Starting position #880
Back-rank setup: BBRQKRNN
SP-880 · 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 e1, the rooks on c1 and f1, the queen on d1.
The kingside rook already stands on f1, so castling short moves only the king, from e1 to g1.
A bishop starts in the corner on a1: it has a single diagonal, which the b-pawn unlocks, running out to h8.
The second rank carries 2 pawns with no defender at all: g2, h2.
The setup belongs to the ThroneScout family; read right to left it becomes position 79.
The engine's main line opens with b3.
Every sentence here is computed from the setup itself and can be checked on the board.
Balance
MBI 1 Morozov Balance Index: 1 of 100 — class D — largest edge.
- Engine evaluation of the starting position: +63 centipawns for White (depth 45, 400 000 000 nodes).
- Rank 946 of 960 by balance — 1 is the most balanced start.
- In 50 self-play games White scored 56.0% (95% CI 42.3–68.8%).
- Balance band L — large edge · dynamics along the play-out: equalizing
- Evaluation along the engine's main line (60 half-moves): +73 → +32 → +19 → 0
Position facts
- Mirror twin: position #79
- The king starts on e, the rooks on c and f
- King and rook are neighbours — castling from adjacent squares feels unusual
- It becomes the daily position in 655 days
Puzzles from this position
- Attack on the uncastled king: knight to g7 (h5·2) — Chess960 specifics · 620
- Attack on the uncastled king: pawn to g3 (f2·2) — Chess960 specifics · 780
- Winning blow: queen to c8 (a8) — Chess960 specifics · 920
- Winning blow: king to h1 (g1·13) — Chess960 specifics · 970
- Winning blow: pawn to g6 (f5·5) — Chess960 specifics · 1060
- Winning blow: rook to f7 (d7·3) — Chess960 specifics · 1150
- Winning blow: rook to e8 (e6·5) — Chess960 specifics · 1430
- Winning blow: bishop to e4 (b1·9) — Chess960 specifics · 1650
- Winning blow: knight to d6 (e4·21) — Chess960 specifics · 1870
- Chess960 tactic on f6 (e5) — Chess960 specifics · 2250
This position appears in course day 12
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Commentary
The queen starts on her classical square d1 with the king beside her on e1, and the rook already occupies f1, so short castling moves the king alone. A bishop holds the corner on a1 with one diagonal to h8; the second bishop is on b1. Two pawns begin without a defender, g2 and h2. The knights are on g1 and h1 — the cornered one has g3 as its only move, and the second rook is on c1. White's edge here is a wide one, +63 centipawns, though the engine opens quietly with b3: b3 Nf6 f4 c5 e3 b5.
Written from the measured facts above and checked against the board before publishing. All 960 positions have one.