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Three minutes sounds awfully low? Though I guess it depends how many more moves are left in the game (and how hard they'll be). I'd be interested to hear other people's thoughts but I'd have thought this is pretty dangerous below at least 5 minutes or so. Though maybe the panic is still more dangerous. Personally I like to take a few breaks like this mid-game with tons of time left, just get up and go to the bathroom or whatever, but I don't know if that would help your stress buildup or if the panic ramps up suddenly out of nowhere. I'd still recommend it though, if only to get you in the habit of actually relaxing during the breaks. Also you don't want to stare at the chessboard intently for an hour and 56 minutes and then suddenly go walk around with four minutes left, or your opponent will realize you're desperately stressed. You'll probably stress more because you know he knows, and he'll get a boost of confidence and might try to rattle your cage more. That's not the end of the world and again it might be better than the alternative, but it's definitely not ideal. McNerd fucked around with this message at 13:33 on Jun 29, 2012 |
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Jun 29, 2012 13:30
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CowOnCrack posted:Spotting that in Blitz is pretty impressive. Um, I believe After 1...Nf4+ both responses lose. 2. Kf1 loses to 2...Qh1# while 2. Kg1 loses to 2...Nh3+ 3. Kf1 Qh1+ winning a rook. 1...Nf4 2. Qg2#
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Jul 8, 2012 16:17
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JerryLee posted:I read that as him saying that if 2. Kg1 then ..Qg2#. Just poorly typed. Yeah, sorry.
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Jul 8, 2012 20:04
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E4C85D38 posted:I finally scrounged up enough money to get a USCF membership and go to a tournament. As long as you've analyzed those games, you're on your way!
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Jul 30, 2012 00:00
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Attorney at Funk posted:Can anyone recommend a primer on chess for someone who doesn't know anything more advanced than "how the pieces move"? I'm asking for a, uh, friend There are about a billion that contain largely the same basic, universally agreed-upon information. (Unfortunately, and rather amazingly, despite this I haven't been able to find any good comprehensive free online resources.) Nimzovitch's "My System" is certainly an option, especially if the idea of soaking in a piece of chess history appeals to you. Nimzovitch invented (or at least was the first to codify) a lot of what is now considered fundamental knowledge. Personally I'd venture you can find modern writers who have maybe refined the notions a little better and probably write in a style more accessible to modern readers, but some people swear by it, and for some people the historical interest might help motivate you to keep studying it. Personally I really like Lev Alburt/Sam Palatnik's "Comprehensive Chess Course, Vol. II." It's written in the form of lesson plans for chess coaches, but don't let that dissuade you: it's very clearly written and has a wealth of material including lots of practice problems (very important) as well as good recommendations for further study. Volume I of that series is all basic rules and probably not necessary for you, although you should go on Wikipedia and make sure you know all these. Contrary to common opinion there aren't that many and none are especially difficult; this ain't American football, although there is an amusing story of a grandmaster getting up to ask a referee about the 'subtleties' of castling. The main rules which most beginners don't know are details of castling, the ways a draw can arise, and en passant (be sure you know the history of this one, it makes it easy to remember). Anyhow if for whatever reason that doesn't appeal, like I say there are a jillion other options, half a jillion of which were written by Bruce Pandolfini. Anything of his that advertises itself as a general primer is probably okay. Edit: I agree that the book recommendations below aren't appropriate at your level, except possibly the very earliest chapters of Silman's Endgame Course. Even Silman doesn't recommend his own Reassess Your Chess, for instance, until you've reached at least 1200 (or maybe even higher, I don't remember) which will take you a while even on chess.com where ratings are inflated by a couple hundred points in my experience. And if Silman doesn't want your money you know he's serious! (Which makes sense: how do you reassess what you haven't assessed in the first place? That book is all about exceptions to general rules and reexamining simplistic ideas that most chess players of a certain level have learned from other books and sometimes from experience. Yes I know, there's an argument to be made for preventing the formation of bad habits instead of correcting them later, but not in this case.) Edit 2: Almost all chess books are best read with a board at hand, and are best studied in depth. These aren't novels you read through and maybe skim a little when you're bored. They're textbooks, though some are denser and drier than others (and primers in particular will usually be relatively light and conversational). For best results you want to absorb every last drop you can from that book; I must have read Comprehensive Chess Course a dozen times before I finally felt I'd outgrown it. But of course chess for most people is a hobby; make whatever tradeoffs you must, that's better than making yourself miserable and quitting. McNerd fucked around with this message at 07:17 on Aug 15, 2012 |
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Aug 15, 2012 05:25
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Forgot to mention earlier, but I was surprised to find that "The Complete Idiot's Guide to Chess" is quite good too. (It's written by a former US champion.) http://books.google.com/books/about/The_Complete_Idiot_s_Guide_to_Chess.html?id=kPd5Cg52QxEC
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Aug 15, 2012 18:22
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Aggro posted:
I can never pass up an opportunity to recommend this site for a really comprehensive look at elementary tactics. Here is the first page about this mating pattern in particular.
