Tactics Lesson 3 Index

Entombed Kings. Checkmate is, of course, always the ultimate application of an entombed King. However, applying tactical and strategical principles to force entombment or to keep an opposing King entombed before delivering mate in order to develop a mating pattern and a mating net is the focus of this lesson. Each problem is designed to assist in exploiting the weakness presented by entombing an opposing King. Usually, an entombed King occurs in one of the corners; however, a King may be entombed anywhere on the board (an example of an entombed King checkmated near the center of the board using a Queen and two pawns is presented in the first entombment problem in the Entombment tutorial in Tactics & Strategy I tutorial). Most often, but not always, checkmate is delivered by a player’s Knight simply because of its unique L-shape movement pattern and ability to “jump” over intervening pieces. However, Morphy’s Mate and Pillsbury’s Mate are two examples of mating patterns and mating nets which do not utlize the Knight to deliver checkmate, but instead use the combinaton of a Bishop and a Rook (Morphy’s Mate – Bishop delivers mate; Pillsbury’s Mate – Rook delivers mate), as are many of the other “named” checkmates presented in the Complex Checkmates tutorial. Antoher example is Damiano’s Mate, where opposing King is entombed next to a corner with a Queen-pawn combination mating. Checkmates result through a combination series of moves by pieces and/or pawn advancements to block and prevent the opposing King from fleeing, whether they may be the player’s or the opposing player’s or both. A common mating net against an entombed opposing King usually involves one or more sacrifices of major pieces (Queen, a Queen and a Rook) but can involve sacrificies of one or more of the Bishops, a Knight, or pawns as well. Two different theoretical lines involve keeping the entombed King at what ultimately turns out to be the mating square or forcing the entombed King to flee along a path to the mating square. This commonly encountered positional structure on the board offers great opportunities to employ artful combinations of moves and/or pawn advances to administer a coup de grace against an entombed opposing King. The problems cover a range of strategical goals utilizing a range of tactical moves and pawn advances alone and in combinations including forks and fork checks, pins, double attacks, and so on. The solution [and any variation(s)] for each problem with annotation and commentary follow the problem’s board.