Endgame Tips

"...but your perfect execution of the Pterodactyl Defense won't do you much good 36 moves later, if you don't have the technique to turn a winning position into a won game." - @DeepGreene

Hello everyone, today I'll be giving tips on endgames. The endgame is the final part of a chess game, and the part that decides the game. There are different things to be cautious about depending on what pieces are on the board. I'll be going through four endgames and showing what to watch out for in each of them.

1. Queen Endgames - Watch out for Skewers.

I usually prefer playing endgames with less powerful pieces, so I'm not a fan of queen endgames. But the most important thing by far is to watch out for skewers. Losing your queen automatically loses the endgame, and skewers are the most likely way of losing it.

2. Rook Endgames - Try to attack more than one pawn at once.

Rooks are really good at attacking two pawns at once, which is good in the endgame. A lot of the time you can do this by getting your rook to the 7th rank as White or the 2nd rank as Black.

3. Bishop Endgames - Look out for backward pawns.

Backward pawns are the pawns at the beginning of the pawn chain that are unprotected. This means that they are the weakest. Use your bishops to take out these pawns, and the whole chain will fall. Look for backward pawns on the same color square as your bishop.

4. King and Pawn Endgames - Push their king away with your king.

When you only have a king and a few pawns, it's likely that you'll run out of pieces to move, so you'll usually move your king. By limiting their king's squares using your king, you can push them away using your king. 

And that ends this blog.  If you are on beta, go to Puzzles>Endgames to train your endgames and see how well you know them. See you in the next blog.