Starting position #300
Back-rank setup: QBNRKRBN
SP-300 · ThroneScout — King on a central file (d/e) with a knight starting on the rim (a/h).
Move the pieces right on the board — full Chess960 rules, castle by dropping the king on the rook.
Position features
The king starts on e1, the rooks on d1 and f1, the queen on a1.
The kingside rook already stands on f1, so castling short moves only the king, from e1 to g1.
The bishops stand on b1 and g1; their long diagonals reach h7 and a7 once the c- and f-pawns step aside.
One second-rank pawn starts with no defender at all: g2.
The setup belongs to the ThroneScout family; read right to left it becomes position 380.
The engine's main line opens with Ng3, bringing the knight out to g3.
Every sentence here is computed from the setup itself and can be checked on the board.
Balance
MBI 98 Morozov Balance Index: 98 of 100 — class A — most balanced.
- Engine evaluation of the starting position: 0 centipawns for White (depth 49, 400 000 000 nodes).
- Rank 19 of 960 by balance — 1 is the most balanced start.
- In 50 self-play games White scored 53.0% (95% CI 39.5–66.1%).
- Balance band E — even · dynamics along the play-out: equalizing
- Evaluation along the engine's main line (70 half-moves): +15 → -4 → 0 → 0
- Deeper check (4 000 000 000 nodes, depth 56): +12 cp, +12 cp against the base run — not confirmed at depth · S — slight edge
- Sign verdict: White edge — the minus was noise
- Self-play v2: 100 games at 1 000 000 nodes per move — White scored 51.5% (95% CI 41.8–61.1%)
Position facts
- Mirror twin: position #380
- The king starts on e, the rooks on d and f
- King and rook are neighbours — castling from adjacent squares feels unusual
- It becomes the daily position in 1105 days
Puzzles from this position
- Attack on the uncastled king: knight to g7 (h5) — Chess960 specifics · 620
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to g3 (h2·16) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Winning blow: rook to f7 (f8) — Chess960 specifics · 920
- Winning blow: queen to d7 (c6) — Chess960 specifics · 1010
- Winning blow: knight to e5 (d3·11) — Chess960 specifics · 1150
- Winning blow: knight to f5 (d4·5) — Chess960 specifics · 1290
- Mate in 3: queen to e8 (e6) — Chess960 specifics · 1630
- Mate in 3: queen to d6 (e5·3) — Chess960 specifics · 1760
- Winning blow: queen to e7 (e2·6) — Chess960 specifics · 1870
- Chess960 tactic on g6 (f5·3) — Chess960 specifics · 2400
This position appears in course day 8
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Commentary
The engine finds nothing for White here at all: +0 centipawns after a search to depth 49. Both rooks already stand on their castling squares, d1 and f1, so the king walks alone in either direction from e1. The cornered knight on h1 has g3 as its only move, and the line is a knight duel: Ng3 f6 c3 Ng6 Nh5 Nh4. The second knight is on c1, the bishops on b1 and g1. The pawn on g2 is the only one starting without a defender.
Written from the measured facts above and checked against the board before publishing. All 960 positions have one.