Fork: bishop to d5 (e4)
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The tactical motive
Fork: one piece attacks two targets at once — they can't both be saved.
Difficulty 960 ShuffleRating — for beginners taking their first steps in Chess960 tactics.
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 c1, queen c3, rook d1 h1, bishop e4 h4, knight f3, pawn b2 c2 f2 g2 h2 e3.
Black: king g8, queen a2, rook a8 f8, bishop g7 c8, knight c6, pawn e5 f5 a6 g6 b7 c7 h7.
13 white and 14 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 15.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 1 points of material (34 against 35; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on c1, the black king on g8.
It is White to move on move 15, with 46 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 7. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: a.
The White king has 1 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
15. Bd5+ Qxd5 16. Rxd5
Why it works
- Great move! bishop to d5 keeps the pressure (+4.0).
- Well found: rook to d5 (+4.0).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qxd5, then Rxd5 and you win the queen.
Move by move
- 15. Bd5+ — bishop to d5 with check
- Qxd5 — queen to d5 (capture)
- 16. Rxd5 — rook to d5 (capture)
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 005
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