Optimal Knight Orientation

For those who have actually played chess on a real board in the real world (i.e., in "meatspace"), how do you arrange the knights in terms of the direction they point?

Bonus points for aesthetically pleasing arguments that your scheme is superior to all others.

Personally, my knights point between 30 and 60 degrees anti-clockwise of 12:00 on a clockface from my point of view, and I place my opponents' so they are exactly parallel and pointing in the opposite direction. I don't have a good argument for that though. It's just the habit I fell in to.

If I ever do play OTB again though, I will experiment with keeping my knights exactly aimed at the opponent's queen (or king if no queen), so their orientation will change from move to move depending on their location and the location of the opponent's piece to be harassed.

If you have no preference whatsoever, never thought about it, or think this isn't a very important issue, feel free to skip the topic entirely.

This extremely important topic hasn't escaped the attention of the chess world outside of chess.com: http://www.thechessmind.net/blog/2013/1/21/which-way-do-your-knights-face.html

Optimal orientation.

Meatspace.

lol :)

I also do the 30-60 degree thing, makes it ergonomic as grasping the piece will force this orientation in any case

Yeah, if you're right handed, 30-60 degrees counter-clockwise of noon is definitely easiest to grasp. Anything else seems to require some extra effort due to the orientation of the hand. Maybe I do have a justification after all.

Do any lefties prefer theirs 30-60 degrees clockwise of noon?

And are there any weirdos who have a deviant scheme like "horsies must point at the four corners of the board"?

Great discusion topic, which somehow happens not to pop up very often.

Pawns, rooks, and queens have enough rotational symmetry for a precise orientation not to matter at all. With bishops, the mitre cut makes much more difference; still, virtually nobody cares anyway (unless you're OCD about it and/or want to take a nice photo of a nice chess set, in which case you might even adjust the rooks so their crenellations are lined up neatly). In the case of the kings, the cross makes the proper orientation kinda obvious. Knights, however, are an entirely different story.

Personally, my habit happens to be extremely close to yours (it's about 30-40 degrees to the left from the player's perspective). Though, I have a few reasons for this.

• The knight's traditional appearance is a profile, i.e. a "sideways" one, and its presence on the board arguably is much more clear that way;
• in virtually all diagram fonts the knights face to the left;
• the knights should be grabbed by their neck, thus if you're right-handed, the knight facing about 30-45 degrees left seems to be the optimal combination of good presence and being comfortable to move.

Most players, however, seem to routinely orient their knights straigt-ahead, or have their own preferences (Fischer used to place his knights facing at 90 degrees towards the center, while Kasparov seems to have both of his knights face 90 degrees left).

Whatever your own preferences are, you mostly just have to live with however the opponent orients his, as it is rather difficult to persuade a player to orient his knights according to your own preferences (he actually might wilfully object hoping that his knights facing in a way that might be "awkward" to you might help disrupt your concentration).

EDIT: As I was taking my dear time to write the post, some of my points have already been brought up in the meantime... ;)

Just out of curiosity: do you do some kind of writing for a living sapientdust? Because you write really well :)

Oh dear... GMO knights. :D

Good points, jaas. Rotational asymmetry is certainly most pronounced for the knights, and secondarily for the bishops. I was going to raise the question of bishop orientation later, in case anybody does anything other than horizontal for those. I pay most attention to the knights, but all the others are simply horizontal for me (bishops' slit, king's cross). Only when I'm setting up a board carefully do I make the queen's crown and the rooks' crenellations align a certain way.

My knights face backwards, mainly because it seems to irritate my opponents.

macer75, why, thank you! I aim for clarity when I write, but I often overshoot, veering into the realm of pedantry.

I'm a software developer, so I do write for a living, but for a non-sentient reader -- one that doesn't give a damn about style but has a seizure if I misplace a comma.

Do you really orient the knights towards their king throughout the game (e.g., 1. Nf3 and the knight must now point back at the king)??

Oic... Guess that sort of explains why you got the idea to make this thread?

Anyway, I've never really thought about it, but I think I always sub-consciously orient my knights somewhere between facing directly forward (I'll call that 12:00) and 10:00, like most people. Like everyone has just said, I think it has to do with right-handedness (so it would be sort of awkward for me to put the knight on the board facing right). However, I've also found that when I move my knight, it often ends up approcimately facing the direction in which I moved it (unless I moved it backwards, in which case it would still be facing forward).

@Estragon:

That would be the "Fischer orientation" then.

Being consistent with it, you wouldn't need actual crown marks on the knights, just on the rooks* - if that is relevant at all for the comfort of replaying or writing down a game using descriptive notation.

___

* The bishops have been argued not to have crown marks due to them "not having allegiance to crown, but only to God", but practically they are just easily distinguished as a king's bishop runs on its own color and a queen's one on the opposite).

Traitorous cavaliers, in war how dare they point weapons towards their leader. Clearly their attentions must be laid upon the enemy monarch at all times.

You can usually tell where I plan to attack by noticing where my knights are "looking".

This is very interesting subject. Here's a thought when we adjust the pieces on the board - sometimes our opponents for not being central etc what would happen if we altered their orientation  ? There are various degrees of this,in more ways than one....It's possible to see some continuous adjusting and ultimately some altercation taking place.....

With one's own knights. How about facing the knights backwards as a psychological ploy ?

Another piece having diffrent rotational symmetry from the other pieces  is the king. What about positioning him so the cross doesn't face forward ?....So knights backwards and king "side on" and be prepared for a "j’adoube war" :-)

Come to think of it the bishop has a "mouth" and could be faced backwards....

I tend to have the knights face the center just because it's more pleasing. It doesn't feel right if they're facing backward or over to one side. 

+1 Estragon - I too position my Knight facing their king...waiting for their deployment orders. :). On a side note, since is first positioned them like this, I often find that after their development, my Knights tend to face their target or support point. Weird how I do that subconsciously and even more interesting, is that possibly an advantage one could look for OTB? "Hmmm, his Knight is facing my weak square on b4. Oh yep, look at that sneaky Bishop on e7! I know what he's thinking whahahahahaha!

My knights face the center of the board. My opponent's knights look off the edge of the table with their backs to the center. It makes my knights stronger.

I had an opponent once, who had to have his knights directly facing my king, for the whole game.  Literally, every time I moved my king or he moved his knight, he would j'adoube so that each knight was pointed directly at my king.  Psychological warfare?