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Hand Knit posted:This is a learnable pattern, something that’s easy to find when you’re told there’s a solution but very few people would find it in a game. yeah i doubt i would find that in a game but when told there is a solution, i found it pretty quickly
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Jan 31, 2022 02:48
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I think where my brain would stop is "oh I see that I could sac the bishop to get that fork, but since they can just move their queen away it's too risky"
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Jan 31, 2022 03:41
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Maugrim posted:The ending was
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Jan 31, 2022 05:44
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Possibly it helps to see the pawn as effectively pinned by the fork threat. What do you do with a pinned piece - attack it. And they have no way to defend it so you're winning the pawn at absolute minimum as well as cracking open their defensive structure.
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Jan 31, 2022 08:47
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Maugrim posted:Possibly it helps to see the pawn as effectively pinned by the fork threat. What do you do with a pinned piece - attack it. And they have no way to defend it so you're winning the pawn at absolute minimum as well as cracking open their defensive structure. I think it's hard to "see" for inexperienced or low players like me because the pawn is literally surrounded by pieces, but they are pieces that can't protect it except the queen. So your mind kind of rules it out as a target.
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Jan 31, 2022 19:28
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I'm a returning chess player who's been blown away by the amount of resources online these days. I was in a chess club in high school, play some with my partner, but recently taught my 4yo how to play and that got me back into the game in a more serious way. I had been hesitant to play against randos online since I'm not that strong but after a crash course in lichess's puzzles to help shake the cobwebs off I secured my first online win. Yes, I made several mistakes upon review and yes, my victory is mainly because the other guy blundered their queen but a W is a W. It felt particularly nice since the game before was a very humbling mate in 9 moves that left me wondering if I should even bother with opponents that aren't baby bots or literal babies. I really enjoy what I'm getting out of the quick "find the best move" puzzles, I don't know how I made it this far without really clocking that they exist. It helps to have a computer there to correct you and rank you.
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Jan 31, 2022 20:47
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The principle that let me see it really quickly is "remove the defender" because once you see the family fork threat you see the defender is the pawn. You can remove the pawn by saccing the bishop.
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Jan 31, 2022 20:47
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LawfulWaffle posted:I'm a returning chess player who's been blown away by the amount of resources online these days. I was in a chess club in high school, play some with my partner, but recently taught my 4yo how to play and that got me back into the game in a more serious way. I had been hesitant to play against randos online since I'm not that strong but after a crash course in lichess's puzzles to help shake the cobwebs off I secured my first online win. Yes, I made several mistakes upon review and yes, my victory is mainly because the other guy blundered their queen but a W is a W. It felt particularly nice since the game before was a very humbling mate in 9 moves that left me wondering if I should even bother with opponents that aren't baby bots or literal babies. Welcome back to the game. I think there are a number of people with similar stories, myself included - former school/club players lured back by lockdown and/or the Queen's Gambit Netflix show. Being able to watch IMs/GMs on YouTube crushing games whilst explaining their thinking in depth is the kind of thing you just couldn't get back in the day without hiring a personal coach.
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Jan 31, 2022 20:51
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Where I thought I knew how to play chess I'm finding that I really just knew how the pieces moved and how to think two or three moves ahead. The key concept that I think is sticking with me now is piece values and letting that kind of logically direct exchanges and attacks. I know that I have made plenty of moves where I could take a rook with a knight but decided not to because I would lose the knight and I thought I could use it better elsewhere. But accepting that the enemy rook is a more dangerous piece than my knight and letting that guide some of my decision making has certainly unlocked something internally. It's made me more aggressive, for one. Since it's been so long between being serious about chess, I've found that my opening game is really weak. A short time ago I would have said starting with 1. Nc3 was just as valuable as 1. e4, and now I understand a lot more about the theory behind why I was wrong. Once pieces are developed I feel a little more comfortable but the kickback from playing against people who have a tenuous grasp of the game to playing against 900+ bots and players definitely made me feel inadequate. Fortunately I know that it's an area I could improve on, but the first dozen moves are pretty scary atm. Any favorite YT personalities I should check out? I stumbled onto GothamChess recently and like the content and delivery, but I haven't gone exploring. I figure people have their favorites for one reason or another. I don't have a lot of free time to sit on Twitch and watch streaming content, although I'm interested in the idea. If it helps I like positive people who can get through a game without strong language or verbally lashing out; I don't know what the shock-jock equivalent in chess is but I'm certain it exists.
