Well, I think that the time has come for me to stop playing correspondence chess online. I dedicate a lot of time to very few moves--I only tend to play 10-20 games at a time--and the competition is becoming increasingly difficult, so since I am now going away to college I don't see myself having the time and energy for so much online chess. It's also a bit discouraging that a bunch of my most recent opponents, two in the same tournament I think, were removed for cheating; a couple of people who helped me out a lot were also removed for cheating. So I'm not going back on my decision to stop playing correspondence chess, but that's not the point of my posting--I'm sure that nobody here really cares if I play or not. My point is: what do you guys think I could do to get the same intense "studying" feel I get from playing correspondence by pondering every single move in great depth, in some other way? Should I try to study master games in my repertoire as though I were playing the games in correspondence or something? I anticipate positive feedback,

-V

That's sad to hear that those who've helped you out a lot were removed from tournaments for cheating (the site seems to 'find' a lot, hundreds if not thousands of cheaters -- I wonder if it's just one or two people?  If so, I urge the site to ban I.P. addresses of offenders).

I admire your patience in having tackled correspondence chess.  My suggestion is:  watch the site's new "study plan" program (just in its infancy but perhaps in a few months it'll be very useful for aspiring Experts).

http://www.chess.com/article/view/study-plan-beyond-the-basics

sftac

I told myself I'd quit when I went away to college but it didn't work....  I'd be interested to know if it works for you.

Why don't you just try playing 1 or 2 games instead of 10 - 20?  Moderation.

If you don't have time to play chess in college, when will you have time for it?

I started playing chess when I was already a postgraduate student studying for my master (MSc) ^_^ (which is 4 months ago).

Just keep playing, college/university is really a time where sometimes you have severely busy and other times you are really bored. Just keep playing 3-5 games and when you are bored holiday make a few more.

I was thinking that since I'm at college I should take on more live chess, with so many available good players in my new area. Maybe I'll play a couple of correspondence games, maybe play unrated in case things get hectic and I can't play regularly. So thank you for that advice--but I'm not quitting chess, as people seem to think, I'm just not playing correspondence. I'm more of a tournament player anyway, and with new opportunities I plan to 'step it up' in that arena.

I'll keep up chess exercises, I've been doing those, maybe I'll do more of them since they're not too time-consuming. And as for the study plan thing, I'll look into that!

You are to stupid to play chess, if you can't figure out on your own that chess software is not allowed. When you play football do you hit people with a baseball bat too and then when you go into prison or have to pay back their hospital cost you say that they should have informed you about the rules before because you are just an hobby player?

Common sense you idiot. *sighs*

The rules on chess.com about cheating are quite clear if you bother to read them when creating a profile, but I have never used facebook to play chess so I don't know what info people coming in through facebook are  provided.

Thomas may have a point if he was never presented a link to site TOS.

It's true people who are banned by chess.com for whatever reason (suspected cheating, posting opinions in the forums that other people or staff disagree with, even making obvious suggestions to improve the site can get you banned-even if you're not obnoxious about it!) can easily create new profiles.

Obviously I'm not going to discuss the procedure to create a new account and defeat chess.com's "system" else chess.com will respond with countermeasures. 

In certain cases you'd think chess.com staff would want some dialog with the player before just nuking them. But no. Most of people I know who have been banned were nuked without warning. That's how staff here rolls I guess.

I suspect you won't be around much longer. 

sftac

I never really worried about people cheating against me.  I mean, if someone needs to cheat in order to beat me, that's kind of a complement...and also kind of a self-putdown.  "my computer can beat you."  yeah tell me something I didn't already know.

my view of chess has always been kind of emersion...I'm either playing, which means to me studying + speed chess + tourneys + correspondence...or I'm not.  nothing wrong with taking a break from chess completely for a while.  you will always come back to it.

or, just cut down your game load, play 1 or 2 games.  keep yourself sharp with little time expended.  or just play 30 minutes of speed a couple times a week.

I never felt that study alone was worthwhile.  rather just play and not study.

or, just do some of the "white to play and win" problems in chess life when you get bored.  that'll keep you sharp too.

either way, don't fret it too much.  whatever feels right to you, is what will work out the best for you.  trust yourself.

             jr

Correspondence chess is just to full of cheaters in my opinion. The time controls are so long they can run any position past 3 engines.

So you joined an online chess server site & didn't even think to do some very basic investigation or even ask if engine use was allowed or not?

Oh, come on...

In fairness when playing chess on facebook a few years ago there were no messages about using engines. I joined chess.com separately after facebook a few months later and it was not even clear then, in fact the rules were suddenly announced that you could not use books or databases, which I had been using.  It was then decided that only engines were illegal etc etc.  My understanding is that later facebook account holders were merged into chess.com with no "signing up" so perhaps his story holds water.

what was amusing about the original facebook chess game was that you could read the "chat" in everyone's games...

You should play coorespondence as if you were OTB and not playing through the variations on a separate board. That is how you improve at this game called chess, play the game in your Head !That is the way i play because it is challendging and Fun ! Opening databases (teach) period, You have plenty of time to mentally analyze the position and find all the possibilities it contains depending on your knowledge and skill level. For those who choose to use engines against you, i think this site does everything they can to get rid of those People. My chat is turned OFF, me and my opponent have Nothing to discuss. At the conclusion of the contest chat is ON and i thank my opponent for a great game !!  LOL 

Study an ant farm?  Go?  Your college books?

play live chess

Sure and some of those people are my friends, but we are serious about our chess so there is plenty to talk about AFTER the contest !!

 http://www.chess.com/members/view/thomaszwijsen

Noting there is no 'cheater' boilerprint on his first profile, perhaps he's included in an Amnesty.

sftac