Puzzles Don't Choose Challenging Responses

I've gotten into this situation too many times to leave it alone... here's the problem.

I'm sitting there, happily crunching away at chess.com puzzles. For the most part, I'm happy, whether I get the puzzle right or wrong: If I get it right, yay! If I don't, then I get to reinforce my understanding of a tactical pattern.

Now... what I don't like is when I get a problem wrong, look at the solution, and realize it's kind of complete bogus. Check this problem out: (https://www.chess.com/puzzles/problem/1324445) is the link if you'd like.

(Keep in mind I am rated 2900 in puzzles, but I'll try to explain exactly what's frustrating here).

This is the starting position:

It's black to move, and we can quickly see that white is attacking our queen. Moving it away with something like Qc8 is just asking for trouble. At the very least, white is not losing any material from that.

Therefore, the two most logical moves are Nxc3 and Bxe2. Both of these threaten white's queen on the next turn, which (hopefully) balances out the threat on OUR queen. Nxc3 feels right to me, but I decide to quickly look at Bxe2 first, in the hopes of eliminating it as an option. If I find that Bxe2 is equal/bad, then I can (basically) confidently choose Nxc3 as my answer.

My analysis:

As you can see, Bxe2 does not seem right. But before I blindly play Nxc3, I decide to take a quick look. Here's what I see:

Huh... it doesn't seem like it can be Bxe2 or Nxc3. Seeing that I'd spent 40 seconds on this puzzle already, I just went full "screw-it mode" and played Nxc3 anyway.

To my astonishment, (you can try out the puzzle yourself if you want using the link at the top) the "solution" did not involve the line that I was stuck on. Instead of playing ...Nxc3 Nxd7, it responded with Bxh5. Let's take a look at why this is kind of insane (I'm ranting now, it's a long post I know)

My point here is that it makes no sense to test the puzzle-solver on Bxh5, compared to Nxd7. Many people (myself included) would instinctively take the queen back after Nxd7, only to find that it's actually basically drawn when the smoke clears. Forcing us to find the queen sac and making sure it doesn't lose in like 3 moves seems much more logical (and interesting) to me. It helps train us better for real positions in games, where we care much more about winning/losing than when we are solving puzzles.

Conclusion: Many puzzles, like the one I demonstrated, simply do not go into the most challenging lines. Bxh5 is not a move that seems like it could work. The tactical placement of the pieces is basically enough for a player like me to just discard that option within a second or two. I just don't see how seeing through Bxh5 and seeing through Nxd7 (the queen sac for 3-4 pieces) is comparable. It's just so much harder for me. 

Let me know, maybe I'm just ranting 'cause I love my rating points.

EDIT: Literally 5 minutes later, I get a puzzle WITHOUT A RESPONSE

https://www.chess.com/puzzles/problem/999180

I made the correct move, Nf2, since I didn't see anything else. I had no idea why it was good in the end, however, because I got the puzzle right immediately afterward. Why am I even speaking about puzzles not giving challenging responses when this one didn't even have a response in the first place? (Truly upset now, this is a problem!!!)

true, this is a problem

I agree but your post is a bit better than a similar one I might make...

nice post : )

thanks @aMazeMove @ninjaswat @Casablanca

EDIT: Literally 5 minutes later, I get a puzzle WITHOUT A RESPONSE

https://www.chess.com/puzzles/problem/999180

I made the correct move, Nf2, since I didn't see anything else. I had no idea why it was good in the end, however, because I got the puzzle right immediately afterward. Why am I even speaking about puzzles not giving challenging responses when this one didn't even have a response in the first place? (Truly upset now, this is a problem!!!) 

You're way above my level, but I've never loved chess.com puzzles. They seem unrealistic to me. Chesstempo.com is the bomb for tactic puzzles Lol  

Agreed, chesstempo is amazing. Most of the time, I like chess.com's puzzles so I just stick around since everything I do is on chess.com lol

If I find more and more of puzzles like the aforementioned ones, I may have to say goodbye to this one resource...

I tried it -- and agree with your line: My point here is that it makes no sense to test the puzzle-solver on Bxh5, compared to Nxd7.

Thanks for sharing -- and providing an excellent illustration of why the puzzle-solver/challenger has to realize: the 'answer' does not make your response to the position incorrect -- the puzzle (author) is not infallible -- and there may be more than one 'correct' response to the position!

I've had that in puzzle rush. Sometimes the puzzle is rated very low, but the lines are unclear... then like you did, I just guess a random check or capture that seems puzzle-ish and it's usually right (especially when the rating is low).

This is why timed puzzles are stupid. If you were training tactics for real, you know, before all this online nonsense, then of course you're going to slow down and calculate. You're not going to say "well 40 seconds sure is a long time, I'll just guess and move on the to next one."

Agreed. Quite annoying.

It’s dumb when I calculate a whole complicated line when the puzzle just chooses to move into mate in one.

...seen multiple mate in 3 2600 puzzles... Wayyyyyy overrated... Also coming for your puzzles soon 😁 2900 by the end of the year? If I don't tilt probably.

You are correct sir !

 I am 3300 in Puzzles and my highest score is 3300 in puzzles .

MY Puzzles Aim :-

Road To 3400 ( now )

Maybe what they do that in a move , maybe you said it is equal and it is not so easy so that's why , maybe they make some easy moves so it may not be a problem .

Still , Nice Post but maybe it was fine , you can post this in a blog format but fine.

A line that's more challenging for one person, may not be for another. It's very possible, there are multiple versions of the same puzzle in the tactics database, that go into different lines. The site can't know which line is the more problematic one for any particular user. 

True this is kind of annoying sometimes

lol yeah 40 sec can be both long and short