Here Comes the Horde!

Here Comes the Horde!

Pawns are the weakest pieces on the chess board. They can only move forward one space and can never look back. They always seem to be the pieces that are sacrificed and sent ahead on the front lines. But what if the pawns could defeat an army? What if there were an army of pawns? Enter Horde. 

In this chess variation, white is in control of a horde of pawns that have the objective of checkmating the black king. All that the black army has to do is capture all of white's pawns and defend against the pawn storm. In this game, I was playing with the white pieces with time control of 3 minutes and 2 second bonus. 

I would start the game off with d5, trying to take up more space in the center and go for the king. But black would play c6 as a pawn break, halting my attack. I decide to trade off my pawns, allowing black to develop his knight quickly. But I wouldn't let him easily develop, as I would continue pushing forward. 

I would attack black's knight, forcing it back. I would begin slowly moving my pawns up the center of the board. In hoard, you generally want your pawns to move as one big unit, rather than alone because of how weak pawns can be by themselves. But if they have their buddies with them, they are able to be an effective force because black will have to sacrifice valuable pieces for pawns. I also play c6, controlling critical light squares on black's queenside, making development very difficult. 

Black tries to defend by pushing out aggressively with d5, but forgets about en passant. After en passant, my horde is breaking through black's front line and is dominating the light squares. Notice how the pawn structure on the light squares are impenetrable. This causes black to take desperate measures and sack their bishop. 

Black continues by developing his knight, but I continue my march and clamp down the king side and play d4, taking full control of the center of the board with a line of pawns that is ready to storm down the center. Black tries to attack with his a pawn, but I simply trade it and keep the clamp on the queen-side. My pawn structure continues to suppress movement by controlling the light squares on both sides of the board and preparing to march down the center of the board. 

Black decides to sack their knight in order to break up my clamp on the queenside. Black also makes an interesting decision to push forward their pawn and sacrifice that as well. This opens up the entirety of the center and queen-side of the board for my pawns to storm. I still have to be careful not to leave the back of my pawns vulnerable, however, especially with the knight's tricky movements. 

I continue the game by pushing my pawns forward on the king-side so that I can open the entire board and allow my hoard of pawns to move in a wave that will crash over the entirety of black's position. Notice that black's pieces are all still on their starting squares except for the knight that black is sacrificing, with the king in the center of the board and no pawn cover. 

Black is able to activate their queen into the action and the center of the board, but I advance my pawns down the center and force black's bishop to the side of the board. Now, I shouldn't be too careless here and attack the queen because that would give black's bishop access to the back row. A big way to win in hoard for black is to get access to the back of the pawns, where they are defenseless from a backward attack. So I seel off the bishop's line of vision and trap the bishop. Although, the queen is going to pick up the rest of my overextended pawns. 

And as expected, black clears out my pawns and survives my first pawn storm. Black is left with all his major pieces and a single h pawn. However, I was already beginning the next storm, lining up my pawns on the center of the board. All I really had to do was advance slowly up the board as a line without opening any diagonals or files. The worst thing in hoard is when you open a file and allow your opponent's rook or queen to move to the back line and sweep all your pawns from behind. 

I continue with my planning, slowly creeping up the center of the board. Black tries to line up his rook on the a-file, which does prevent me from moving up the side of the board, but it isn't quite enough when there are 7 other files. Black would also blunder a fork of his queen and king when he started getting low on time, resulting in black sacking his queen rather than rook for the pawn. 

I line up my pawns to just keep moving forward, and black has a difficult time countering

I continue the push, building a simple pawn bridge since I don't have to worry about open diagonals. I would only have to worry about the king walking into the structure, but I play c4, cutting off all light square infiltration for the king. 

And black continues to play for a little while but soon resigns because there isn't a way to stop the impending horde from promoting. But what are your thoughts on this game? Do you think this game favors white or black? Let me know!

and ends up shuffling his rooks and gets pushed back.