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Chess Strategies for Beginners

I teach you some basic chess strategies for beginners on this page to widen your understanding for the game.

Many people have a purely materialistic attitude to life and to chess. They grab material every time they can without thinking about the consequences. If you grab material every time you can in chess then you are going to lose. This does not work in chess.

You need to develop your forces to the maximum and build a strong position first, then there will be opportunities to win material in tactical combinations, because when all your chess pieces work together harmoniously then tactical chances will evolve naturally and will be in your favor. This is just common sense.

Don’t grab material in the opening stage of the game.

Don’t waste time (moves = tempis).

I show you some basic endgames now which you must know, when playing chess, as many games will eventually end up in these basic endgames. If you don’t know these endgames below, then you can’t give a checkmate when these positions come up.

Or it will take forever until you finally give checkmate if you don’t know how to do it. If you can’t handle these basic situations you might make yourself ridiculous. However your opponent will usually resign when he is a queen or a rook down. But it is still important that you know the procedures below.

Basic Chess Strategies for Beginners

Endgame: King and Queen versus King

  • Chase the king to the edge of the board. You achieve this using your queen to cut of the king from the rest of the board. You give a check only if the king will be driven closer to the edge of the board. Don’t give senseless checks!
  • You move your king closer to the enemy king. You need the help of your king as you can’t give checkmate working with your queen only.
    Get this! A queen on its own can achieve nothing. It always needs the support of other pieces. In this case it is the king that gives the necessary support. It is like in real life. You on your own can achieve nothing, you always need help and support from others.
  • If the king has been driven to the corner you give checkmate with the queen. There are a few possibilites to achieve this. You will see them if you are there, so just follow the procedure and don’t worry about checkmate now.
  • AVOID STALEMATE! Always make sure that the enemy king has a square to move or it will be a stalemate which is a draw. If you are a Queen up you are expected to win, if you just make a draw because you overlooked a stalemate this would be annoying indeed. If this would happen to a real chess player he would be quite upset about it.
  • Cut off the king with your queen Come close with your king
    passed pawn backward pawn

    Various Checkmates

    Give Checkmate Checkmate
    passed pawn backward pawn

    Checkmate Checkmate
    passed pawn backward pawn

    Endgame King and Rook versus King

    Endgame King plus two Bishops versus King

    Endgame King and Pawn versus King

    Place your Knights to the best Squares

    The best squares for the knights are the natural squares f3 and c3 for White and f6 and c6 for Black. If you put it to an inferior square like e7, then the knight loses power.

    Black Knight is on the unnatural square e7 White can place his queen to h5
    chess strategies for beginners

    Black Knight at unnatural Square e7

    Black has developed his knight to the unnatural square e7 where it does not control the square h5. White uses this square (h5) for his queen to start a deadly attack.

    Make sure that you develop your pieces to the best natural squares where they exercise the optimal power. The best place for the black knight would be the natural square f6 where it would be well placed and where it sits normally.

    Replay the game below and see how Black gets overrun because of this minor mistake.

    Flip Board: Press F-Key (or click e7 or d2 on top)



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