Horde Chess Guide For Begginer

What is Horde Chess?

Horde chess is a chess variant that exists on Lichess.org and on Chess.com

White has 36 pawns while black has their normal chess setup. To win with white, you need to checkmate the black king with either your pawns or by promoting into a piece (Queen, Knight, Rook, Bishop) White has no king. But for black to win, they need to capture all whites pawns. All the rules apply like in normal chess including Stealmate and our favourite EN PASSANT.

How to play with Black:

So, you are playing with black. That means you have to take all 36 pawns. At the start of you "Career" it will seem as if it is easier to play with the white pieces. But no it is not. People have won computers with black but they were not even close with white. So to win with black you either have to influtrate the back rank with your Queen or your Rook. You can also make a fortress but I will talk abut that at the end, since it is the hardest way to win with black.

Lets see the opening:

https://lichess.org/study/MKjA4MPQ/qY0zPi11#18

This is the Ideal position out of the opening. As you can see black sacrifices a bishop for 2 pawns (A piece for 2 pawns is usually good for black in horde chess) and then taking back with the Knight. This isw all done to open up the A file for your rook to breakthrough. I recommend you looking at the whole game because you will want to see how black converts the position.

How do you play with white:

So, now you are white, and you ask how to play? Well Lets start with the opening.

https://lichess.org/study/MKjA4MPQ/sY1FahAE#3

For begginers I recommend you playing a5 as your 1st move. Because lot's of people at your rating will have no idea how to play against it (When i was starting out I also had no idea on how to play it against a5 with black)

I recommend you looking at the whole game to see how you to play when black breaks through and general plans. Yes black does in fact breakthrough but it is to late.

Basic endgame for black and white:

So, now you are in the "Endgame" phase of the game. No matter what color you are endgames are always super interesting in horde chess. Take a lok at this basic endgame for black (It is a draw if white plays correctly, but in most of the cases it is a win for black)

https://lichess.org/study/MKjA4MPQ/F5ovrmxg#0

Take a look at the king pattern. (I played Ka7 in the example just so you would know that there are multiple ways to play against this)

If black had a bishop (Or any other piece) it would have been winning because black has infinite moves with the bishop. That is important becaue wite pawns can only move forward and never backwards.

If you are playing this endgame as white, then you have to be very carefull to not lose and make a draw via promotion to queen or stealmate.

Fortress for black:

Now finally, the last chapter. Now this is preatty hard to understand for begginers so return to this when you are 1800 rated horde player. But if you wanna look at it now, go ahaed it will not harm you.

Fortress or Zugzwang is a position were black occupies all the minor squares in whites position. That means white when they push a pawn will have to give it up. Take a look at this example:

https://lichess.org/study/MKjA4MPQ/mMupMFB5#18

As you can see, black occupied all the minor squares and white ran out of moves while black was moving his king back and forth.

Study used in this blog post:

https://lichess.org/study/MKjA4MPQ

THANK YOU FOR READING!

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