For example, White could not castle in this position, because the Black bishop, which can move diagonally any number of squares, controls a square in the king’s path to castling.Īnd with that, you know how the chess pieces move! While it is a lengthy article, it is much more simple than it sounds. This means that if an opponent’s piece threatens to capture your king after you have castled, or ‘on the way’ to the castled square, you can’t castle then and there. If you castle queenside, you have to move more pieces to make it happen. This is another reason that kingside castling is usually preferable to queenside castling. In other words, the rook and king must “see” each other in order to castle.
There must be no pieces in the way of the rook and king. The king and the rook involved in castling can’t have moved prior to castling – it must be each piece’s first move. Queenside castling is not necessarily a bad thing, but it does mean that castling kingside is often preferable to castling kingside. (In chess, the king in the center of the board in the early and middle stages of the game is usually a bad thing, as it is exposed to attacks from many pieces). It is therefore a little more exposed to danger. Notice that with queenside castling, your king is a little closer to the center of the board. You get your king safe and your rook a little more into the action all in one move! For that reason, in the vast majority of cases, it’s a good idea to castle early on in a chess game! In queenside castling, you move your king two spaces toward the further rook to your king, and then put the rook on the other side of the king, like so:Ĭastling is an extremely useful move. In kingside castling, you move your king two spaces toward the closer rook to the king, then put the rook on the other side of the king, like so: Castling is the only move in chess where you can move two pieces at once – the king and the rook. Remember how I said there are two special rules with regards to how the pieces move? One is en passant capturing, and the other is castling. Yeah, a little tricky, but that’s the most complicated rule in chess – if you know that one, you’re well on your way to getting the game down! Castling So for this reason, when two pawns meet head to head, they lock up, like so: While a piece can capture a pawn with forward movement, a pawn can’t do the same. So, what happens if a pawn meets another pawn or piece face to face? Nothing! They simply butt heads, unable to make any progress. So, to restate, pawns can only move one space forward (or two on the first move), and can only capture pieces diagonally. Pawns do the same, but they can only do so diagonally. Normally, to capture an opponent’s piece, you just move your piece to the square where the opponent’s piece is, replacing it with your own. And for that reason, it’s perhaps no surprise that a common strategy is to get a pawn to the other side of the board, and stop your opponent from doing the same at all costs!īut maybe the strangest thing about pawns is how they capture other pieces. That’s right, you can even have another queen if you want. When you advance a pawn all the way to the other side of the board, you can change the pawn into any piece you want except the king. Any time you move a pawn, you are doing something permanently which cannot be undone! Pawns are also the only part of your army that cannot move backward, which is quite an important feature of the game. This makes her the most powerful piece at your disposal by far. Unlike her lazy husband, the queen can move any amount of squares in any direction – horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. Next is the king’s faithful companion: the queen. You can allow any of your pieces or pawns to be captured if you so choose (though it’s usually not a good idea), but it is actually illegal as per the rules of chess to let your king be captured! How the Queen Moves You also cannot move your king on a square where one of the opponent’s pieces or pawns can take it. They can take the squares of your opponent’s pieces, however this is called “capturing.” To capture a piece, you simply replace it with your own and remove the opponent’s piece from the board. This is true for all of your pieces and pawns in fact: they cannot occupy the same square as another. 
In general, you can move your king anywhere on the board, except to squares occupied by another one of your pieces or pawns. It can move horizontally, vertically, or diagonally (see the diagram above).
The king, marked with a cross-bearing crown, can move in any direction one square.
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