Buy a book from amazon.com with thousands of combinations and all the major types of combinational themes (i don't know if it is still in print but combinational chalenge was a good book) read the book and try to solve as many problems as you can if in a few minuets you can't guess the solution look up the answer and try to store the pattern in your memory.
Then look over games of good attacking players like Tal, Alekhine, Morphy, Fischer, Reshevsky, and numerous others and look as themes and combinational patterns from the book you read are played out masterfully by these grandmasters. Then hopefully in your games in the future you will have a better grasp of the initiative and the common tactics/combinations in various positions for use in your own games
Hello there! Two questions. First, I generally play King's pawn, possibly playign out king knight soon thereafter but it depends on there defense. Anyhow, I tend to botch the opening. Meaning, They have good attack and I am trying to get out of the hole, generally. I try to develop my pieces, but they always seem to get the goods on me. Any advice?
Second thign is, I wasn't exactly sure where to ask this, so I decided on here. Another problem I have is if I survive the opening, I generally begin losign in the middlegame. (This and previous against the 2000+ computer on this site). They seem to be good at attacking, and I fear how they use ther queen so well. Meanwhile, I am bnot really attackign as such. Any idea how I could do better in this area?