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Feb 1, 2022 06:54
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ChessNetwork is notably soft-spoken and has a good series of videos on beginner to master that it sounds like you'd get a lot out of. Daniel Naroditsky also has a gentle teaching style and his masterclass speedrun videos cover a lot of good stuff. I find GothamChess makes for good entertainment but his analyses go too fast to be very useful to me.
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Feb 1, 2022 08:40
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think i met my first cheater, but hesitant to report them in case it’s just me being overly suspicious. anyone know what i should be looking for?
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Feb 1, 2022 17:05
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jesus WEP posted:think i met my first cheater, but hesitant to report them in case it’s just me being overly suspicious. anyone know what i should be looking for? well step one would be turning on your monitor
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Feb 1, 2022 17:25
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wow
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Feb 1, 2022 17:30
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i'm no expert at exposing cheaters, but i would be looking at 1) how many mistakes the computer finds with their moves during the post-game analysis 2) how much time was spent on each move. In particular, there are certain positions where a human would need to take a longer time to find a good move. If your alleged cheater is banging out perfect moves every 10 seconds (or however long it takes for him to copy-paste your moves into the engine) no matter how complicated the position is, then i think it's clear that player is cheating.
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Feb 1, 2022 17:52
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jesus WEP posted:think i met my first cheater, but hesitant to report them in case it’s just me being overly suspicious. anyone know what i should be looking for? Don't be afraid of reporting. It just means they will be looked at my other eyes. You don't need to be sure, they won't ban unless they are sure, and they are the ones that know what to look for.
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Feb 1, 2022 17:52
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Helianthus Annuus posted:i'm no expert at exposing cheaters, but i would be looking at 1) how many mistakes the computer finds with their moves during the post-game analysis 2) how much time was spent on each move.
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Feb 1, 2022 17:54
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LawfulWaffle posted:Any favorite YT personalities I should check out? I stumbled onto GothamChess recently and like the content and delivery, but I haven't gone exploring. I figure people have their favorites for one reason or another. I don't have a lot of free time to sit on Twitch and watch streaming content, although I'm interested in the idea. If it helps I like positive people who can get through a game without strong language or verbally lashing out; I don't know what the shock-jock equivalent in chess is but I'm certain it exists. Agadmator is kind of the gold standard. He covers major events day by day, then goes back and covers the careers of past masters when there's nothing big going on in "Sagas". (Capablanca Saga, Fischer Saga, Tal Saga, etc.) It's pretty chill coverage with pauses at significant moments of the game where you can try and figure out the next move, and continuing the game past the point where one player resigns to show why he or she resigned. His videos got me back into chess after decades away from the game.
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Feb 1, 2022 18:13
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jng2058 posted:Agadmator is kind of the gold standard. He covers major events day by day, then goes back and covers the careers of past masters when there's nothing big going on in "Sagas". (Capablanca Saga, Fischer Saga, Tal Saga, etc.) It's pretty chill coverage with pauses at significant moments of the game where you can try and figure out the next move, and continuing the game past the point where one player resigns to show why he or she resigned. His videos got me back into chess after decades away from the game. Agadmator is great but I don't think he is the best teaching resource for players trying to break out of beginner level. He'll have the occasional comment like "The rook looks like it's hanging, but not really, if Bxe4 then Ne7 forks the king and queen", "White wants to get his knight to this excellent central outpost" or "here we see all of Black's pieces are on the queenside, so White goes for a kingside attack" etc. but the games aren't really presented in a way that is trying to walk you through the logic of every move. He'll say things like "of course if Bxb7 then Rxa7 and Black just has no way out of this position" which may be obvious to a stronger player but if you are 1000-level, you'll want it spelled out more clearly why.
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Feb 1, 2022 18:32
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The Oh My Lands series by Daniel Naroditsky is the most instructive chess content I've ever seen https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLT1F2nOxLHOefj_z54LNBpnASnIROm43e
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Feb 1, 2022 18:34
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jesus WEP posted:it was a daily game and dude has 90-100% accuracy most every game (around 1100 rating on chess.com) How are they only 1100 with those accuracies, have they just not played many yet? As others have said you can report and let chess.com's algorithms take a look at it, they are supposed to be decent at detecting this stuff.
