# Chess: Why don't they actually capture the king? **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Tags:** chess\ **Created:** [February 25, 2025, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786 "2025-02-25T19:07:15Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![CookingWithGas](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cookingwithgas/32/485_2.png) [@CookingWithGas](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CookingWithGas)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 7:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/1 "2025-02-25T19:07:15Z")
I have only a very rudimentary understanding of chess. I know how it’s played but nothing about strategies or how to play well. Fortunately that’s not what this question is about. 1. Why must you announce that you have put the other player’s king in check? Seems like part of any game is to recognize when you’re in trouble, and any competent player would know when they’re in check anyway. 2. Why does the game end on a correct declaration of checkmate? Why not proceed to actually capturing the king, which seems like it would be more dramatic and satisfying? Is these rules intended to keep the game “sporting” or “gentlemanly”? I know it’s an old game, and the answers might be lost in the sands of time. But regardless of the origins, the tradition persists. ---
**Author:** ![Great\_Antibob](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/e47c2d/32.png) [@Great\_Antibob](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Great_Antibob)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 7:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/2 "2025-02-25T19:10:07Z")
As far as I know, it’s actually the reverse. At high levels, you don’t announce check or checkmate. It can be distracting for any other players in the vicinity. Your opponent should be aware of the game situation on their own. And should offer you their hand (resign) when the checkmate is obvious but before it happens. In classical formats, anyway. At low levels, well, neither of you may be good enough to recognize the situation, so it might help to announce it. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 7:11pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/3 "2025-02-25T19:11:13Z")
Because the opposing player cannot play any move other than one that removes the check. If a player in is checkmate, there are no viable moves. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![rippingtons\_fan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rippingtons_fan/32/11767_2.png) [@rippingtons\_fan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rippingtons_fan)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 7:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/4 "2025-02-25T19:29:36Z")
Checkmate=Shah Maat (The King is dead) ---
**Author:** ![Mangetout](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mangetout/32/19_2.png) [@Mangetout](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mangetout)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 7:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/5 "2025-02-25T19:36:01Z")
Yeah, I think the notion of the game ending on the king being trapped and _about to be captured_ is more dramatic than actually capturing him. Some really dramatic movie endings are like that - there is no escape; doom is inevitable and imminent, and the screen goes black. ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 7:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/6 "2025-02-25T19:41:27Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > Because the opposing player cannot play any move other than one that removes the check. If a player in is checkmate, there are no viable moves. I’d say this is the practical answer. Players are meant to play in turn, and so the capturing player would have to make two moves without the losing player playing his move. At that point, it gets weird anyways, so why not just end it? ---
**Author:** ![Cervaise](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/cervaise/32/16693_2.png) [@Cervaise](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Cervaise)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 8:32pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/7 "2025-02-25T20:32:13Z")
That’s true, but that’s also an artifact of the current ruleset. Player A puts B in check; B _must_ get out of check, with no other moves permissible. In a checkmate situation, B _has_ no move. Game over. But in the alternative posited in the OP, that restriction makes no sense. Consider: Player A _silently_ puts B in check; B, _not realizing it,_ makes a different move; then A captures B’s king (no doubt surprising B). This is obviously a different ruleset for the game’s finale, but it’s not impossible. I think that’s what the OP is asking about. How would the game, potentially, change? ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 8:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/8 "2025-02-25T20:46:28Z")
> [@Cervaise](#): > > This is obviously a different ruleset for the game’s finale, but it’s not impossible. I think that’s what the OP is asking about. How would the game, potentially, change? It would be trivial. If the king doesn’t move out of check, you’d immediately capture it on the next move. Doing anything else would be extremely silly. The only way it might have an effect is if neither player realized the king was in check, and the winning opportunity was lost. I suppose that might add some drama to the lucrative televised chess match industry. ---
**Author:** ![gnoitall](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/bb73d2/32.png) [@gnoitall](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gnoitall)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 8:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/9 "2025-02-25T20:58:47Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > I’d say this is the practical answer. The rules make it that way. A king cannot move into check or remain in check after the completion of the checked player’s turn. Together, those rules mean that checkmate, not a hypothetical capture of the king, is the end of the game, because checkmate means there are no legal moves available for the checkmated character – they can’t play anything, and they can’t pass their turn, and their opponent can’t take their hypothetical “capturing turn” until their opponent finishes theirs. ---
**Author:** ![Hoopy\_Frood](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hoopy_frood/32/8452_2.png) [@Hoopy\_Frood](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hoopy_Frood)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/10 "2025-02-25T21:03:54Z")
In blitz chess, you generally don’t say check, either. And if an opponent points out an illegal move you made, you lose immediately. So if your opponent checks you, and you don’t move out of check, they can either announce your loss or just capture your king. ---
**Author:** ![Pleonast](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pleonast/32/1183_2.png) [@Pleonast](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pleonast)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 9:05pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/11 "2025-02-25T21:05:16Z")
> [@Hoopy\_Frood](#): > > just capture your king Isn’t that an illegal move as well? What happens if both players have made illegal moves? ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/12 "2025-02-25T21:23:57Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > The only way it might have an effect is if neither player realized the king was in check, and the winning opportunity was lost. I suppose that might add some drama to the lucrative televised chess match industry. If that happens, I can finally pitch my script entitled _Blitzer_ about a young chess hustler grinding away on the dirty benches of Central Park looking who aspires to build a bankroll and compete in the World Series of Chess. “I’ve often seen these people, these squares at the chessboard, three pawns and a knight down and long odds against them. All their gambits gone. One last move on the board that can help them. I used to wonder how they could let themselves get into such bad shape, and how the hell they thought they could turn it around.” Stranger ---
