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A general reminder: Please remember that there are players on both teams that have literally no chess experience prior to this game!  I'm not saying you should stop making effort posts and the like (because those are all great!), but it's great if you're willing to spend some extra effort to help less experienced players being able to understand what's going on! As for new players, don't be afraid to ask questions! Me/mentors/teammates are happy to help out!On the same note, apologies for slacking off with the infoposting recently! I'll be covering a few topics in the near future (primarily some thoughts on active defence and some ideas on when you want to make an exchange of pieces or not). If you feel that there are any other topics that are unclear and should be covered as soon as possible, let me know! Finally, I've been updating the Chess by Post-post in the OP regularly as goons sign up, check it out if you want an opportunity to play some friendly games. Edit: Last move on the last post of last page!
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Sep 20, 2017 19:48
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| # ? May 3, 2024 14:36 |
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Did you flip the board?
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Sep 20, 2017 21:24
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Yup! Or rather, I forgot to flip it. Fixed now!
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Sep 20, 2017 21:32
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Looking at that board, I think White's best options are more or less limited to capturing our pawn in d4. If they make practically any other move next turn aside from capturing that pawn (for example, by castling), we can get control of the center of the board through e7-e5: Two protected Black pawns in the center of the board puts us in pretty good shape going forward. So if they have to capture that pawn, the two options they have are Nf3xd4 or Qd1xd4. As discussed yesterday, we have the counter-move already for Nf3xd4 by going Bc8-d7 to allow our knight in c6 to threaten d4. If they go Qd1xd4, I believe our response should still be the same, since the end result is still the knight in c6 threatening to capture d4. I'll have to think about this some more, though.  If we end up in the board position above, what White moves should we be watching out for? anakha fucked around with this message at 00:12 on Sep 21, 2017 |
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Sep 21, 2017 00:09
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 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Qxd4 You have 24 hours to decide on a move.
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Sep 22, 2017 01:30
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anakha posted:
Likely they will remove the threat to the Queen by trading their Bishop for the Knight, but I don't see what else we can do now.
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Sep 22, 2017 01:59
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Huh, so they decided to bring their Queen out early. That could actually work in our favor later on if we can harass that piece since they don't have much else developed. In my last post, I suggested moving our bishop to d7, like so: However, I also see another interesting option now that they brought their Queen out. We can also try advancing our pawn in the a column, a7-a6:  This puts White in a position where both their bishop and queen are now under threat. The idea is that if we can keep pressuring those pieces, White has to focus on protecting them at the expense of developing their other pieces. They have three main options here that don't end up wrecking their board: 1. Start the bloodshed by capturing our knight with their bishop, Bb5xc6. After we recapture their bishop, we're left with the board below. White may have their Queen out, but we've developed our pawns more and still appear to be in a pretty even position.  2. Decline the exchange and move the Queen to the a column, Qd4-a4 (as seen below). This would protect their bishop by threatening to capture our rook if we make the capture with our pawn. In this situation, I like making the Bc8-d7 move mentioned in my previous post in respose as it frees up the knight to make additional moves later on.  3. Retreat the bishop to a4, Bb5-a4. This keeps the knight pinned in place and moves the bishop of out immediate danger. However, an easy response for us would be to move our pawn in the b column, b7-b5. This forces them to continue to move their bishop and Queen out of danger while we continue to develop with our pawns.  Literally any other move White makes aside from the three above allows us to either trade our knight for their Queen, or trade a pawn for their bishop. I like either Bc8-d7 or a7-a6 as our next move, but I'm not sure if I'm missing a better move for us. I'll think about it some more then vote later.
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Sep 22, 2017 02:13
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We don't have many pieces developed yet and we'd better make moves on the queenside of our board. With that in mind, I don't see any better moves for us other than those two anakha suggested. I think that moving our bishop is a more obvious choice, one that they might be ready for. Moving our pawn lets us do the same thing but later, as well as giving us more options and applying immediate threat. I'm definitely voting for a7-a6 for now, but let's see what others think. Also, I don't see their Queen sitting in the center for long, they might have to waste a move to get her out, so it's all better for us.
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Sep 22, 2017 09:39
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Bc8-d7. Gives us better tempo than his other option.
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Sep 22, 2017 10:29
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Loutre posted:Bc8-d7. Gives us better tempo than his other option. Would you mind elaborating on this? I'm not seeing how this move gives us any tempo. Voting a7-a6 for now, I think putting more pressure on the bishop is good.
