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Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

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Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#131

Post by jules »

trycatch wrote: post #54

By the way, there is a very interesting tournament going on currently -- TCEC, unofficial computer chess championship [1]. The main intrigue of the tournament is the fight between Stockfish and Komodo. Houdini, dominating engine in the last few years, already lost any chances to go into the superfinal -- two very strong challengers, Komodo and Stockfish, in the last few months were able to eat huge advantage of Houdi…

Do you know of a document explaining the most important ideas in these chess engines? I know about alphabeta search and the like, but I'm wondering what the secret sauces in the recent best chess engines are.

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#132

Post by vadman »

auctiontheory wrote: post #106
klapinat0r wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you mind to elaborate on what you mean by playing tactical vs. strategical? (part of my yearly "now I'll get started with Chess again")

Tactics: knowing what to do when there's something concrete to do, aka calculation. Strategery: knowing what to do when there's nothing obvious to do, aka vision, planning.

Upvoted for "strategery" :)

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#133

Post by jonathansizz »

Peroni wrote: post #72

I'm an experienced poker player however I'm an absolute chess novice. Aside from the obvious "just practice" advice, what are the best resources to fall back on in terms of books, videos etc if I wanted to learn the game in significant depth?

Don't worry about reading lots of chess books and learning all the theory or openings (other than the basics, that is). The main things you should do are:

1] Develop a good thought process and general approach to the game. NM Dan Heisman has an excellent series of articles ('The Thinking Cap', 'Novice Nook' and others). Find his stuff and study it well.

2] Tactics, tactics, tactics! chesstempo.com is my favourite place for tactics problems. Make an account there and play regularly; you'll see a huge and rapid improvement in your game. There are many great books that cover this ground as well.

3] Play regularly at reasonably slow time controls (necessary to utilize and internalize the proper thought process), mainly against players who are slightly better than you are. FICS or ICC are great places to play online (humans, unlike chess engines, will not allow you to take back your mistakes, which tends to focus the mind!).

4] Analyze your games. Ideally you'll have a stronger human to help you with this, otherwise get a strong chess engine. Identify your major tactical blunders and remember the patterns so you can avoid making the same mistakes in future.

5] Go through annotated games of the strongest grandmasters. There are lots of collections available. Good ones for starters are Morphy, Marshall, Spielmann, Alekhine, Tal and Kasparov (highly tactical players).

6] You can also find GM games where one player resigned. Take the winning side and finish the game against a chess engine on its highest strength. See if you can convert the win.

7] Now you can read a bit more about strategy, openings, etc. Try to play openings that lead to open, tactical positions (forget about whatever the latest fashions amongst grandmasters are). Excellent choices are the various gambits, and ancient openings like the Spanish, Italian, etc.

Good luck and have fun!

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#134

Post by JRobertson »

klapinat0r wrote: post #92
jrs99 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it may mean he went from being a more calculating type of player(tactical), which you can win many games with, to being a more positional type of player (strategical) which takes a much greater understanding of the game.

Would you mind to elaborate on what you mean by playing tactical vs. strategical? (part of my yearly "now I'll get started with Chess again")

Strategy refers to overarching objectives that will direct the larger part of your moves throughout the game.

IE - Knowing your opponent is aggressive with their queen and having plans in place to quickly neutralize her, or being good at manipulating your opponents pieces util it gets to a point where you can gain a strong advantage by castling.

All these objectives form the basis of what you're trying to accomplish with the ideal being that successfully executing your major objectives will gain you victory.

Tactics refers to how well one reacts to and overcomes changes on the board.

IE - Based on the current board layout you notice that a certain move(s) will heavily fortify a section of the board that you previously were not focused on, or seeing your opponent set up for a particular pattern of play you feint a reaction only to hit them somewhere else.

As a tactical player he focuses more on evolving his strategy(larger objectives) to fit the board rather than trying to manipulate the board to fit his strategy more so than the average chess player.

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#135

Post by dsbmac »

klapinat0r wrote: post #92
jrs99 wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

it may mean he went from being a more calculating type of player(tactical), which you can win many games with, to being a more positional type of player (strategical) which takes a much greater understanding of the game.

Would you mind to elaborate on what you mean by playing tactical vs. strategical? (part of my yearly "now I'll get started with Chess again")

In chess, tactics are usually shorter term moves that aim to gain material advantage or mate. Pins, skewers, discovered check, forks, double attacks, etc. These are usually in a time frame of around 2-3 moves. This is often described in chess terms as 'concrete' threats.

