Silver general

How it moves

Compared with the gold, the silver gives up the sideways and straight-back steps and gains the two backward diagonals, for five directions in all. Black's silvers start on 3i and 7i. A silver may promote in the opponent's three ranks to a piece that moves like a gold, but the trade-off is real, so silvers are often left unpromoted.

How it is used

In Climbing Silver (bogin) the right silver walks 3h-2g-2f-1e and breaks through on the 2nd file together with the rook. In castles it sits beside the king: on 3h in the Mino, on 7g in the Yagura.

Its backward diagonals make the split silver (wariuchi) possible. Dropped just behind and between two enemy pieces, typically a rook and a gold standing side by side, it attacks both from behind, where neither can capture it.

Weak spots

A silver covers neither the squares beside it nor the one straight behind, so it cannot protect a neighbor on the same rank. That is why castles need golds as well as silvers. With a rough value of 5, it is a little cheaper than the gold.