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Chess is an ancient Indian game of strategy, played by two individuals on an 8x8 grid. The objective is to maneuver one's pieces so as to put the opposing king in "checkmate". This book will cover the basic pieces of chess, before going on to some more advanced topics.

© Copyright 2003–2006 contributing authors, all rights reserved. Permission is granted to copy, distribute and/or modify this document under the terms of the GNU Free Document License, version 1.2. A copy of this is included in the section entitled GNU Free Document License.

Contents

If you save this file to your computer, you can click on a link below to go to the chapter.

• Playing The Game
• Notating The Game
• Tactics
• Strategy
• Basic Openings
• The Endgame
• Variants
• GNU Free Documentation License

Playing The Game

Overview

Chess, unlike many other games, does not involve chance. It does not hinge on the roll of dice or which card is drawn. The outcome completely depends on the decisions of the players. However, because of its vast complexity, the far-reaching consequences of some decisions are practically unforeseeable.

One player ("White") has the white pieces while the other ("Black") has the black pieces. Sometimes the colors are not black and white (for instance, light and dark, or yellow and blue), but they generally contrast each other. In friendly games the choice of colors can be made by any method, such as flipping a coin. If there is no coin at hand, another typical way of deciding would be to conceal a black piece in one hand and a white piece in the other and ask one's opponent to select a hand. The colored piece selected will be the opponent's color. In competitive games the players are assigned their colors.

Order of play

Once all the pieces have been arranged, White (or the lighter color) makes the first move. White always makes the first move; this is important for notation, and any chess player will insist upon it. After White has made the move, Black will then make a move. The gameplay will continue in alternating fashion, White making a move, followed by Black.

General movement rules

• A move consists of moving a single piece, in accordance with its rules of movement, to a square that is unoccupied or occupied by an enemy piece. The one exception is a special move called "castling" where two pieces are moved. A player may never move a piece onto a square already occupied by another of his or her own pieces.
• If a piece is moved onto a square occupied by an enemy piece, the latter piece is removed from play and the first piece replaces it. The removed piece is said to have been captured or taken.
• With the exception of the knight(s) and "castling", no piece may make a move to a non-adjacent square unless all the intervening squares are vacant (pieces may not 'jump over' other pieces).
• No player may make a move that leaves their king in check (see below).

There are some exceptions to these rules, where a player's turn can consist of two pieces moving (castling), where a pawn moves to an unoccupied square but still captures (en passant capture), or where a pawn moves to a square and becomes a different piece (pawn promotion), all of which are covered below.

The board

Traditionally, the game is played on a board of 64 alternating black and white squares turned with a white square to each player's near right-hand corner. "White on right" is a helpful saying to remember this convention. The light and dark squares on the chessboard and the light and dark chess pieces are traditionally referred to as "white" and "black" respectively, although in modern chess sets almost any colors may be used. The horizontal rows of squares are called ranks and are numbered 1-8; the vertical columns of squares are called files and given the letters a-h.

The pieces

The movement of the individual pieces is described below. In all the board diagrams shown, the squares to which the piece in question can move are indicated with x's.

King

The king can move one square at a time in any direction, with certain restrictions.

The king is the most important piece belonging to each player, though not the most powerful. If a player moves a piece such that it threatens to capture his opponent's king, that king is said to be in check. If a player's king is in check, he must immediately remove the check by moving the king, blocking the check with another piece, or capturing the checking piece. Players may not make any move which places their own king in check, though they may check their opponent's king. Two kings may never occupy adjacent squares, since they would have put themselves in check by moving there.

If the king is placed in check and cannot escape, it is said to have been checkmated (or "mated" for short). The first player to checkmate the opponent's king wins the game. Note that the king is never actually captured, since it is obliged to move out of check whenever possible (and the game ends when it is impossible).

The White king in the following diagram cannot move upwards or to the left since it would be in check from the bishop, or diagonally downwards which would leave it adjacent to the Black king. Also, as no piece is threatening it if it fails to move, the king is not currently in check.

Capturing Pieces

The king may capture any opponent's piece adjacent to it, as long as doing so does not place himself in check.

Knight

The knight is the only piece that may jump over or "move between" other pieces. The knight has a unique L-shaped move; two squares in one direction either horizontally or vertically, and one square in another direction perpendicular to the first.

Other ways to look at it are

1. that the knight moves to the closest square to it not on the same rank, file, or diagonal, or

2. that the possible knight moves form a "Y" (up, right, down, and left), once like a rook and once like a bishop away from its original position.

Capturing Pieces

The knight captures any opponent's piece that it lands on at the end of its L (or Y) shaped move.

Bishop

The bishop can move any number of squares diagonally. Each side starts the game with one light-squared bishop and one dark-squared bishop. Note that the bishop is restricted to the color of squares on which it began. Each player stars out with a bishop that moves on the light colored squares, and one on the dark colored squares. In the diagram below, the bishop stands on a light square and can only move to other light squares.

Capturing Pieces

The bishop may not jump over any piece of either color. It captures any opponent's piece that it encounters during the movement described above, and then occupies the captured piece's square.

Rook

The rook can be moved any number of squares horizontally or vertically, but not diagonally. Note that like the bishop, the rook cannot jump over any pieces, except for "castling". If the rook attempts to occupy a space already occupied by an opponent's piece, it captures the piece. It cannot occupy a space already occupied by an allied piece.

Queen

The queen is the most powerful piece, being able to move any number of squares in any lateral or diagonal direction. It is best described as the combination of a rook's and bishop's movement capabilities.

Pawn

Pawns can move one square straight forward, or optionally and on their first move only, two squares straight forward. The pawn can move one square diagonally forward to capture a piece, but cannot capture a piece by moving straight forward. For this reason, two opposing pawns on a file may become blocked by each other.

In the diagram below the White pawn is prevented from moving forwards by the Black pawn immediately in front of it (in the d file) which it cannot capture, but can capture the adjacent Black pawn by moving diagonally forward.