Discovered attack: knight to f4
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The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Difficulty 899 ShuffleRating — for beginners taking their first steps in Chess960 tactics.
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 g2, queen h6, rook b1 h1, bishop e4, pawn a2 e2 f2 h3 g4 c5.
Black: king g8, queen e7, rook b8 e8, knight e6, pawn h4 g5 c6 a7 b7 f7.
11 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 28.
The position in numbers
Material is level — 28 points of pieces on each side (pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9).
The white king stands on g2, the black king on g8.
It is Black to move on move 28, with 26 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: e.
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
28... Nf4+ 29. Kh2 Qxe4
Why it works
- Great move! knight to f4 keeps the pressure (+4.6).
- Well found: queen to e4 (+4.5).
- You win a piece — the bishop.
- If instead Kh2, then Qxe4 and you win the bishop.
Move by move
- 28… Nf4+ — knight to f4 with check
- 29. Kh2 — king to h2
- Qxe4 — queen to e4 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Queen fork
The queen lands on a square from which it attacks two targets at once.
The queen strikes along files, ranks and diagonals, so she forks more often than any other piece. Look for a square where the queen attacks two undefended targets at once — most often a check combined with a loose piece. Diagonal blows are especially venomous: a slanting check that also eyes a rook in the corner is the classic of the genre. Remember that both targets must be unprotected, or your «fork» is just a shot into the air.
Clearance
Clear your own piece out of the way — with tempo — for the decisive blow.
Clearance is about your own piece standing in the way of the decisive blow — so you move it aside, or even throw it away. The key is to clear with tempo: jump off with a check, a capture or a threat, giving the opponent no time to regroup. The telltale sign: you see a crushing queen or rook move, but one of your own pieces blocks the line or occupies the square. Do not cling to it — a clearance sacrifice usually costs less than a missed attack.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 004
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