The tourney judge, Friedrich Chlubna, considered that its rich thematic
contents made this one of the best logical three-movers he had seen.
Tries:
1.Rh1? Be7!
1.Bb1? Rxd8!
1.Qf7? Qxc3+!
Key
1.Re1 threat 2.Sc4+ Kd5 3.Rxe5;
1...Bg7 2.Rh1 threat 3.Rh4; 2…Bf6 3.Qh7;
1...Sd7 2.Bb1 threat 3.Bxd3; 2…Sc5 3.Qb4;
1...Bc5 2.Qf7 threats 3.Qf5 and 3.Qf3; 2...Qf6 3.Qd5; 2...Bxe3+ 3.Rxe3.
A rich blend of themes. 1…Bg7 is a Roman decoy. The bishop defends against the threat of Rh4 from a new square on the same line, but interferes with the black queen, allowing the white queen to safely unpin. This type of interference is known as a Gamage unpin. The second decoy 1…Sd7 shows the Dresden theme. The original good defence against Bxd3 by the rook is replaced by a bad defence by the knight, which is a second Gamage unpin. 1...Bc5 shuts the queen off from c3, allowing a safe second move unpin.<
Dafydd Johnston: The key is pretty obvious, but to appreciate this problem the solver must ask why
the thematic Qf7, Bb1 and Rh1 don't work on move 1 but do after the decoy of the black defenders.
Jacob Hoover: This problem had me stumped for several hours before I finally saw the solution. I found the correlation between the tries and defences intriguing.