My most recent question from a random reader raises a seemingly simple question whose answer is anything but simple and presents the task of attempting to make some sense of the myriad different methods of attacking.:
“Dear Chess Doctor – How should I attack after I finish developing?
To begin with, the idea of simply attacking in chess is a very vague concept indeed. For one thing, you can attack an opponent’s king, a weak pawn, a weak square, etc. Making sense of all of the different methods of attacking is a considerable task.
There are many different ways you should attack, and it mostly depends on the position. Indeed, an attack will generally not work until you bring all of your forces into the game, but after that how to continue? As mentioned in the preface there are many different types of attacking positions, and I will try to cover as many as possible.
For starters, there is often the possibility for an attack on the opponent’s king. In this case often a pawn storm is a useful tool to rip open the opposing king’s cover. As a general rule, when eyeing the king you should bring every possible piece to that side of the board, as victory in this endeavor does not lead simply to gain of material: it often leads to check and mate!
Here is one great attacking game where the pawn storm idea was put to good use:
While this type of attack is quite common (and great fun to watch), the king is not the only piece one can attack on the chess board. Another common method of attack is called the minority attack. This arises from a very specific opening setup, but I figured it was worth a mention. The intention of this attack is to weaken the base pawn in the opposing player’s setup, and thus send the opponent’s supposedly strong pawn majority crumbling down.
The general idea of the minority attack is to weaken the opponent’s pawns and then attack them, so by studying the idea one would learn how to pressure weak pawns by default. Here is one good example of this attacking concept in action:
A really great positional game, don’t you think? Indeed, some of the ideas Benko showed lead straight into our next (and last) example of attacking: attacking a weak square. Often an opponent will play the opening somewhat carelessly, pushing his pawns and leaving behind weak squares. The question now is how to exploit these holes in the opponent’s position?
There is no surefire rule for how to exploit a weak square, but often knights are extremely powerful on these outposts. In general if you can conquer a weak square you gain a lot of control over the game, so you should concentrate your pieces around this weak square and look to win control of it. This is a typical sequence where black misplays the opening and ends up with a passive position for the rest of the game:
Now I would like to show this game, where the weak square proved decisive in the long run:
This is one of the purest examples of a dominant outpost. Indeed, that knight on f5 cut black’s position in half, and while it was soon eliminated the ensuing attack on the king proved decisive.
I hope this helps answer the (admittedly somewhat vague) original question. Attacking in chess is a very open concept, and these are a few of the ways you can attempt to be successful in your attack, whether it may be positional or against the king. If there are any general attacking ideas that you think I missed let me know in the comments! I’m always open to constructive criticism.
I wish you luck in your future attacks, and thanks for reading. As always, feel free to submit your questions through the button below. Keep the questions coming!
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