Starting position #412
Back-rank setup: RBQNNKBR
SP-412 · BastionGuard — Both knights begin inside the board while the king stands on c or f; a position and its mirror twin share this family.
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 a1 and h1, the queen on c1.
Castling ends where it always does: king to g1 and rook to f1 on the short side, king to c1 and rook to d1 on the long one.
The bishops stand on b1 and g1; their long diagonals reach h7 and a7 once the c- and f-pawns step aside.
The pawn on e2 is defended by the king alone — the same soft spot f2 is in the classical setup.
The setup belongs to the BastionGuard family; read right to left it becomes position 748.
The engine's main line opens with d4, putting a pawn straight into the centre.
Every sentence here is computed from the setup itself and can be checked on the board.
Balance
MBI 65 Morozov Balance Index: 65 of 100 — class B — balanced.
- Engine evaluation of the starting position: +22 centipawns for White (depth 46, 400 000 000 nodes).
- Rank 346 of 960 by balance — 1 is the most balanced start.
- Balance band S — slight edge · dynamics along the play-out: stable
- Evaluation along the engine's main line (60 half-moves): +24 → +13 → +4 → 0
Position facts
- Mirror twin: position #748
- The king starts on f, the rooks on a and h
- It becomes the daily position in 113 days
Puzzles from this position
- Winning blow: queen to a6 — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to b3 (a2·5) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Attack on the uncastled king: knight to e6 (d4·9) — Chess960 specifics · 920
- Winning blow: bishop to c1 (f4·2) — Chess960 specifics · 970
- Attack on the uncastled king: rook to h2 (h1·10) — Chess960 specifics · 1060
- Winning blow: king to h2 (g1·22) — Chess960 specifics · 1110
- Attack on the uncastled king: queen to c8 (c1·7) — Chess960 specifics · 1280
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to g3 (h2·33) — Chess960 specifics · 1420
- Winning blow: rook to h5 (e5) — Chess960 specifics · 1870
- Winning blow: bishop to h7 (c2·2) — Chess960 specifics · 2400
This position appears in course day 51
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Commentary
Castling is ordinary in both directions from f1, with the rooks in the corners on a1 and h1. The bishops are on b1 and g1, the queen on c1. Among the pawns, e2 leans on the king alone; no other second-rank pawn starts short of a defender. The knights are on d1 and e1. The engine takes the centre with d4, and Black's queen comes out to recapture: d4 c5 dxc5 Qxc5 f3 Qc7.
Written from the measured facts above and checked against the board before publishing. All 960 positions have one.