So you read my awesome article on why you should play chess? That is great! You are on your way to joining hundreds of millions of players worldwide united by the simple yet complex game of chess!
But there is one small problem. You do not know how to play well. Now, you, like many other people who played chess as a child with a parent, might be saying, “I do know how to play! I know how to move all of the pieces.” However, that does not necessarily translate into knowing how to play chess effectively. Chess is a very complex game that involves strategy, tactics, time management, positional thinking, memorization, and much more of that big word stuff. Now before you run away, you should know one thing: I have got your back. I am a pretty advanced chess player, so I know quite a bit about the game. Let’s get started!
The one biggest rule you should follow while playing chess is – Develop Your Pieces. Move your pieces out towards the center. Your pieces start on the edge of the board, and if you look at where your pieces can move, you will immediately see that they are kind of useless. They do not have many attacking opportunities; they do not have many squares that they can move to. For example, your knight, from its starting square, only has three squares it can go to on your next move, and all of these squares are kind of useless. These squares do not give you any ways to attack, and the entire goal of the game is to checkmate your opponent through attacks! But if you move this same knight towards the center, all of a sudden, it has a full eight squares that it can travel to. Many of these squares are closer to your opponent’s side of the board as well! In this way, it is crucial to develop your pieces out to the center, so they have more options.
Because your pieces are strongest in the center, your opponent will also be pushing for the center. As a result, the focus of chess will be around the center squares. To establish dominance over the center, push your center pawns, the ones in front of the king and queen. Pushing these pawns also opens up your bishops for development, killing two birds with one stone! Now, I’ve given you the main purposes of the opening. Play for the center, push your center pawns, and develop your pieces to the center. Follow these for the first section of the game, and you should be fine. But of course, there are a few mistakes that you should try to avoid.
Do not move your queen out early in the game! This is possibly the most common mistake beginners play in the opening. The queen is the most valuable and most powerful piece in the game as it can travel in any direction. However, as a result, it is also a weak piece. It can be easily deterred and annoyed by weaker pieces like bishops and knights. If a knight attacks a queen, the queen is forced to move unless the player is fine with losing his most powerful piece. In this way, moving your queen out early is actually a problem. Your opponent could develop his pieces and attack your queen, forcing you to move the queen again. And this process repeats. In a few moves, your opponent has many, if not all pieces developed, and you will have wasted many moves on moving your queen around and around. Thus, moving the queen out early only leads to weaknesses and lack of development.
So there you have it, some tips beginners can follow and a common mistake they can avoid to make their position in the opening much, much better. Not following these guidelines would essentially lead to a position where most of your pieces are inactive and your opponent gets simple opportunities for attacks. Following these guidelines leads to active pieces and potential attacks on your opponent’s king.
