CHESSmis

Have you ever played chess? Here's a little introduction of the game.

Chess is one of the most popular game in Philippines. We see people playing chess in many different corners like barbershops, tailoring, machine shops or even in terminals. Here in Davao City, you can find great chess players in Quezon park along Claveria. There you can see some popular personalities of chess that played several tournaments throughout the country or even in the world.

The game is the oldest skill game in history. From the look of pieces in the set it is something about the people in the medieval age. The way how to play the game is a kind of miniature representation from the history of medieval times. I guess this is how they practice and plan a strategy for a war that time.

Then from what I heard in "Maayong Buntag Mindanao" this morning, chess was originated in India. Then it goes to Persia until it reaches the different places in the world. But somehow it is very popular in Russia where great players like Garry Kasparov(World Chess Champion) came from.

Ahmmnn. we should not mind them they were the greatest and what we need is just the basic. hehe. So first...

The chess algebraic notation:

For those who want to use chess books, you need to learn the notation first. From the figure above you can see letters a-h(horizontally) and numbers 1-8(vertically). For the pieces' movements the codes will be the guide on how to determine the next location of a piece. Say for example (from the figure) the white's pawn. That second location will described in the books as Pe2-Pe4. Another example is the white's bishop. From the figure it could be described as Bf1-Bb5. Probably it is easier to understand when you have the guide above. Anyway more practice and you can perfect the notation.


Introducing the pieces:

PAWN - Then pawn is the least powerful piece because of it's poor mobility. It only scores 1 point of quality. There are 8 pieces of pawns in a player and this is arranged along the second row at your side (from your opponents viewpoint). It may move only one square forward if its path is not blocked. However, it may move as an option one or two squares forward on its first move only. It may capture only diagonally one square. It may not capture forward. It may not move backward. The lowly Pawn usually does not last long, but if it is able to reach the 8th row or rank, then it can promote itself to any other piece except the King. A Pawn thus promoted is replaced by that piece. Therefore, it is possible to have more than one Queen, or two Rooks, Bishops, or Knights on the board at one time.


HORSE/KNIGHT-The Knight is nearly as powerful as the Bishop not because of its range, but because it is the only piece that can hop over other pieces in an L-shaped path. This ability makes it particularly powerful in the early stage of a game when the board is crowded with pieces.






BISHOP-The Bishop is a powerful piece because it can move to any square along its diagonals as long as its path is not blocked.Its range is the source of its power. More often a combination of Bishop and the Queen is the deadliest to hunt the King.









ROOK-The Rook is a very powerful piece because it can move to any square along its file or row as long as its path is not blocked. For me this is the best guardian of the king together with the pawns while castling.






QUEEN-The Queen is the most powerful piece because she can move to any square in any direction as long as her path is not blocked. Her range and the ability to attack many pieces an once are the source of her power.But somehow it has no ability to move L like the knight.







KING- The King is the most important piece.When it is trapped so it cannot move without being captured, then the game is lost. This trap is called checkmate. The King can move one square in any direction. A King can never move into check, or onto a square where it can be captured by an opponent's piece. If a King is not in check, and no other legal move is possible, then the position is said to be in stalemate. A stalemated game is a draw, or a tie.






That's it and more to come. By the way in my humble opinion the best chess players I've seen so far in Eversun Davao were Ice "Isis" Lahora(day shift), Wilmer "Pappy" Timbal(night shift), Henshin "Henry" Rebirth(day shift) and Christian Ray "Edu Manzanu" Dinopol(Night Shift). You might want to ask them anything about chess later. Or you may want to challenge any of them. I'll warn you that you should show your best move. They were definitely not as easy as me as an opponent. The first thing to do before challenging them is to read the best books in chess history to have a chance against them. They were once the greatest players in Davao City history. Ayt!