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Feb 1, 2022 18:54
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Maugrim posted:How are they only 1100 with those accuracies, have they just not played many yet? they've only played a handful of games - they've won all of them except two losses to the same person i don't want to link their profile because i don't want either them or me to be doxxed 
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Feb 1, 2022 18:57
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Carbolic posted:Agadmator is great but I don't think he is the best teaching resource for players trying to break out of beginner level. He'll have the occasional comment like "The rook looks like it's hanging, but not really, if Bxe4 then Ne7 forks the king and queen", "White wants to get his knight to this excellent central outpost" or "here we see all of Black's pieces are on the queenside, so White goes for a kingside attack" etc. but the games aren't really presented in a way that is trying to walk you through the logic of every move. He'll say things like "of course if Bxb7 then Rxa7 and Black just has no way out of this position" which may be obvious to a stronger player but if you are 1000-level, you'll want it spelled out more clearly why. Yeah, I really like agadmator and will recommend him to anyone who'se interested in high level chess matches. But he's better at "entertaining video about interesting high level games" than at "teaches basic chess".
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Feb 1, 2022 19:13
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Maugrim posted:I find GothamChess makes for good entertainment but his analyses go too fast to be very useful to me. i wanna like levy but every time i watch one of his videos i feel like i play worse afterwards. if i want edutainment i just tune in to chessbrah
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Feb 1, 2022 20:23
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Thanks for all the recommendations. I'm really gelling with the Oh My Lands series, I appreciate how Daniel plays the live games as he commentates. The moments he pauses and lets the viewer try to find to move are also very educational.
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Feb 1, 2022 20:36
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I’m a big fan of Ben Finegold, personally. He’s a chess educator and used to teaching kids, so his lectures are both interesting and easy to watch. I know some folks don’t enjoy his persona, though. I’m not sure watching him has really improved my game much, but honestly I don’t think you can expect much improvement from videos, and there are a few things I’ve picked up.
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Feb 1, 2022 21:14
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Finegold is the best for fun factor (assuming you're a fan of condescension toward small children), and I think he's actually pretty good to learn from if you're still at a stage where you don't even know what to learn. I unironically started off at a pretty decent level before ever playing a game of legit chess just from watching him and trying to process what was going on, while I definitely would have bounced off of specifically educational stuff. By the time you start looking for more focused material you will also have experienced every single one of his jokes  Guy definitely has a formula he sticks to.
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Feb 1, 2022 21:26
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jesus WEP posted:Daniel Naroditsky I watched two of his "watch me do puzzles" videos and my puzzle rating went up 200 points basically instantly. 
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Feb 1, 2022 23:27
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Finegold and Naioditsky are the best teachers on YouTube imho because they combine high level chess ability (both strong GMs, especially so in Nairoditsky's case) with a lot of experience teaching kids. It really shows in how they explain concepts that they have done a lot of teaching and know what works. Someone like Hikaru is of course an insane player, but he can struggle to explain precisely his thought process in a way a sub-2000 player can understand clearly. tanglewood1420 fucked around with this message at 03:59 on Feb 2, 2022 |
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Feb 2, 2022 01:40
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I have yet to find a YT creator who I enjoy for actual chess instruction. Naroditsky is probably the closest I've seen, and thanks for the Oh My Lands rec because that seems like it'll be pretty good. I think that the video format, especially the reposted livestreams, are just a less than stellar instructional method. There are a ton of moments in Naroditsky's videos where it's clear he wants to show why a certain position is winning/losing/advantageous, but instead his opponent hangs a rook on their next move and he had to switch gears. A lot of the others seem to fall into the pattern of just running through the moves of a game, and going "well this is the move he made, and this is the move he actually should have made... well actually, this is the move he should have made, because Bb5 is losing, and his opponent would reply with this, and then his move would be XXX. But if he went Ne5 then takes, takes, takes, takes, takes and now he'd be down a bishop. Oh, and a5 here would be a dubious line, but it actually came up in *insert historical game* because it might encourage your opponent to move this piece and then you'll get a lead in development. Oh, and if all of this is sailing straight over your head, well too bad because I haven't even pointed you in the direction of the theory underpinning what I'm saying" If I just want to watch videos about chess, Eric Rosen and Levy Rozman all the way.
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Feb 2, 2022 02:20
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i started watching ben finegold videos before i was into chess because i found the mixture of his hatred for his students, his viewers, and himself to be incredibly compelling despite having no grasp on the subject matter
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Feb 2, 2022 06:13
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I just appreciate Naroditsky not flying though his low rating matches. I really like the approach of "oh, this is a puzzle set up. See if you can solve it." It does fit with his recurring philosophy of "If you do the puzzles, you'll see these set-ups faster." He also isn't playing optimally, letting some ideas play out just to demo them and he can come back after the match to run through the alternatives. As someone who's spent enough time with educators I also appreciate his thought process behind the introduction of terms and concepts. It's clear that he is keeping his audience in mind and has an idea of the hierarchy of chess education.
