Castling makes my King vulnerable???

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Viznik
Am I the only one who feels like castling makes my King way more vulnerable?

I’ve lost SO many games literally because I’ve castled, basically putting my king in a corner and letting my opponents queen attack it Willy nilly with help from its knight.

Just take a look at my most recent game. I was crushing my opponent, but he got checkmate because he infiltrated my castle. His king was stuck in center, which were told is terrible... but his king had way more squares to run to in check!

Why is castling recommended so heavily? I just don’t get it. I’ve lost so many games BECAUSE I’ve castled. It seems to be a disadvantage.
justbefair
Viznik wrote:
Am I the only one who feels like castling makes my King way more vulnerable?

I’ve lost SO many games literally because I’ve castled, basically putting my king in a corner and letting my opponents queen attack it Willy nilly with help from its knight.

Just take a look at my most recent game. I was crushing my opponent, but he got checkmate because he infiltrated my castle. His king was stuck in center, which were told is terrible... but his king had way more squares to run to in check!

Why is castling recommended so heavily? I just don’t get it. I’ve lost so many games BECAUSE I’ve castled. It seems to be a disadvantage.

It wasn't the castling that made your king vulnerable. This is not a crushing position for white:

You made many moves that weakened your castled position. First off, you sacrificed your only two developed pieces for a rook and a pawn. That is not a good trade. Then you tried to win with just your queen. Fortunately for you, your opponent was making bad moves too.

You are losing in the above position. Both of you were playing random moves but your opponent has almost all of his pieces available for an attack and you have only your queen.

Then you opened up a hole near your king.

Have you ever considered taking some of the lessons they have here?

XequeYourself

That move you do in turn 6 & 7 is one that newer players seem to find irresistible...I can say that as a newer player myself. It seems to make sense as 1+5 = 3+3 and it breaks up the king's defenses and exposes the piece but it's a terrible move and as you improve you'll only play opponents who can shrug it off and beat you consistently. 

You know the classic cliche moment in action movie scenes where somebody is in a gunfight, runs out of ammo and then throws their gun at their opponent in a last ditch attempt to get them? This move is kind of like going into a gunfight but throwing your loaded gun at the enemy before a single shot has been fired.

 

Mandy82

Castling is good, because your opponent can only attack it from half as many sides in the middle. When you weaken your position however, (by moving at least one of your pawns in front of your castled king) the opponent can attack the pawn that stepped out of line and it means you will have an open and vulnerable king, and since the opponent is  attacking you from a side, you only have 1 more place to move your king. 

Mandy82
aka-old-fart-5 wrote:

Castling is overrated and done too prematurely in most beginner games.  If executed early it defines the rest of the game and allows your opponent to set a strategy against you.  Castling needs to be part of a larger plan.  Too many new players hurry to castle and when I ask them why they don't even know.  More often then not I use castling as a change-up mid-game to throw the opponent off but it is always combined with other moves.

 

When you castle, you develop your rooks towards the middle, setting them up for the middle/endgame. Many Grandmasters and chess teachers/books recommend castling early. If you are a beginner, you still have to grasp the concept of chess as a whole and how the pieces work together. Then, you can use castling to your full advantage. One drawback of castling is that when ever someone castles in my game, I target the castled king and go to attack it, trying to checkmate or mess up his position. When the king is castled, there are many well known checkmating combinations. When the king is not castled, it may be more exposed, but will have more pieces around it in the opening. Why people castle early is so that in the middle game, when the pieces are developed and not in their starting squares, the king is not exposed.

Mandy82

You can wait a bit before you castle through, if you have a bad pawn structure on the kingside or the opponents pieces are attacking the kingside, you should castle queenside.

Mandy82

The things people say to beginners in the opening are to develop your pieces, control the center, castle early, don’t  bring out your queen to early, dont make to many pawn moves, and dont move the same piece twice, try to connect your rooks, as they are stronger together, and when you develop towards the center.

Mandy82

Yes, and for white he took the pawn, but the engine said he should of castled and it was only move 7!!!!

Mandy82

In the game, when black castles, it was the best move as well

Mandy82

Notice how they both made mistakes, but the major mistake is when white moved his pawn to h4 because up until then his king was fine but when he moved his pawn he made it a target for the queen. And when the queen took it, it opened up the h file and allowed an attack on the king.

Mandy82

This is very true, i dont disagree

Mandy82

Yes, correct

Mandy82

Gtg

Mandy82

Bye

Mandy82

Yes, correct. This is why in a previous post I said in order for castling to be used to its full advantage you have to know why you are doing it.

DasBurner

in that game that was posted up there, your king was completely safe until you played h4 for no reason

Mandy82

Yes, the king was safe until the what would be in my opinion a MAJOR BLUNDER that is impossible to save for white

Mandy82

( h4)

XequeYourself
aka-old-fart-5 wrote:

after 65 years of chess I cannot recall anyone of stature recommending early castling especially for an inexperienced player.  There are too many pitfalls and many more important strategies to learn

 

It literally took me two seconds to find somebody of stature recommending castling quickly "in the vast majority of cases".

https://www.chess.com/article/view/castling-early-and-piece-coordination

XequeYourself

Of course the advice is to assess your position first, but you have to give new players a break and assume it takes time to learn that assessment. But certainly a new player reading this would come away planning to castle early...