Starting position #646
Back-rank setup: RNBKRBQN
SP-646 · ThroneScout — A knight starts on the edge (a/h) and the king sits centrally on d or e; the mirror twin stays in this family too.
Move the pieces right on the board — full Chess960 rules, castle by dropping the king on the rook.
Position features
The king starts on d1, the rooks on a1 and e1, the queen on g1.
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 c1 and f1; their long diagonals reach h6 and a6 once the d- and e-pawns step aside.
The pawn on c2 is defended by the king alone — the same soft spot f2 is in the classical setup.
The setup belongs to the ThroneScout family; read right to left it becomes position 214.
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 16 Morozov Balance Index: 16 of 100 — class D — largest edge.
- Engine evaluation of the starting position: +39 centipawns for White (depth 47, 400 000 000 nodes).
- Rank 802 of 960 by balance — 1 is the most balanced start.
- Balance band M — moderate edge · dynamics along the play-out: stable
- Evaluation along the engine's main line (60 half-moves): +41 → +42 → +9 → 0
Position facts
- Mirror twin: position #214
- The king starts on d, the rooks on a and e
- King and rook are neighbours — castling from adjacent squares feels unusual
- It becomes the daily position in 797 days
Puzzles from this position
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to c5 (d4·2) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Winning blow: rook to d5 (d1) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to c5 (d4·16) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to f4 (e3·34) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to c7 (d6·5) — Chess960 specifics · 920
- Winning blow: rook to d6 (d1·6) — Chess960 specifics · 1010
- Winning blow: rook to c8 (d8·2) — Chess960 specifics · 1280
- Mate in 2: rook to d8 (d6·2) — Chess960 specifics · 1320
- Mate in 3: queen to c6 (f6·3) — Chess960 specifics · 1760
- Winning blow: queen to d6 (g6·3) — Chess960 specifics · 2120
This position appears in course day 49
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Commentary
The king begins on d1 and castling is ordinary in both directions, with the rooks on a1 and e1. The bishops are on c1 and f1, the knights on b1 and h1 — the cornered one has g3 as its only move. Among the pawns, c2 leans on the king alone; no other second-rank pawn starts short of a defender. The queen is on g1. White's edge here is a wide one, +39 centipawns: d4 d5 Nc3 f6 Ng3 c5.
Written from the measured facts above and checked against the board before publishing. All 960 positions have one.