The Everything Chess Basics Book (13 page)

Chapter 5
Special Moves

You now know how a chess game is conducted, at least in general, and the basic moves of the pieces and pawns. So what’s next? Why, all those pesky exceptions to the rules known as
special moves
. There are quite a few, so let’s begin.

Touch Move

The first special move isn’t an exception at all. In fact, it should never be an exception, despite the take-back feature on many of today’s chess-playing computers. It is the notorious touch-move rule.

The Rule

The rule is simple enough: If you touch a piece or pawn, you should then move that piece or pawn. If you have made a move and let go of whatever piece or pawn you moved, your move is completed.

This rule is sensible and fair. And it is often abused in casual chess. Many players, particularly those who are not very experienced, will notice that something is wrong about a move in the process of making that move or just after making it. Then the temptation to change the move is often hard to resist.

But it is simply bad manners to change the move in the process of making it, and even poorer manners to change a move that has already been made. Besides, changing the rule is against the rules of chess, as well as against the rules of good sportsmanship.

J’adoube

There are many foreign terms interspersed throughout chess, just like there are foreign terms in music and science—well, maybe not so many as in science. One of these terms is the French expression
j’adoube
, which means “I adjust.” It refers to handling the pieces or pawns prior to making a move when you have no intention of making a move. You may want to do this to adjust the pieces so that they are neater, setting in the center of the squares, or you may simply want to pick up a piece that has fallen down and place it on its proper square.

Should I say
j’adoube
if I accidentally touch a piece?
Yes, and immediately, if not sooner. If your opponent doesn’t hear
j’adoube
or “I adjust,” how can she know the touch was accidental?

However, how can your opponent know your intention? If he sees you touch your queen, and he knows that he will win if you move your queen, he may be highly motivated to claim the touch-move rule. But you can circumvent that simply by saying
j’adoube
or “I adjust,” the English equivalent. That way everybody knows you had no intention of moving your queen.

Promotion

The basic move of the pawn leaves a rather large hole, which I hope you at least wondered about. What happens when a pawn reaches the far side of the board and there is nowhere else to go? Since a pawn can’t move sideways or backward, what use is it?

When you are ready to promote a pawn and there are no queens available, you can usually get a hold of a captured rook and turn it upside down. If none are available, you can place two pawns on the square or turn a piece or pawn on its side. There is always a way!

This is where promotion comes in. Any pawn, upon reaching the farthest possible rank (the eighth rank for White pawns and the first rank for Black pawns) undergoes a metamorphosis. You remove the pawn from the board and replace it with a piece.

Promotion, by the way, has nothing whatsoever to do with any of the pieces already on the board, or even with any of the pieces captured. A pawn upon promoting theoretically turns into whatever piece you want it to turn into.

Practically speaking, this doesn’t happen, of course. Instead, you must search among captured pieces or get a hold of another set in order to make a second or third queen, for instance. If nothing is available, however, you’ll find a way.

A New Queen

You always have a choice as to which piece you want to turn the pawn into. But first consider the restrictions: The pawn cannot remain a pawn, and it cannot become a king. Nor can it become an enemy piece (not that you’d even want to make it into one!).

This choice is most often not thought about at all. The queen is such a powerful piece that almost every pawn that is promoted is promoted into a queen. In fact, this is often called
queening
the pawn.

White is poised to promote the pawn. Remember that White pawns move up the board, while Black pawns travel down the board.

White has turned the little pawn into a queen. This is a rule that made it into Lewis Carroll’s
Through the Looking Glass
.

Underpromotion

Nevertheless, there are times when you might not want a queen. In these cases, it’s good to know that the choice is yours. You can promote to a rook, a bishop, or a knight, as well as a queen. As for why you might want to do such a ridiculous-seeming thing, a very simple example will suffice.

White’s pawn is ready to promote. Should it become a queen?

Look at the diagram. You are White and it is your move. If you promote the pawn to a queen your opponent will then checkmate you and you will lose. If, however, you underpromote the pawn to a knight, it is checkmate and you win!

White has decided that greedily promoting to a queen and losing is not the way to go. Underpromotion to a knight produces this checkmate.

Just keep in mind that the choice is yours every time you promote a pawn, and the choice is your opponent’s every time she promotes one of her pawns.

Promotion with a Capture

One of the most spectacular changes you can bring about during a chess game is to capture a piece, let’s say the opponent’s queen, with a pawn while promoting it to a queen. To gain two queens in one move is unbelievable, but it is actually possible.

Black has a pawn for a queen. But it is Black’s move, and Black pawns march downward.

In one move Black has transformed her pawn into a queen while capturing the White queen.

En Passant

Another French term in general use with chess players is
en passant
. This means in passing, and it refers to a particular situation that comes up from time to time in games. It doesn’t happen in more than one game in ten, perhaps, but it is a rule you should be aware of if you want to play chess or follow the games of others. To understand en passant, you have to go back to the rule about the pawn’s initial two-square option on its first move.