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On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

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Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#111

Post by xuki »

_the_inflator wrote: post #36
windowshopping wrote: post #28

I did something very similar with an old strategy game called Age of empires II. Over the course of two years I went from a 1300 rating to 1850. I don't play chess, so it's hard for me to compare the scales, but I will say the highest players were rated around 2600. I think being 1850 put me around 90-95th percentile for active players-- there were less than 50 players over 2300, and only a few hundred over 2000. My…

Hey there fellow AoE II player! Cool, to hear from some decent player. What time did you play? Around 2002? Since I was a 2k player at the time, let me assure you, that the top dudes at the time (Koven, Sheriff for example) were already so called pro gamers who got payed/sponsored and they were exceptionally good. The true story is, that many folks above 2k+ did what was called "points trading" back then. Koven once…

As someone who could never break 1750 on Zone, hat off to both of you. Even though I no longer play, I did follow the scene closely for a while until a few years ago. To my surprise DauT is still a top player, although one of his teammate is clearly the indisputable No. 1 by a distance compare to anyone else.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#112

Post by mantap »

tutfbhuf wrote: post #86
hvdfhbj wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I think that almost everyone should be able to achieve a solid 2000 elo rating, with enough dedication over the years I think you are massively underestimating the natural range of human intelligence. I don't think the average IQ 100 individual could ever reach an ELO of 2000 regardless of how much they practice, and half the population has IQs of less than 100.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23888814 > GM Hikaru Nakamura famously took the Mensa online IQ test and scored a very average 102 His elo peak rating is 2816. Just one example for an extraordinary strong player with average IQ (there are many other examples). I don't think that a high IQ is required to become a decent chess player (like 2000). It may help though.

If anything, top level chess players are likely to have missed some non-chess education when they were young due to being a chess prodigy, which would contribute to a lower IQ in adulthood.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#113

Post by ZephyrBlu »

globular-toast wrote: post #104
ZephyrBlu wrote: post #91

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate instead of just dropping a sharp comment? I'm curious about what you mean.

Sure. I see it almost every time I visit HN. I've encountered many people with a slightly warped sense of reality but none more so that on this website. There are two broad patterns I often see: The first is where they think everyone on the planet is somewhat like them. You'll see comments like "everyone should be able to program" or even "everyone should program". I've even seen people claim that ability to program…

I agree with what you're saying but it seems like you might have replied to the wrong comment.

The parent comment is making the same point as you about IQ: "I don't think the average IQ 100 individual could ever reach an ELO of 2000 regardless of how much they practice, and half the population has IQs of less than 100."

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#114

Post by sharedfrog »

mpol wrote: post #74

Two small notes, this seems not to be an official rating. The 1750 is reached at chess.com it seems. I play at lichess, where I am around 1700. My official rating is currently 1437, my highest rating ever was 1583 two years ago. So there is definitely inflation at lichess, and I would assume there is inflation at chess.com. So claiming 1750 ELO when it is not an official rating seems somewhat risky. Another note, he…

> So there is definitely inflation at lichess

I don't think it's inflation. Lichess simply uses a different formula (Glicko-2) than either chess.com or FIDE.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#115

Post by blub »

I would recommend chess for kids/teens, because it's an interesting way to teach certain self-control and tactical/strategy concepts which can be applied in real life.

As an adult, chess is a time sink with very little upside if you want to be at least decent, especially at longer time controls. I've been playing chess for more than a couple of decades, but recently decided to stop partly because of the pandemic, but mainly because it just takes too much time.

Chess at its core is a battle of intellects. It's not a relaxing thing like watching a movie, or cooking or even kicking a ball. It's a competition and at the end of each match there will be a winner and a loser. Unlike other sports it only requires mental effort without the benefit of working out the body.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#116

Post by Guthur »

nurettin wrote: post #110
arcticfox wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You might enjoy the games of Federico Perez Ponsa, chess Grandmaster. He plays Age of Empires II at a 2k+ level and is known as Fedex.

Thanks, that is interesting. I used to be 2000+ rated for AOE1 on zone.com and 1400+ chess on Yahoo! games back in late 90s, and to me it is a point of contention that I often bring up because chess is not motivated by capital greed whereas microsoft and their game studios are. And the dissimilarity between two games is pretty obvious to anyone who plays above 700 ranks.

Sorry, what?

What does MS market position have to do with the design of the game, it's not like it has any sort of monetization within the game mechanics at all.

You are conflating so much BS that it shows a profound lack of understand of both game mechanics and dare i say market economics.

It appears that you've rapped yourself up in some anti market bubble of cognitive disonance and can not longer think straight, I'm sorry for your pain.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#117

Post by jsnell »

hackerNoose wrote: post #103
sedivy94 wrote: post #31

Highly, highly recommend "The Queen's Gambit" on Netflix. Like wow.

It's not very realistic when it comes to the chess, except the actual games. I also found it frustrating that they obviously were inspired by Bobby Fischer whose real life would have made a great story, but decided he wasn't hollywood friendly.

The Netflix series was an adaptation of a 35 year old novel of the same name.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#119

Post by ricardo81 »

esfandia wrote: post #34

I've noticed a big time day-to-day correlation between my chess performance and the amount of sleep I had. Also, coming back refreshed from a 1 or 2-week vacation (with plenty of sleep) leads to an immediate boost as well.

Sounds like "The yips". I know what you mean. It's as if overusing part of the brain makes the connections less powerful than they'd normally be. Possibly already some credible science behind it.

Re: On Learning Chess as an Adult – From 650 to 1750 in Two Years

#120

Post by edanm »

mantap wrote: post #112
tutfbhuf wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23888814 > GM Hikaru Nakamura famously took the Mensa online IQ test and scored a very average 102 His elo peak rating is 2816. Just one example for an extraordinary strong player with average IQ (there are many other examples). I don't think that a high IQ is required to become a decent chess player (like 2000). It may help though.

If anything, top level chess players are likely to have missed some non-chess education when they were young due to being a chess prodigy, which would contribute to a lower IQ in adulthood.

I'm pretty sure IQ tests aren't supposed to work that way. At least theoretically, they're measuring intelligence, not education.
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