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Sep 22, 2017 14:15
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After having thought about it some more, I'm going to put my vote in for Bc8-d7: I like this move better for the following reasons: 1. If they choose to exchange pieces via Bb5xc6, we'd go Bd7xc6 in return. This puts us like so:  , as compared to if we went a7-a6 first before they captured our knight.I prefer ending up with a bishop in c6 than a pawn since the bishop can threaten more spaces. 2. If they choose to back off their queen instead of exchanging pieces, we can still follow up with a7-a6 to chase off the bishop. This means we'll have forced them to waste turns getting their queen and bishop out of danger rather than developing their board. It's a small advantage, but we can hopefully snowball that later on.
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Sep 22, 2017 16:11
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If this was just me playing I would happily sacrifice a knight for a queen. I'm guessing such aggressiveness would lead to bad losses further ahead? Either way, I agree with Bc8-d7.
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Sep 22, 2017 17:16
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I like exchanging a knight for a bishop, a single bishop is crippled when compared to the pair. I'm for Bc8-d7, since the more developed Bishop puts pressure on the center. We should also think about setting ourselves up for kingside castling, or at least freeing our black bishop. Ibblebibble posted:If this was just me playing I would happily sacrifice a knight for a queen. I'm guessing such aggressiveness would lead to bad losses further ahead? If all you have to sacrifice to get their queen is a knight, you take that deal everyday and twice on sundays. We can't do it at the present moment 'cause our Knight is pinned.
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Sep 22, 2017 19:41
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Oh yeah, durr I completely forgot about the pin.
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Sep 23, 2017 00:01
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I'm all for that bishop move too, Bc8-d7 I had thought it was going to come into play eventually to help free our knight from the pin
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Sep 23, 2017 05:47
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 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Qxd4 Bd7 White has 24 hours to decide on a move. What do you think is the opponent's best move, and what is your best counter to that move?
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Sep 24, 2017 22:55
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If they make the right play (like they seem to have so far), I really can't see them do anything else other than trading their bishop for our knight (Bb5xc6). Retreating their queen kind of undoes the move they made getting her out there early. If they take the trade, as mentioned earlier, anakha posted:If they choose to exchange pieces via Bb5xc6, we'd go Bd7xc6 in return. This puts us like so:
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Sep 25, 2017 14:29
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Yeah, they probably will trade their bishop for our knight, retreating the queen is a no-no since it leads to a huge tempo loss and all the other places the queen can reach are either threatened or will generate a worse situation.
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Sep 25, 2017 17:37
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I would have personally said Nf3-e5 to contest the center of the board but that's just me being my usual aggressive self.
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Sep 25, 2017 19:36
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Ibblebibble posted:I would have personally said Nf3-e5 to contest the center of the board but that's just me being my usual aggressive self. Anything they do that isn't a)capturing our knight or b)retreating their queen gives us their queen for free, since our knight is now unpinned. That'd be a massive advantage for us.
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Sep 25, 2017 20:08
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Good point, I forgot that the queen was under threat 
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Sep 25, 2017 22:42
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Well, as others mentioned, there isn't any real choice here. We have to take a piece next turn, be it their Queen (unlikely) or their Bishop.
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Sep 25, 2017 23:19
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Do you think white has settled on a move yet?
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Oct 1, 2017 04:26
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Hey thread! Sorry about the lack of updates, the last week has been a perfect storm of being incredibly busy, fighting a pretty terrible cold, topped of with my laptop's supremely non-standard power adapter dying. The game will resume once I get a new one sorted out!
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Oct 1, 2017 20:12
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If they do Bb5xc6, do we want to capture the bishop with our pawn or our own bishop?
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Oct 9, 2017 13:44
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Odysseus S. Grant posted:If they do Bb5xc6, do we want to capture the bishop with our pawn or our own bishop? I'm in favor of capturing with the bishop. anakha posted:If they choose to exchange pieces via Bb5xc6, we'd go Bd7xc6 in return. This puts us like so:
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Oct 9, 2017 15:49
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Aaaand we're back! Sorry about the hiatus, hopefully people still remember this game exists   1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Qxd4 Bd7 6.Bxc6 You have 24 hours to decide on a move.
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Oct 10, 2017 21:41
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I'm down for Bd7xc6
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Oct 10, 2017 22:36
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Ibblebibble posted:I'm down for Bd7xc6 Yup, I think Bd7xc6 is the way to go.
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Oct 10, 2017 23:26
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Ibblebibble posted:I'm down for Bd7xc6 As analyzed above, Bd7xc6 seems to be the move.
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Oct 10, 2017 23:42
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Ibblebibble posted:I'm down for Bd7xc6 Do wonder what white will do as a follow-up to that though.
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Oct 11, 2017 00:46
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Bd7xc6
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Oct 11, 2017 12:07
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Bd7xc6 Depending on how they move, we might think about putting their king in check or developing our remaining knight. They should be more on the defensive, and I wouldn't be too surprised if they castle.
