Alternate Valuations
Although the 1/3/3/5/9 system of point totals is generally accepted, many other systems of valuing pieces have been presented. They have mostly been received poorly, although the point system itself falls under similar criticism, as all systems are very rigid and generally fail to take positional factors into account.
Several systems give the bishop slightly more value than the knight. A bishop is usually slightly more powerful than a knight, but not always – it depends on the position (Evans 1958:77,80), (Mayer 1997:7). A chess-playing program was given the value of 3 for the knight and 3.4 for the bishop, but that large of a difference was acknowledged to not be real (Mayer 1997:5).
| Source | Date | Comment | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3.1 | 3.3 | 5.0 | 7.9 | 2.2 | Sarratt? | 1813 | (rounded) pawns vary from 0.7 to 1.3 |
| 3.05 | 3.50 | 5.48 | 9.94 | Philidor | 1817 | also given by Staunton in 1847 | |
| 3 | 3 | 5 | 10 | Peter Pratt | early 19th century | (Hooper & Whyld 1992:439) | |
| 3.5 | 3.5 | 5.7 | 10.3 | Bilguer | 1843 | (rounded) (Hooper & Whyld 1992:439) | |
| 3 | 3 | 5 | 9-10 | 4 | Lasker | 1934 | (Lasker 1934:73) |
| 3½ | 3½ | 5½ | 10 | Euwe | 1944 | (Euwe & Kramer 1994:11) | |
| 3½ | 3½ | 5 | 8½ | 4 | Lasker | 1947 | (rounded) Kingside rooks and bishops are valued more, queenside ones less |
| 3 | 3+ | 5 | 9 | Horowitz | 1951 | The bishop is "3 plus small fraction" (Horowitz 1951:11) | |
| 3½ | 3½+ | 5 | 10 | 4 | Evans | 1958 | Bishop is 3¾ if in the bishop pair (Evans 1958:77,80) |
| 3 | 3¼ | 5 | 9 | Fischer | 1972 | (Fischer, Mosenfelder & Margulies 1972:14) | |
| 3 | 3 | 4½ | 8½ | European Committee on Computer Chess, Euwe | 1970s | (Brace 1977:236) | |
| 3 | 3 | 5 | 9-10 | Soviet chess encyclopedia | 1990 | A queen equals three minor pieces or two rooks (Hooper & Whyld 1992:439) | |
| 3¼ | 3¼ | 5 | 9¾ | Kaufman | 1999 | Add ½ point for the bishop pair (Kaufman 1999) | |
| 3.20 | 3.33 | 5.10 | 8.80 | Berliner | 1999 | plus adjustments for openness of position, rank & file (Berliner 1999:14–18) | |
| 3½ | 3½ | 5 | 9 | Kurzdorfer | 2003 | (Kurzdorfer 2003:94) | |
| 3½ | 3½ | 5 | 9½ | early Soviet chess program (Soltis 2004:6) | |||
| 3 | 3 | 4½ | 9 | another popular system (Soltis 2004:6) | |||
| 4 | 3½ | 7 | 13½ | 4 | used by a computer | Two bishops are worth more (Hooper & Whyld 1992:439) | |
| 2.4 | 4.0 | 6.4 | 10.4 | 3.0 | Yevgeny Gik | based on average mobility; Soltis (2004:10–12) pointed out problems with this type of analysis |
Read more about this topic: Chess Piece Relative Value
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