Starting position #54
Back-rank setup: NNBRQBKR
SP-54 · RampartScout — King on the wing (b/g) with a knight on the rim (a/h) — the rarest 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 g1, the rooks on d1 and h1, the queen on e1.
The king already stands on its castled square, so castling short moves only the rook, from h1 to f1.
The bishops stand on c1 and f1; their long diagonals reach h6 and a6 once the d- and e-pawns step aside.
One second-rank pawn starts with no defender at all: a2.
The setup belongs to the RampartScout family; read right to left it becomes position 902.
The engine's main line opens with e4, 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 72 Morozov Balance Index: 72 of 100 — class B — balanced.
- Engine evaluation of the starting position: +20 centipawns for White (depth 45, 400 000 000 nodes).
- Rank 275 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 (49 half-moves): +41 → +3 → 0
Position facts
- Mirror twin: position #902
- The king starts on g, the rooks on d and h
- King and rook are neighbours — castling from adjacent squares feels unusual
- It becomes the daily position in 1315 days
Puzzles from this position
- Attack on the uncastled king: bishop to g5 (c1·2) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Winning blow: queen to d1 (e1) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Winning blow: bishop to g3 (f4) — Chess960 specifics · 970
- Attack on the uncastled king: rook to a8 (d8) — Chess960 specifics · 1060
- Mate in 2: queen to e7 (e2·4) — Chess960 specifics · 1320
- Castling-960 to the rescue on h1 (g1·2) — Castling-960 · 1340
- Mate in 2: queen to g5 (e3) — Chess960 specifics · 1440
- Winning blow: bishop to h7 (d3·4) — Chess960 specifics · 1790
- Winning blow: queen to g8 (c4·4) — Chess960 specifics · 1870
- Chess960 tactic on c6 (d4) — Chess960 specifics · 2400
This position appears in course day 45
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Commentary
The king already stands on g1 and the rook already stands on d1, so each castling move here needs only one piece to travel. The knight in the corner on a1 has b3 and nothing else. The queen is on e1, the bishops on c1 and f1. The pawn on a2 starts without a defender. The engine's main line opens e4 e5, then Nc3 d6 d4 exd4.
Written from the measured facts above and checked against the board before publishing. All 960 positions have one.