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Questions tagged [queens]

Questions relating to the Queen

The Queen is the most powerful piece. It can move either up, down, left, or right (like a ), or diagonally (like a ), in any, but only one, available direction per move, and moving along any number of unoccupied squares per move. The Queen captures (see ) by moving to occupy the square of an opposing piece. In standard chess, each player begins the game with one Queen next to his King. For White, the Queen begins the game to the left of the King, and for Black (whose setup is mirrored by White), the Queen begins to the right.

The Queen has an approximate value of 9 on a scale of 1-9, where a Pawn has the value of 1, Knights and Bishops each have the value of 3, and a Rook has the value of 5.

The symbol for the Queen in most notations (see ) is Q.

For more information about Queens, see the Wikipedia article.

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King or Queen-Which piece is which?

I recently bought a set of wooden chess pieces, which I liked for its simplicity. I'm not sure, however, which one is supposed to be the king and which one is supposed to be the queen. I would say that the one with the spike is the queen, and the…
Sembei Norimaki
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Must one say "queen check" before capturing a queen?

I was playing a friend and I took her queen. She said that I didn't say "queen check" beforehand. I have never heard of this. Is it a rule?
Sean Malcolm
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Maximum number of queens possible

I was thinking about what the maximum number of queens can be on the board after only legal moves. The theoretical upper bound would be 18, the original 2 queens plus 16 promoted pawns. However, to have the pawns get past each other they would have…
Zitrax
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Why is the king powerless and the queen powerful?

Historically, real kings were powerful (Alexander the Great, Napoleon Bonaparte etc.) and women were powerless. The game of chess began in Asia, some say, and the women were definitely powerless there. Maybe Cleopatra was powerful, but still doesn't…
Lynob
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Trading queens in the opening

Which standard openings in chess usually pave the way for an early queen trade in the game? In other words, which opening has a high probability of exchanging the queens in the opening itself? Does any opening contain queen trade as a part of…
Haran
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When is a queen stronger than two rooks?

Two rooks are stronger than one queen. Let's assume that the material is equal, except that one player has a pair of rooks while the other player has a queen. In what situations is the queen stronger than the pair of rooks?
Rauan Sagit
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Why does a knight combine better with the queen than a bishop does?

From this question, the couple queen + knight is strong in attacking the opponent's king. I searched why the knight combines better than the bishop with a queen, and all I could find, from this article, is: "Knights cooperate better than bishops…
user18196
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How to deal with your opponent's queen if your opponent rejects any trades?

If my opponent brings out his/her queen early in the game, I usually attack it with my own queen. The opponent can either accept the trade or reject it. If he/she accepts, I have no questions at all. The game continues, and I am happy. The question…
Alexander
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Does GM Larry Kaufman's "principle of the redundancy of major pieces" truly exists? Or could this effect be caused by the number of Pawns instead?

The following is an extract from The Evaluation of Material Imbalances by GM Larry Kaufman. I put in bold characters everything that was important for this…
Fate
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Has there ever been a grandmaster-level win where a queen did not move nor get taken throughout the game?

Has there ever been a grandmaster-level win where the queen of the side that won did not move nor get taken throughout the game? I feel like this is possible even at such a level as the side whose queen does not move could still castle but would…
TheSimpliFire
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How do I stop blundering my queen?

I have a particular bad habit when I play chess. I play reasonably well (at least by the standards of people I play with), and am quite careful with my pieces. But in about 80% of games I play, once I get into a good position - one or two pieces…
naught101
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What is the shortest possible game with 18 queens?

This question demonstrates a game in which all 16 pawns promote for a total of 18 queens on the board. It takes 80 moves... What is the shortest sequence of moves that achieves this goal?
yrodro
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What is the earliest queen move in any strong, modern opening?

I have noticed a tendency of weaker players to move their queen out very early (e.g. move 2-5), and conversely, a tendency for strong players to move their queen much later (usually later than move 5, but often not until move 7/8/9 or even…
stevec
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What sense does promotion to queen make?

When a pawn finally reaches the eighth rank, then it can be promoted to rook, knight, bishop or queen. It is not hard to imagine that a soldier who has achieved a lot could be promoted to an officer. However, it is almost incredible that a…
Popopo
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In the immortal draw, why is the Queen sac 9...Qxa4+ considered the best move?

After White's first nine moves in the Immortal Draw: [FEN ""] [title "Hamppe-Meitner, Vienna"] 1.e4 e5 2.Nc3 Bc5 3.Na4 Bxf2+ 4.Kxf2 Qh4+ 5.Ke3 Qf4+ 6.Kd3 d5 7.Kc3 Qxe4 8.Kb3 Na6 9.a3 Why is 9...Qxa4+ the best move here? Doesn't Black have an…
Daniel
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