Mate in 2: discovered attack on h3
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The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Mate in 2: the first move creates an unstoppable threat, the second delivers mate.
Difficulty 1914 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A discovered attack fires when one piece steps aside and unmasks the piece behind it. Look for your own units that block a rook, bishop or queen: moving the front piece — ideally with a threat of its own — springs two attacks in one move.
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 g1, queen h1, rook a1 e8, knight d2, pawn a2 b2 f2 h2 c3 d4 f4.
Black: king h8, queen g6, rook f8, bishop g4, pawn b5 a6 g7 h7.
12 white and 8 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 26.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 8 points of material (29 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 g1, the black king on h8.
It is Black to move on move 26, with 31 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 7 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: c, d, 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
26... Bh3+ 27. Qg2 Qxg2#
Why it works
- Great move! bishop to h3 keeps the pressure (#1).
- Well found: queen to g2 (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 2.
- If instead Qg2, then Qxg2# and it is mate.
Move by move
- 26… Bh3+ — bishop to h3 with check
- 27. Qg2 — queen to g2
- Qxg2# — queen to g2 (capture) and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Ladder mate
Two heavy pieces climb line by line, cutting off every retreat.
The ladder mate uses two heavy pieces climbing rung by rung: one cuts the king off along a line, the other checks on the next line, driving him toward the edge. It is the classic two-rook technique — check, the king retreats one rank, the other rook checks, until mate on the last rank. The only danger is the king creeping close enough to attack one of your rooks. If it does, simply slide that rook to the far side of the same line.
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.
Mate defense
Mate is threatened — parry it and stay on top.
Mate defense: your opponent is one move from mating you — but it is your turn, and that changes everything. Find the defense that kills the mating threat while keeping your advantage: often a check or a counter-threat that leaves no time for the mate. First name the exact square where the mate would land — otherwise you are defending blind. The mistake is playing a "defensive" move that does not actually remove the threat.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 014
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