Chess.com for Tigers: 7. Know your opponent - and yourself

Updated: Apr 29, 2021, 7:55 AM | 14

In the previous blogpost I explained the most simple trick that will improve your play here on the site. Yet there is another maybe even more important gimmick.

It's rather not just a simple trick, but a fantastic technical option within the opening explorer, which may be very helpful if you want to go deeper into your games. (I am not sure if it is available for basic members as well, but even if so, it does not make much sense if you are just limited to four opening moves there.)

As a tiger would study his opponent before he attacks, you would probably like to learn something about your opponent in advance.

OTB, this can be quite difficult and take some time, and you would probably only do that in important games. Here, online, one option is to search his game archive games (following the link in the header "completed games" ...).

But that is tedious. And there is a much easier and much more effective way.

It is a feature within the explorer which is probably widely overlooked, but can become very important in an individual game. I used the explorer myself for more than a year before I detected it.

There was a recent change in the explorer function, so clicking on the name of the opening (indicated above your moves' list) will lead only to the standard opening now; however, there is a "compass" icon now on the right of the opening name - and if you click on that, you get to the present position, and the setting there will have three lines above the moves, the top of them saying "Master Games".*

And here we come to the heart of the matter.

Because in fact, this is just a default setting, which you can change – and make the explorer show either your own games with that position, or those of "other players", i.e. any (!!) other member of the site. (And you can do that also for Black and White.)

And as usual, by clicking on the number of the archived games with a specific move, you get a list with all games of that line. You can also chose "all games" or restrict the results on Daily or other games.

Now imagine the possibilities! Mainly in the early opening, you can check which opening or line your opponent may be familiar with! Does he play it often or rarely? Does he play it successfully or not?

With one glance, you learn a lot about your opponent, without having to look into dozens or hundreds of games. Maybe you have the choice between two variations, which you know both very well, and you see that he is not so successful in one of them. Or maybe you do not like a certain line, but you will notice that your opponent you usually doesn’t play it? You may even find archived games of your opponent when there are no or little Master games left.

Mainly such lines would be even worth to be checked deeper. For example, if after a rather natural move you would prefer, you see that he wins most of his games. But not all of them. So you look into the list and see that he won most of his games rather quickly, while the games he lost (or only made a draw) went much longer. So maybe there is a trap? And you can learn how to avoid it just by comparing some of these games.

Only mind that there is a restriction to that: This feature includes standard games, and only against humans, and only if they have a certain lenght (at least "15 ply" - meaning 15 probably 15 moves by each colour together(?), i.e. 8 moves by White, as I found games with less than 15 moves archived there). Which means games where one player has given up before that may not be included.

But you might also find it helpful to check your own games. How often do you really win in a specific line? You probably would know this roughly, but sometimes numbers can be surprising. Or maybe you do not remember a specific line anymore you have played before, or search for a specific model game - you will find it there. Also you might change colours to look up what you play with your opponent’s colour. Or what your opponent would play with yours.

And there is even a another fantastic use of this: In "other players", you can even fill in any other member fo the site! Maybe you know someone whom you regard as an expert in a specific opening? Look what he (or she) would have played. This may be even useful if there still would be some Master games, but even more, even if there are no or few archived Master games anymore - or if they are pretty old and might be outdated. (You could also in the setting "Master games" chose a specific master as well.)

Of course you can also use that feature also outside an ongoing game, just by opening the explorer and creating a line there, in order to prepare or study something.

And here's another tip, as long as they do not give you the exact position at once by opening the explorer: In order to avoid creating the current position again and again from scratch, you could also just copy the browser adress of your current explorer position and paste it in the "notes" section of that game; so on the next move, you just have to re-copy it into a new browser and add the latest moves (but not most of the previous line ...).

I also would not check my opponent’s games at each and every move, but before I chose at least a specific variation of an opening, or before I make a move that goes in to less known territory, I would like to see what the stats of my opponent say about that. And if I am not sure about an idea, why not checking a strong players' games as well ...

Did you know this feature already? And if so, did you learn something new here nevertheless?

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* I updated this paragraph on April 28th, as only then I learned about this new icon (no idea when it was implemented), thanks to @Bartholomaeus and @truroruditralala.