King

• A point value cannot be placed on the king since it cannot be traded without ending the game. Because of this, a king's role on the board is not to get captured rather than assisting other pieces.
  
  However, during the end game when the likelihood of the king being captured is reduced, the king's relative strategic value is four; in between a bishop or knight and a rook or queen.
  
  

Queen

• The queen is the most valuable piece on the board in terms of strategy. The queen has the skills of both the bishop and the rook, making it a potent force in any role.
  
  Queens are even more powerful when used in combination with other pieces to achieve strategic goals, since they can be used for multiple purposes throughout the game.
  
  

Rooks

• Rooks are very strong pieces. Although they are not as strong as queens, as they cannot move diagonally, their horizontal and vertical mobility is equal to that of a queen.
  
  Rooks also take more importance at the game's end in trapping enemy pieces to certain sections of the board in what is known as "pinning;" as well as allowing a king to take a better defensive position in a move known as "castling."
  
  

Bishops

• Bishops are pieces that share the queen's ability to move diagonally across the board but not their ability to move horizontally or vertically.
  
  Each bishop is limited to a single color on the board in its movements. This makes a bishop less useful for pinning than queens or rooks since enemy pieces can evade bishops by moving to different colored squares.
  
  Bishops work best in tandem with other pieces and near the board where more squares are available for their movement.
  
  

Knights

• Knights can move two spaces horizontally or vertically and then one space to the left or right after that, making an "L" shape.
  
  Like bishops, knights are not very useful in pinning and are more useful when used in combination with other pieces, particularly at the center of the board where their mobility is increased.
  
  

Pawns

• Pawns are the least valuable pieces since they can only move forward and capture diagonally adjacent pieces. Pawns are generally used for strategic actions not important enough for more valuable pieces; although pawns can be turned into more valuable pieces if they reach the end of the board.