/jp/ - Otaku Culture

A little bit about chess.

-- Pawns can only move 1 space forward. They take sideways, because that way they can protect each other.
-- Because bishops can only move diagonal, they are locked to a single color. You have 1 lightsquare, and 1 darksquare bishop.
-- Rooks move horizontally or vertically. Because they are not locked to a color, they are considered more powerful and more valuable than a bishop.
-- Queens are the most powerful piece, and can move either like a rook or a bishop. Taking your opponents queen is a major objective.
-- Knights move in a strange pattern, but there's a reason for their madness. This type of move is the only one that can attack the queen without being attacked. Knights are the only piece that can hop over other pieces in their move.
-- King are slow and must be protected. But they can be strong in the lategame if the queens and rooks are off the board.

There are a few "special rules"
1) You cannot move into check. This means you cannot move a piece which is guarding your king from being attacked. The game forces you to prevent your king from being taken at all costs using the "check" mechanic.
2) Pawns can move 2 spaces on their first move. This was an innovation that was developed to speed up games. But this comes at a cost, it's now possible to "leap past" the pawn of your opponent and avoid their attack. To fix this deficiency, they created "en passant". You can take a pawn which moves 2 spaces past your pawn. This is one of the few special rules of chess.
3) Castling allows your king to move 2 or 3 spaces in one move. If your king has not been moved, and your rook has not been moved, you can exchange their positions into the center. This is a defensive maneuver which helps expedite your king's journey to the corner, where he is much better defended, and it helps get your rooks in play, which is often difficult.

In general, the values assigned to pieces are as follows:
Pawn = 1
Bishop = 3
Knight = 3
Rook = 5
Queen = 9

So if you trade your rook for a bishop and 2 pawns, that's an even trade.
These values are not set in stone. It's known that a knight in the middle of the board is more valuable than just 3 points. In particular if there are no pawns that can move up and challenge the knight. And it's known that the bishop-pair is extremely strong, especially in the mid-late game. A single bishop might be worth 3 points, but the bishop pair working in coordination is worth much more than 6 points. A "passed pawn" is also much more valuable than 1 point. This is a pawn which has no pawns in front of it, or that can attack it, and is racing towards the finish line. Stopping a passed pawn from reaching the end and promoting can be difficult.