Win the hanging queen on d8
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The tactical motive
Hanging piece: your opponent left a piece undefended — take it.
Difficulty 2158 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A hanging piece is one that is attacked and not defended, or defended too few times. Count attackers against defenders on each enemy unit; where attackers win, take it — often with an in-between move or a check to gain the extra tempo.
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 c2, rook d1 d8, bishop b2, knight f3 d5, pawn a2 f2 b3 h3 e4 f6.
Black: king g8, queen c7, rook a6 e6, bishop f8, knight b6 f7, pawn a4 c5 e5 g6 h7.
13 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 32.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 1 points of material (34 against 33; 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 g8.
It is Black to move on move 32, with 34 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: b, f.
The Black king has 1 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
32... Qxd8 33. Ne7+ Bxe7 34. Rxd8+ Bxd8
Why it works
- Great move! queen to d8 keeps the pressure (+2.7).
- Well found: bishop to e7 (+2.8).
- Strong! bishop to d8 is the sharp choice (+2.9).
- You win a piece — the rook.
- If instead Ne7+, then Bxe7 and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 32… Qxd8 — queen to d8 (capture)
- 33. Ne7+ — knight to e7 with check
- Bxe7 — bishop to e7 (capture)
- 34. Rxd8+ — rook to d8 (capture) with check
- Bxd8 — bishop to d8 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Winning exchange
A forced series of captures on one square ends in your favour.
A winning exchange is a forced series of captures on one square that leaves you ahead in material. It is pure arithmetic: count the attackers and defenders of the square and note the value of every piece in the queue. Capture in the right order — cheap pieces first, expensive ones later — or a winning trade turns into a losing one. The classic error is stopping the count halfway and missing the opponent's final recapture.
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 015
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