Queen swapping

Originally posted by Lord Erdrick
When do you trade queens with your opponent? I generally only do it when I'm at either a material or a positional advantage. However, if I'm at a positional disadvantage but a material advantage, I won't. How about you?

I agree with the first part of the post(exchanging when ahead in positional and in material.)
One should also exchange in the second case, i.e. ahead in material and in a positional disadvantage. Exchanging queen here will eliminate the opponents queen which can be a attcking piece. This way you can be comfortable going in the endgame with your material superiority.

Originally posted by Prashant
I agree with the first part of the post(exchanging when ahead in positional and in material.)
One should also exchange in the second case, i.e. ahead in material and in a positional disadvantage. Exchanging queen here will eliminate the opponents queen which can be a attcking piece. This way you can be comfortable going in the endgame with your material superiority.

This is a blanket statement, and is part of what I meant in my previous post. You cannot just decide to exchange Q's based on rules. Sometmies I exchange Q early in the game, sometimes I dont, it depends on what seems to help me most. As for the bit about exchanging Q when materially up but down positionally, your Q could be the best piece to defend with, or even counter attack with. By taking off your Q you could leave your opponent with a huge initiative if he has better developed pieces (which i guess would fit with him being up positionally).

Sticking to rules is one of the things that causes so many problems in chess (eg teaching rigid dogma on opening principles to juniors).