Learn everything you need to start playing chess with confidence, taught by International Master Levy Rozman (GothamChess). Across nine short sections you will cover the board and how to set it up, how every piece moves and what it is worth, attacking and defending, check, checkmate and the stalemate trap that catches every beginner, opening principles, basic tactics such as forks and pins, the endgames every beginner should know, and a simple plan to keep improving. A closing section traces a brief history of chess, from its ancient origins to the game we know today. Free to learn, with no ads — a clear, focused place to begin.
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":0,"seg_end":61,"text":"welcome to the world of Chess my name is Levy Rosman I'm an international master from New York City hence the name Gotham and in this video I want to give you all the tools you'll need to learn chess and navigate it as a beginner I'm covering five major Concepts that I've picked out they're right here we'll talk about the board and the setup and obviously all of the pieces how they move and how many points they're worth then we'll talk about their interactions that means what pieces have what Vision attacking capturing creating threats and defending them that will flow into number three which is checks and Checkmate that's talking specifically about the king because Checkmate is the goal of the game in the fourth category I will show you some basic opening ideas how to start a game with white and with black certain traps to avoid falling into the middle game will be tactics and strategy the two major branches and talk a little bit about end games as well what are the most important end games for beginners to know and last but not least we'll just talk a little bit about a study plan all right tell good let's go first","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":61,"seg_end":142,"text":"things first a chessboard is an 8x8 square which has files which are the a file the B file the C file and so on and ranks the first rank the second rank Etc boards with coordinates as you see here have A1 B1 and so on white starts on one and two and if you don't have those coordinates the bottom right hand corner should should be a light Square okay each side has eight pawns they go on the second and seventh rank respectively then the back rank of pieces you can put the Rooks or the castle like structures in the corners followed by the knights or the hores however you want to call them the Bishops go next the ones with the pointed hats and in the middle you've got the royalty the king and the Queen the easiest way to remember how to put the king in the queen is that the White Queen likes to uh have a white dress with white shoes she likes to stand on the same color Square The Black Queen likes a black dress with black shoes so the black queen will stand on the dark square and the lighten a light Queen will a White Queen will stand on a light Square the Kings will obviously stand adjacent now Kings you can also remember are on the E file and the Queens are on the defile that's one more way to remember it now this is a lot of pieces so what I'm going to do when I'm","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":142,"seg_end":445,"text":"teaching you about piece movements is I'm going to cut back a lot now hopefully all of the games that you play look like this well you will be playing with the white pieces hopefully in this position you're up 35 points of material let's start with the pawns pawns are worth one point they only move forward they do not move backwards on their first move pawns can go up two in one go like this however after that they can only move forward one square if a pawn makes it all the way to the end of the board you can promote it to a queen Queen a rook a bishop or a knight even if you already have the two you know the two knights for example that you start with you can have a third one one thing about pawns the way they capture is not forward it's diagonally one square so for example in this position the white Pawn would oops sorry wrong Arrow the white Pawn would capture the black pawn like this that would be the capture of a pawn okay um now there's one other bonus rule of Pawns that I'll include here just for the sake of including it it will confuse you and you might be tempted to leave this video but that rule is called on pant there is this Special Rule I did not invent it so please don't hate me which looks something like a software glitch and it goes like this if an enemy pawn moves two squares okay two squares and stands side by side with your Pawn you can take that pawn via something called on pant in passing only on this move if you wait one turn you can't do it and it looks like this you say Levy I'm only like 5 minutes into this video you're already confusing me I don't feel safe I listen it's just my rule it's just my job to report the rules okay that's the only Special Rule about pawns okay all good terrific now let's move to Knights and Bishops together because those are called the minor pieces and they're worth three points okay Bishops are very simple they can go forward and backward diagonally on their own color so a light squared Bishop that's how it moves","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":445,"seg_end":640,"text":"little bit about how the pieces interact on the chessboard the way I want you to think about this okay is vision of a piece what does that mean well let's start with the queen this queen sees all the way down here but it's all empty squares the board is split into emptiness empty squares and physical pieces a piece that is there that is that we can see it okay so first things first the queen sees the pawn who else sees the pawn for black not for white but for black you look around the Rook sees the pawn so taking this Pawn would be a terrible move because the Rook would