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Oct 11, 2017 13:18
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yep, going with Bd7xc6 because it's good
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Oct 11, 2017 22:01
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 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Qxd4 Bd7 6.Bxc6 Bxc6 White has 24 hours to decide on a move. Also: We're far enough into the game that we're well out of standard openings, so from this point on  looking up the board position or future lines is no longer allowed. Not saying you can't post if you've read up on lines earlier, but please refrain from doing it from this point on
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Oct 11, 2017 22:48
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I definitely see them castling next round, though there are other options. I'd suggest Kg8-f6; we might also have a chance to take their pawn, since e4 is attacked by our Bishop. Other than that we need to free our pieces on the left side of the board.
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Oct 12, 2017 10:11
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Flame posted:I definitely see them castling next round, though there are other options. I'd suggest Kg8-f6; we might also have a chance to take their pawn, since e4 is attacked by our Bishop. Other than that we need to free our pieces on the left side of the board. Couldn't have said it better. We need to open up kingside, and if they don't protect it with another piece or move it that is a free pawn, since I doubt they would trade the queen for the knight. That said, if they move it we might be in for some hard decisions. LupusAter fucked around with this message at 10:59 on Oct 12, 2017 |
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Oct 12, 2017 10:57
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 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bb5+ Nc6 4.d4 cxd4 5.Qxd4 Bd7 6.Bxc6 Bxc6 7.Nc3 You have 24 hours to decide on a move.
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Oct 13, 2017 13:46
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Let's talk about when it is a good idea to make equal exchanges of material! Remember, material is compared by the number of pawns a piece is worth. (8~ for queens, 5 for rooks, around 3 for bishops and knights - we'll get back to them) Knowing when to exchange is a big part of chess. Many new players (and some more experienced players) err either on the side of never being willing to make equal exchanges, or on the side of taking every exchanged offered to them. Neither gut instinct is usually correct - here are some ideas on when exchanging is a good idea. When you are up material: Generally speaking, you can comfortably trade off material from the board when you already have a material advantage. The reasoning for this is simple: Having 4 pawns to the opponent's 3 is a 25% material advantage, having 2 pawns to the opponent's 1 is a 100% advantage. Making equal exchanges makes your proportional advantage greater when you're already ahead. When you are at a positional disadvantage: If your position on the board is very constrained at you are under a lot of pressure on several important squares, trading material can be a good way to relieve the tension and take some of the pressure off, giving you more options. Conversely, when you are the one applying the pressure you want to avoid making trades as much as possible. When the exchange improves your position on the board: Oftentimes, this is done by worsening the opponent's pawn structure. These small positional advantages can be subtle and hard to recognise when you are new to the game, but they will add up over the course of the game. As a rule of thumb, pawns are stronger when they can protect each other, while doubled pawns (two pawns on the same file) are weak and hard to protect. This point also applies to situations when you can make the opponent lose tempo by recapturing with a piece ending up on a less relevant space on the board, but pawn weaknesses are longer term problems since pawn moves are irreversible. Conversely, you rarely want to make or offer a trade which allows the opponent to improve or repair their pawn structure. When you can trade a bad piece for a good piece: A "good" piece in this case is an active piece that can do dangerous things on the board. This is especially obvious with bishops, as their usefulness is very dependant on what pieces are stationed on their colour of square. A bishop hemmed in by your own pawns is a lot less useful than a bishop with a lot of potential targets. This is the reason why the relative value of bishops and knights is such a matter of debate: Not only do bishops tend to get stronger as the board clears (opening diagonals for their long range shenanigans), but their usefulness also varies based on pawn structure. Trading a bad bishop for a good knight is almost always a good trade. There are of course other scenarios when an exchange can be a good idea, but these are some of the most common things to look for. If you know that you are a stronger player in the late game than your opponent, or that your opponent happens to be extraordinarily good with a certain piece? Don't be afraid to trade! Just remember to avoid making exchanges without a good reason, and always remember that all the examples I've discussed work both ways: Trading for the sake of trading risk giving an advantage to your opponent!
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Oct 13, 2017 14:21
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| # ? May 3, 2024 14:36 |
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Ok, that knight is annoying but not immediately threatening. They are both deploying and keeping the possibility of castling alive, while protecting their advanced pawn. I think Ng8f6 is still our best move, we need to put pressure on the center or we lose it. We could be cheeky and go Qd8a5 to pin their knight and deploy our queen, but it is easily countered by either the bishop or castling. Voting Ng8f6 for the moment, but I'm very open to counterproposals.
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Oct 13, 2017 14:26
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