Discovered attack: bishop to e7
li-0St5tOpens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Discovered attack: one piece steps aside, unleashing another's attack.
Difficulty 2167 ShuffleRating — expert level — few solve it at first try.
Black 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.
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 h4, rook f1 d2, bishop g2 c3, knight g7, pawn a2 f2 h2 b3 e3 g3.
Black: king g8, queen d7, rook c6 f8, bishop c5 g6, knight b6, pawn d5 a7 b7 f7 h7.
13 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 25.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 1 points of material (34 against 33; 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 Black to move on move 25, with 44 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 6 pawns, Black 5. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): c — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: e, g.
The Black king has 1 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
25... Be7 26. Qh6 Rxc3 27. Nh5 Bxh5
Why it works
- Great move! bishop to e7 keeps the pressure (+1.8).
- Well found: rook to c3 (+1.8).
- Stunning! bishop to h5 gives up material but you stand better (+2.0).
- You win a piece — the bishop.
- If instead Qh6, then Rxc3 and you win the bishop.
Move by move
- 25… Be7 — bishop to e7
- 26. Qh6 — queen to h6
- Rxc3 — rook to c3 (capture)
- 27. Nh5 — knight to h5
- Bxh5 — bishop to h5 (capture)
Types in this puzzle
Quiet move
No check, no capture — yet this modest move decides the game.
A quiet move gives no check and takes nothing — yet it decides the game by creating an unstoppable threat or stealing the king's last square. This is the hardest class of moves: the eye hunts for loud blows while a modest shift does the winning. The clue: every forcing try runs into a defense, so seek the move that strengthens the threat or takes squares away. Train yourself to ask: what if I neither capture nor check, but quietly improve?
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Pack 015
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