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Mar 26, 2013 00:36
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Great post! Is there any chance you may have confused Comprehensive Chess Course Vol 1 with Vol 2? (Or thinking of the version where both are printed in one book?) Vol 1 is mostly just the rules of the game. Which is well and good and I guess I sometimes underestimate the importance of such things, but Vol 2 is absolutely fantastic and I hate to see it left out in the cold.
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May 2, 2013 04:12
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CrimsonSaber posted:A couple books that have been getting a lot of positive attention for learning tactics, and may be appealing to young people is Both of these books are online free at chesstactics.org. Absolutely fantastic; it completely changed my perspective on the game and made me love spending time on tactical puzzles.
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Jun 29, 2013 05:00
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Jonked posted:I've been reading books on building my opening repertoire, and doing tactic puzzles to build up my middle and end games, but... The advice I keep reading is to study your middle and end games, but I don't really know how to do that beyond what I'm doing now and playing more games It sounds like you're a beginner, or at least you've never taken the game seriously before this? For endgames, start off by learning to checkmate with a lone King and Queen or King and Rook against a King; then how to Queen a single Pawn/stop it from being Queened. You should be able to do all these flawlessly with both hemispheres tied behind your head. There are decent tutorials for all of them on YouTube (let me know if you can't find them) and there's a site here where you can practice them against a computer. (Don't worry about all the other ones on there; some are very advanced, and few if any are really appropriate for you to worry about.) These are important so that you have a clear path toward winning a won game. Beginners often have problems: they'll be up a piece but that isn't enough, they feel--perhaps correctly--they need two extra Queens or something ridiculous. And so, where a good player would calmly trade material until there's nothing left but one Pawn in a position to Queen (or if the opponent refused to allow these trades, they'd use the threat to bully the opponent around), the beginners continue attacking recklessly in an effort to expand their advantage, and wind up making mistakes or even stalemating with their two Queens. Don't worry about opening repertoire (although basic opening principles are a different story). You can memorize a few moves but ideally you should just never play a move you don't understand. Look at it this way: most published lines drop you off at a position that's basically equal (or so close that only a high level player could tell the difference). But you start off in a position that's basically equal. So, what a waste of time learning all this stuff! Strong players use opening theory; they learn the strategic principles that apply in one specific opening, hoping they'll have a better understanding than their opponent. But before you do that, you need to learn the strategic principles that apply to all games. If you were learning to be a general, what would you learn first: the strategic ins and outs of one particular battlefield, or how to command an army? Of course the latter is better, even if you could reliably lure all your enemies to that precise battleground and keep the battle from flowing outside its bounds. (Which you can't.) If you're interested in a book recommendation, I always recommend Lev Alburt's Comprehensive Chess Course, Vol. 2. (Vol. I is just the rules.) This contains the endgames I talked about (and maybe more, I forget) along with everything else you could want from a first book. Unfortunately I can't think of any good online resources for basic middlegame strategy, if you're not up for buying the book. Then, the free ebook at https://www.chesstactics.org is absolutely fantastic and covers basic tactics in nauseating detail; it's worth reading every page if you have the time, or skimming if you can't. Silman's Endgame Course is great too for continuing beyond the bare-bones endgames I outlined, but should probably wait until you're finished with the other two books (which could be quite a long time if you really try to soak the material in). McNerd fucked around with this message at 15:47 on Jul 29, 2013 |
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Jul 29, 2013 15:27
