Elements of Positional Evaluation: How the Pieces Get Their Power

by Dan Heisman

Overview

Which side stands better? How much better? Why?

Most chess players rely on loosely knit, unstructured methods to evaluate chess pieces and positions. They learn positional principles which often lead to inaccurate evaluations and faulty decisions about how to proceed.

This ground-breaking book by best-selling chess author Dan Heisman addresses the evaluation and understanding of how static features affect the value of the pieces in a given position. Now in its fourth edition, emphasis is placed on the static evaluation of each piece’s value and its role in the overall position rather than the assessment of a specific position, but Heisman’s approach can also be applied to help evaluate entire positions by helping to answer the questions who stands better, by how much, and why?

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781949859621
Publisher:	Russell Enterprises, Incorporated
Publication date:	03/30/2023
Edition description:	Enlarged
Pages:	216
Sales rank:	485,925
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 8.60(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

National Master Dan Heisman is a chess writer and professional chess instructor in the Philadelphia area. His best-selling chess books include Looking for Trouble and Back to Basics: Tactics.

Read an Excerpt

Chapter 5: Static Features and the Elements

5.1 Introduction
Static features, first introduced in Section 1.3, are those that can be determined by looking at the position without analy¬sis. In this chapter we will continue to examine static features, this time with the aid of the elements.

Static features usually — but not always — are evaluated without the use of dy¬namic elements, especially time. Static feature evaluation does not change based upon whose move it is, but of course the overall position evaluation almost always does. Static features do change every time an irreversible (castling, capturing, or pawn) move is made.

Chess, as a fmite, full information game, should include concepts that enable you to evaluate the position, i.e., answer the questions, "Who stands better, by how much, and why?" — given who is to move, of course. It is one of our goals to show that evaluation of a position (excluding tactics; i.e., who stands "positionally better") based on static features alone is insufficient for this purpose.

In 1974 many chess theoreticians agreed that evaluation theory, based upon static concepts alone, had an almost endless series of exceptions and even exceptions to the exceptions. In this chapter we will re-examine 1974 theory (as first introduced in Section 1.3) in light of the new theory (and add some observations about how these ideas are viewed in 2009). Then, hopefully, the reader should be able to decide that:

(1) The new theory leads to a more profound understanding of chess, even if used only as a "lower level" basis for static theory; or

(2) The new theory has inherently fewer exceptions than 1974 theory.

If either is true, then the new theory can be used as a basis for new works involving chess application and annotation.

One consequence of accepting the deficiency of 1974's static theory is that statics can no longer be used as a complete positional teaching package. Too often serious students mistakenly use misleading shortcuts in their thought process, stunting their development. It is insufficient to think, "I have a doubled pawn; that is weak. Therefore, all else being equal, I am losing ..." Such a thought process may be perfectly correct in a given position. However, a con-sequence of the new theory is to identify aspects of the doubled pawns that represent the weakness, not the "doubleness" itself.

5.2 Static Features and the Pawns
A beginner can make a big mistake by being overly concerned about static theory.