Chess960 position 849

The back rank is B R K B N R N Q. The king starts on c1, the rooks on b1 and f1, the bishops on a1 and d1, the queen on h1.

White has twenty legal first moves, the same as in ordinary chess.

Castling short, the king goes from c1 to g1 and the rook stays on f1.

Castling long, the king stays on c1 and the rook goes from b1 to d1.

Two things about castling here surprise people: castling long leaves the king where it already stands on c1; only the rook moves; the kingside rook already stands on f1, so castling short moves only the king.

The pawn on d2 is defended only by the king, which makes it the square both sides look at first.

The pawn on a2 starts with no defender at all.

The bishop on a1 sits on the long diagonal behind the b2 pawn. Move that pawn and the bishop looks the length of the board at g7.

Every rule of chess applies here unchanged apart from castling, which the rules page explains in full. To play this exact arrangement against the computer, open position 849 on Play CPU. To train tactics on positions like it, use the Chess960 puzzle trainer.