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Regularly analyzing your games is absolutely a good use of your time. Those who don't learn from history are doomed to repeat it. That said, computer analysis is only one tool for analyzing your games: it's good, but what's even more important is going back through the game move by move and figuring out how your plans went right/wrong. It's also worth asking a better player's opinion now and then. You can always post a game on here or elsewhere and ask for feedback. For best results, include at least some of your own analysis when you do this. (The more you share your thought process, the better others can critique it, and the more they'll spend their time discussing mistakes you haven't already figured out. Also for some people this seems to be an etiquette issue, like, why should we spend time thinking and writing about your game when you can't be bothered to?) Incidentally the engine at chess.com is not so good, I'm told? Although it might be sufficient for your purposes, and undoubtedly it's fine at basic blunder checking. Maybe someone else will chime in to suggest a good alternative? You don't want to use what I use. McNerd fucked around with this message at 17:31 on Jul 29, 2013 |
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Jul 29, 2013 17:26
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he1ixx posted:Resign? (this was a game against me, I think) I'm sure this is a joke but Black has a lot to work with here; it's not remotely time to think about resigning. You've got the Bishop pair in a pretty open position, open files for Rooks, a nice centralized Pawn, a space advantage, the d4 square. Your opponent's advantages probably outweigh these but it's up to them to prove it, and indeed, here they are saying they don't know how! quote:Honestly, this game (and many I am playing with aggrosa) are interesting because they have many moves which I just don't see coming at all. I'm not even sure how to respond to most of them as he plays very aggressively and puts me in positions where I feel I need to respond and by the end of the volley, my defenses are in disarray and I'm without hope of recovery. Really hard to say much without seeing an example of this play. (Or was there a move in this opening that you didn't anticipate?) But if you routinely don't see your opponent's forcing moves coming at all, or anticipate their results, it sounds like your main problem, and you would want to address it directly, not hide from it by backing down from tactically tricky situations.
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Jan 3, 2014 19:14
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Tony Montana posted:Ok, next time I'll do that and I know. He was still playing like a dick.
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Feb 25, 2014 22:06
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Snorb posted:As terrible as I am at playing chess, I actually beat my DS at it in Clubhouse Games. Granted, it was set to Easy, but a victory's a victory. OK I'm making a couple of quick formatting changes so this is viewable in a PGN viewer like this one. You can just copy/paste the whole thing in there if you want; you don't even have to delete my comments. 1. Pc3 Pc6 2. Qa4 Qb6 {I guess you were a little lost for ideas and you imitated the computer's play? These are both poor moves. The pawn on c3/c6 blocks the square that the Knight will likely want to go to, and it's just too passive. Seize the center with a move like 1...d5. Bringing the Queen out early is a classic beginner mistake: with proper defense, the Queen can't do much in the beginning except to be harassed by less valuable pieces.} 3. Qc4 Nf6 4. Qf4 Nd5 5. Qxb8 Rxb8 6. Pe4 Nc7 7. Bc4 f6 {What was f6 for? Assuming of course you didn't know White would hang a Pawn. Again you could go ahead and play something like e5 to fight for the center.} 8. Pe5 Pxe5 {If this is the point where you beat yourself up for doubling your Pawns, don't. A free Pawn is worth it! And if it weren't you could always just sacrifice it back. } 9. Pb4 Pe6 10. Pa4 Bxb4 11. Pxb4 Qxb4 {Do you know the classic values of the pieces? Two pawns for a Bishop is not a worthwhile trade, generally speaking. Obviously there are exceptions. Anyway now that you are winning by a Queen you should just play calm simple chess. Activate all your pieces, look for chances to trade until you're the only one who has anything left. If your opponent refuses to make equal trades then you can push them around. Don't do anything wacky that complicates the game and gives you opportunities to screw up. Most games especially at this level are (or could be) won by this procedure of obtaining a significant material advantage and simplifying the game.} 12. Na3 Qc3 {These sorts of mistakes happen to everyone, especially beginners. But you should be aware, you would have had this game in the bag when your opponent gave up their Queen on move 5. If you can practice double-checking your moves to avoid mistakes like that, really this would be the single biggest thing you can do to improve your game.} 13. Pxc3 Pe4 14. Bg5 Pd6 15. Ph4 O-O 16. Be7 Rf4 17. Bd8 Kf7 {Not sure what the purpose of your move here was. But you should always ask yourself what the reason for your opponent's move was. Answering this question would have saved you your Knight.} 18. Bxc7 Ra8 19. Bd8 Ke8 20. Bc7 Kd7 21. Bxe6+ Kxe6 22. Bd8 Kd7 23. Bg5 Pa5 {Again, you'd have caught the straightforward threat to the Rook if you'd asked} 24. Bxf4 Ra6 25. Bg5 Rb6 26. Nb5 Ke6 27. Bd8 Rxb5 28. Pxb5 Pxb5 29. Rxa5 Pd5 30. Ra8 Bd7 31. Rb8 Ke5 32. Ra8 Pd4 33. Rb8 Pxc3 34. Ra8 Pc2 35. Rb8 Pc1=Q+ 36. Ke2 Qb2+ 37. Kd1 Qxf2 38. Bc7+ Kd5 39. Rg8 Pb4 40. Rf8 Pb3 {The computer could have taken your Queen here and won the game} 41. Rg8 Pe3 42. Ne2 Pb2 43. Nc3+ Kc4 44. Rh2 Pb1=Q+ 45. Nxb1 Pe2+ 46. Kc2 Pe1=Q+ 47. Nd2+ Qexd2+ 48. Kb1 Ba4 49. Ka1 Qde1# McNerd fucked around with this message at 14:41 on Apr 1, 2014 |
