Who Plays Black & Who is White in a Chess Game

Video Transcript

In chess, there are many rules and many conventions. And one of them is that the white pieces always play first. And in chess, it is an advantage to play first, because it does give you the initiative. And as we get more into the tactics and the strategy of the game, you'll see why it is a big advantage to have that initiative. So the question then becomes, "well, how do you decide who is going to play with the white pieces and who is going to play black?" And the traditional way of doing this is that one of the players will pick up a pawn of each color, and will hide it behind his back, and will then bring out the two hands. And the other player will then choose one of the hands and whatever color is in that hand is the color that he will get. So let's just assume that the opponent has chosen this hand. The opponent has the white pieces. They are lucky. They are going to get to move first in this particular game. In the next game, of course, you would reverse it. And what is typically done, now that the other player is playing white, to avoid rearranging the pieces, is simply swivel the board around.

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