Thematic Puzzles
Thematic Courses
Practice makes perfect! These hyper-focused courses will allow you to train on very specific patterns and improve your recognition capabilities during your games.
- All
- Tactics
- Endgames
The epaulette mate is, in its broadest definition, a checkmate where two parallel retreat squares for a checked king are occupied by its own pieces, preventing its escape. The most common epaulette mate involves the king on its back rank, trapped between two rooks. The perceived visual similarity between the…
Morphy's mate is a common method of checkmating. It was named after chess master Paul Morphy and works by using the bishop to attack the black king and a rook and Black's own pawn to confine it. In many respects it is very similar to the Corner mate.
When you notice that a piece has limited mobility, meaning that it has few of no safe squares it can move to, you should take the time to see whether this piece can possibly trapped and captured in a way that wins you material.
Deflection tactics, also called decoy tactics occur when you lure (attract or force) an enemy piece to a square where it will be exposed to another tactical combination.
Interference refers to a tactical concept where a piece moves to disrupt the coordination between two other pieces or interferes with their ability to defend or support each other. By placing an interfering piece between the opponent’s pieces, it obstructs their communication and prevents them from efficiently carrying out their…
Zwischenzug, also known as an intermediate move, is a tactical concept in chess where a player inserts an unexpected move that interrupts an expected series of moves and that forces the opponent to respond differently than they had planned. The purpose of Zwischenzug is to create a surprising and disruptive…
An X-Ray attack is a tactical pattern where a piece controls a square or attacks a piece indirectly behind another piece. This is not an obvious tactic to see as the player must force themself to look at the full range of pieces and not stop at the first obstacle…
A clearance tactic is an idea where the player aims to vacate a square by moving the piece standing there and putting a more useful piece on this square. The first piece is often sacrificed in order to gain a tempo or to allow further tactical combinations.
A skewer is a tactical maneuver that is similar to a pin, but where the values of the attacked pieces are reversed. The attacking piece, which can be a queen, rook, or bishop, targets a piece that is positioned in front of another less valuable piece. The opponent is compelled…
A discovered attack occurs when moving a piece reveals an attack from another piece behind it. The moved piece can go make another threat while at the same time it uncovers the attack of a second piece, generally a bishop, rook, or queen. Discovered attacks are powerful tactical maneuvers as…