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Apr 1, 2014 02:47
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Oh, looks like I forgot to close some of my braces; maybe that's the issue? I fixed them, it's working for me now. Anyway don't beat yourself up; this is where every beginner starts except maybe child prodigies like Capablanca. But in all honesty strategy wouldn't really have helped you much here; if you could have kept from giving away pieces you could have done almost anything and won. Even looking multiple moves ahead wasn't really necessary here. (Although of course both are important in general.) I think your main strategic lesson for the day should be that thing I said about how to play when you have a big material advantage. If you want more, maybe learn the three classical goals in the opening: to control the center, get your pieces active, and castle. These should be your main focus in the opening, and all were a bit lacking. (Though I see you noticed the problem that you blocked in your Bishop and Rook, which goes toward piece activity, so that's good!)
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Apr 1, 2014 15:08
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Okay seems like a good time to review basic Bishop and Knight strategy in case anyone's interested. A Bishop has the advantage of longer range; the Knight has the advantage of being able to jump over things. It's generally agreed that in the middlegame, the Knight is stronger in closed positions--ones where the board and especially the center is clogged with Pawns for the foreseeable future--while the Bishop is better in open positions where it can stretch its legs. Strong players are always cognizant of whether the pawn structure is open or closed and will always work to create a type of position that favors their forces; it's never left to chance. Less knowledgeable players don't think about this and don't deliberately aim toward either type of position; in my experience they almost always wander into open positions where the Bishops are better. When the stronger player plays the weaker player of course they will probably be able to set up their desired type of position. (As with any strategic battle they'll set up dilemmas where the weaker player must either cede this advantage or give up something else. The weaker player might sense the other threat and avoid it, but since they don't understand the nature of this pawn structure business, they won't anticipate this dilemma and won't be able to avoid it. So the lesson here shouldn't be to favor Bishops when you're playing beginners: the lesson is to play correctly and learn to bully beginners with your superior positional understanding.) Another issue is that Bishops can only travel on one color. When the opponent only has one Bishop you kind of know where it'll be; you can anchor his own Pawns on that color to get in his way, and you can keep vulnerable targets like loose Pawns on the other color where they're safe. When the opponent has both bishops they don't have that problem. Consequently, having the "bishop pair" is considered to be worth roughly about half a Pawn. I suppose you could interpret this to mean that the first Bishop to be captured is much more valuable than the second, and usually more valuable than a Knight. For whatever reason it usually isn't phrased this way though. In the endgame it's sometimes said that Bishops are typically stronger when there are Pawns on both sides of the board due to their range but Knights are stronger when the Pawns are only on one side because they can cover both colors (and range isn't such a factor). I think the Bishop pair usually beats B+N either way? It's also notable that Bishop-and-pawn endgames with opposing Bishops of opposite colors are notoriously drawish: it's very easy for the defending side to block Pawns from advancing across particular squares while the opposing Bishop has no ability to interact with those squares and stop this. Another common drawing idea is when the attacking side has a Rook-pawn and a bishop on the wrong color, the defender can simply sit their King in the corner and can't be dislodged without stalemate. Obviously avoiding these types of situations (or achieving them, if you're the defender) is of paramount importance and if you have to trade your Bishop for a Knight or even for a Pawn, that's what you do. McNerd fucked around with this message at 16:28 on Apr 2, 2014 |
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Apr 2, 2014 16:00
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Descriptive isn't really any harder to learn, it's just super-hard to avoid mistakes because of how the coordinate system changes. But there isn't really much reason to learn it these days anyway.
