While I do already understand the fundamentals of chess, I thought it would be appropriate to start this blog at the very beginning, the board and the pieces.
The board of chess could likely be described by anyone, even those who have never played. It’s ubiquitous in it’s simplicity: Alternating (typically white and black) tiles creating a checkered pattern. It’s on this playing field that our pieces begin their journeys, but not all of their journeys are equal. Some are strong and decisive, charging head on into the enemy. Some are more calculated, attacking at unexpected angles. Some avoid straight paths altogether, favoring a more surprising advance. Some are some combination of the rest, but some, some are simple, and none are more simple than the humble pawn.
The Pawn
Pawn Movement
Eight strong at the start of the game, the pawn’s confidence is unrivaled. While typically the pawn is limited to moving one space at a time, it’s first move can be up to two spaces forward. The interesting thing that sets pawn’s apart from the other pieces, is that the pawn’s movements and attacks are separate. For every other piece, their movement and attack’s are synonymous, but for the pawn, they may only move forward UNLESS they are attacking, in which case they take a piece at a diagonal.
Pawn Attack
The Rook
Rook Movement
Ditching some of the complexity of the pawn in favor of brute force, we find ourselves observing the rook. Considered the second-most powerful piece, the rook can move horizontally or vertically and attack at any distance. This makes the rook not only a constant threat as its presence is sure to be known, but also a consistent defender as it can protect an entire row on its own.
The Knight
Knight Movement
@zury14benitez
This agile horse has been the most confusing and surprising piece for me to both use and encounter, and I can only assume that many new players will have the same experience. Typically it is most commonly described as moving in an “L” shape pattern. In first imagining it’s capabilities, that seems rather simple, but as you can see by the picture above, depending on the knight’s positioning it can have up to eight potential moves! Notably, the knight can also “go over” other pieces and attack positions your opponent may have felt were defended.
The Bishop
Bishop Movement
The bishop is the rook if you rotated its movements 45 degrees. Moving only at a diagonal, but again infinite in it’s potential distance for an attack. While slightly less revered than the rook as it can be dealt with far easier, it opens up potential sneaky attacks the the rook’s bumbling nature could never attempt.
The Queen & the King
@randyfath
King Movement
Finally we find our way to the Queen and the King. While the King is technically the most important piece in the game, as it is the sole factor deciding whether the game is won or lost, I put the queen first as it is far more powerful and can often decide the game itself. The other reason for grouping them together is that they share the same directional movement, that being ANY direction; however, the king may only move one tile, whereas the queen (essentially a combination of the rook and bishop) can move infinitely in any direction. Typically if the queen is lost (without a substantial trade such as the opponents queen) it will not be long before the king follows.
Queen Movement
Conclusion
So we know how the pieces move! Yay!
While each piece deserves hundreds of it’s own blog posts, this is certainly the first step, yet knowing how to throw a football and where to throw it are substantially different things. Now that we know the how, over the coming weeks I hope to get into the where and why of piece movement.
While these are all the fundamental movements of chess, look forward to learning a couple more movement options that are lesser known in the coming weeks: Castling, and en passant.
Keep your Piece of Mind and your Mind for Pieces and I will see you next week!
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