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Feb 2, 2022 06:18
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Levy, Rosen, Danya, Finegold are all very good but only Danya is really devoted to instructional content. When the others do that kind of content, aimed at the 1200 -1500 level then it's pretty good. Levy in particular has a ton of different content series but his instructional stuff is mostly part of his paid courses. All of them have experience teaching young children and if you watch their individual lessons with other streamers you can tell they're very good teachers when they need to be. Agadmator, the Chessbrahs, BotezLive and Hikaru less so, but they have different audiences. I don't watch enough Nemo or the old school chess network stuff to comment.
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Feb 2, 2022 14:58
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jiggerypokery posted:Anyone got a favourite offline puzzle/training app? also wondering this EDIT: so far, only found this https://github.com/brianch/offline-chess-puzzles Helianthus Annuus fucked around with this message at 21:13 on Feb 2, 2022 |
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Feb 2, 2022 18:28
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been trying something new with puzzles lately: flipping the board and trying to find the move for the opponent. Anyone ever try this? Its a hell of a lot more difficult for me than just doing puzzles normally -- i have lots of practice finding good moves for myself, and not very much the other way around. Am i facing an uphill battle to get better at this? Is there some cognitive shortcut to map one onto the other?
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Feb 2, 2022 18:31
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John Bartholemew also has a 'Climbing the Rating Ladder' series and I think he instructs well. He has been described as having "strong youth pastor energy", which is spot on, but I like him and find the videos easy to watch. Similar to Naroditsky in my opinion, but from a slightly lower level.
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Feb 2, 2022 20:35
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if you want a nice simple opening repertoire for black, john bartholomew’s scandi course has a free version on chessable
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Feb 2, 2022 21:27
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https://lichess.org/kIacz8oYsiT2 My play's been horribly uneven lately, so I'm really happy with this game. I first played the opening in 2019 and, while I knew the first few moves, I've never really gotten a handle on the ideas. This is the first time I feel like I actually played through the opening coherently. Specifically, the whole structure that comes from taking the bishop on g6 (making sure black has to take with the pawn) and then getting in e5.
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Feb 3, 2022 17:03
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Nice game. That ending double pin is beautiful. I rarely end up feeling comfortable playing fianchettoed positions so I've never even considered going King's Indian as white. On the subject of openings we're not comfortable with, this is the first time I've felt in control playing against the London system - I used the line recommended in the Chessbrah building habits series, and it felt like my opponent was extremely constrained after the queen exchange while I could storm down the queenside at leisure. This was a daily game albeit against a lower-rated opponent. E: let's see if this works https://lichess.org/TJUxrhri/black [WhiteElo "1222"] [BlackElo "1372"] 1. d4 d5 2. Bf4 c5 3. e3 Nf6 4. c3 Nc6 5. Nf3 Qb6 6. Qb3 c4 7. Qxb6 axb6 8. Na3 Ra5 9. Ne5 e6 10. Be2 Bxa3 11. bxa3 Rxa3 12. Bg5 Rxc3 13. O-O b5 14. Rfc1 Ne4 15. Rxc3 Nxc3 16. Bf3 Nxe5 17. dxe5 b4 18. h3 b5 19. a3 b3 20. Bd1 b2 21. Rb1 Nxb1 22. Bc2 Nxa3 0-1 Maugrim fucked around with this message at 18:34 on Feb 3, 2022 |
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Feb 3, 2022 18:14
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I recently had this game, and while chess.com gave me an accuracy of only about 77% IIRC, it feels like one of the smoothest games I've ever played. https://lichess.org/BtER7ioI [White "Kalanco"] [Black "FeyChess"] 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 f6 4. O-O Bc5 5. c3 d6 6. b4 Bb6 7. a4 a6 8. a5 Ba7 9. d3 Qe7 10. Na3 Be6 11. Qb3 f5 12. Bxe6 Nf6 13. exf5 Ng4 14. Bg5 Qf8 15. h3 h6 16. Bh4 g5 17. fxg6 Qf4 18. Bf7+ Kf8 19. hxg4 Qxg4 20. Bf6 Rh7 21. gxh7 { Black resigns. } 1-0 The poor bastard just got murdered.
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Feb 4, 2022 13:09
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Been working through an endgame book and I think I found some puzzles which would be good for this thread. Before sorting out particular lines, trying to figure out what the key idea is. I'll put the answers in the next post. (1) white to move and win  (2) white to move and win  (3) white to move and draw  (4) white to move and draw 
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Feb 4, 2022 17:07
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