Mate in 3: rook to h7 (h2)
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The tactical motive
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1496 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
In a mate in three every move must be forcing; the defender should never get a free tempo. Find the check or threat that herds the king, calculate the single defence to each, and confirm the net closes on the third 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 g1, queen d2, rook h2, bishop d3, knight e7, pawn a2 b2 c2 e3.
Black: king h8, queen f3, rook a8 f8, knight d6, pawn f5 a7 b7 c7 g7 h7.
9 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 23.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 4 points of material (24 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 g1, the black king on h8.
It is White to move on move 23, with 38 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): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: f, g, h.
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
23. Rxh7+ Kxh7 24. Qh2+ Qh3 25. Qxh3#
Why it works
- Great move! rook to h7 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: queen to h2 (#1).
- Strong! queen to h3 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Kxh7, then Qh2+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 23. Rxh7+ — rook to h7 (capture) with check
- Kxh7 — king to h7 (capture)
- 24. Qh2+ — queen to h2 with check
- Qh3 — queen to h3
- 25. Qxh3# — queen to h3 (capture) and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Mate in 3
A forced checkmate in three moves.
Mate in three is a forced staircase: each of your moves narrows the opponent's choices, and the third one ends the game. Look for the start among checks and sacrifices — quiet first moves are rare in mating problems, but deliciously sneaky. Keep the tree in your head: every defense gets its own branch. Do not stop calculating after move two — see the final mating picture with your own eyes.
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.
Sacrifice attack
Give up material to unleash a decisive attack.
A sacrificial attack gives up material on purpose to rip the king's shelter open and launch a decisive assault. The sac is sound when you get concrete assets in return: open lines to the king, tempi, pieces ready to pour in. The signs: a poorly sheltered king, your forces aimed at its home, defenders stranded far away. The iron rule is to calculate, not hope — once the material is gone, there is no way back.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 011
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