Discovered attack: knight to f3 (d4·2)
li-02Xg7naming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Difficulty 1559 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
Black 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 b2, queen d2, rook f1, knight c4, pawn c2 f2 b3 d3 a4 e4.
Black: king g8, queen f6, rook h2, knight d4, pawn b4 c5 a6 g6.
10 white and 8 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 33.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 2 points of material (23 against 21; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on b2, the black king on g8.
It is Black to move on move 33, with 41 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: d, e, f.
The Black king has 5 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
33... Nf3+ 34. e5 Nxd2 35. exf6 Nxf1
Why it works
- Great move! knight to f3 keeps the pressure (+4.8).
- Well found: knight to d2 (+4.9).
- Strong! knight to f1 is the sharp choice (+4.9).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead e5, then Nxd2 and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 33… Nf3+ — knight to f3 with check
- 34. e5 — pawn to e5
- Nxd2 — knight to d2 (capture)
- 35. exf6 — pawn to f6 (capture)
- Nxf1 — knight to f1 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Discovered check
The moving piece opens a check — and is free to grab anything meanwhile.
With a discovered check the moving piece unmasks a check from the piece standing behind it. While the king deals with the check, the piece that moved grabs whatever it likes, free of charge. Look for your long-range piece on a line with the enemy king, with exactly one of your own pieces in between. The rule: among all the ways to step aside, pick the one that captures or attacks the most expensive loot.
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.
Simplification
Trade the heavy pieces and steer into a won endgame.
Simplification is how you convert an advantage: by trading queens and rooks you extinguish the counterplay and steer the game into a won endgame. The rule is simple — the side with extra material trades pieces but keeps pawns. Look for exchanges once the material is already won and your opponent is still rattling threats. The mistake is avoiding the queen trade and letting him muddy the water forever.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 011
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