Pin: queen to f3
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The tactical motive
Pin: a piece can't move without exposing something more valuable behind it.
Difficulty 2089 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
White 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 h1, queen b3, rook g1, bishop b5, pawn a2 b2 c2 g2 h2.
Black: king b7, queen e6, rook d2 e8, pawn b6 g6 a7 f7 h7.
9 white and 9 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 28.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 2 points of material (22 against 24; 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 b7.
It is White to move on move 28, with 35 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d, e — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: f.
The White king has 0 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
28. Qf3+ Qe4 29. Bxe8 Qxf3 30. gxf3
Why it works
- Great move! queen to f3 keeps the pressure (+4.2).
- Well found: bishop to e8 (+4.3).
- Strong! pawn to f3 is the sharp choice (+4.3).
- You win a piece — the queen.
- If instead Qe4, then Bxe8 and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 28. Qf3+ — queen to f3 with check
- Qe4 — queen to e4
- 29. Bxe8 — bishop to e8 (capture)
- Qxf3 — queen to f3 (capture)
- 30. gxf3 — pawn to f3 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Winning blow
Find the strike that wins material by force.
A winning blow is a forced material gain that does not fit a single textbook motif. The general tactical recipe applies: spot loose pieces, an awkwardly placed king, overloaded lines. Go through the forcing moves in order of violence — checks, captures, threats — because most combinations start with one of them. Do not judge by feel: calculate the concrete line until the outcome is beyond doubt.
Simplification
Trade the heavy pieces and steer into a won endgame.
Simplification is how you convert an advantage: by trading queens and rooks you extinguish the counterplay and steer the game into a won endgame. The rule is simple — the side with extra material trades pieces but keeps pawns. Look for exchanges once the material is already won and your opponent is still rattling threats. The mistake is avoiding the queen trade and letting him muddy the water forever.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
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