How to Play Chess

By Josh

Hello! If you are reading this, you have most likely have never played chess, and if you have then you have probably forgotten how to play chess. The game is simple. The game is played on a checkerboard. when set up properly, the board looks like this:

Let me tell you the names of the pieces

• Pawn
• Bishop
• Knight
• Rook
• Queen
• King

You go through the game taking turns, landing on your opponent's pieces to "capture" them (taking them off the board) and trying to "checkmate" the opponent's king (I will tell you about that later). You cannot land on your own pieces.
I will now walk you through how to move them

Pawn

The pawn can only move forward one space at a time. If the pawn has not moved yet it can move 1 or 2 spaces. The only way the pawn can capture pieces is diagonal. The pawn cannot ever move backwards, even while capturing a piece. If the pawn reaches the last square on the other side (what I mean is that it can't move forward anymore) it will "promote" which means you take the pawn off the board and in it's place put down a different piece (it can't be a king).

Bishop

The bishop can only go diagonal as far as you want and in any direction you want (like, backwards, but it still has to be diagonal). It cannot go over pieces. It captures the same way it moves, diagonal and then stopping at the place that the captured piece was at.

Knight

The knight is the weird piece. It only moves in an L-shape. 2 squares one way, and then 1 square left or right of that direction. This confuses some people, so I'll show you an example.

The knight is going to move two spaces to the left (our first direction), and one space down (or, left of the first left). The knight is the only piece that can jump over other pieces. It only captures by landing on the piece. The knight can't stop in the middle of the L to capture a piece.

Rook

The same movements as a bishop, but only vertically and horizontally.

Queen

The queen is like a bishop and rook COMBINED! It can go diagonal or straight (it can't do both in the same move)! 

King

The final piece, and the most important. It moves just like a queen, but only one square at a time. If the king is in check (it can be captured in the next move) then you must do one of 3 things,

1. Capture the piece putting the king in danger
2. Put a piece in between the attacker and your king
3. Move the king away

If you can't do any of them then you have been checkmated (you have lost)! So, protect your king at all costs! You cannot put your own king in danger.

Piece Worth

Before you win a pawn and lose your queen, take a look at this chart to see what piece exchanges are worth your while.

Pawn is worth 1

Bishop is worth 3

Knight is worth 3

Rook is worth 5

Queen is worth 9

King is worth infinity

Sometimes, people will do "sacrifices" which lose pieces but give them something else in return.

I hope you found this helpful and happy chess playing!