The Three Most Important Aspects Of Chess Learning
Understand the Game, Boards and Pieces |
Every type of piece moves differently. Here are the names of every piece and how they move (with one or two exceptions, that we'll cover in a bit):
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Play the Game Carefully |
Always think a step or two in advance. If you move your knight there, what happens? Does it expose other pieces for your opponent's next play? Do you have time to play offense or does your king (or maybe even queen) need protecting? What ideas seem to be brewing on your opponent's turf? Where do you see the game going in the next few moves?
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Incorporate a Strategy |
1) Use all your pieces. Do not keep moving your Knight around, just because he can give lots of checks. Use your entire army! One of the biggest rookie mistakes is to only using a few of your pieces. When that happens, the rest just end up lagging behind and make for easy captures for your opponent. So keep the board lively, keep your opponent on his toes.
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5 Tips and Tricks for Advanced Players:
1) Think about the entire game from the opening moves on. A game of chess is generally considered to have three stages, all of which are deeply linked. The best chess players are always 10-12 moves ahead in their brain, developing 3-4 strategies simultaneously depending on the moves of their opponent. They know that moves and pieces traded in the early stages will profoundly affect the end of the game, and they plan accordingly.
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2) Know when to push for a draw. If you're down material, and you know you have no chance of getting checkmate with what you have left, it's time to push for the draw. In competitive chess, you need to realize when you've lost the chance to win (you're down to a King, a pawn, and maybe 1-2 other pieces, they have you on the run, etc.) and should instead go for a tie. There are several ways to cut your loses and grab a draw, even when things seem hopeless:
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3) Choose Bishops over Knights in the Endgame. Early on, Bishops and Knights are roughly even strength. In the Endgame, however, Bishops can quickly move across the entire, much emptier board, while Knights are still slow. Remember this when trading pieces -- the Bishop may not help as much in the short-term, but they'll be an asset at the end.
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4) Utilize your pawn's strength in numbers on an empty board. Pawns may seem useless, but they are critical pieces as the game winds down. They can support stronger pieces, push up the board to create pressure, and are a wonderful shield for your King. This benefit, however, is lost if you start doubling them early on (put two pawns in the same vertical line). Keep your pawns close together and let them support each other horizontally. When there are very few pieces left on the board, a push upward to promote into a Queen can win you the game.
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5) Practice some chess problems in your spare time. You can vastly increase your chess skills without ever facing an opponent. Chess problems are sample boards that ask you to get checkmate with just 1 or 2 moves. You can practice on 100's of them in books and online, and over time you'll start to learn great piece positions and unexpectedly sneaky modes of attack. While you will, more likely than not, never see the exact situation on the board, chess problems develop your ability to see all potential angles of attack and how to best set up pieces.
- Look online for problem sets, or check out a book on chess strategy at the library, as they will all have practice problems.