Chess and Twitter – Chess Tweets!
I recently saw a blog post about ChessTweets, a chess community for Twitter. ChessTweets is going beyond making an app for playing chess by Twitter, they’re conducting an experiment in the value of a collective mind.
The ChessTweets Experiment attempts to expand on the collaborative ideas intended by this famous chess game by creating the world’s first automated and objective hive-mind machine. With the advent of Twitter, developing such a machine has become both readily-possible and irresistible. Can such a machine learn to compete with the best of the best? The ChessTweets Experiment intends to find out.
By asking its participants to give their input in community games and without preselecting grandmasters, ChessTweets will examine each participant’s relative skill and apply a formulated weight to each and every suggested move such that every mind plays an important and unique role.
The experiment is just beginning, and the level of play appears to be fairly uneven. But this should improve as more players join the experiment and as the organizers collect more information about the community. This will be a long-term project, but it is interesting and may provide interesting insight into thinking processes.
If you’re interested in playing casual correspondence-type chess (games are played at approximately one move per day), and you love Twitter, I think you’ll love ChessTweets
I have a suggestion for getting the most advantage out of playing chess on Twitter (or any of the online correspondence-type chess communities): practice analyzing each position by first asking yourself what all the checks, captures, and threats are for your opponent, and how you should respond to each of those. Then examine what checks, captures, and threats you have in your position. Only after you have ascertained all these facts should you begin to do further analysis.
Tags: chess tweets, online chess, twitter
En Passant Capture During Check
In a comment to a recent post, Scott asks why someone doesn’t mention that you can’t make the en passant capture if the King is in check. The short answer is that you can make the en passant capture if it removes the check.
Here are two videos to help illustrate the en passant rule.
So, for example, in the following diagram, Black has just played 1… d5+. White’s King is in check and he has a pawn in position to make an en passant capture.
It is perfectly legal in this position for White to play exd6 (and it would be the best move on the board!), capturing the pawn en passant and removing the check against his King. The important point to remember here is that the capture is legal if it removes the check, but would be illegal if it did not remove the check.
Tags: en passant capture
Chess Notation Part 3 – Playing Over a Game
Good Moves and Bad Moves
When you are reading a chess book, you will often find exclamation points or question marks (or some combination of exclamation points and question marks) after certain moves. These are generally accepted indications of good moves and bad moves. Here’s the normal meaning for these symbols:
- ? = bad move
- ?? = really bad or losing move
- ! = good move
- !! = brilliant move
- ?! = questionable move, probably bad
- !? = interesting move, possibly good
Ellipses …
When you see ellipses (the three dots …), that usually means that a move that was played is being omitted from the notation. It is most often used in a book or magazine before or after a diagram to indicate that it is Black’s move. For example, in the following diagram, it is Black’s move. This would be indicated in the following manner before the diagram:
1.e4 …
1… e5
The ellipses in the move before the diagram indicates that it is Black to move in the diagram. The ellipses after the diagram indicate that it is Black who has moved.
Other symbols
Some chess books (such as the Encyclopedia of Chess Openings) employ special symbols to indicate more detailed evaluations of positions in a single symbol. Many of those books are addressed to international readership and will usually have an explanation of the symbols somewhere in the book.
The moves for a complete game.
Here is an interesting game with a strong attack against the castled king and the sacrifice of a couple of pieces to maintain the attack. If you want to practice using chess notation, set up a chess board and play the moves listed below and check the position you get on your board against the diagrams shown below.
- e4 c6
- d4 d5
- exd5 cxd5
- Bd3 Nc6
- c3 Nf6
- Bf4 e6
- Nf3 Be7
- O-O a5
- Nbd2 O-O
- Re1 b6
- Ne5 Bb7
- Ndf3 Re8
- Qc2 g6?
- Nxf7! Kxf7
- Ng5+ Kg8
- Bxg6! Rc8??
- Bxh7+ Black resigns 1-0
If you’re practicing reading chess notation, compare the position above with the position you get on your chess board. After you’ve done that, try to work out why Black resigned. Black has four legal moves, and you should work out the best line for White after each possibility. I’ll post the answer tomorrow.