respond with a capture that's a capture of a pawn that's what that's called taking a pawn capturing a pawn The Rook would take back we lose nine points in that trade that's how I want you to think about it we get one one for nine is not a good trade what else can we see our Bishop can see this Knight who else this bishop sees this Knight the Bishops don't see each other because the Knight is in the way so if white in this position play the move Bishop takes Knight and Bishop takes Bishop that's a fair trade that's three for three that's not a bad deal okay that's how I want you to think about it when you're first starting out three for three that's fine that's more than okay now what does this bishop see bonus question uhoh uhoh losing five would not be good unless we got more than that in return or close like four four points now our Rook here defends that that's what that's called that's called defense same way that Rook is protecting that pawn or defending that pawn we're defending but that's not a fair trade so in this position let's move this Rook here for example on this square look who we see oh and the queen cannot come down and take us that's a very important thing because the Rook is protecting The Rook right now here how about this what if let's say black plays a move Queen F6 the queen sees the Knight is it attacking the Knight no it's not because we're protecting it that would not be a g","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":640,"seg_end":831,"text":"check this next part will cover just checks and Checkmate so we'll move ahead to this position here it's white to move white has a million ways to attack this King a check is an attack on the king it threatens to capture the king in Chess there is no cap caping of the king the king has to escape danger so for example let's say the White Queen goes here check well the king would slide out of danger otherwise we would take the king and so on but what if we put the queen here that's a check the king anywhere it moves remains in check which means that we have put the enemy King in a check that is unavoidable nothing that black can do that is Checkmate and we would win the game Checkmate happens at the beginning of the game sometimes sometimes all the way at the end okay sometimes in the middle but Checkmate will ultimately decide the game one little more got to include a little bonus here this position is a little bit different let's say it's black moo here black move not White's move if it's White's move we give a check but if it's Black's move can black move legally no because black cannot put the king in danger that's not allowed you can't give up your your king but is black in check is the queen threatening the King right now to take it no because the queen doesn't actually see the king it just doesn't there the queen does not see the King this is called stalemate stalemate is when one side has no legal moves but is not in check the king is not in danger that is a draw not a win for one side but a draw a tie you say Levy that's stupid what if I'm up 37,000 points of material I accidentally stalemate tough luck it's a draw we're working on it it's December 1st 20 2020 if the rules change in the future I'll make an update video but as far as it goes this is still it I'm very sorry now as I said Checkmate can happen at the beginning of the game right so the fastest Checkmate known to well chess is called the two move Checkmate and essentially it's it's it's this I mean","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":831,"seg_end":1307,"text":"to take control of the center of the board this area for a Advanced beginners maybe a little rectangle best way to do that is to put Pawns in the center so that might means something like E4 or D4 both are okay all right now just for instructive purposes I'm going to do nothing with black I'm going to move the Knight back and forth to give us the most perfect setup possible if you can put a second Pawn in the center you should do that without it getting captured if you can do it make sure you can do it okay I'm going to continue to do these things over here next come the knights again to the center of the board better because from there they control more squares Knights on the side they don't really do that okay now I'm I'm still doing my thing over here two knights that's usually the best way to go if you can the Bishops will go next all right and one thing that you have to remember Bishop can go to C4 or to D3 or even to E2 as long as you're getting out the bishop you want to give everybody a turn in the opening before you start repeating moves you don't want to move the same piece four or five times that's not how chess works you don't need to reinvent the wheel at the beginning of a chess game because we already kind of know how to do that these are the secrets so again black is just doing goofy stuff and I'll show you obviously a legitimate game after this now I'll put the second Bishop just don't want the bishop to feel left out remember that castling rule get the king out of the center of the board two squares with the king and the Rook will jump right over and be adjacent okay I want you to remember to do this if you try to do it at home on a computer you can just kind of drag this over here and it will happen or on a tablet or a mobile phone but uh over the board you have to know how to do this then you can bring the queen up and connect the Rooks that's kind of called the Golden moves of Chess now here's the problem uh if you have a strong opponent and the","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":1307,"seg_end":1467,"text":"simple example of what a tactic is a tactic is a forcing move or sequence of them that guarantees gain of material so look at the position that you have in front of you how do we get this Knight with the King that would be a three-step process 1 2 3 that's a bit more strategic in nature