Advice On Chess - Check And Mate

by skorg

posted on 06/30/2009

This will conclude our series of articles on chess. The main objective of the game of chess is to have the opponent's king in check and nowhere else to go. So we are planning to seal the escape route and give the killer blow by finally placing the opponent's king under attack. First we should know how all our check (attack on the king) is likely to be handled.

Handling a Check
There are three ways in which the check can be handled. The first is the simplest and often done. Move the check away from check. As simple as that. When someone attacks a king just move away from the line of attack. For example if the king is at g1 after having castled and a bishop at c5 is attacking it, then the king can move safely to h1. This ensures that the king has moved to safety. This is preferred if the attack is not likely to continue. In our example the king is not likely to be attacked after having moved to h1 since the black bishop now becomes useless in the direct attack (King is in white square).

The next defense against attack on the king is to have a piece between the attacking piece and the king thereby hiding the king from attack. This is not possible if the attacking piece is a knight or if there is no square between the attacker and the king. But there is an obvious problem in this approach. Unless the piece that comes between the king and the attacker is able to attack the attacker it will end up in a pin and unable to move. If a queen attacks a king ideally we would want a rook to be in between so that it not only saves the king from attack but also attacks the queen. It is taken for granted that the piece coming in between has support so that it is not taken by the attacker.

The last and the most uncommon is to take the piece that is attacking. This does not usually happen because the attacker has the support of other piece when it attacks or checks if it will be taken before he attacks the king.

Attacking the defense
So as an attacker, we should deal with these three defenses to successfully check and mate the opponent king. The first point is to check if the square we are planning to occupy is not under the control of the opponent, next would be to check the pieces that might come as a sacrifice between the king. The last is to check the options for the king to get out of attack (escape route). With this knowledge it is just a matter of time before we nail down the king.

Comment on this article

You must be logged in to post comments.

Previous Comments