If you’re interested in a great book for beginning chess players, check out Learn Chess: A Complete Course
King and Rook v. King Checkmate Patterns
One of the first things a new chess player must learn is how to finish off the checkmate when you have won the game. Often this boils down to one of the basic checkmates: King and Queen v. King, or King and Rook v. Rook. I previously gave some rules about how to checkmate with King and Queen against King, and you might want to review that if you’re unsure how to finish that mate.
This article is about how to finish the mate with King and Rook against King. This mate is slightly more difficult than the one with the Queen, but relatively easy once you see the method and understand the concepts.
I will have three posts about this checkmate: the first shows the checkmate patterns with Rook and King against King, the second has rules and tips for mating with a King and Rook against King, and the third will show a 15-move checkmate from a difficult starting position to the final checkmate.
The checkmate patterns
There are three, and only three, patterns for checkmating with King and Rook v. King. The first pattern is the checkmate on the side of the board. This checkmate can occur on any edge of the board on any square that is not a corner square. The Kings stand opposite each other and the White Rook checks the Black King along the side.
In the diagram above, the Rook gives check along the rank, and could be anywhere on that rank except c8 or e8. (If the Rook were on c8 or e8, the Black King could get out of check by capturing the Rook.)
The second and third patterns occur with the Black King in the corner. In this next one, the Black King is in the corner with the White King a Knight’s-move away and the White Rook checking from the side. Again, the White Rook can be anywhere along the 8th rank, provided he’s not right next to the Black King on b8.
The third pattern is really just a variation of the first and second patterns; the Black King is in the corner and the White King stands directly opposite the Black King.
If you know these patterns, you will have a goal to reach for your King and Rook v. King checkmate. The video has examples of how you might reach these positions, and my next post will give rules for reaching these checkmate positions.
Chess Notation Part 2 – Captures, Castling, and Checkmate
In the first part, we saw how the moves of the pawns and pieces are recorded, but we still have to see how captures are recorded, ambiguities are resolved, and some other matters. I haven’t put the labels along the side of the board for all the diagrams in this post. If you need to review how the squares are named, review Chess Notation Part 1.
Recording Captures
It is common to write “x” for “captures.” So if the King captures an enemy piece on f1, the move is written “Kxf1.” (You will find some players and some books that use a colon : to designate a capture. So the King capture described above would be written K:f1. This is not common in the U.S.)
It is common for Pawn captures to name the file that the Pawn is capturing from, and the square that the Pawn is capturing to.
So in the diagram above, if White captures the Black Pawn on the second move, it would be written “exd5.” Some books and players just name the files for Pawn captures. This is an abbreviated notation, and the pawn capture just mentioned would be written simply “ed.”
Removing Ambiguities
If the simple method just described for naming the piece and destination would be ambiguous, you should add the name of a file or rank that would remove the ambiguity. In the diagram below, both White rooks could move to e5.
If the Rook at e1 were to move to e5, the move should be written “Ree5.” If the Rook at a5 were were to move to e5, the move should be written “Rae5.” In that same diagram, both Black Rooks could move to f7. If the Rook at f2 were to move to f7, you should write “R2f7.” If the Rook at f8 were to move to f7, you should write R8f7. Of course, if all else fails, you can remove all ambiguity by naming the piece, the square of origin, and the destination square: Rf8f7.
What about en passant captures?
In the old descriptive notation, en passant captures were written, PxP e.p. (Pawn captures Pawn en passant). In algebraic notation, you would just name the file that the capturing Pawn starts on and the square that the Pawn captures to: exd6. Remember that in the en passant capture, the capturing Pawn arrives at the square that the enemy Pawn bypassed in its two-step move. So though the Pawn being captured may be at d5, the capturing Pawn captures by arriving at d6. In the following diagram, Black has just moved d7-d5.
That means that White has two ways of capturing the d-pawn: each of the White’s e-pawns can make the capture. We can’t just write “ed” (the abbreviated way of writing the move) because this wouldn’t tell us which of the pawns made the capture. But in this case, we can remove the ambiguity by naming the destination square, so our normal way of writing the move will suffice: exd6 would be the en passant capture, and exd5 would be the normal capture. Again, the simple way to remove all ambiguity is to name both the square of origin and the square of destination of the capturing piece: e5xd6 or e4xd5.
