Mating with two nights

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Avatar of Waltz

I need help people with my endgame, I'm very good with my openings and my middle game.

I need advice and any tips to improve my game.

Everyone is welcome to participate in the discussion, I need everybody's view on this.

Avatar of orangehonda

With the title you're likely to have the first 5 posts explaining how mating with two knights is impossible, then some newer members saying it may be possible who really knows, and then some veteran members saying yes it's possible but only when there's an extra enemy pawn.

Then you'll have the help mates where you can actually do it pawnless followed by the namalov guys who claim a mate in 137 in some made up position.

And then, finally, someone will mention a classic like Averbakh's chess endings, or possibly Horowitz's how to win in the chess endings. 

Also modern books like Silmans complete endgame course or who knows, they might even throw in Dvoretsky's endgame manual.

Well known advice like after learning some basics change the diagram by adding a pawn, taking one away, shift it up, left, right, etc and see if you still know how to win/draw it.  There are free online videos out there, some of them on this site, and endgame puzzles at chesstempo.com

Meanwhile people will debate how much you actually need to know based on your current level. Hopefully this post covers most of it though, good luck Tongue out

Avatar of rooperi
orangehonda wrote:

I have no response to that...

Avatar of Pwninate

I had an endgame maybe a month ago in which I had two bishops, zero pawns on either side. I know it is possible to force a mate, but I goofed and caused a stalemate. These things do come up and it is worth learning how to do it.

Avatar of Fromper

Pwninate, two bishops is realistic - it could happen, and it's a forced win for the side with the bishops. Two knights is very rarely a win for the side with the knights. It can happen, but only if the guy with the lone king helps by intentionally walking his king to the corner. If he goes out of his way to keep his knight as close to the center as possible, then call it a draw and move on to the next game.

That said, Silman's Complete Endgame Course is THE book that everyone should get. It starts with the stuff that comes up the most often, rather than categorizing things based on what pieces are involved. So he starts with mating with just a queen, or a pair of rooks, then just a rook, etc. Then he goes into realistic examples of lone pawn endgames, rook and pawn vs rook (saving the less common scenarios for later in the book), knight vs pawn, etc. The organization of the book makes it the most useful endgame book ever written for amateur players. HIGHLY recommended for ALL chess players rated below 2000 FIDE.

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