Mate in 2: queen to c3 (a5)
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The tactical motive
Mate in 2: the first move creates an unstoppable threat, the second delivers mate.
Difficulty 1952 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
Mate in two usually opens with a forcing move — a check, a capture or an unstoppable threat — that strips the king of squares or defenders, so the follow-up mate becomes unavoidable. Look for the first move that leaves the opponent only losing replies.
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 b5, rook d1 h1, bishop b3, knight c3 f3, pawn a2 b2 f2 g2 h2.
Black: king b8, queen a5, rook d8 h8, bishop c5 f5, knight e7, pawn f6 a7 b7 f7 h7.
12 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 19.
The position in numbers
Material is level — 33 points of pieces on each side (pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9).
The white king stands on c1, the black king on b8.
It is Black to move on move 19, with 52 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c, d, e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: g.
Black hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. The Black king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
19... Qxc3+ 20. bxc3 Ba3#
Why it works
- Great move! queen to c3 keeps the pressure (#1).
- Well found: bishop to a3 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead bxc3, then Ba3# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 19… Qxc3+ — queen to c3 (capture) with check
- 20. bxc3 — pawn to c3 (capture)
- Ba3# — bishop to a3 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Two-bishop mate
The bishop pair sweeps two adjacent diagonals — the king has nowhere to hide.
The two-bishop mate rakes two adjacent diagonals: one bishop mates while the other seals off the escape squares. The bishops complement each other perfectly — living on opposite colors, together they cover an unbroken strip of the board. The pattern usually appears at the edge or in the corner where the king was pressed beforehand. Treasure the bishop pair until the attack comes — on an open board two adjacent diagonals become a solid wall.
Mate in 2
A forced checkmate in two moves.
Mate in two: your move, any reply, then the mating blow. Start with the most forcing first moves — checks and sacrifices that shrink the opponent's options to almost nothing. Against every single reply you must have a mate ready, so check them all without exception. The common failure is analyzing the pretty defense and forgetting the boring one.
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 014
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