Pin: rook to f2
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The tactical motive
Pin: a piece can't move without exposing something more valuable behind it.
Difficulty 1939 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A pin freezes a piece in front of a more valuable one behind it. Scan the ranks, files and diagonals your bishop, rook or queen controls: if an enemy piece cannot move without exposing its king or queen, it is pinned and can be piled on or bypassed.
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 b7, rook f1 f2, pawn a2 b2 c2 g2 h2.
Black: king h8, queen e3, rook a8 f8, pawn d6 h6 a7 g7.
9 white and 8 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 26.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 1 points of material (24 against 23; 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 45 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): e, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: b, c.
The Black king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
26... Rxf2 27. Rxf2 Rf8 28. Qf3 Rxf3
Why it works
- Great move! rook to f2 keeps the pressure (+6.1).
- Well found: rook to f8 (+6.0).
- Strong! rook to f3 is the sharp choice (+6.1).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Rxf2, then Rf8 and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 26… Rxf2 — rook to f2 (capture)
- 27. Rxf2 — rook to f2 (capture)
- Rf8 — rook to f8
- 28. Qf3 — queen to f3
- Rxf3 — rook to f3 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Win the pinned piece
The pinned piece cannot run — attack it again and win it.
A pinned piece cannot flee, which means you can win it outright by attacking it one more time. Count attackers against defenders: if you outnumber them, the piece is yours. The best extra attacker is a pawn, since it costs less than anything it might capture. Do not rush the capture — build up the pressure first, then harvest.
Remove the defender
Capture the guard first — then take what it protected.
Removing the defender is the straightforward plan: capture the guard first, then take what it guarded. Unlike deflection, the defender is not lured away — it is traded off or destroyed on the spot. Stare at the target you crave and ask who defends it, and whether that defender can be profitably eaten. Count the whole capture sequence, not just the first move — the trade must pay off at the end.
Decoy
A sacrifice lures the king or a piece onto a fatal square.
A decoy is the mirror image of deflection: you sacrifice to drag the king or a piece onto a fatal square. The classic is a queen or rook sac whose capture pulls the king into a knight fork, a discovered check or mate. Find the square where the target will be hit, then find the offer it cannot refuse. Calculate to the very end — a decoy only works when the follow-up is forced.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 014
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