**Author:** ![Horatius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/horatius/32/3572_2.png) [@Horatius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Horatius)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 9:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/13 "2025-02-25T21:26:49Z")
> [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](#): > > "I’ve often seen these people, these squares at the chessboard, three pawns and a knight down and long odds against them. All their gambits gone. One last move on the board that can help them. I used to wonder how they could let themselves get into such bad shape, and how the hell they thought they could turn it around.” Get Matt Damon (_Matt Damon!_) to star, and I’m in. ---
**Author:** ![Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/13edae/32.png) [@Stranger\_On\_A\_Train](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stranger_On_A_Train)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 10:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/14 "2025-02-25T22:21:31Z")
> [@Horatius](#): > > Get Matt Damon (_Matt Damon!_) to star, and I’m in. Yeah, but he has to play a Armenian gangster (“Garnik SNS”) with a terrible, exaggerated accent and a habit of drinking sweet coffee whenever he’s about to spring a gambit. Stranger ---
**Author:** ![HeyHomie](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/heyhomie/32/207_2.png) [@HeyHomie](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/HeyHomie)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 10:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/15 "2025-02-25T22:41:16Z")
We discussed an adjacent issue to this one a while back in this sub-forum, I’ll try to dig up the thread. Basically a popular and respected chess YouTuber/International Master proposed allowing the King to be removed from the board in certain situations. For example, under current rules, if you make a move that exposes your King to check, you just made an illegal move. IM suggests instead that your opponent should be allowed to capture your King and, too bad so sad, you just lost. In that thread someone brought up the historical taboo against “eliminating” the monarch, even in abstract, metaphorical, game form. In other words, it’s derived from an ancient societal construct that is largely no longer relevant (although I wonder if the rules are tighter in Thai chess, Thailand having pretty strong cultural and legal taboos against lese majeste). ---
**Author:** ![Andy\_L](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/c67d28/32.png) [@Andy\_L](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Andy_L)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 11:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/16 "2025-02-25T23:01:10Z")
There were stories about Ben Franklin in France playing chess (whether or not they were true is irrelevant - they were told, to make a point): "At these he sometimes met the old Duchess of Bourbon, who being a chess player of about his force, they very generally played together. Happening once to put her king into prise, the Doctor took it. ‘Ah,’ says she, ‘we do not take kings so.’ ‘We do in America,’ says the Doctor. " ---
**Author:** ![Pasta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@Pasta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pasta)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 11:41pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/17 "2025-02-25T23:41:05Z")
The game would change dramatically due to the existence of stalemate in the current rule set, without which the game loses substantial depth. If you had to play until the king is captured, then ending your turn in check would be an allowed board state. But then something like [Diagram 1 here](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stalemate) is no longer a draw by stalemate but rather a win for white. From this kernel of a change, most of endgame depth and strategy would be upended. If a player is up by one pawn they would have, in a vastly larger number of cases, a trivial win, and the weaker side would have no path to holding the game. ---
**Author:** ![Thudlow\_Boink](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/thudlow_boink/32/320_2.png) [@Thudlow\_Boink](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Thudlow_Boink)\ **Post date:** [February 25, 2025, 11:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/18 "2025-02-25T23:48:21Z")
These threads look similar: > [@Chess: Why Can't The King Be Removed From The Board?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-cant-the-king-be-removed-from-the-board/989133): > > [This chess YouTuber](https://www.youtube.com/@GothamChess) (an International Master) supports a change to the rules: basically, that the King can be removed from the board. Specifically, if you and I are playing and you move a piece that reveals a check on your King, well, too bad so sad, you just lost – as opposed to FIDE rules that say you’ve simply made an illegal move. Similarly, move your King into Check and, well, too bad so sad, you just lost – again, as opposed to FIDE rules that simply say you’ve made an illegal move. I rat… > [@At high levels of chess how would the game change with no check?](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/at-high-levels-of-chess-how-would-the-game-change-with-no-check/985994): > > If FIDE were to simplify the rules of chess to “capture the king” and do away with check, (except regarding castling), and stalemate what major impact would that have on high level play: 2 obvious ones are that a K+P v K is now always a win if the K can protect the P and K+2N v K is now a win. Games potentially leading to those endgames will be evaluated differently. Any other major impacts this would have? ---
**Author:** ![aceplace57](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aceplace57/32/3500_2.png) [@aceplace57](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aceplace57)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2025, 1:02am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/19 "2025-02-26T01:02:59Z")
I prefer wizards chess where the Knights are 7 feet tall and have real swords. [![](http://images5.fanpop.com/image/photos/27800000/Wizard-Chess-harry-potter-27851111-500-330.jpg) ](http://images5.fanpop.com/image/photos/27800000/Wizard-Chess-harry-potter-27851111-500-330.jpg) It is an awesome chess set. [![](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/article/4/1/0/839410.jpg) ](https://s3.crackedcdn.com/phpimages/article/4/1/0/839410.jpg) ---
**Author:** ![Kent\_Clark](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kent_clark/32/105_2.png) [@Kent\_Clark](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kent_Clark)\ **Post date:** [February 26, 2025, 1:24am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786/20 "2025-02-26T01:24:10Z")
> [@CookingWithGas](#): > > Why not proceed to actually capturing the king, which seems like it would be more dramatic and satisfying? Actually, the most dramatic and satisfying thing I ever saw was my father’s melodramatic way of resigning a game. He would signify suicide by tapping his own king, knocking it over, and then extend his hand to his opponent. For years I thought that was a traditional resignation gesture for all players. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/chess-why-dont-they-actually-capture-the-king/1014786.md?page=2)