These words should be known by everyone who plays chess.
At first look, chess may seem easy, especially when compared to the many new and difficult board games that have come out in the last few decades. It doesn’t come with an encounter deck or any status effects. Instead, it has a clear set of rules and eight pieces and pawns for each person.
Chess is a game with secret depths, even though it looks simple. When the pieces are equal, the game of chess can go almost anywhere. In fact, there are more possible chessboard positions than there are atoms in the world. To understand some of them, you need to know special terms.
Blunder
Everyone messes up sometimes. To win at chess, you need to avoid making mistakes for longer than your opponent can. This is just as important as having a good strategy and planning for the long run. We all make mistakes sometimes, whether it’s forgetting to move a weak queen, missing a Scholar’s Mate, or just slipping up with the mouse.
In spite of that, some mistakes are worse than others. Blunders are major mistakes in the game that put not only a piece but also the whole state of play at risk. It’s possible to fix mistakes, but it’s better not to make them in the first place.
Desperado
Sometimes, in chess, it’s all about giving a well-planned checkmate that surprises your opponent. But when gamers are down, even the best ones may resort to desperate means to get back on track or even end the game early.
A desperado move can make a heroic piece give up for the greater good. It may do this because it is trapped and ready to fight to the death, capturing pieces in the process. A suicide run like this might not be the best move tactically, but it can make things better in a bad situation and might even set the stage for a tie, which is better than a loss.
Castling
The weak king can only move one square in any direction, so he’s not known for being quick. It’s almost possible for the royal figure to stay alive until the endgame because of this. The king can still jump more than one place during castling, which is when he does a kind of switcheroo with one of his rooks.
If you cast at the wrong time, the game could go in a different direction. There are, however, some rules. Sometimes you can’t castle because the king or rook has already moved or because enemy pieces are in the way of the king’s move. Because of this, this defense move should be carefully timed to have the most impact.
En Passant
Chess players give each pawn one point of value. For new Geometry Dash Subzero players, the pawns may not seem important at first. After all, the way they move—crawling forward and catching diagonally—can make them look slow compared to their faster relatives. So, it’s not a surprise that many players have chosen to kill these small soldiers throughout history.
But pawns have a secret move called “en passant,” which means “through.” When the conditions are right, like when a white pawn has moved two squares forward and is now on the same file as a black pawn, the black pawn can sneak up on the white pawn and take it. This will throw off any new opponent.
Gambit
When it comes to chess, the saying “no pain, no gain” is also true. As opposed to losing pieces because of mistakes, a ploy involves giving up pieces on purpose in order to reach a long-term goal.
A lot of well-known moves are gambits, like the Queen’s Gambit, which became famous on Netflix. In the Blackmar–Diemer Gambit, white gives up a pawn to partially open up the f-file and get a tempo, which means the black player has to lose a move. Players can quickly improve their pieces this way, which puts white well on the way to win.
Absolute Pin
When playing chess, a good player can make the most of the moves they can make, but there are times when they can’t. Another player may check their king and force them to move, or a piece may stop an attack on their king and make it impossible for them to move.
This last situation, called a “absolute pin,” can really lock down your opponent’s most important pieces. This can let a player’s pieces move forward without being stopped, into squares that would usually be open for capture in the middle of the game. It takes a lot of control to pull off an absolute pin, and players who can’t avoid getting caught in one will probably have a hard time beating their opponent.
Skewer
The rook, bishop, and queen are very strong chess pieces that can attack from dozens of squares in many directions. In Harry Potter, Ron Weasley took the force of a queen’s attack, which really showed how powerful these pieces are. Utilizing these pieces to carry a skewer can increase their ability to cause damage even more.
A skewer is when one player attacks an opponent’s valuable piece with a less valuable piece of the same rank or file. If you know how much each piece is worth (queens are worth 9 points, rooks are worth 5, etc.), you will automatically save the most important piece. So, we can’t stop the loss of the less important stuff. If done right, a skewer can tear apart an opponent’s position, giving you a big material edge.
Fork
A well-made fork can feel like a knife in the heart to even the best chess player, but it might be the wrong kind of cutlery. A fork basically targets two pieces at once, making the other player waste time picking which piece they want to lose. When faced with a particularly bad fork, some opponents will even quit out of shame.
The royal fork is the best forking move there is. One piece, usually a knight or bishop, is used to checkmate and attack the queen at the same time in this powerful move. The queen can be captured, which changes the course of the game, since the king has to be moved to avoid the check.