The True Value Of Pieces

*positions taken from Larry Kaufman so shoutout for amazing lectures*

So, your probably thinking “What do you mean, ‘true value’? Doesn’t everyone who plays chess know this already?!”

Well, you probably know the basic count for each piece: a pawn is worth 1, a knight is worth 3, a bishop is also worth 3, the rook is worth 5 and the queen is 9. But is this really accurate? Take a look at the position below.

It’s white to move, and your knight is being threatened, are you going to retreat it, or will you trade your knight and bishop for a rook and pawn? You’ll probably end up retreating it, but why wouldn’t you take the offer to trade? Most people will say because it trades your two most developed pieces for inactive pieces, but this just isn’t the case, since black will have to spend time retreating the king, so at best they just get the move. So why than isn’t it a fair trade? It’s because the core values we’ve been taught are all wrong, and can be misleading —especially in situations like this!

Just in case you couldn’t see what the position would look like afterwords. But the beginners way to see piece worth isn’t right, so although it’s fine for simple endgames and such there’s a much better value you can use to tell if somethings a good trade or not (Note, sometimes this will be off just like the normal system, since in some positions a certain piece is extremely valuable. In this case it’s spot on).

Now, let’s do some simple, math here, the bishop that is worth 3 1/2 and the knight is worth 3 1/4. Add on top the bishop pair (extra quarter pawn) and black gets 7 points for 6 of their own (values of pieces found below), sound like a fair trade? Probably not.

The Values Of Each Piece: Redefined

These pawns are worth 1, since they are the base value which we base everything else on. Rook pawns are missing here because they can only take in one direction, so in this system they are counted as 3/4 of a pawn, or .75 of a pawn.

Knights are worth 3 1/4 pawns, or 3.25. These values may seem like small differences but they make a big difference in your calculations, which we will see. 

Bishops are worth 3 1/2 pawns, or 3.5 op if you prefer decimals. If you have the bishop pair than it’s an extra quarter of a pawn added on top!

Rooks are still worth 5, so no change there.

The queen is now worth 9 3/4, or 9.75 if you like decimals, and the king is still worth the game, because, otherwise it just ain’t chess!

Why Are These New Values Important?

These values are important to know because when you’re calculating you wanna know how much you’re trading your for. A good example of this is the queen versus 3 minor pieces, a case in which the 3 minor pieces will usually outplay the single queen. If you do the math for say, 2 bishops and a knight, the bishop pair is 3 3/4 per bishop, so 7 1/2 plus 3 1/4 for the knight gives you 10 3/4 to the worth of the queen, 9 3/4. It more clearly can determine the precise value of your trades and will help your calculation! Let’s take a look at another example.

Now, there’s a tactic here which most of you will probably spot quickly, and by the normal count you win a pawn, but do you actually? In the position that arises from the tactic, you have the rook and two pawns, but your opponent will have the bishop, knight, and the added bonus of the bishop pair, which balances it out to 7 against 7. 
So white doesn’t have a material advantage, doesn’t have any lead in development or any extra space, but black on the other has an advantage, because when you have more major pieces on the board (rooks/queens) it favours the minor pieces more. If you took off the h1 and h8 rooks white would be in a better in that situation, so keep that in mind before trading down!

Thats all I have for right now, if you want more on this comment below, or if I made any mistakes!