Skewer: rook to g4 (g7)
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The tactical motive
Skewer: a valuable piece is forced to move, exposing the one behind it.
Difficulty 2145 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A skewer is a pin reversed — the valuable piece stands in front and, when it moves, the piece behind falls. Line your rook, bishop or queen up against the king or queen and win whatever is hiding behind it.
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 f4, queen c4, rook e5, pawn b2 a3 f3 g4.
Black: king h7, queen g1, rook g7, pawn h5 a7 b7 c7.
7 white and 7 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 38.
The position in numbers
Material is level — 18 points of pieces on each side (pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9).
The white king stands on f4, the black king on h7.
It is Black to move on move 38, with 34 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): d, e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: f, g.
The Black king has 3 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
38... Rxg4+ 39. fxg4 Qxg4+ 40. Ke3 Qxc4
Why it works
- Great move! rook to g4 keeps the pressure (+5.5).
- Well found: queen to g4 (+5.6).
- Strong! queen to c4 is the sharp choice (+5.7).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead fxg4, then Qxg4+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 38… Rxg4+ — rook to g4 (capture) with check
- 39. fxg4 — pawn to g4 (capture)
- Qxg4+ — queen to g4 (capture) with check
- 40. Ke3 — king to e3
- Qxc4 — queen to c4 (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.
Skewer
A line attack forces the valuable piece to move, exposing the one behind it.
A skewer is a pin turned inside out: the valuable piece stands in front and something cheaper hides behind it. The big piece must step aside, and you collect the one that was sheltering in its shadow. Scan for the enemy king or queen sharing a file, rank or diagonal with another enemy piece. The deadliest version comes with check — the king moves, the rook behind it dies.
Winning exchange
A forced series of captures on one square ends in your favour.
A winning exchange is a forced series of captures on one square that leaves you ahead in material. It is pure arithmetic: count the attackers and defenders of the square and note the value of every piece in the queue. Capture in the right order — cheap pieces first, expensive ones later — or a winning trade turns into a losing one. The classic error is stopping the count halfway and missing the opponent's final recapture.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
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