Tactics Trainer

Do any of you play Tactics Trainer here on chess.com?

I play it a lot. It is fun but can sometimes be real frustraiting. I guess the most frustraiting thing is when you solve a puzzle correctly but lose points because you were too slow - and sometimes what TT calls too slow isn't real slow. Many times I have correctly solved a puzzle and lost points because I used 40 seconds and the average time is 20 seconds. 

The other frustraiting thing is when you miss a puzzle and see that the pass rate is 23% or something like that. I have seen some puzzles with a pass rate of 5%!  I don't know why they don't rate them higher when the pass rate is real low.

However, all things considered, Tactics Trainer is fun.

Comments?

Didn't you post something like this a few months ago ?

I recall feeling the same: the trainer is more aimed at OTB chess than for online chess or vote chess. But the practice is what matters, and that is good. When the tactics become easy enough for you to do them quickly, the bar will be raised.

I got a 2100 tactics rating but I quit doing it for a while because I found it annoying I'd get an answer correctly in like 40 seconds and still lose points for it.

Hello Blackfoxx, yea I made a post like this a while back in another place,  not in the forum for this group. 

Okies that clarifies it, I was just so sure about it xD I remember responding to it actually

I do it but using chess.tempo for tactics is much better.

I have used chess tempo, but i don't like it too much.

Back when I was still into this Chess you're talking about...! I did try TT a few times but I wasn't really a fan. There are a few tactic apps out there I enjoyed and even though they are usually not very well crafted, I got better at chess. I also used Bruce Pandolfini's Bobby Fischer's Outrageous moves like ten years ago which was an eye openner at the time. I prefer my games to be rich on positional play, which they're not, but I'd like it that way, with just a pinch of tactics...

And I forgot one funny thing. Once I did a TT puzzle and sorta rushed and missed it. When the screen came up to show that i missed it, it said that the pass rate was 50%, total attempts  2.  

So I was the first person to ever miss that problem! I said so in the comments and i still track it, so it comes up from time to time still. 

It is puzzle 0518820 if anybody cares! 

Yeah I use it from time to time :) just for fun :) think it is a great thing :D 

I got a lot more out of Tactics Trainer when I instituted two personal rules:

(1) Hide the clock.  You still lose points for being slow but at least you're not distracted by knowing about them while solving.

(2)  I try to pay almost no attention to whether I gain or lose points, but I penalize myself harshly for getting the puzzle wrong:  if I get it wrong I have to go away and do some work, if I get it right I can do another puzzle.

My rating fell a couple hundred points and then slowly climbed back up, but I feel I've learned a lot more.  I've had a couple of definite "Tactics Trainer moments" in OTB games.  I particularly remember one game where my opponent could trade off a bishop that was threatening him, and obviously I could recapture:  but the position was bugging me, and suddenly I saw that instead I could sack a rook and piece and deliver mate.  My opponent reached out to capture my bishop--I was holding my breath--then literally sat on his hands and thought another ten minutes before making a better move.  (Maybe he does TT too....)

In the end we had 8 minutes each to make 10 moves, and he made a move that allowed an exchange sack and lethal pin--the whole thing just sprung into view instantly and I had to sit on *my* hands long enough to check through it once.  I'm happy with that game.

@mkkuhner I can't figure out how make it rated and make the timer disappear. Can you give me exact directions.

mromanian, I can do that.

Start on your home screen. Click the Learn button and then the button for Tactics Trainer. That will bring up a block that says Start Training, but don't pick that. Below that you will see a button called Customize. There you can find the selections for rated or unrated and the setting to show the clock. After you pick, make sure to hit the Save Settings button at the bottom.

That's it. 

Thanks Rocky

You are welcome! 

Chess.com Vice President Daniel Rensch said a long time ago in a video that when the new version of Tactics Trainer comes along, you won't lose points for getting a problem right, no matter how long it takes. That is a goooood idea.

Since I heard that on his video, I have considered the "lose points because you are slow" feature of TT to be bogus. So now if I see that I have run out of time and I see that I have the correct answer (got the first move or two correct) I just hit the "Home" button on my screen and leave the problem without taking that loss of points.

I guess that mite be sorta cheating the TT software, but that is what I do. 

Excellent!

I'm very much for timed tactics, but you can do untimed elsewhere.  (I believe V3's problems are timed, but do not deduct; but I don't know for sure, because I dislike it and do not use it.)  If you want untimed problems, look at ChessTempo's tactics and Convekta's software called CT-ART, particularly 5.0.  

There are more important things to be annoyed about with TT, which is why I use it in alteration with other tactics servers and software.  For example, the proble,s on here have quite a bit of "noise."  By that, I mean that they put in the appearance of other, more obvious motifs or counter-tactics, and so one is often mislead to find the wrong answer.  Compare this with chess.emrald.net, which is timed, but the motifs are purer and there are very little in the way of distractions.  I think that, if like me, you are trying to develop a very solid pattern recognition of the basic and intermediate motifs, then chess.emrald.net is better.  You have seconds to find the motif, which shows either that you do or do not have the pattern in your pattern bank.  If you want to practice calculation more than pattern recognition, then TT is better.  I vary all of these, incoroporaitng tactics books, too.