What Makes a Draw? Part One

What Makes a Draw?

Insufficient Material and Equal Positions

Not every game of chess will end up with a win for one of the players. Often the opponents’ skills are evenly matched and neither side can achieve victory, and so the game ends in a DRAW (a tie). A Draw is an acceptable result of a chess game. There is no shame in admitting that your opponent was equal to you... Here are the different ways a game can end with a draw.

1) Insufficient material

The simplest example of a draw is when only the kings are left on the board. Since the two monarchs cannot approach one another without making illegal moves, (as it is impossible to give a check to your own king let alone checkmate the opponent) king vs. king is always a draw.

The game will also be called a draw when one of the players has an advantage, but not enough sufficient material to checkmate the opponent’s king. K+B vs. K or K+N vs. K are two examples of "insufficient" mating material.

In these positions with only one minor piece, the attacker can push the opponent’s king around the board, sometimes even give checks along the way, but he or she is unable to achieve checkmate even with the help from the opponent. No possible checkmating positions exist with only one minor piece and your king versus the opponent's lone king– so the game is called a draw...

2) Equal position

An interesting discussion may arise when we study King+Bishop vs. King+Bishop. If the bishops are of the same color squares, then checkmate is physically impossible, but it is possible that the opposite color bishops can produce a mating position.