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Chess queen: The most aggressive piece on the board
The chess queen is the most important piece in the game of chess, it provides dynamism and attacks to the position. Using the queen for the attack is always the strategy of the player who has the initiative in chess.
There are many patterns and tactics related to the chess queen, every chess player should know to start playing chess. The different ways to get synergy within the pieces and exploiting their potential at the most of it.
The thing with the chess queen is that it covers a ridiculous amount of squares, which gives a lot of opportunities to the chess player. It is common to see many chess queen tactics in action like double threats or a game decided by the queen attacking two pieces at the same time.
Another interesting point about the chess queen is that because of the number of squares it controls you can perfectly attack and defend. With a gracefulness almost divine the chess queen can be protecting her king and checkmating the rival.
But as with any matter of chess piece activity, it’s not quite easy to find the correct position for the queen chess piece on many occasions. We have to correctly assess and put our tactical vision in its best to know which the best square is.
This is why today we will see how to get the best out of the chess queen in chess positions.
The chess queen fundamentals to win
We already know the queen chess piece is one of the most valuable, and this is why you need to be careful when maneuvering the chess queen. The importance of the queen is the same limiting reason for not moving it around too much.
I don’t mean you have to play scared not taking the queen out of d1 for your entire life, I mean you have to be careful. Getting the queen fully into the fray is like putting Roma’s king in the front line of the battle.
The chess queen accomplishes the mission of attacking itself but it is also important to put pressure on your opponent so try not to lose it.
I know it's annoying to always hear the same quote for beginners in chess, but simple rules in chess have great value.
Never take out the queen too early in the opening, exposing the queen in the center of the board allows your opponent to win tempos. This can lead to a disastrous opening position in which you’ll be quickly destroyed by the opponent’s initiative.
Don’t rush to win material in the opening, this follows the same principle. If you try to win material, with the queen normally, in the opening your opponent may allow this while getting a development advantage himself. If you allow your opponent to be ahead in development, not even 1000 extra pawns will save you!
Attacking with the chess queen
The queen is an excellent attacker, one or two minor pieces with the queen are enough to create serious threats to the enemy king. There are a few things you have to know to carry out a successful attack in chess.
I see many amateur chess players who fail in spotting this weakness in their game. This is why we will explain in simple steps how to aim and shatter the weaknesses of your opponent.
Determine the opponent’s weakness, you can’t throw yourself in a wild attack if you don’t know what you are attacking! A weak pawn, a weak square near the king, a weak diagonal, or a poorly defended key spot. You decide, just set the goal before starting striving for it.
Arrange the pieces to harass the foe, your pieces have to be placed in squares where they accomplish an objective or exploit an advantage. Imagine where the pieces could make the opponent faint to take control of the position.
Go on a rampage! If you successfully got the positional advantages needed to organize the attack and every single piece is working it’s time for action. When you have superiority in the position to the point that you can’t improve more look for a forced combination.
There is nothing easier in the world than sticking to the rules! Don’t think you are the exception, if you play by the strategic rules and principles of chess you’ll be rewarded.
If you planted the attack seed carefully and put all the conditions you will find the killer combination, you just need to look at the opportunities on the board.
The chess queen trade
The queen in chess is considered to have such power that when they trade off the board is when players conceive the start of the ending in chess. Trading the chess queen is one of those important decisions in chess that will change drastically the position.
Normally there will be a player who wants to trade queens while the other one doesn’t. Everything depends on the assessment of the position and the plan players chose to follow.
But when do we need to trade queens? That’s a really interesting question, to explain, we need to know the situations in which having the queens is beneficial and when it’s not.
You need to exchange the chess queens when:
- You are under attack, if the opponent has a tight grip on the initiative you need to exchange queens to relieve pressure.
- Lacking space to maneuver, when you are down in space all the exchanges will be beneficial in some way.
- You want to enter the ending, if your opponent has positional disadvantages like an isolated pawn, for example, trading pieces will be good to exploit these weaknesses.
Of course, there will be exceptions to the rule but, in general terms, these are the specific situations in which trading the chess queen will be good for you.
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