Endgames: Rook Tactics

Introduction:

The rook vs. "other pieces" is sometimes a tricky endgame.  This blog gives you no gaurantee to win all your games that are like the rook vs. "other pieces", but has some important tips that may be useful in your future games. 

Skewers:

Skewers are when you check a king so it is forced to move. In addition, on the same row or rank lies another piece, such as a rook, queen, etc. Its a common trick that turns around a lot of games. Though some skewers may not be obvious sometimes, its a good trick. This puzzle I'm giving you  an extra pawn, so use it wisely to enable a skewer.

So I'm assuming you solved it. Even though the theme of the endgame is promotion, sometimes you have to sacrifice a pawn in order to get a better chance of shooting out checkmate. For example, in the position, the king AND the rook threaten to stop promotion so there really is not much you can do about the pawn which is why you sacrifice it to enable a better chance of hitting the checkmate spot.

Pins:

Pretty much the same thing as skewers, but backwards. So the piece is on the rank, and then you pin it to the king, but make sure the piece that is pinning the other piece is well defended. So that the opponent cannot simply take. Here's a small puzzle to make sure you understand.

Now, that may not be the best demonstration puzzle, because I made you move your king all the way to the other side, but the main idea of that puzzle was to enable the pin.

And the last technique I have to share is the double check. This is not a regular check, but a "double" check. This is when two pieces check the king at the same time. These checks force the king to move and you can set up a mating net and force the king to walk into mate.

Heres a li'l game for you to (maybe) understand better.

In the very beginning you say the rook and the bishop check the king at the same time- forcing the king to move. Then we were able to use the queen to form a checkmate. Now- of course, this position is extremely unlikely to happen in a real game, and that was because it was just for you to understand what it is. 

Welp. That's all I'm gonna say. You probably find out more about rook vs. "other pieces" in your future chess games. But for now, I guess that's it.