Win the hanging queen on d1 (a4)
li-02NcPnaming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Hanging piece: your opponent left a piece undefended — take it.
Difficulty 1852 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A hanging piece is one that is attacked and not defended, or defended too few times. Count attackers against defenders on each enemy unit; where attackers win, take it — often with an in-between move or a check to gain the extra tempo.
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 h2, queen a4, rook g4, bishop f4, pawn a2 g2 h3 b4 c4.
Black: king g8, queen f2, rook d1 a8, pawn c5 c6 h6 a7 f7 g7.
9 white and 10 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 29.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (22 against 25; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on h2, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 29, with 28 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d, e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: f.
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
29. Qxd1 h5 30. Bg3
Why it works
- Great move! queen to d1 keeps the pressure (+4.2).
- Well found: bishop to g3 (+5.1).
- You win a piece — the rook.
- If instead h5, then Bg3 and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 29. Qxd1 — queen to d1 (capture)
- h5 — pawn to h5
- 30. Bg3 — bishop to g3
Types in this puzzle
Winning blow
Find the strike that wins material by force.
A winning blow is a forced material gain that does not fit a single textbook motif. The general tactical recipe applies: spot loose pieces, an awkwardly placed king, overloaded lines. Go through the forcing moves in order of violence — checks, captures, threats — because most combinations start with one of them. Do not judge by feel: calculate the concrete line until the outcome is beyond doubt.
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.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 013
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