in positions with many more pieces on the board strategic plans take two or three moves often times it means rerounding a piece to the other side of the board to make it more more active gaining very good control of a square tactics are immediate they are the most forcing moves in the game they make they make your opponent react so for example here there's something called a double attack or a fork the queen can go here attacking the king and the Knight that will guarantee that you win the Knight guarantee because the King has to move and then we would take the Knight there's one other way to do this and then would be here because that's all the same right that's how powerful a queen is another kind of pin sorry another kind of tactic I should say is a pin and a pin means a diagonal or a vertical or horizontal attack on a piece that can't move it just can't move this Knight cannot move because we would win the king and we cannot capture a king look it literally won't let me move this is a pin on the Knight to the king this can also happen in Reverse there's some debate as to skewer x-ray pin but the concept is all the same and by the way if it was Black's move in this position black can fork or double attack the queen and the King themselves tactics are so important you should do as many of them as possible there are workbooks my favorite one is 1,1 chess exercises for beginners they did not SP sponsored this video I just recommended that book that book goes chapter by chapter every single kind of tactic deflection pin you know discovered attack there's a lot of different tactics a lot of different ways to solve these tactics um that's what you should do chess is so much about patter","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":1467,"seg_end":1705,"text":"toward the end obviously of chess games which you should know how to win so for example King and one Pawn versus King end games that's something that without any knowledge you would not be able to figure out yourself that's something that you can pick up and learn there's a book a 100 end games you must know for example it's a great book um but more importantly for beginners is how to Checkmate for example with a queen and a king versus a king like that is something you should be able to do like that or a latter Checkmate a lad Checkmate is even easier so when you have a queen and another queen or a queen and a rook for example or two Rooks and that's useful for positions like this like let's say you get a position like this in a game with queen and pawn you go wait remember that rule I can go make a second Queen it's much easier to win with two queens versus a king and a latter Checkmate uh would uh would look for example like like like this let's say uh we promote a second Queen just you know you do a drill on lad Checkmate it's when you use both of your pieces to cut the enemy King laterally and walk it to the other side of the board so for example that might look something like this queen B5 cuts the king laterally and now your your Queens Alternate which row they're going to control or rank right there you go that's something that you just pick up as a beginner you go practice some latter checkmates you go practice how to checkmate with king and queen I will give you kind of the the two-minute rundown I don't know if it will be useful for you Pa please disappear thank you the easiest way to checkmate with just the queen is to put the queen in what's called Knight opposition what does that mean that means if this piece was a knight it would be attacking the king now you copy everything black does if black moves one square to the left you move one square to the left if black moves one square diagonally backwards you go the same way and you get this King to one of","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}
{"vid_id":"OCSbzArwB10","seg_start":1705,"seg_end":1886,"text":"study plan I get asked this question all the time especially now with so many more chess fans around the world because of the Queen's Gambit you know it's December 1st like I said 2020 so whenever you're watching in the future if you've made it this far in the video you want to know how do you get better at chess there's a ton of books there's a ton of resources a few days after recording this I will have a beginner's course it will be linked in the comments um you want to learn a few openings with white and with black you want to be confident in how you start the game personally I don't recommend playing computers or Bots I recommend going to play people online or how you know over the board I recommend longer games 10minute games 15-minute games I recommend playing just a few games a day and then analyzing and when you analyze with a computer it won't always be so easy to understand and frankly there's no clear advice I can give on how to understand certain engine recommendations the th because it doesn't speak to you frankly when you look at a game with an engine you need to look for your one move mistakes you need to like oh I blundered that piece that's what I did I just literally left the piece hanging okay how did my opening go did I fall for a trap try not to fall for the same mistake two times have your end games down and start slowly adding a little bit of information to your end games learn how to checkmate with a rook okay uh learn a king and pawn endgame for example keep adding information there and for the puzzle puzzle solving quality over quantity do 10 puzzles in one day spend as much time on them as you need get them all correct when you solve puzzles you should look to solve them with a process of checks captures attacks those are the most forcing moves in chests moves that they have to respond to I have videos on puzzle solving so if you ever want to watch videos on puzzle solving and how to improve at that uh that there's content out out there f","source":"youtube-caption","version":4}