Initiative (chess)
Encyclopedia
Initiative in a chess
position belongs to the player who can make threats that cannot be ignored. He thus puts his opponent in the position of having to use his turns responding to threats rather than making his own. A player with the initiative will often seek to maneuver his pieces into more and more advantageous position as he launches successive attacks. The player who lacks the initiative may seek to regain it through counterattack. The importance of initiative is summed up in the syllogism that initiative is necessary to attack; and attacking is necessary to win (i.e. by capturing pieces and checkmating the opposing king
); therefore initiative is needed to force a win.
starts the game with the initiative, but it can be squandered in the opening by accepting a gambit
. Players can also lose initiative by making unnecessary moves that allow the opponent to gain tempo
, such as superfluous "preventive" moves intended to guard against certain actions by the opponent, that nonetheless require no specific response by them. The concept of tempo is closely tied to initiative, as players can acquire the initiative or buttress it by gaining a tempo.
The initiative is important in all phases of the game, but more important in the endgame than in the middlegame and more important in the middlegame than in the opening
. Having the initiative puts the opponent on the defensive.
Grandmaster Larry Evans
considers four elements of chess: pawn structure
, force (material), space (controlling the center and piece
mobility), and time. Time is measured in tempos. Having a time advantage is having the initiative . The initiative should be kept as long as possible and only given up for another advantage .
Chess
Chess is a two-player board game played on a chessboard, a square-checkered board with 64 squares arranged in an eight-by-eight grid. It is one of the world's most popular games, played by millions of people worldwide at home, in clubs, online, by correspondence, and in tournaments.Each player...
position belongs to the player who can make threats that cannot be ignored. He thus puts his opponent in the position of having to use his turns responding to threats rather than making his own. A player with the initiative will often seek to maneuver his pieces into more and more advantageous position as he launches successive attacks. The player who lacks the initiative may seek to regain it through counterattack. The importance of initiative is summed up in the syllogism that initiative is necessary to attack; and attacking is necessary to win (i.e. by capturing pieces and checkmating the opposing king
King (chess)
In chess, the king is the most important piece. The object of the game is to trap the opponent's king so that its escape is not possible . If a player's king is threatened with capture, it is said to be in check, and the player must remove the threat of capture on the next move. If this cannot be...
); therefore initiative is needed to force a win.
Discussion
Due to moving first, WhiteWhite and Black in chess
In chess, the player who moves first is referred to as "White" and the player who moves second is referred to as "Black". Similarly, the pieces that each conducts are called, respectively, "the white pieces" and "the black pieces". The pieces are often not literally white and black, but some...
starts the game with the initiative, but it can be squandered in the opening by accepting a gambit
Gambit
A gambit is a chess opening in which a player, most often White, sacrifices material, usually a pawn, with the hope of achieving a resulting advantageous position. Some well-known examples are the King's Gambit , Queen's Gambit , and Evans Gambit...
. Players can also lose initiative by making unnecessary moves that allow the opponent to gain tempo
Tempo (chess)
In chess, tempo refers to a "turn" or single move. When a player achieves a desired result in one fewer move, he "gains a tempo" and conversely when he takes one more move than necessary he "loses a tempo"...
, such as superfluous "preventive" moves intended to guard against certain actions by the opponent, that nonetheless require no specific response by them. The concept of tempo is closely tied to initiative, as players can acquire the initiative or buttress it by gaining a tempo.
The initiative is important in all phases of the game, but more important in the endgame than in the middlegame and more important in the middlegame than in the opening
Chess opening
A chess opening is the group of initial moves of a chess game. Recognized sequences of opening moves are referred to as openings as initiated by White or defenses, as created in reply by Black. There are many dozens of different openings, and hundreds of named variants. The Oxford Companion to...
. Having the initiative puts the opponent on the defensive.
Grandmaster Larry Evans
Larry Evans
For the football player of the same name, see Larry Evans .Larry Melvyn Evans was an American chess grandmaster, author, and journalist. He won or shared the U.S. Chess Championship five times and the U.S. Open Chess Championship four times...
considers four elements of chess: pawn structure
Pawn structure
In chess, the pawn structure is the configuration of pawns on the chessboard. Since pawns are the least mobile of the chess pieces, the pawn structure is relatively static and thus largely determines the strategic nature of the position.-General observations:Weaknesses in the pawn structure, such...
, force (material), space (controlling the center and piece
Chess piece
Chess pieces or chessmen are the pieces deployed on a chessboard to play the game of chess. The pieces vary in abilities, giving them different values in the game...
mobility), and time. Time is measured in tempos. Having a time advantage is having the initiative . The initiative should be kept as long as possible and only given up for another advantage .