Scandinavian Defense:Modern Variation

It is reached after 4 moves: 1. e4 d5 2. exd5 Nf6. It is a line of the Scandinavian Defense.

White is to move and has 30 legal moves. Over the next four moves — two for each side — the game can branch into 860,565 different games. Those games reach 316,348 different positions: most positions can be reached in more than one way, 2.7 on average.

The Lichess opening list names 19 further lines after this position, such as Icelandic-Palme Gambit (3. c4 e6) and Panov Transfer (3. c4 c6).

No other order of these moves reaches this position: each move depends on the one before.