How to Record the Castling move, Check, and Checkmate
Castling has a unique designation that doesn’t involve naming any squares. Castling to the king-side (castling “short”) is written 0-0. Castling to the queen-side (castling “long”) is written 0-0-0 (By the way, this is one way in which algebraic notation is the same as English descriptive notation.)
You may see some places where the castling move is recorded differently from the way described above.
Check
If a move ends in check to the enemy King, a + is added at the end of the move. For example, in the above diagram with the Rooks, White could check the Black King by moving his Rook to g5. This would be written “Rg5+”.
Checkmate
If a move is checkmate, a # is put at the end of the move (or you could just write “mate” or “checkmate”).
It is also common to write the result of a game using a shorthand. If White wins, this is written “1-0″. If Black wins, the notation is “0-1″. If the game ends as a draw, the notation is 1/2-1/2.
You can learn all the rules … including chess notation in the wonderful book that I recommend to new players: Learn Chess: A Complete Course
In Part 3, we will review a short game to test our knowledge of chess notation.
Chess Endgame Strategy – King & Queen v King & Pawn
The importance of chess endgame strategy
It is very common for chess games to come down to an endgame, and very often those endgames amount to a single Pawn or a Pawn for each side (plus the Kings, of course). In order to win more chess games, you must know endgame strategy.
Queen v. Pawn strategy
Take a look at this endgame diagram:
The players each have a simple overall strategy for winning (or drawing) this game. White’s strategy is to capture Black’s pawn. In order to do that, he must do two other things: he must first prevent Black from promoting his Pawn, and he must attack the Pawn with both his King and Queen (the Queen alone can’t safely capture the Pawn as long as Black’s King guards it). In order to do this, White must bring both his King and Queen to bear on the Pawn; both must attack the Pawn at the same time.
Preventing Black from promoting the Pawn can be done by pinning the Pawn and keeping Black busy with checks against his King. Bringing White’s King closer requires that Black have his King in front of his Pawn, physically blocking the Pawn from the promotion square. This will give White a free move (a tempo) to move his King closer to the Pawn. Each time Black’s King sits on the promotion square, White has a free move to bring his own King closer to the action.
Black, on the other hand, wants to promote his Pawn to Queen (which would result in a draw). In order to do that, Black wants to both protect his Pawn from capture while leaving the promotion square open so that if he gets a chance, he can push the pawn to e1.
Black’s strategy is simple; and while White’s strategy is equally simple, executing the strategy requires careful maneuvering.
Here are the moves for finishing this mate. The starting position is in the diagram above. Also listen to the video for my additional comments about the position and White’s techniques for winning the game.
- Qf6+ Kg1
- Qe5 Kf1
- Qf4+ Kg1
- Qe3 Kf1
- Qf3+ Ke1
White has driven the Black King in front of the Pawn (which Black has resisted as long as possible), preventing Black from promoting and giving White time to bring up his King. Achieving this position is one of White’s intermediate strategic objectives. Watch how White brings about this position several times in order to give his King opportunities to move closer to the action.
- Kb7 Kd2
- Qf2 Kd1
- Qd4+ Kc1
- Qe3 Kd1
- Qd3+ Ke1
- Kc6 Kf2
Avoiding Kf1, which would be moving into a pin and would give White a “free move” to bring the King closer.
- Qd2 Kf1
- Qf4+ Kg1
- Qe3 Kf1
- Qf3+ Ke1
- Kd5 Kd2
- Qf4+ Kd1
- Qd4+ Kc1
- Qe3 Kd1
- Qd3+ Ke1
- Ke4 Kf2
Now the White King is close enough to help in both attacking the Black Pawn and delivering checkmate to the Black King. You can’t give checkmate with the Queen alone … the Queen needs some help (from either friendly or enemy pieces) to checkmate the King.
- Qf3+ Kg1
- Qe2 Kh1
- Kf3 Kg1
- Qg2# …
This ending works every time against a Knight-pawn or center-pawn (the b-pawn, d-pawn, e-pawn, or g-pawn). The Rook-pawns and Bishop-pawns can be more tricky and sometimes impossible to win. That will be the subject of another post soon.
