+ and you win the knight.
Move by move
- 34. Qh5+ — queen to h5 with check
- Rg6 — rook to g6
- 35. Rxf6+ — rook to f6 (capture) with check
- exf6 — pawn to f6 (capture)
- 36. Qxe2 — queen to e2 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Win the pinned piece
The pinned piece cannot run — attack it again and win it.
A pinned piece cannot flee, which means you can win it outright by attacking it one more time. Count attackers against defenders: if you outnumber them, the piece is yours. The best extra attacker is a pawn, since it costs less than anything it might capture. Do not rush the capture — build up the pressure first, then harvest.
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.
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.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 015
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