Ok, I have been playing chess for a long while, and I am pretty good at it, but now that I have joined this site I wish to study chess, in order to improve my game...
One question, I have seen mutliple references to a king bishop, compared to a queen's bishop....and that they are different, and one would prefer to lose one over the other...
what is this with differences in the bishops? I have seen them as equal pieces...
they are equal but depending on the situation you might want to trade off in order to control one set of colours.
I would guess that this refers to certain positions, in certain openings most likely. For example I hear (and might be wrong) that in the French Defense black's queen bishop tends to get stuck behind all the pawns, making it a "bad bishop". Plenty of chess books will say that pieces may be worth more or less depending on their position, so working from that we can see that trading this bishop for an equal piece that is more mobile or well-positioned will be a good idea.
If the people saying this are not talking positionally, rather meaning that the queen's bishop is always inferior, then I would say, from my current and limited knowledge, that those people are unhinged loons.
Your good/bad bishop largely depends on where you pawns are on the board. If you pawns are mainly on black squares, then your black bishop is less mobile and may be the 'bad' one.
If one castles behind a fienchettoed bishop, they should avoid trading that bishop unless the position demands a trade. Without that bishop, there will be weak squares infront of the king... hope this helps
thanks for the responses guys....
and fienchettoed bishop refers only to the bishop which starts on the king side correct?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fianchetto
Basically you move the b or g pawn and then move the bishop where it was.
didnt think it would be on wiki...thanks for the article...so you can have two fianchetto bishops then...
Sure can - I just don't believe it's advisable in most accepted openings. But don't listen to me :)
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