This chess endgame is very important to know, and it is surprising how few average tournament players know this ending. If you play enough chess, this will come up. You should know this well enough to be able to play it without thinking. Well … at least not thinking too much. 
You can find this endgame in Reuben Fine’s masterwork, Basic Chess Endings
How can you record your own chess games for later study (or to show your greatness to future generations)? The answer is in chess notation. This article (part 1 of 3 parts) will show you how to use algebraic notation to record your chess games and read the games of others.
Algebraic notation
I learned chess using English descriptive notation. I prefer it for sentimental reasons. A lot of the books in my library are printed with descriptive notation. But the modern chess world has abandoned descriptive notation for algebraic. Algebraic notation does have its advantages, and – best of all – it is easy to explain. So we’ll learn algebraic notation.
Each square has a name
First, each square of the chess board has a name. Each square is designated by a letter corresponding to the vertical columns (called “files”) and a number corresponding to the horizontal rows (called “ranks”). The dark square at White’s lower left is called “a1,” and the squares across White’s first rank (where White’s King, Queen, and other pieces are lined up in the starting position) are called a1, b1, c1, d1, e1, f1, g1, and h1. The second row (where White’s Pawns are lined up in the starting position) are called a2, b2, c2, … h2. The rest of the squares of the chess board are similarly labeled until we get to Black’s king-side Rook, which sits on h8 in the starting position.
The diagram of the chessboard below has letters along the right and left side of the chess board and numbers along the top and bottom of the chess board.
For any square, you can find the letter designation by looking along the top or bottom and the proper number by looking at the numbers along the sides. For example, the White Pawn in the diagram below has been moved to e4 and the Black Pawn has been moved to d5.
By the way … always use lower-case letters for designating the squares. The reason for this is that the pieces are designated using upper-case letters.
How the pieces are named
The pieces are labeled as follows:
- Rook = R
- Knight = N
- Bishop = B
- Queen = Q
- King = K
To record a move, you first write the piece that is moving and then put the name of the square that the piece is moving to. So if the King is moving to f1, you write “Kf1.” If the Rook is moving to e5, you write “Re5.”
Recording Pawn Moves
The Pawn is not normally given a label. For Pawn moves, only the destination square is named. So if White moves the Pawn in front of his King two squares forward on his first move, the notation to record that move is just “e4.”
In part 2, we will cover recording captures, castling, and checkmate. In part 3, we’ll review the chess notation of an entire game.
You can learn all the rules … including chess notation in the wonderful book that I recommend to new players: Learn Chess: A Complete Course
Searching for Bobby Fischer
For those of you who are new to chess, or wondering what chess players are like, I recommend the movie Searching for Bobby Fischer. I was talking with some friends last night (hi Tracey and Stan!), and the subject of the movie came up. I told them I would have to blog about it … and I was right!
The movie is a heart-warming story of the relationship between a father and his precocious son. And if you have any interest in chess, it accurately portrays the feeling of chess as it is played in U.S. parks, clubs, and weekend tournaments.
The movie has a great story, a superb cast: Joe Mantegna, Joan Allen, Ben Kingsley (superb!), Laurence Fishburne, Laura Linney, William H. Macy … it just doesn’t get any better!
And the movie has some real life chess stars in it. Bruce Pandolfini (one of the great chess teachers of our time, played beautifully by Ben Kingsley) and Asa Hoffman are portrayed in the movie, and real-life chess stars Joel Benjamin, Roman Dzindzichashvili, and Kamran Shirazi have a part in the movie (one of the tournament scenes); and Bruce Pandolfini even gets a cameo (I think he even has a line!).
The book on which the movie is based is even more wonderful, as it probes the life of the mind of a chess player and the relationship between father and son. I highly recommend the book; it’s even better than the movie. (Check out Searching for Bobby Fischer: The Father of a Prodigy Observes the World of Chess at Amazon. And if you want the movie, click the pic!
How to Draw a Chess Game
This article is about the rules for how to draw a chess game.
A draw is a tie … neither player wins. Though a draw against a very strong player can feel very much like a win. You will often hear chess players brag of their draws … (“I got a draw against such and such grandmaster”).
