Deflection: rook to b6 (a6)
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The tactical motive
Deflection: force the defender to abandon its post.
Difficulty 2020 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 c1, queen b3, rook d1 a6, bishop e2, pawn a2 b2 f2 g2 h3 e4.
Black: king b7, queen c7, rook a8 h8, bishop b6, knight f4, pawn c5 c6 g6 h7.
11 white and 10 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 29.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 1 points of material (28 against 29; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on c1, the black king on b7.
It is White to move on move 29, with 50 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: c.
The White king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
29. Rxb6+ Qxb6 30. Rd7+ Kc8 31. Qxb6
Why it works
- Great move! rook to b6 keeps the pressure (+3.6).
- Well found: rook to d7 (+3.5).
- Strong! queen to b6 is the sharp choice (+3.5).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qxb6, then Rd7+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 29. Rxb6+ — rook to b6 (capture) with check
- Qxb6 — queen to b6 (capture)
- 30. Rd7+ — rook to d7 with check
- Kc8 — king to c8
- 31. Qxb6 — queen to b6 (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).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 014
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