How to Play Chess

The Queen

At the beginning of the game the White queen will be on the d1-square, and the Black queen will be on the d8 square. The White queen starts on a light colored square (d1), and the Black queen starts on a dark colored square (d8).

The queen is the most powerful piece on the chessboard, because she can go to more squares than any other piece. The queen moves to any square on the file, rank, or diagonal(s) on which it stands. When the queen is on an empty board, and stands on a central square (like d4) she can move to one of 27 squares (See Figure 1).

 

The range of the queen is limited by the edge of the board and any pieces that may be in the way. In the case of a friendly piece, the queen must stop on a square before it reaches the friendly piece (see Figure 2). In the case of capturing, she moves to the square occupied by the opponent's piece. The player making the capture removes the captured piece immediately from the board.

In Figure 2, the White queen sits on the b3-square, she attacks two Black pawns at b7 and f7. To capture the b7-pawn, one would remove that pawn from the chessboard, and then move the queen to that square (b7). Notice that the queen's movements along the 3rd rank is restricted by the placement of the White knight sitting on the f3-square. Because this knight is in the way, the queen can not move along the 3rd rank beyond the e3-square.

To better understand the activities of the queen, please watch the video at the bottom of the page.

In the next section we will descuss the Rook.