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Apr 7, 2014 15:13
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You need to develop your pieces and not make so many early pawn moves in general. To point out a couple in particular,
McNerd fucked around with this message at 22:27 on Sep 4, 2014 |
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Sep 4, 2014 04:09
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Some notation errors here, but you'll get better with practice. Pawn captures should be written like 7.exd5, not just 7.xd5. quote:1. I've started using this opening after learning that it's the quickest way to castle. Why is quickly castling important to me? I don't know yet. quote:3. I was debating between Bc4 to cover the center or Bb5 to attack the king. I decided to be the aggressor in hopes of disrupting black's opening. quote:7. Take d5 or castle? I didn't like the imminent pawn fork, so I took. Pawn fork? No danger here that I see. After something like 7. O-O dxe4 8.dxe4 you'd be just fine. That said, Black's offer of a free central Pawn is far too kind to pass up. I think you're definitely right to take. (Though even better would be 7.Nxd5, which grabs the Pawn and avoids doubling your own Pawns.) quote:8. Now seemed a safe time to castle. You should have captured on move 8 and not risked letting this opportunity slip away. Your opponent is now simply down a Knight for nothing. This would in all likelihood be a game-winning advantage for a stronger player; at your level it's still quite a nice lead. Castling is important but this is much higher priority, unless Black is mounting an immediate and reasonably serious attack that you need to get the King away from. quote:12. I noticed a possible rook fork from black. In fact 12.Bb3 looks all right, blocking the way to the b-pawn and moving the Bishop to a diagonal where maybe there's more going on. So the lesson here about how to respond to your opponent's threats is twofold. First, calmly assess whether the threat is really something to worry about at all. Then if it is, try to defend with a multipurpose move that improves your position and blocks the threat, rather than a passive move like 12.a3 which does nothing to help you. quote:17. Nf5 seems to have better results than Qxd8. Qg4 or Qh5 avoids losing either the Queen or Knight here. (Qc1 even saves the c-pawn too.) You can afford to spend a few passive, even awkward defensive moves to get all your pieces comfortable and out of danger. You're up a Queen for a Bishop and entitled to a pretty easy win if you just keep things simple. quote:19. I think black should have played Be8, but then again this was the easy setting. McNerd fucked around with this message at 21:45 on Sep 10, 2014 |
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Sep 10, 2014 20:09
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dee eight posted:More to the point, rooks generally belong on open or half open files. Odds are that the c, d, and/or e files will open first in most openings and the King's rook will likely be most effective on the e file and the Queen's rook on the c or d file. As always, that's a general rule not to be followed blindly. As well, castling is usually how you connect the Rooks along the back rank (i.e. clear the space between them so that they protect each other). This is a textbook example of great piece coordination. The Rooks protect each other, and one can take over the other's duties if it moves or is traded or even sacrificed. It's also a first step toward doubling the Rooks on the same file, which can be a very powerful formation if you can create a target or a weakness to exploit there.
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Sep 11, 2014 00:01
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Very welcome. By the way, nice mate! Of course it's easier (and generally more useful) to talk about what went wrong than what went right, but sometimes I forget that newer players may be discouraged by such negativity; sorry if it comes off that way.
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Sep 11, 2014 18:14
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I'm guessing he was referring to your bishop, but no this is not a Nimzo-Indian by any means. In fact I don't think it's really very much like a Nimzo-Indian; your pawn on e5 for instance makes quite a huge difference. Grain of salt on that last part though as my opening theory is crap.
McNerd fucked around with this message at 14:02 on Nov 11, 2014 |
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Nov 11, 2014 06:35
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