Strategy concerns more of theoretical ideas, long term possibilities. 10+ moves ahead. This involves pawn structure, where your king is positioned, how your pieces are developed, which side of the board left or right you might launch an attack, end game considerations, etc. How you intend to defend or win the game. This type of play is usually called positional. Whereby the placement of your pieces gives you an overall advantage. In GM level play this is very subtle and 15+ moves ahead. Positional vs. tactical.

As an analogy tactics are like cobra strikes and positional play is like a boa constrictor where tiny shifts strangle the opponent in the end. Both are lethal.

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#136

Post by tzs »

po wrote: post #32

During the press questioning the computer they were using froze up a bit and Anand became frustrated and rattled through his thinking out loud instead. The commentator then asks Anand something along the lines of "did you think through all of these complications?" and his response was a curt "no, I was thinking of what to eat tonight." "Yeah… so, do we have questions to the players?" oof... such high stakes and he ju…

> The commentator then asks Anand something along the lines of "did you think through all of these complications?"

The question was "did you try really to calculate [...]?" which is quite a bit different that "did you think through all of [...]?". The latter is implicitly asking if perhaps he was not successful at seeing through the variations (which is a reasonable question). The former is asking if he even tried, which is not a good question.

He had come out of the opening with a significant lead in time, and near the end he spent a very long time thinking, so much that he became behind on time. Of course he was calculating variations. It is quite reasonable for him to give a snippy answer to that question.

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#137

Post by mehwoot »

clarky07 wrote: post #113
pa5tabear wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So the greatest of all time? It's getting hard to argue LeBron is not...

It's not that hard to argue. Given there are lots of things to take into account, but Jordan averaged 2.5 more ppg than lebron, and 5 ppg if you take out the wizards comeback. Jordan also won 6 out of 8 championships, (and you know, was playing baseball for the other 2 years). Obviously ppg is not the only metric, and championships are won by teams. LeBron is probably in the argument for best all time, and by the end…

It's not that hard to argue. Given there are lots of things to take into account, but Jordan averaged 2.5 more ppg than lebron, and 5 ppg if you take out the wizards comeback. Jordan also won 6 out of 8 championships, (and you know, was playing baseball for the other 2 years).

In a specifically chosen 8 year period. There were 7 years before that where he didn't win a championship. LeBron's career is far from over, and titles won by a player is surely the least informative measure of an individual player's skill anyhow.

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#138

Post by heyheyhey »

duffdevice wrote: post #127
anExcitedBeast wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a chess player and fan, this will never happen. Poker can be very fun to watch, even for people who don't know how it's played. Chess is often boring to watch, even for people who do know how it's played. Can it's profile be increased? Absolutely. Will it ever compare to the television success of poker? I doubt it, but that's OK.

Also, poker has the "everyman" factor going for it. When the amateur Chris Moneymaker won the World Series in 2003, the popularity of the game exploded. This could never happen in chess.

In poker, the luck is what keeps the fishes from leaving.

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#139

Post by auctiontheory »

kamaal wrote: post #44
kzrdude wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Anand seems to have some frustrations. In an interview he lamented that he reached GM at the age of 18, while the youngest have been able to do that at 12 or 13 (Magnus at 13). He's not content with being the world champion, he wants to be the youngest, most talented, etc too. Can't have everything. Since internet commentary is always interpreted with a negative tone, I'll edit to add: Anand is a fascinating personal…

>>he wants to be the youngest, most talented, etc too. Can't have everything. As an Indian, and someone who practically looks at Anand as a role mode. I would be disappointed if Anand really had that attitude. Frankly speaking, I don't like the 'naturally talented' or 'natural genius' or this whole belief that people are born with some skills that can't be matched by other people. This isn't just about chess. This so…

Frankly speaking, I don't like the 'naturally talented' or 'natural genius' or ...

I think you will enjoy reading the book Mindset. It's for parents, and it explores and expands on the very idea you have described ... which is the opposite of how every Indian parent thinks, so the total addressable market for the book is a big one!

Re: Carlsen wins game 9, only needs 1 draw in 3 remaining games

#140

Post by dfrey »

maaaats wrote: post #108
anExcitedBeast wrote: post #60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a chess player and fan, this will never happen. Poker can be very fun to watch, even for people who don't know how it's played. Chess is often boring to watch, even for people who do know how it's played. Can it's profile be increased? Absolutely. Will it ever compare to the television success of poker? I doubt it, but that's OK.

I feel the other way: Poker is boring to watch, too much luck/randomness when watching. Fun to play, though. I'm not really a chess player, but I've watched all the matches this Championship, and all my friends (not chessplayers as well) are watching. It helps that we are Norwegian, though. And that may be the point: A western player will bring back the popularity in the west.

I agree that poker has too much randomness, but I don't think that games with zero randomness (like chess) are ideal for spectator events.
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