which is better option to keep between knight or bishop ? (both sides are equal)

hi friends!

please give your opinion and views :

1) what is a better option to keep between knight or bishop, when both sides are equal ? 

kindly justify.

thanks.

Completely depends on the position.  Especially the pawn structure.  Knowing the strengths and weaknesses of the minor pieces, and therefore the positions in which they are strong and weak, is a major aspect of positional chess.

Essentially, in positions where the centre of the board is blocked with pawns (closed positions) the knights are usually better.  Whereas in positions where the central pawns have been traded (open positions) the bishops are stronger.  Bishops work best as a pair since that allows them to cover both colour squares so in many scenarios 2 bishops > any other combination of 2 minor pieces.

thanks amartalon!

 for your valuable opinion

*  it is right, knight helps in clearing blocked path.

* bishop works better as a pair.

but what should one keep, knight or bishop,

1) if both sides are equal? or

2) if trading is done in the begining of game.

please give your opinion.

Keep the knight, It captures on 8 different squares and is not limited to colors.

That isn't what he said or meant. Knights are better in closed positions because they do not get blocked in behind pawns as easily as bishops do. In general, if you are not a master then Knights are better.

bishops, for stabbing my eyes out right about now.

thanks friends!

for your expression of sharing knowledge with every body.

 yes it is right,

1) knights are not immune to colour.

2) for beginers, knight is a better option.

Also,

1) the attack of knight cannot be blocked by any material, unless a more better attack or move is played by opponent.

2) but checks or attacks by other materials can be blocked by other pieces of the opponent.

so may be a knight has a upper hand as compared to bishop in chess  !

please give your opinion and views too .

thanks.

danheisman.home.comcast.net/~danheisman/Articles/evaluation_of_material_imbalance.htm

hi andreasweber!

thanks for link.

can u please summarize the contents of the link in brief please.

I'm glad someone is finally asking this question. I will be following this thread closely. I can't wait to find out which is better. We should have asked this long ago.

hi tfulk !

thanks for appreciation of the query between knight or bishop.

what will be your opinion ?

please express.

Knight > Bishop blocked by Pawns
Knight on Outpost in 4th rank = Bishop
Knight on Outpost 5th or 6th rank > Bishop

Otherwise Bishop > Knight

hi Xilmi,

thanks.

can u please simplyfy your reply.

what do u mean by outpost ?

It´s not so simple :=) If it was we would have seen it in master games during last couple hundreds of years. You just have to reason yourself why in this position knight or bishop is better. It depends so much of your game plan. And the overall situation on board. An equal position? Not so easy to defind either. There is no one true answer for that question.

Personally I prefer bishops in online games. But only if there is no positinal reason to save knight. Sometimes you end up to endgame there one side has only a king and other side has two officers. Two bishops can relatively easy mate lonely king. Mating is much harder with knight and bishop but it can be forced. Two knights against lonely king is a draw. 

For average players like me that is not a big deal. If you feel comfortable with knight there is nothing wrong with it. In general chess is great. And both knihts and bishops belong to it.

hi kinghunter75!

what is your view?

Hi Rocky0chess

My opinion is :try to keep  yours bishops since you can checkmate at endgame . Howewer your position is very important because if you have a material  desavandtage the knight can help .

Kinds regards

 Veuillez être pertinent, aider et être gentil!

That's reasonably to keep the knight in a blitz game, because forks you can make with it could be effective under time pressure. But, basically, there are weak and strong pieces in every particular position (sometimes a bishop with a rook can be stronger than a queen etc.).

An important disadvantage of the knight is that sometimes it can be cut off the play or trapped on the side of the board, which is harder to do with the bishop.

palloilija, theoretically, in some cases you can mate a king with two knights, if there is a pawn left on its side - the point is that the king doesn't get stalemated in the corner while there is a pawn. But it's a tricky endgame.

True. But lonely king against two knights is a draw. (no other pieces on board)

Now all we need is for someone to start a thread about which is better out of 1. d4 and 1. e4, preferably with a Bobby Fischer quote in the OP.

Yes, but I mean that in a real game you can always leave one last pawn on the board to try playing for a win, though I doubt that anyone lower than a master is actually able to win that.