Since I’m a chess coach, I figure it’s a good idea to put some chess lessons up here! I’m not going to go ‘all chess all the time’ with my posts here, but my main goal is to help as many people learn chess as I can. I love to learn and I love to teach, so I hope this is informative.
There are not a lot of complicated rules in the game of chess, but one that confuses a lot of people is the rule of stalemate. In fact, draws generally confuse most people who don’t play tournament chess regularly. And even that statement may confuse you!
That’s because there’s a common misconception that every draw in chess is called a stalemate. That’s not true. There are many kinds of draws in chess, and stalemate is just one of them. As draws go, however, it’s fairly common and that’s why I’ve chosen to tackle it first.
THE GOAL OF CHESS
Let me ask you: What is the goal in a game of chess?
Some of you may have answered, “To capture the other player’s king.”
While I can’t completely disagree with you, here’s something that might surprise you…
The goal of a game of chess is NOT to capture the other player’s king… The goal is to checkmate the other player’s king. That’s how you win.
If you learn chess from a formal instructor or from a chess book or website that teaches the rules of the game, you’ll know this and you’ll understand that the kings never leave the board. But many people who learn through a family member or a friend often get some well-intended misinformation.
The reason I say that I can’t completely disagree is because of the way checkmate is defined. The best explanation of checkmate I’ve ever seen in written form is:
“Attacking the enemy king in such a way that it cannot escape, making its capture inevitable on the next move.”
So you don’t ever actually capture the king. You simply prove that you can on the next move, and the opponent isn’t able to do anything about it.
It follows, then, that a player is never allowed to make a move that ends with their own king in check. You would be setting up your own king’s inevitable capture! In fact, if you’re playing chess and your opponent tries to make a move that would produce such a condition, you have to ‘help them,’ and tell them that their move isn’t allowed and they have to choose another one.
In the position shown above, the Black king is in check from the White queen, and it cannot escape. Nor can it capture the White queen, because doing so would move it into check by the White rook that is supporting the queen.
WHAT IS STALEMATE?
Again, a written explanation will help, but like with checkmate, showing you some chess positions here will better illustrate what stalemate is.
First, I want to start with what it isn’t. Some players think that if your king has no moves, that makes the game a stalemate. However, this idea is quickly debunked by looking at the starting position:
In the starting position, neither player’s king can make any moves. So by that definition of stalemate, every game is a stalemate as soon as it starts! Clearly this can’t be true.
The best written definition of stalemate I know is: “Stalemate happens when the player whose move it is cannot make any legal move and their king is not in check.”
Here’s a visual aid:
The difference between this position and the checkmate above is subtle. But if you look closely, you’ll see that the Black king is not in check from either the White queen or rook, yet it cannot make a legal move.
It’s important to stress, however, that stalemate is not just about the king! In this particular case it is, because that’s all Black has left on the board.
But consider this position:
Look how much there is on the board for Black here! Yet this position is a stalemate. Black’s king is not in check, and because you’re never allowed to make a move that ends with your own king in check, Black cannot make a legal move anywhere on the board!
I should also point out that it’s very important whose move it is when considering whether it’s stalemate or not. In either of the above positions, if it were White’s move, White could win. But since it’s Black’s move and there are no moves that can be made, the game is a draw.
Finally, here’s a real heartbreaker played by one of my students recently, which really was the impetus for this post if I’m being honest.
In this position, White should easily win the game. Either one of the pawns White has left can promote to a queen, and once that happens, the new queen and the king can work together to force checkmate.
But my student did not calculate accurately — perhaps even not at all! — and hastily played the pawn on e7 to e8, proudly making a new queen.
Take a look at the resulting position. It’s Black’s move now, but Black has no legal moves and Black’s king is not in check. The game is over immediately and is a draw by stalemate. My student should have come away with a tournament win, and instead only got half the point.
Had he been more patient, he would have realized that he was about to stalemate his opponent by making a queen on e8, and could have chosen a different move that would allow him to go on to victory.
FINAL THOUGHTS
Understanding stalemate is important so that you can avoid it when you’re clearly winning, as my student was in the example I showed, and also so that you’re aware of it when you’re losing, for there are positions in which the losing side can force a stalemate to happen!
But not without understanding what stalemate is in the first place.
Thanks for spending some time with me. I hope I’ve clarified some things in this post, and I’d love it if you’d drop me a line with any questions you have: coachrob@kidsnchess.com
