Fork: knight to c6 (e5·2)
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The tactical motive
Fork: one piece attacks two targets at once — they can't both be saved.
Difficulty 1905 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
White 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 g1, rook a1 d1, knight e5, pawn a2 b2 f2 g2 h2 e3.
Black: king e7, rook a8 d8, knight c3 c5, pawn b5 a6 e6 f7 g7 h7.
10 white and 11 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 19.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (19 against 22; 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 e7.
It is White to move on move 19, with 35 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c, d — natural highways for the rooks and queen.
The White king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
19. Nc6+ Ke8 20. Rxd8+ Rxd8 21. Nxd8
Why it works
- Great move! knight to c6 keeps the pressure (+2.7).
- Well found: rook to d8 (+2.5).
- Stunning! knight to d8 gives up material but you stand better (+2.6).
- You win a piece — the rook.
- If instead Ke8, then Rxd8+ and you win the rook.
Move by move
- 19. Nc6+ — knight to c6 with check
- Ke8 — king to e8
- 20. Rxd8+ — rook to d8 (capture) with check
- Rxd8 — rook to d8 (capture)
- 21. Nxd8 — knight to d8 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Royal fork
A fork with check: the king must move, and the second piece is lost.
A royal fork is a fork with check — one of the two targets is the king itself. The check must be answered first, so nobody is left to rescue the second piece. Look for squares where your piece gives check and simultaneously attacks an undefended queen or rook. It is the most reliable fork of all, because your opponent literally has no choice.
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.
Counter-strike
Don't defend — answer the threat with a bigger one.
The counter-strike: instead of defending against the threat, you answer with a bigger threat of your own. While your opponent grabs a pawn, you deliver mate — the arithmetic favors you. Look for a counter when direct defenses fail: do you have a check, an attack on the queen, a mating threat? The beginner's error is meeting every threat with a reflexive defense without checking the counterattacking resources first.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 014
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