How a chess game ends in a draw
There are five ways to end a chess game in a draw:
- Insufficient material to mate
- Stalemate
- Threefold repetition of position
- The fifty-move rule
- By agreement
Insufficient material to mate
In order to win the game, one side must have at least two minor pieces (the Bishop and the Knight are referred to as “minor” pieces; the Queen and Rooks are called “major” pieces), a Rook, or a Queen. Keep in mind, however, that if there is a Pawn on the board, there is always sufficient material for a mate because the Pawn could be promoted to a Queen. Bare Kings, King and Bishop against King, or King and Knight against King is a draw because there is not sufficient mating material. The stronger side must have at least King and Queen; King and Rook; King and two Bishops; or King, Bishop, and Knight. (King and two Knights against King is not enough to force mate, but that subject is beyond the scope of this article.)
Stalemate
The game is a draw if either King is stalemated. A stalemate occurs when the King is not in check, but has no legal moves. In the diagram below, if it is Black’s move, he has no legal move; Black is stalemated and the game is a draw. If it is White’s move, however, the game is not a draw, because Qe2 would be checkmate.
Threefold repetition of position
If the same position occurs three times on the chessboard with the same player to move (and the same castling and capturing privileges [the en passant capture might be a factor]), the game is a draw. “Perpetual check,” where one side repeatedly checks the enemy king over and over in an endless cycle, is a draw because of the threefold repetition rule.
The fifty move rule
If the players have made 50 moves without moving a Pawn, capturing a piece, or either side delivering checkmate, the game is a draw. This might occur in the more difficult checkmates (Bishop and Knight against King or King and Queen against King and Rook). It doesn’t occur very often.
By agreement of the players
By far the most common way of drawing a game is where the players agree to a draw. This occurs because the players foresee that the game will inevitably end in a draw by one of the other methods. In such a situation the rules allow the players to end the game as a draw by agreement.
How should I offer a draw?
The proper way to offer a draw to your opponent is to say, “I offer a draw,” then make your move, and punch your clock. The opponent then has as much time as he wishes to consider your draw offer … as long as his flag hasn’t fallen! Some players will offer a draw on their move and look at their opponent, expecting an answer. If you are going to wait for an answer, wait for it with your opponent’s clock running! And if you offer a draw, you have to wait for an answer.
If you have offered a draw and your opponent makes a move without responding, he has rejected the draw offer and it’s off the table. He can’t “accept” your draw offer two moves later.
Be sure to visit my chess store, Shop For Chess, for my recommended chess books and equipment!
Tags: chess beginner, chess draw, chess for beginners, chess rules, how to play chess
How to Play Chess – Rules of Checkmate
Today’s article is about the rules of checkmate.
Checkmate is the object of the game. The object is not to have more pieces than your opponent; it is not to play the most beautiful game; it is to checkmate your opponent’s King.
Checkmate occurs when the King is in check (hopefully your opponent’s King) and he cannot get out of check by any of the possible means.
Here is a typical checkmate pattern.
Notice that the Queen gives check to the King on the diagonal, and the Bishop guards the Queen against capture. Remember from our previous article about check that there are three ways to get out of check: move the King, interpose a piece, or capture the checking piece. Let’s apply those tests to this diagram to see if White can get out of check.
First, the King can has only two hypothetically possible moves: capture the Queen on h2 or move to the vacant square on h1. But both those squares are guarded – h2 by the Bishop and h1 by the Queen. White cannot move out of check.
Second, there is no possible interposition. Whenever the checking piece is in an adjoining square (or when the checking piece is the Knight) interposition is impossible. In those cases only moving the King or capturing the checking piece is a possible means of evading check. In this case the Queen gives check from an immediately adjoining square, so no interposition is possible.
Third, the King could get out of check if a piece (even the King) could capture the checking piece (the Black Queen in this case). But here there is no piece that could capture the Queen other than the King, and the King can’t capture it because the Bishop guards it. The King is not permitted by the rules to move into check.
The King is checkmated.
Have a look at the video to see ways that the King could avoid checkmate using variations on this basic position. And if you want to learn how to checkmate, there are some very good books to teach you just that. Learn Chess: A Complete Course
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