Rescue the bishop to d1
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The tactical motive
Save the piece: one of your pieces is attacked — find the best way to rescue it.
Difficulty 2240 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
Here the task is defensive: one of your pieces is under attack and must be rescued without losing more. Look for a move that saves it with tempo — a counter-check, an equal counter-attack or an interposition — rather than a passive retreat.
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 b3, rook c1, bishop f3 g3, pawn g2 h2 a3 e3.
Black: king g8, queen e4, rook d1 c8, pawn c2 a5 b6 e6 g7 h7.
9 white and 10 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 34.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 1 points of material (24 against 25; 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 g8.
It is White to move on move 34, with 4 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle. White are in check right now, so every reply must answer the check.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: b, c.
White hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. 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
34. Bxd1 cxd1=Q+ 35. Rxd1 Rc2 36. Bf2
Why it works
- Great move! bishop to d1 keeps the pressure (+3.7).
- Well found: rook to d1 (+4.0).
- Strong! bishop to f2 is the sharp choice (+4.0).
- You win a piece — the rook.
- If instead cxd1=Q+, then Rxd1 and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 34. Bxd1 — bishop to d1 (capture)
- cxd1=Q+ — pawn to d1 (capture) with check
- 35. Rxd1 — rook to d1 (capture)
- Rc2 — rook to c2
- 36. Bf2 — bishop to f2
Types in this puzzle
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.
Mate defense
Mate is threatened — parry it and stay on top.
Mate defense: your opponent is one move from mating you — but it is your turn, and that changes everything. Find the defense that kills the mating threat while keeping your advantage: often a check or a counter-threat that leaves no time for the mate. First name the exact square where the mate would land — otherwise you are defending blind. The mistake is playing a "defensive" move that does not actually remove the threat.
Save the piece
The attacked piece can be saved — with profit.
Saving the piece: one of your pieces is attacked, and the job is not to lose it for nothing. There are several tools: retreat with tempo, defend it, block the attack, or create a bigger counter-threat. Before retreating automatically, look for a retreat that attacks something — you save the piece and gain time in one move. The typical mistake is panicking onto the first available square, where the piece gets trapped again.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
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