Deflection: rook to b5
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The tactical motive
Deflection: force the defender to abandon its post.
Difficulty 2290 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
Deflection drags a defender away from its duty. Identify the enemy piece that guards a key square or mate, then force it to move — with a check, a capture or a threat it must answer — and strike where it no longer defends.
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 d6, rook b1, bishop e5, pawn g2 h2 e4 a5.
Black: king b7, queen d8, rook f7 a8, pawn b5 a6 h6 g7.
8 white and 8 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 31.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 2 points of material (21 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 b7.
It is White to move on move 31, with 43 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c, d, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: b.
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
31. Rxb5+ axb5 32. a6+ Rxa6 33. Qxd8
Why it works
- Great move! rook to b5 keeps the pressure (+6.1).
- Well found: pawn to a6 (+6.5).
- Strong! queen to d8 is the sharp choice (+6.6).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead axb5, then a6+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 31. Rxb5+ — rook to b5 (capture) with check
- axb5 — pawn to b5 (capture)
- 32. a6+ — pawn to a6 with check
- Rxa6 — rook to a6 (capture)
- 33. Qxd8 — queen to d8 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
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.
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.
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.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
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