Advanced pawn

An advanced pawn sits close to promotion — in WayChess, typically two or three squares away. It is a signal that tactics around blocking, capturing, or escorting that pawn may exist *now*, not only in a distant ending.

The signal

Find a pawn on the sixth or seventh rank (from its own side’s view: two or three squares from the last rank) that is a candidate for “advanced.” If there is none, the correct answer can be empty — you still ran the scan.

Why it is easy to miss in a game

You treat passed pawns as “later.” Meanwhile a pawn on the sixth rank creates mating nets, deflection, and piece traps. Puzzle sets labelled “endgame” train the conversion; they do not train noticing the pawn the moment it appears in a middlegame.

What WayChess trains

You mark the advanced pawn (yours or the opponent’s) or submit with none. Distractor positions exist so you do not guess that one is always there. Pair with trapped figure: both are “this unit has almost nowhere to go.”

See all habits.