Fork: knight to h7
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The tactical motive
Fork: one piece attacks two targets at once — they can't both be saved.
Difficulty 1364 ShuffleRating — club-player level.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A fork is one piece attacking two targets at once. Look for a knight, pawn or queen move that lands where it hits the king (or a bigger piece) and a second undefended unit on the same turn — the opponent can save only one.
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 d3, queen d7, knight g5, pawn h2 e4.
Black: king f6, queen f8, rook g2, bishop e5, pawn b4 a5 d6 h7.
5 white and 8 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 39.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 7 points of material (14 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 d3, the black king on f6.
It is White to move on move 39, with 27 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 2 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c, f, g — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: a, b, d.
The White king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
39. Nxh7+ Kg6 40. Nxf8+
Why it works
- Great move! knight to h7 keeps the pressure (+4.9).
- Well found: knight to f8 (+5.2).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Kg6, then Nxf8+ and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 39. Nxh7+ — knight to h7 (capture) with check
- Kg6 — king to g6
- 40. Nxf8+ — knight to f8 (capture) with check
Types in this puzzle
Royal fork
A fork with check: the king must move, and the second piece is lost.
A royal fork is a fork with check — one of the two targets is the king itself. The check must be answered first, so nobody is left to rescue the second piece. Look for squares where your piece gives check and simultaneously attacks an undefended queen or rook. It is the most reliable fork of all, because your opponent literally has no choice.
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.
Check chase
Every move is a check — the king is chased into losing ground.
In a check chase every one of your moves is a check, so the opponent never gets a free second. The king is herded across the board until it loses a piece or walks into a decisive blow. Such lines are the easiest to calculate: each check allows only a handful of replies, so try them all. Make it a habit to start calculating any sharp position with the checks — they are the most forcing moves on the board.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 010
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