Originally posted by tomtom232 Which means you should only give the opposition the bishop pair in a closed position or a position where you can destroy their pawn structure. I can agree with this because if you give yourself lots of juicy targets you can overwork the bishops.
Originally posted by greenpawn34 Some B v N stats posted on the latest blog.
Used 1400 DB - close to what I'd exepect
But the good guys DB was a surpirse.
The White Knight v Black Bishop Endings.
White is well ahead on this. (I double checked it).
And the blog stuff is excellent, I'd like to add.
I wasn't too surprised about the single bishop vs knight numbers, because a single bishop can only operate on half the board, and it's much easier to work around than when facing two bishops who collectively have both colors covered.
The implication I hadn't considered is that when two bishops face bishop and knight, they guy with the diety-driven duo definitely wants to avoid trading bishops!
Most players know they must keep their pawns off the same colour as
their Bishop. Yet this means you have an unprotected piece wander
about the board.
In lone B v N endings this is not bad. But in mixed pieces endgames,
especially with QN v QB the Bishop is best held by a pawn else it is
open to tricks.
Originally posted by greenpawn34 I did not do the BB v BN stats.
One thing I thought of years ago.
Most players know they must keep their pawns off the same colour as
their Bishop. Yet this means you have an unprotected piece wander
about the board.
In lone B v N endings this is not bad. But in mixed pieces endgames,
especially with QN v QB the Bishop is best held by a pawn else it is
open to tricks.
Yeah I was thinking of how the game gets to the combinations you looked at, and how we would steer into the favorable ones and avoid the inferior ones. It is part of the essence of good chess- in the absence of a tactical shot that is, literally, quicker to the point!
And I have to admit that in the 2B vs 2N endings, I was shocked to see that in the 1400 DB that the guy with the 2B scores over 60% regardless of color (win% plus half of drawing😵.
I interpret that to mean that the two bishops are even more formidable at lower levels. It implies that the two bishops are inherently more powerful, in that they excel more where general technique is less adequate, but are reined in slightly when facing master technique.
Thought it would be evens. You are most likely right good players can
put up a better fight with the 2 Knights.
Certainly easier to play the two Bishops and it may just come down
that.
In general I prefer knights in the middlegame, bishops in the endgame...
I feel like it's easier to improve the position of knights in the middlegame... If you spot a weak square in your opponent's camp, or a strong blockading square in yours, it really doesn't take much imagination to reroute a knight there. Improving a bishop's position is much more difficult as they can't can't hop over pawns... In that way bishops are less forgiving than knights. If a bishop is placed on an inconsequential diagonal sometimes it takes a lot of work to give it a job.
Endgame preference for bishops is pretty universal I think. They're a lot more mobile than knights... Which I hear is a pretty big deal.
As for IQP, I prefer playing against it for the same reason I prefer knights. Easier to work with. The player with the IQP has to be active in order to cover his weakness. Playing against the IQP one has tangible goals mind: blockade and exchange pieces.
Is the startling fact of Black being poor with the Bishop due to how this arises out of the the openings? For example in the Lopez, White sometimes exchanges B for N early on, but compensates by weakening Black's pawn structure. Whereas Black may end up with the Bishop through less unfavourable exchanges, for example ...BxN/f3 and recapture is with Q or B?
You guys should read the article in the OP of this thread, which confirms that in the hands of good players a Bishop pair gives a significant advantage. The author talks about how there is no redundancy when two bishops remain, given that they cannot ever control the same squares. For this reason other pairs like Knights or Rooks are maybe not as good as you might think.
The article comes from a 2400 database, so maybe not generally applicable, but still interesting to know.
13 Oct '10 17:01
B vs. N, and the isolated queen's pawn adv/disadv
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