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Chess tactics explained

chesstactics.org

111–120 of 271 posts

Re: Chess tactics explained

#111
post #2

I wondered if the popularity of 'The queen's Gambit' would lead to a brief infatuation with chess in the popular imagination. The fact I've seen about 3 chess related submissions on HN recently, where I don't recall ever seeing one before, suggests it does. I used to enjoy a game of chess back in the day, although I was never very good. And I always imagined myself playing chess with a remote opponent by post when I…

Chess has been popular on HN for more than a year. It was popular before covid lockdowns. Covid lockdowns have done a ton for chess popularity. Then queen's gambit is very approachable without chess knowledge. It's a perfect storm.

Re: Chess tactics explained

#112
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I sometimes play online and for some reason I frequently stumble upon users who cheat in all kinds of ways. From using a computer (it's easy to tell when all moves regardless of difficulty take exactly the same time to make) to baiting me to play a 3-min game and then changing it to 30-min right before I accept the game. The only reasonable explanation is that they are trying to harvest ranking to "transfer" it to an…

I have a completely opposite experience (on chess.com). Playing a lot of games lately at a low level, never stumbled upon a cheater.

I would imagine those that cheat at online chess wouldn't stay at a low level for very long.

Re: Chess tactics explained

#114

If you prefer learning by practicing, Lichess has a great introduction to most tactical patterns: https://lichess.org/practice Once you start mastering them, you can try real problems on Lichess as well ( https://lichess.org/training ), or try solving as many as you can in five minutes ( https://chesscup.org/ ), it's a lot of fun!

Does lichess practice have anything about fundamental principles? Like another commenter mentioned here, control the center etc. It looks like the current selection is mostly tactical, which will help with puzzles, but the fundamentals are missing (which will help with the basics of an actual game).

Re: Chess tactics explained

#115
About the author: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ward_Farnsworth

Interesting profile. Law school dean. Books on law, chess, and classicism.

His writings on chess tactics are immediately actionable for novices.

His books on classicism (and one on stoicism) employ a really unique technique: he puts forth an abstract point, then stands on the shoulders of many giants to support and thoroughly make it very tangible. All dressed up and presented with his personal commentary to make his lessons his own.

Re: Chess tactics explained

#116
post #16

> This site teaches chess in words. > It assumes you know only how the pieces move and builds step-by-step from there. Do not get me wrong: TFA is a fine and useful book for an intermediate player but the above claims are overselling it. They are equivalent to telling you that learning the x ^= y; y ^= x; x ^= y; trick will make you a better programmer while being silent on what copy-and-paste programming, magic cons…

Coming across the theory of Steinitz from [0] has made me look at chess in a different manner: at most levels of play rather than it being tactics or strategy, it is more about avoiding mistakes and waiting, prolonging play till oponenent eventually makes a mistake. My experience in over board play has been in concurrence with that view, one plays carefully parrying the opponent's move, while waiting till they make a…

Exeter Chess Club!!!

I remember this site from 20 years ago, one of the very first open knowledge repositories (chess related) that I had the luck to find back then.

Re: Chess tactics explained

#117

Looks like good information for beginners, but the hardest part of chess, for me, is the opening and how to play from move 4 onwards. It is less obvious why a strong position is a strong position early on, unless your opponent makes some very poor choices.

Typically in the opening you'd want to develop your pieces, control the center and move your king to safety. There are a lot of lectures for beginners covering opening strategies. For example: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xh4sO1ICS_Q

Re: Chess tactics explained

#118
post #2

I wondered if the popularity of 'The queen's Gambit' would lead to a brief infatuation with chess in the popular imagination. The fact I've seen about 3 chess related submissions on HN recently, where I don't recall ever seeing one before, suggests it does. I used to enjoy a game of chess back in the day, although I was never very good. And I always imagined myself playing chess with a remote opponent by post when I…

There is at least a correlation.

[1] https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=today%205-y&ge...

Re: Chess tactics explained

#119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The vast majority of grandmasters didn't play chess at age 4.

That's incorrect. I did a lot of ending puzzles and knew a lot about openings and variations at age 5, learned mostly because a father of a friend was very enthusiastic about it. I quit playing around age 7 because some kids there were really out of my league and there wasn't enough government or support for me to continue playing given that I wasn't the best. I still play to this day, but mostly amateurish and very…

Magnus Carlsen, the world champion, learned the rules of the game at 5 years old. Hikaru Nakamura started playing chess at age 7.

Re: Chess tactics explained

#120
post #38

> between good players, a one-piece advantage is enough to cause the disadvantaged party to resign. Is this accurate? I would have assumed that, say, positioning is equally important and a naive "count the pieces" assessment wouldn't hold much value.

To add to the other answers, part of it is also etiquette. If the only way you could recover a game was your opponent doing a really bad blunder, at a rating where such blunder is very unlikely you should simply resign.

Obviously, you have to take the whole situation in consideration. If the position is very tricky, you would play on even anyway. If your opponent is low on time, then it depends on your opinion on "dirty flagging".

This only applies to the top, as a +3 advantage is definitely not a guaranteed win unless you're at least a titled player.

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