How to learn chess as an adult (2021) • Hacker News Board

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#141

Post by Someone » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:18 AM UTC

chongli wrote: post #38

washmyelbows wrote: post #18

"Only about 10% of players ever gain more than 100 points, and only about 1% of players gain more than 200 rating points given years." This seems like a wild claim. On chess.com I've gone from 500 to ~1050 in a handful of months without any real study, just some light YouTube watching. 500->800 felt like all it took was learning a few openings and not blundering pieces. 800-1050 felt like it came mostly from getting…

If you follow the link to the data analysis [1] you’ll see that the argument is based on higher rated players. Low rated players have much higher variance in their rating and can improve by quite a lot, just by learning to stop blundering. That’s basically the situation you’re in. Getting to 2000 rating is going to be quite a mountain to climb for you, unless you’re very young. [1] https://github.com/jcw024/lichess_d…

But that’s not surprising at all if you assume every player has a ‘ceiling’ performance they can attain, isn’t it?

Higher rated players tend to be closer to their potential than lower rated ones, leaving less room for improvement, in any sport. They also will be more likely to get worse over time because, the nearer to the top, the more roads lead you downwards.

You’d have to pick a very peculiar metric to measure performance to compensate for that.

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#142

Post by FergusArgyll » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:21 AM UTC

8n4vidtmkvmk wrote: post #99

INTPenis wrote: post #86

My dad was a master chess player in my country when I was growing up so I know all the moves but I never had the interest to go further than that. So what I really need to study are the famous openings and the responses to various openings. Seems like a memory game. Computer games were always more fun.

This is why I've been avoiding chess. Anything that feels too memory intensive just doesn't seem fun to me. It's not creative strategy it's just rote memorization. Same goes for Rubik's cubes.

I don't find chess memory intensive, I almost never directly commit opening variations to memory. I play around with them, often against myself, until I get a feel for what works, what's speculative and what's bad.

Preparing for a tourney or a big game is different obv. but usually you just play enough that openings and their values become a part of you

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#143

Post by shric » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:24 AM UTC

washmyelbows wrote: post #18

"Only about 10% of players ever gain more than 100 points, and only about 1% of players gain more than 200 rating points given years." This seems like a wild claim. On chess.com I've gone from 500 to ~1050 in a handful of months without any real study, just some light YouTube watching. 500->800 felt like all it took was learning a few openings and not blundering pieces. 800-1050 felt like it came mostly from getting…

> I don't understand how people learn from slamming blitz/bullet games. The time constraints are too rushed to really think about what makes a move good or bad. I assumed it was a young person's thing, but the author said he plays these quick formats too.

I'm 47 and started playing around 5 years ago. I only play Blitz and Bullet because I find it fun. In the first two years I went from around 1000 on lichess to around 1700. I've been "stuck" at 1700 plus or minus 100 since then.

I know I could improve with puzzles and classical time controls and study and analysis but I have no interest in that. I play games for fun. If I improve then great. If not no problem. It's the same as breaking out a game of Tetris or something for 5 minutes to me.

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#144

Post by gwnywg » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:24 AM UTC

lovegrenoble wrote: post #51

Never watched the Queen's Gambit )

I stopped watching movies and series altogether a few years ago feeling I'm wasting time. Now I still waste time, but on other things :)

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#145

Post by ZiiS » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:25 AM UTC

For anyone less then 1,000 it is trivial to gain 100 points. Most could do it by playing games but anyone wanting to learn just needs to read some advice, study an opening and practice. 1400 > 1500 is much more impressive then 300>1200.

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#146

Post by gwnywg » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:27 AM UTC

locallost wrote: post #3

On a side note, it's a good demonstration that knowledge beats intelligence. Being smart just gives you a higher ceiling, but most people can get pretty good at almost anything if they work hard enough. The question is of course why would you do it, and do you have the motivation.

When I was a kid I heard proffessional player opinion that people who play more games get better results, he stated chess is game of numbers. I'm probably not on that level as no matter how many games I played there is rating level I cannot beat, it's glass ceiling for me.

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#147

Post by FartyMcFarter » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:29 AM UTC

mseidl wrote: post #62

washmyelbows wrote: post #18

"Only about 10% of players ever gain more than 100 points, and only about 1% of players gain more than 200 rating points given years." This seems like a wild claim. On chess.com I've gone from 500 to ~1050 in a handful of months without any real study, just some light YouTube watching. 500->800 felt like all it took was learning a few openings and not blundering pieces. 800-1050 felt like it came mostly from getting…

I've been playing chess since I was 6, and I'm 7 now. You should learn endgame and tactics, the basics of opening and maybe a few openings. endgame will teach chess. openings teaches you openings. especially when you're a beginner people will make moves that don't make sense. Plus aren't there like over 4 or 5 quadrillion possible moves just within the first 10 moves?

It doesn't necessarily matter that there are quadrillions of possible openings. Studying traps that occur often in the openings you play is definitely helpful.

For example, if you're an 1. e4 e5 player you'll want to learn how to counter the Fried Liver attack, as it's one of the most popular lines at the beginner to intermediate level.

You don't need to know many lines 7 moves deep either, just a couple of moves is already very helpful.

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#148

Post by pmontra » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:34 AM UTC

hinkley wrote: post #98

washmyelbows wrote: post #18

"Only about 10% of players ever gain more than 100 points, and only about 1% of players gain more than 200 rating points given years." This seems like a wild claim. On chess.com I've gone from 500 to ~1050 in a handful of months without any real study, just some light YouTube watching. 500->800 felt like all it took was learning a few openings and not blundering pieces. 800-1050 felt like it came mostly from getting…

I’ve known this guy off and on for years. When we first met 15+ years he was slightly better at Go than me, which was middling amateur. All the Go books say if you want to be a pro you have to start as a child. But he studied, and studied, and last I knew he was 3 dan, which is about the point you can entertain the idea of becoming a pro (if I just worked harder). Kids have a lot more free time to sink into a singula…

A friend of mine devised an empirical rule to predict the highest Go ranking that a player will reach: the ranking after the first 4 years of play plus 4.

You can check that on https://europeangodatabase.eu/EGD/ and pick some players at random.

They have a nice date/rank graph and all those graphs start with an almost vertical growth which slows down and flattens. Some players play less often and get weaker but that's not the point.

I have no idea if it applies to chess too, possibly with different parameters, but why not? They are both games played with the brain by humans.

Re: How to learn chess as an adult (2021)

#149

Post by gwnywg » Tue, Dec 19, 2023, 11:35 AM UTC

grzaks wrote: post #92

My biggest frustration with chess online is the huge number of cheaters on platforms like chess.com and lichess. It really takes the whole fun away. I never really understood WHY people are cheating in online chess games. There is no fame, no money in it. This is puzzling for me. My frustration is that chess.com and lichess are extremely week at finding and banning cheaters. Sometimes is sooo obvious, when for exampl…

chess.com puts some effort in detecting cheaters. When I was active user I was receiving messages stating that such and such game was lost to cheater and my rating is updated to reflect that.

Cheater detection sounds like very interesting problem