I recently had a student tell me that a piece of advice I gave him really helped his game improve so I'll share it and who knows it might improve yours.
His question whent something like this:
I often find myself in a position where I have no clue how to evaluate it or which moves to look at, I try to find kandidate moves and start calculating variations and end up spending a lot of time organiszing them in some sort of analysis three (these ideas he got from the book Think like a grandmaster from Kotov) but this takes up a lot of time and I still have no idea if Iam looking at 'the right' moves and when I am finished evaluating a kandidate move should I look for others.
This is an important problem that all chessplayers are faced with and what differentiates us from computers who just use brute force to calculate out every possibility. As a matter of fact I've noticed in my own games against strong grandmasters in the postgame analysis how 'little' they actally saw. The difference there is that I think I saw more in general but what I saw whas of relative little value whereas the grandmaster knew where his thoughts should go and calculated only that which was relevant in the postion.
So how should we begin looking at a position and determine which kandidate moves to consider:of course the standard questions will be asked --> what did my opponent try to do with his last move, are there any of my pieces attacked,can I take any of my opponents pieces...but then where do we begin our caculations.
My suggestion to the student was: Take the idea of 'talking to your pieces' seriously. I got his idea from recently rereading Nimzowitsch's My sytem where he writes: "It may seem strange, but to me the chess pieces have living souls; they have wishes and desires, slumbering in their subconsious, to be understood only by me. They want something without understanding why. I don't understand either, but i know what they want.
No I am not you start talking aloud to your pieces and treat them like living beings but if you find yourself in a position where you have no idea where to begin, start by asking your pieces and let your pieces 'tell you what they think'.
The basic point is that evaluating well is the key to good moves and this way you can take a fresh look at the position and avoid falling into the familiar thinking patterns I make amove, he makes a move with all its rules memories and painfull impressions.
This can be for example a goodway to find out which pieces to exchange in a endgame where'knowing where to put your pieces becomes more important and when deciding which piece to exchange and which to keep: a piece that has no will that finds no meaning in roaming the board should immediately be exchanged.
My student told me that this helped him 'decomputerify' his thoughts and made chess a lot more animate.
Tip: I know you might prefer talking to the lady but don't neglect your other pieces ask that bisshop if he is happy with his diagonal,the knight on which square he'd like to stable, the rook where which file he would like to roam, the king if he feels happy and secure and always remember your soldiers that have such great potential.
Greetings S.
Hi S.
Fully agree with your proposal and the way to look at it from a strategically point of view - allthough I do not actually conversate the pieces :-)
Maybe I missed it in your text, but it should be noted that 'talking' to your opponents pieces while considering your own position would also be required in order to avoid an opponent preassure, e.g. a Knight on a central/positional square where it cannot be attached.
Keep talking folks!
I agree Schnipper, in that you should also talk to your opponents pieces. Unfortunately, at my rating the pieces often betray me and tell me exactly what my opponent wants me to think. Your opponents pieces evidentally gain respect for you the higher your rating becomes.
So very true Nytik. When thinking it over more closely, I believe you've pinpointed the core issue. A lower rated player (lower rated for whatever reason!) asking the pieces for comments, will only hear "statements" that are equal to his level of rating/and or understanding of the position.
However I kind of like the potential in the idea of talking to the pieces, as I strongly believe that a lower rated player who is quite new in chess could make use of this idea and thereby increase pretty rapidly his/her understanding of the game (which will eventually lead to increased rating).
One could argue though that it's simply the time spent on each move that is then reflected into a more comprehensive understanding of the game and thus giving an increased rating.
Now, back to my games... :-)
Very interesting. Just came back from my chessclub and could have done with some good conversations on the board. I won but with a headache after calculating too many useless lines... I also like this line I read in a chessbook once. "If you have no clue what to do, improve the position of your worst piece". Now I'll add to that "after you had some fruitful discussions with all of your pieces!"
Ever thought about asking the Board? It must have seen a thing or two in its time....
song- 'White Rabbit' "when the men on the chessboard get up and tell you where to go" like your advice..heck liked the comments.
It seems that it's more important to listen to your pieces, than to talk to them.
hey!
maybe i should listen to mine...
because i talk to them and nothing good is happening.
word of caution.
just be careful when you talk to your pieces...it might talk back!
Problems arise when you start naming your pieces "Dave the bishop" for instance. Sacrifices become harder decisions to make after that.
That's beyond cool, respect...
As an aside, it's notable that ethnographic studies often indicate that people from non-western societies do not differentiate between animate and inanimate objects (in the way we do), just a different mindset/perception with it's own internal logic.
R
hahaha
anyways.. thanks for the post! im gonna try that out
But my pieces are so indecisive.
Great idea.
Regards
oh my, that was good - wow - i laughed pretty good at that one!
je ne comprends pas très clairement tout l'article de base ! mais j'ai déjà essayé de parler à mes pièces de toutes les façon possible, en les félicitant, en les insultant, en les flattant.... mais désolé, RIEN n'est arrivé. Où ai-je commis l'erreur ? je cherche encore et toujours. Mon siamois, quand je lui parle, au moins lui me répond. Qui peut m'aider ?
thanks this really is helping me
To elaborate slightly on Nosferatu's and Schnipper's points, it seems to me chess is an internal dialogue from start to finish, the conversations with one's pieces and one's opponent's pieces being the projection of every possibility of a given game's plot. So of course, as in a story, every character in the plot--every bishop, every rook, every pawn, etc.--has its own story to tell, a story that changes for every piece with every move. The difficulty of complex games is to keep track of every pieces' character. It's as demanding on one's concentration as keeping track of all the characters in a Russian novel (which is also why Russians are such good chess players. They're used to the plot-tracking complexity). This is where imagination and concentration merge and where the art of imagining each piece's "thinking" makes the game the novelized art form that it is.
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