5.3.

Local Force Superiority

The first and most important criterion to evaluate the success of an attack on some
area of the board is to determine the number of attacking pieces and the number of
defending pieces.
If for example, White attacks the black king with 3 pieces and Black defends with 2
pieces, the attack might have good chances. Without the intention to confuse you: in the
same time, Black can have 3 pieces ready to counter-attack on the queenside, defended
by 2 white pieces. Here, the harmony between pieces (the attacking group) and the
importance of the weakness pieces attack have a very important role.
Everyone should know that a piece usually can do no harm when attacking alone. For a
successful active operation on the kingside or queenside, the player should create a
superiority of forces on that area of the board.
However, notice that the bishops can attack even from the other side of the board
(example: 2 bishops on b2 and d3 can see the kingside).
The rooks usually attack from a long distance using open files, but they can attack from
the other side as well (a white rook which entered the opponents camp on a7, for
example, can see the black kingside).
The queen is a special case, of course. In order to use her full power, the queen should be
used close to the area of attack, as the knights. For example: if White attacks on the
kingside and his queen is on c2, the queen will be no stronger than a bishop; if the queen
is on h5, the queen acts and moves as both a bishop and rook together.

Situations for building local force superiority

The type of the centre has a very big influence for the premises and success of creating a
superiority of forces on one of the flanks.
When the centre is open or dynamic, the players should usually keep their pieces
centralized or targeting important central squares as from there they can move easily
from a flank to another. However, when the centre is closed or semi-closed, so secured,
the players usually bring their pieces on one of the flanks.

1. Closed Center
When the center is closed, building local force superiority on one of the flanks is almost a
requirement of the position. However, almost all the time, the agglomeration of pieces
should be preceded by advancing the pawns on that side, in order to create space for
maneuvers and open files for rooks.
In the situation of the closed centre, the player who is able to open the position, bring
more pieces, creating real threats first, gets the initiative.

This position is from a theoretical line of the

French Defense. Here, Black already pushed the cpawn and, now, he brings his pieces to get the
initiative on the queenside:
5... Qb6 6.Qd2 Bd7 7.Nf3 cxd4 8.cxd4 Rc8 9.Nc3
Na5 10.Rc1 Bb4 11.Bd3 Nc4 with good play for
Black.
In this example, you could see that Blacks only
interest was on the queenside. He continuously
developed the pieces on the same area of the
board, which is a very good strategy (when this is
possible) in positions with closed centre.

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Black is to move

2. Static center
When the centre is semi-closed, the attacks on flanks have good chances for success, but
the consequences of moving the pieces on one of the wings have to be seriously
calculated beforehand as the counter-attack on the other side can be very dangerous.
So, while the attacks in positions with closed centre should run in any circumstances as
fast as possible, when the centre is semi-closed (static), some weaknesses should be
created on opponents camp before moving the pieces on that side. This way, creating a
superiority of forces on that side should bring the initiative as the second player has to do
defend the problematic square/s of his position, not being able to create a counter-attack
on the other side.
If there are no weaknesses or easy targets in opponents camp, the attack can fail while
the counter-attack will run easier on the other side of the board. In the lesson piece out
of play, we saw examples of how bad bringing the pieces on one of the flanks can end if
the attack runs slowly (the pieces can become even out of play).

Also, when the pieces are not supported by advancing the pawns (like in the closed
centre), some neat maneuvers are usually required to arrange the pieces for a good
collaboration. This aspect is very important and it will be studied in the next lesson.