Sunday, May 13, 2007
Chess Rules (part 4)- Special Moves
  Chess Rules - Special Moves Castling Castling is a special defensive maneuver. It is the only time in the game when more than one piece may be moved during a turn. This move was invented in the 1500's to help speed up the game and to help balance the offense and defense. The castling move has some fairly rigid caveats: 1. It can only occur if there are no pieces standing between the king and the rook. 2. Neither king nor rook may have moved from its original position. 3. There can be no opposing piece that could possibly capture the king in his original square, the square he moves through or the square that he ends the turn. 4. The king moves two squares toward the rook he intends to castle with, this may be either rook. The rook then moves to the square through which the king passed. Hopefully, the diagram below helps to makes this clear.
Strategy Note: Castling is a great aid in defensive strategy. It also has a tendency to bring a powerful rook into play when under normal circumstances it might be stuck behind a wall of pawns. En Passant Perhaps the most obscure and least used moves in Chess is called En Passant. It can only occur when a player exercises his option to move his pawn two squares on its initial movement while the opposing player has a passed pawn, that is a pawn one square pass the middle of the board. The rules state that the passed pawn must be challenged first by the oposing pawn. If the oposing pawns first move is two squares without challenging the passed pawn, the opposing player has the option to take the moved pawn "en passant" as if it had only moved one square. Note: this option only stays open for that one move. In the example diagram below, the light pawn has just moved forward two squares. The dark pawn, the passed pawn, may now move to the square where the white pawn should have challenged, and removes the white pawn.
The en passant move was developed after pawns were allowed to move more than one square on their initial move. This was done to make sure they retained some of the restrictions imposed by slow movement, while at the same time speeding up the game. The End of the Game The game ends when one of the players captures his opponent's king, when one of the player's resigns or there is a stalemate. When a player's king is threatened by an opposing piece, it is said to be "in check". When a player places the opposing king in check he should announce, "check". The object of a player is not merely to place his opponent's king in check but to make certain that every square where the king has a possibility of movement is also covered. This is called checkmate. The king is considered captured. Note: The King in never actually captured, rather it is put in checkmate. Either player may resign at any time. This generally happens when a player loses a major piece and the outlook for victory in his case appears bleak. Stalemate is considered a tie. A stalemate occurs when a player's only move is to place his own king in check, but its current square is not threatened. As long as he can move another piece or the king can move to an open square, stalemate may not occur. A draw also results when the only two pieces on the board are Kings, regardless of their position. If the pieces remaining on the board make check mate impossible, for example one cannot checkmate an opponent with only a king and a bishop a draw would also result. Back to Chess Rules - How to Play. |
Technorati Tags
Special Moves
Chess Rules
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
RE: Castle rule #3
A castle cannot take place if the king is in check OR if he will be in check in the square he moves through or into?
Did I understand that correctly?
Hello again my friend, and thanks for dropping by.
Your understanding is correct, and that is a very good interpretation, I might add.
Regards,
Ray
Post a Comment