Why does white go first in chess Reddit

Q: Why does white in chess go first?

A beginner of chess learns the power of white first” very quickly. They will see that an opponent will prefer the white pieces if given a choice. They feel a sense of empowerment even when they are playing a stronger opponent. For this reason, players who play white may be more motivated to win.

Q: Does white always go first in chess?

What is the international chess federations (Fide) rule on the opening move? Article 1.2 of the Rules of Play says the player with the light pieces (white) makes the first move, then the players move alternatively, with the player with the dark-coloured pieces, making the next move.”

Stopped reading after: “Editor’s note: The recent protests over racism have rekindled a longstanding discussion about whether chess promotes white privilege with its rule that the first move always goes to the player with the white pieces.”

Table of Contents Show

Why does white in chess go first?
Does white always go first in chess?
Why is white always better in chess?
Does black have a disadvantage in chess?

There’s not racism in chess. White goes first because someone has to and it has to be a uniform rule so there’s no confusion. 1,000+ years ago they weren’t thinking “hmmm how can we promote white privilege into this game?”. They were thinking “well we only have tools to make black and white pieces, and one has to go first, let’s make it white”.

Shit like this is what’s wrong with society today. I’m not saying racism doesn’t go on or it’s not a problem, but when people turn over every stone to try to prove racism in places it isn’t, that itself is racist.

The unsatisfying answer is really just "because that's the way it is."

It didn't always used to be that way, but it was helpful to have one set color go first, because strategy depends on who goes first and who goes second so it was easier to always refer to the same pieces in the strategy.

White just kind of became standard. I guess we'll never really know the motivations for why it was preferred, it just kind of turned out that way.

Wikipedia actually has an article on it

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/White_and_Black_in_chess

I don't remember where I read this:

At the London Chess Club in the 1850s, there was a beautiful red and white chess set everyone wanted to play on. Members would fight over who got to use the red pieces.

The director of the club, in an attempt to cut down on the arguing, made the rule: whoever had the red pieces would have to let white go first.

And that's how the "white goes first" rule came into being.

Good post! Gotta make two corrections though:

A better comparison might be Go, in which the legendary player Honinbo Shusaku boldly claims that he never loses when he plays black, which goes first.

That claim is made in the Go-related anime, Hikaru no Go, which has a lot of embellishments. As far as I know, there is no historical reference to Shuusaku ever having actually said this. And indeed, if you look through game databases, there are a number of recorded games where Shuusaku played as black and lost -- even after he had been given the title of Honinbo.

Of course, Shuusaku did rarely lose as black in his later years, and he is known for having developed and popularized a very respected opening for black, which subsequently became one of the most well-studied openings, even today. However, I don't think there is actually any truth to him making the claim that he never loses as black -- rather, the anime made this idea popular, and it was probably added to emphasize the advantage that black begins with (assuming no compensation points for white), since that's the conversation in which the claim is made.

Also,

This makes sense, as in his era people didn't realize what a great advantage it was to go first.

This is definitely not true. While compensation points for white (komi) were not used during his era, it definitely was very well understood that black had an advantage, and the advantage was considered significant. In 10-game matches (jubango) which were played to determine correct handicap levels between two players, taking black 2 out of every 3 games was considered a handicap (the smallest handicap possible, equivalent to about 1/3 of a stone advantage), while taking black for all games was considered an even larger handicap (equivalent to about 2/3 of a stone). If a player lost too many games during the match, they would be "beaten down" to the next handicap level (which was often just taking black more frequently). This was considered a significant blow to the player's prestige -- as I recall, there was even a player who committed suicide after being beaten down, but after searching a little while I wasn't able to find his name. :( Too many references to playing suicide moves in an actual game.

I suspect that, without the komi, black will have an abnormally high win rate in modern tournaments.

This, on the other hand, is definitely true -- and it's actually how the correct komi value is set, for modern rulesets. When komi was first introduced, it was set to 2.5 points, on the basis that among "even" professional matches, black had a higher win percentage. After many matches were played with 2.5 komi, analysis of the games revealed that black still had a significant advantage, so komi was bumped up to 4.5, and again to 5.5 shortly thereafter. It remained at 5.5 for a long time, but analysis of "even" pro games still showed black to have a statistically significant advantage, so it was bumped up to 6.5. Some other modern rulesets now use 7.5 as well.

Analyzing modern games played with both 6.5 komi and 7.5 komi, it has been shown that with 6.5 komi, black has a very small (statistically insignificant) advantage, while with 7.5 komi, white has a very small (also statistically insignificant) advantage. It is widely believed by professionals that the correct value for komi is 7. But, of course, choosing exactly 7 komi allows for draws, so usually either 6.5 or 7.5 is still chosen for modern games.

Why does white in chess go first?

A beginner of chess learns the power of “white first” very quickly. They will see that an opponent will prefer the white pieces if given a choice. They feel a sense of empowerment even when they are playing a stronger opponent. For this reason, players who play white may be more motivated to win.

Does white always go first in chess?

What is the international chess federation's (Fide) rule on the opening move? Article 1.2 of the Rules of Play says “the player with the light pieces (white) makes the first move, then the players move alternatively, with the player with the dark-coloured pieces, making the next move.”

Why is white always better in chess?

In chess, there is a general consensus among players and theorists that the player who makes the first move (White) has an inherent advantage. Since 1851, compiled statistics support this view; White consistently wins slightly more often than Black, usually scoring between 52 and 56 percent.

Does black have a disadvantage in chess?

Does black have a disadvantage in chess? The answer is yes. Statistics show that black has a disadvantage in chess because players with the white pieces tend to win 52-56% of all won games. That means playing with black could result in significantly more losses than playing with white.