As mentioned, chess strategy concerns long term goals through evaluation of current positions and using that evaluation to create both short term goals and long term plans. chess strategy requires players to consider a number of factors like piece value, area control, pawn formation, king safety and attack positions. With the most basic strategy is to judge position based on piece count.

Although minor details have changed from the history of chess 1000 to 1850 the overall strategy has remained the same.

Common point values consider pawns to worth a point, knights and bishops to be worth 3 points, rooks to be worth 5 points and queens to be 9 points. King’s don’t undergo sacrifice (as that would end the game) and so aren’t assigned a point value. In fact, king’s often don’t come into play until the “endgame” phase.

These basic values are then altered given other factors such as position, how they work with other remaining pieces or whether that piece is more advantageous than another given the formation in use. For instance, pawns that have advanced are considered of more value than those that have yet to move; a pair of bishops is considered to be a better pairing at coordinating attacks and whatnot than a bishop and knight pair; and knights are considered to be good pieces to have in an encircled position while bishops are thought to be advantageous in open boards.

One of the more important early game factors in evaluation is known as pawn structure or pawn skeleton. In other words, the configuration of pawns on the board. This is because of the relatively limited movement of the pawn. Without a proper structure, pawns are easily isolated and captured. Most players will expose weak pawn structure.