Fork: knight to e3 (c2·2)
li-0CAjJnaming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Fork: one piece attacks two targets at once — they can't both be saved.
Difficulty 2156 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A fork is one piece attacking two targets at once. Look for a knight, pawn or queen move that lands where it hits the king (or a bigger piece) and a second undefended unit on the same turn — the opponent can save only one.
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 h1, queen d5, rook f1, knight f3, pawn a2 g2 h2 b3 d4.
Black: king h8, queen g4, rook f8, knight c2, pawn g7 h7.
9 white and 6 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 28.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 3 points of material (22 against 19; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on h1, the black king on h8.
It is Black to move on move 28, with 36 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 2. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c, e, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: a, b, d.
The Black king has 0 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
28... Ne3 29. Ng1 Nxf1
Why it works
- Great move! knight to e3 keeps the pressure (+5.3).
- Well found: knight to f1 (+5.5).
- You win a piece — the rook.
- If instead Ng1, then Nxf1 and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 28… Ne3 — knight to e3
- 29. Ng1 — knight to g1
- Nxf1 — knight to f1 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Knight fork
One knight move attacks two targets at once — the opponent can only save one.
A fork is one move that attacks two targets at once, and no piece forks better than the knight. Look through the knight's eyes: it jumps in an L and never moves along straight lines, which is exactly why its threats get missed. Both victims of a knight fork always stand on squares of one color, while the knight strikes from the opposite color. Hunt for the square from which the knight hits the king and a heavy piece at once.
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.
Quiet move
No check, no capture — yet this modest move decides the game.
A quiet move gives no check and takes nothing — yet it decides the game by creating an unstoppable threat or stealing the king's last square. This is the hardest class of moves: the eye hunts for loud blows while a modest shift does the winning. The clue: every forcing try runs into a defense, so seek the move that strengthens the threat or takes squares away. Train yourself to ask: what if I neither capture nor check, but quietly improve?
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 015
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