Starting position #177
Back-rank setup: BNRBNKRQ
SP-177 · BastionGuard — King shifted to c or f, knights kept clear of the edges — 168 positions in all.
Move the pieces right on the board — full Chess960 rules, castle by dropping the king on the rook.
Position features
The king starts on f1, the rooks on c1 and g1, the queen on h1.
Castling short simply swaps the two pieces: the king on f1 and the rook on g1 trade places.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
One second-rank pawn starts with no defender at all: a2.
The setup belongs to the BastionGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 779.
The engine's main line opens with g4.
Every sentence here is computed from the setup itself and can be checked on the board.
Balance
MBI 8 Morozov Balance Index: 8 of 100 — class D — largest edge.
- Engine evaluation of the starting position: +45 centipawns for White (depth 44, 400 000 000 nodes).
- Rank 883 of 960 by balance — 1 is the most balanced start.
- Balance band L — large edge · dynamics along the play-out: equalizing
- Evaluation along the engine's main line (60 half-moves): +51 → +63 → +24 → +8
Position facts
- Mirror twin: position #779
- The king starts on f, the rooks on c and g
- King and rook are neighbours — castling from adjacent squares feels unusual
- It becomes the daily position in 1377 days
Puzzles from this position
- Attack on the uncastled king: knight to e4 (c5) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Attack on the uncastled king: queen to h8 (h1) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Winning blow: queen to d8 (g5·2) — Chess960 specifics · 920
- Winning blow: bishop to f6 (b2·3) — Chess960 specifics · 1010
- Winning blow: pawn to f7 (g6·2) — Chess960 specifics · 1200
- Mate in 2: queen to e7 (f7·2) — Chess960 specifics · 1320
- Mate in 3: queen to g7 (h8) — Chess960 specifics · 1630
- Winning blow: rook to e4 (d4) — Chess960 specifics · 1870
- Winning blow: queen to c7 (e5·4) — Chess960 specifics · 1870
- Winning blow: queen to g7 (g2·6) — Chess960 specifics · 2380
This position appears in course day 53
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Commentary
Short castling swaps the king on f1 with the rook on g1. The queen begins in the corner on h1 and a bishop in the corner on a1, its diagonal to h8 opened by the b-pawn. On the second rank, a2 starts with no defender at all, and f2 has only the king. The second bishop is on d1, the rooks on c1 and g1. The line in the dataset opens g4 g5, then e3 e6 Bf3 Bf6 — both bishops step to the third rank.
Written from the measured facts above and checked against the board before publishing. All 960 positions have one.