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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

#231

Post by seg_lol »

aerovistae wrote: post #212
_the_inflator wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

T90official is also suuuuupercool! He also started as a pretty mediocre player and now deserves his rank among the best players! He shares a lot of his secrets and is also #1 commentator now for AoE II:DE related games: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCZUT79WUUpZlZ-XMF7l4CFg Also watch his Twitch account. Spirit of the Law is also a great resource: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UChzLZJo-SxuPHz-oYKAIC_g

T90 to me is such a confusing phenomenon. I've never understood why a low-rated player who (to me) did not have a particularly entertaining personality was the most-subscribed AoE2 player on twitch. Is he actually good now? How high-rated is he compared to Daut and Viper and so on?

Maybe because

> He shares a lot of his secrets

? Teachers don't have to be the best at the _thing_, they should be really good at explaining concepts. Maybe T90 is the people watch when then want to go from zero to average?

I don't want to be coached by the best tennis player in the world, it would be a waste and I couldn't do any of the things they could teach me.

A solid above average player that knows my limits and can explain how to correct flaws would be much better (for me).

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

#232

Post by yewenjie »

prune2000 wrote: post #10

You should use lichess.org instead. You would have unlimited tactics per day which come from real games played on the website, endless number of studies made by other players on opening theories, free analysis of your games, and all these statistics about your progress and more! Like "do I win more often or not when Queens are traded?". Good luck!

Lichess is something that strikes pure joy to me as a service. Full of features, free and open source, privacy friendly, zero ads or 'freemium' tiers, blazing fast, yet catering the 'non-tech-savvy' regular user (compare the last point with GNU/Linux vs Windows).

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

#233

Post by noir_lord »

thom wrote: post #172
noir_lord wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey, That's my project (caissabase). Small world, thanks for mentioning it :).

Woot, and I completely missed that you did a new release over the weekend! Thanks for all the good work!

Aye, Saturday - now that my life has settled down I'm going to aim for once a quarter (I always announce them on twitter @caissabase ) but there will be another before Xmas because someone sent me a bunch of TWICS I was missing so once I've cleaned/de-duped those probably.

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

#234

Post by pbhjpbhj »

EL_Loco wrote: post #133
blub wrote: post #115

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…

Chess is good for kids, but I fortunately fell out of the "chess makes kids smarter" trap a few years before I had my own kids. Besides teaching self-control, focus, how to think more strategically, etc, getting very good at chess will mean that you are just that: very good at chess. So I taught my kids and they play when they want, but they seem to get the same benefits from other boardgames of varying complexity, a…

IME, which is limited, low level chess competitions might be a good social outlet. Also chance to show a relatively gifted child that 'they might not be all that' which can encourage effort in intellectual pursuits, I feel.

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

#235

Post by georgeoliver »

noir_lord wrote: post #123
thom wrote: post #83

It feels like a golden age to be learning chess right now. There's just infinite good content on YouTube (St Louis Chess Club, Atlanta Chess Club, Chess24 etc) and various apps (lichess, Chessable, Chess Tempo etc). Plus you can get a decent sized database (e.g. http://caissabase.co.uk/ ) and cutting edge engine for your own study for absolutely free. Really hoping when the pandemic is over this leads to a boost for…

Hey, That's my project (caissabase). Small world, thanks for mentioning it :).

I'm a happy caissabase-ist! Thanks for maintaining.

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

#236

Post by georgeoliver »

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.

Not very realistic? I thought the depiction of tournament play was spot on, with the obvious exception of a few 'dramatic moments'. Have you played OTB tournaments?

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

#237

Post by noir_lord »

georgeoliver wrote: post #235
noir_lord wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hey, That's my project (caissabase). Small world, thanks for mentioning it :).

I'm a happy caissabase-ist! Thanks for maintaining.

:) I'm just glad people actually use it, I do it for myself anyway but it's nice to know that others get some benefit out of it as well.

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

#239

Post by cambalache »

david927 wrote: post #226
nandreev wrote: post #222

Some "suggestions" that helped me get from 1000 to 1300 very quickly: - Castle very early - Resist taking pieces for no reason. To take is a mistake - Use your opponent's time to plan your next move - If you stop hanging pieces you will automatically be >1200 - Save your bishops, bishops > knights in most endgames - For every hour you spend analyzing your past games your rating will go up by 10 - You won't improve by…

> Save your bishops, bishops > knights in most endgames That's funny because I found the opposite to be true if it's a single bishop / knight endgame. > You won't improve by playing blitz. It will just take longer. A single five minute game a day over coffee will work, if that's all the time you have for.

> That's funny because I found the opposite to be true if it's a single bishop / knight endgame.

No matter what you found, it has been statistically proved that a Bishop (against a Knight), and especially a Bishop pair is stronger than a Knight/Knight or Knight/Bishop .

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

#240

Post by cambalache »

georgeoliver wrote: post #236
hackerNoose wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Not very realistic? I thought the depiction of tournament play was spot on, with the obvious exception of a few 'dramatic moments'. Have you played OTB tournaments?

Have you seen the top 100 chessplayer list? Now, 10 years ago?, 50 years ago? Have you see the women top 100 list? The few American women there are Asian-Americans or FSU. Only in Hollywood a cute WASPY girl is the GOAT of chess, and yes I know this is based on a 1980s novel.That does not make it realistic.

It's like making a movie where the best 100m sprinter in the world is a Guatemalan woman. Nice story, 0 credibility.

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