When to trade pieces?
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I often begin the game with a +1 or +3 advantage, but later in the game I simply don’t have the mental capacity to defend them all and I lose the game. I heard that you’re not supposed to exchange pieces just because you have a lead but avoiding it makes it so much harder for me - I keep getting pushed back and my pieces get in each other’s way. Then I spend turns improving their positions while the enemy simply attacks. What gives...? When are you supposed to exchange? Like, should you never exchange when an enemy pawn can recapture and thereby move into the central 4 squares? Is there a rule or something?
When you say “the only player with a piece” are you referring to knights, bishops, rooks, and the queen? What if the last trade means nobody has any pieces but you have one more pawn then the other player?
If I had to make up a rule for trading, it would be something like:
"don't trade away your most active pieces if it leaves you with passive pieces"
(and yes, in chess lingo "piece" means knight, bishop, rook or queen. A pawn is not a piece)
Using this rule of thumb to answer your question, if you're ahead material, and none of your pieces are passive, then it will probably be beneficial to make equal piece trades at every opportunity.
Bag_of_Hydration wrote:
I heard that you’re not supposed to exchange pieces just because you have a lead
That's sort of like saying "you shouldn't castle during the first 15 moves of the game just because you can"
Sure, that's true, but 99 out of 100 times it's good to castle, so don't lose sight of good advice just because someone is reminding you there are exceptions to the rules. Rules of thumb are good in most cases. Worry about exceptions when you start losing games due to exceptions.
Okay, and so, when it comes to equal, does that mean I should not trade a bishop for a knight, but I should trade a knight for a bishop? Or should I ignore that idea that bishops are worth more and just trade both for the other?
It’s all dependent on the position. Which pieces are active, is the position closed or open, etc
When the other player is using the hippopotamus defense, is that categorized as open or closed?
Open I think
Open I think
Yeah, just ignore the idea a bishop is worth more than a knight.
Remember there are openings where as early as move 5 even top grandmasters will trade their bishop for their opponent's knight.
Yes sometimes a bishop is worth more, but this is such a slight advantage, we're talking small fractions of the value of a pawn. Like 1/5th of a pawn. I don't even consider it while playing.
Remember some knights are worth more than other knights. Some bishops are worth more than other bishops. The true value of a piece during a game fluctuates from move to move and depends on things like how many squares it influences, if it's centralized, if it's helping attack or defend an important point, things like this.
I see. So how about a scenario where your bishop can slice through the diagonal and take the enemy’s rook who hasn’t moved from the corner yet. Doing this puts me some points ahead but leaves the center of the board unguarded in some way. Should I have instead traded for their well-positioned and active knight or bishop?
Bag_of_Hydration wrote:
I see. So how about a scenario where your bishop can slice through the diagonal and take the enemy’s rook who hasn’t moved from the corner yet. Doing this puts me some points ahead but leaves the center of the board unguarded in some way. Should I have instead traded for their well-positioned and active knight or bishop?
Sometimes, yeah.
Especially very early in the game rooks are not worth very much, so in a dynamic position with lots of tactics and initiative and an open king, etc, you probably shouldn't take the rook in the corner. It will just be a wasted tempo to take a passive piece 
But if the position doesn't have a lot of dynamism going on, then winning material is an easy way to be ahead.
Umm it’s material so unless you lose because you take the hanging rook, I would take it lol
There are all kinds of guidelines:
1) Trade when you are ahead in material.
2) Avoid trading when behind in material.
3) Trade when your opponent has a space advantage.
4) Avoid trading when your opponent has a space disadvantage.
5) Trade when you can trade a passive piece for an active piece.
6) Avoid trading an active piece for a passive piece.
And the list goes on. These are certainly things to keep in mind. But the tactical realities of a position have to be considered as well. The bottom line is you can't turn your brain off and just go by platitudes. Guidelines are just that, guidelines. Sometimes (often) they work. Sometimes they don't. And sometimes it is very unclear whether trading a piece makes good sense or not.
In my last daily game, I was able to trade a knight for a bishop getting the bishop pair (often considered to be about 1/2 a pawn. On the other hand, doing so opened up a file where my opponent was able to get a lot of pressure. I decided to take, and I won the game. When analyzed with a computer afterwards, the computer agreed with taking. I don't know if I would do it again. I had to defend very accurately as a result.
You make your best judgement. You live with the results.
Very frequently I end up in a situation where multiple pieces are targeting the same square, then all capture each other one after another after another. For some reason, the engine disagrees with the order in which I choose to trade them and marks them mistakes - I should have sent in the bishop instead of the knight - and so on. But I’m just thinking it’s one of like 7 trades going on in a row so I don’t see the mistake in individual choices one by one like that. How do I be more understanding about this?
If the computer is marking the order you are trading pieces as a mistake, then there is a tactical reason why you should not have done it in that order. Either you could have won material by doing it differently, or you potentially could have lost material with your order.
Those tactical reasons are going to be specific to the position. The best advice I can give is do tactics puzzles.
Bag_of_Hydration wrote:
Okay, and so, when it comes to equal, does that mean I should not trade a bishop for a knight, but I should trade a knight for a bishop? Or should I ignore that idea that bishops are worth more and just trade both for the other?
You shouldn't trade an ACTIVE Bishop for a PASSIVE Knight.
You need to think about it from your opponents perspective, are you improving his position or making it harder to play. You don't want to improve it unless it's very marginal, you allow them to create complications or even. a winning attack
If you are only a pawn up you need to be playing as strong as you would without, otherwise your play will just hand the pawn back, maybe more. Keep good piecs and look to trade bad ones, don't go trading bad pieces just because of arbitrary "rules of thumb"
