The “L” terminologies in chess
The world of chess is complex and deep. One can spend a life and still make more discoveries. What it has to offer is limitless. So if you are of an adventurous nature, chess is the game for you. Does that seem contradicting seeing that one has to sit for
long hours looking at a board, only occasionally making some hand movements? If you have ever played chess, you would know that the thrill lies in the challenge chess poses to a player. The challenge is not only to be better than your opponent; it is also
to excel yourself.
But if you want to experience this adventure, you would have to begin at the beginning. As with any other thing, the start is made with the basics. So before you dive into the vast literature of chess, you should know what the chess terminologies mean. This
will help you understand the more complex chess concepts that you will come across, in the course of your journey. In this article, we are going to be explaining the more important chess terminologies. To make it easier for you, we will be dealing with the
‘L’ terms exclusively. Over the years, several types of chess have evolved, to make the game more interesting for different groups of people. In this way, a large number of people have been targeted and chess has gained more followers. Among the different
types, the most popular one is called the Lightning chess. Also called Blitzkrieg chess, the players are given only one to two minutes each in the entire game.
Moving on to the variations of the term, there is one which describes the 32 light coloured squares on the chess board. These are referred to as Light squares. Generally, the light coloured squares are white while the other 32 squares are black in colour.
But there is no hard and fast rule about this specific coloration. Apart from the light squares, we also have light-square bishops. As the name suggests, these are the bishops that are positioned and move about on the light squares of the chess board. Anyone
who is familiar with chess would know that bishops move diagonally. There are two diagonals on the chess board that provide the greatest mobility to the bishops. These are the ones present on the corners of the board and are called the Long diagonals. Long
diagonals consist of eight squares.
As opposed to diagonals, there is a Line as well. This term has dual meaning. A simple meaning of Line is the open path available to a piece which has a long range of movement. Such pieces include the queen, rook and a bishop. The other meaning for this
term is a sequence of moves, which is usually made in the opening game or when a player is analyzing a strategic chess position. Talking about chess positions, there is a well studied classic end game position known as the Lucena position. This is also commonly
called the rook and pawn versus the rook endgame. In such situations, the player who has an extra pawn has the advantage and can use it in order to force a checkmate. When one player is checkmated, she has experienced a Loss. A loss can take place if a player
decides to resign from a game, if her play exceeds the time control limit or if the player is found cheating. In tournaments, a loss can also occur if the director of the tournament decides to forfeit a player for a specific reason.
With this, we end the “L” adventure for you. Let it absorb and sink in before we take you to the next one.
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