Mate in 3: discovered attack on h6 (d2)
li-0KGA2naming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1810 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
White to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
A discovered attack fires when one piece steps aside and unmasks the piece behind it. Look for your own units that block a rook, bishop or queen: moving the front piece — ideally with a threat of its own — springs two attacks in one move.
In a mate in three every move must be forcing; the defender should never get a free tempo. Find the check or threat that herds the king, calculate the single defence to each, and confirm the net closes on the third move.
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 d2, rook e1, bishop c4 h4, knight f7, pawn a2 g2 h3.
Black: king g7, queen c8, rook a8, bishop d7 f8, knight h5, pawn b4 e5 g6 a7 b7 h7.
9 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 26.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 3 points of material (26 against 29; 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 g7.
It is White to move on move 26, with 54 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 3 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c, d, f — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: b, e.
The White king has 4 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
26. Qh6+ Kg8 27. Ng5+ Qxc4 28. Qxh7#
Why it works
- Great move! queen to h6 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: knight to g5 (#1).
- Strong! queen to h7 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Kg8, then Ng5+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 26. Qh6+ — queen to h6 with check
- Kg8 — king to g8
- 27. Ng5+ — knight to g5 with check
- Qxc4 — queen to c4 (capture)
- 28. Qxh7# — queen to h7 (capture) and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Supported queen mate
The queen delivers mate face to face, protected by a friend.
The supported queen mate is the most common pattern of all: the queen lands next to the king and mates because a friendly piece or pawn protects her. The king is helpless — capturing is impossible, and the queen covers every neighboring square herself. Hunt for a protected square beside the enemy king: a knight, bishop or pawn eyeing it turns her invasion into mate. Verify one thing — that the square really is defended, or the king eats her.
Mate in 3
A forced checkmate in three moves.
Mate in three is a forced staircase: each of your moves narrows the opponent's choices, and the third one ends the game. Look for the start among checks and sacrifices — quiet first moves are rare in mating problems, but deliciously sneaky. Keep the tree in your head: every defense gets its own branch. Do not stop calculating after move two — see the final mating picture with your own eyes.
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 013
Similar puzzles
In your browser or in the Android app. Nothing to install · Free, no ads