Any tips for a slow beginner?

I agree with the idea of needing to look into candidate moves. I spend more time looking at potential threat and less time than I should seeing the specific move and how it plays out for certain ideas. I need to focus more and make more specific plans, some days I do better at this, but other times I forget and let it slide. 

Also looking forward to seeing what you add. I initially was going to wait to see the additions but decided to reply after a few hours. I agree with what you've said so far and will work on that. I think even if I'm unsure of my opponent's plan I just need to pick one, run with it, and if my plan sucks vs this unfamiliar situation I will analyze it as a learning experience and make a new plan for the future, lol.  

I recommend winning chess strategies, and winning chess tactics by Yasser Seirawan. Additionally, practice some calculation puzzles. There are some nice ones in Aagaard's calculation (free pdf) book - a lot of the puzzles are really difficult though, but it's definitely worth it. 

Some Youtube channels I recommend are IM Levy Rozman's Channel - he has a nice series where he covers different openings in 10 minutes, as well as a middlegame series where he covers concepts like pawn breaks, initiative, etc. Watch these videos, and familiarize yourself with these concepts, it will help you make better realistic and objective plans.

Another great way to improve is just by watching a lot of chess, whether than be just watching chess streamers, or event coverage. For streamers, I recommend the Chessbrahs, and GMHikaru, and for event coverage, you can usually find events (such as titled Tuesday, or online tournaments) being streamed on https://www.chess.com/tv. Watching chess casually actually helps you improve a lot more than you would expect it to.

I don't know too much about your "playing style", since I've only seen one game. I can give more specific recommendations if you answer a few more questions. Sometime later in the week, I'll also annotate and send over some master games for you to review: 

• How would you describe your playstyle?
• Do you like more open or closed positions?
• Are you better tactically or positionally?
• Post your results to https://www.chesspersonality.com/ here. By this, I mean, tell me what you wrote for each question, and then tell me which "personality" you got.
• What openings do you play with both colours?

That's a good one, but it's very long (still working my way through it)

Bonjour

I'll look into those, thanks! I've started looking into chess channels, started with Bartholomew (it helps that I've recently been using chessable more) and saw Rotham's as a result, so I'm slowly making my way through those. I did not fully appreciate how many online resources there were for this game, lol. 

My playstyle is fairly reserved, I look for attacks to get small leads and that is it. My favorite way to win is pretty direct. I get 1 pawn up, trade everything else, then promote for a simple endgame. If I can get more I'll take it, but I'm not looking for a brutal attack plan, just a small edge I can grind to a clean victory. I prefer to have material leads and hang on to them, and I like to kill tempo, nullifying leads in development either exchanges, etc. I don't use gambits but I enjoy facing them, as they give me material, then force me to justify it with a brutal attack, making me have to figure out how to nullify leads in development, etc. In spite of my more reserved style, I like to get those small attacks when I can and don't always fully appreciate king safety. 

 I think I prefer open positions for the chance to exchange material and grind. Not as familiar with the closed positions to feel comfortable with them. 

I think I'm better tactically, though my intuition wants to say positionally. My tactics rating no chess.com is around the 1900s, (currently very low 2000s, but that's also my highest, so I wouldn't call that a stable thing yet.) My chess.com rating is mid to high 1300s. I'm pretty sure the ratings aren't the same scale, tactics is probably higher, but still guessing my tactics are better than my rating, unless the difference between the scales really is that huge. Anyways, I build some position, but ultimately am looking for that small move to quickly punish you and gain material. I'm not always ready with any kind of proactive plan, more often zeroing in one creating an edge out of the first error I think I see. So my tactics are not looking for some crippling assault, just small tactics to get edges then grind to the end. I may need to rethink my understanding of this question, especially after taking the quiz and seeing personalities, the ones that seem the most likely me are the ones that like positional play more.  

1. B. 

2. B. (no tournament experience, going off casual play. I think I streak, on a given time I am nailing things, other times I'm flopping.)

3. B. 

4. A. 

5. B. 

6. B.  

7. B. (I'm not always calculating variations, but I definitely will on a move like that.)

8. B. 

9. A.

10. A.  

11. A.

12. B.

13. A.

14. B (My gameplan might like that more, but I think there's a lot more I don't understand.) 

15. A. 

16. A.

17. B (Wondering if my answer to that will change soon, I seem to like castling queenside, but only a bit earlier today I've been considering looking into that more.)

18. A. 

19. A. (might be working to change that to B, especially in light of this thread)

20. A

I'm told I'm a "genius". Scrolling through the names I actually feel more at home with escape artist, both in chess and in a lot of other games. I always feel like I'm trying to get a calm game, but then things get wild, generally as a result of me on the back foot as my opponent goes for a brutal attack, at the cost of some long-term material and I just try to weather the storm and grind them down for the comeback. Makes me keep rethinking my tactical vs positional answer, all the descriptions that I felt closer to seemed to prefer positional play, even though I doubt I understand it that well. Then again, I am a low rated player, so my understanding of much of this game is majorly flawed, so this may not be much of an objection.  

Opening I play as white. I always open e4, and will always go for the Italian if possible. Besides that, I'm winging it, get stuff out, look for an error, get a small lead in material and grind it to the ground. With black I have no openings, try to hold off whatever my opponent is doing, getting to the center and getting my pieces out however. I need to decide upon more of a plan, I'm mostly winging it there still. I will do the same thing over and over if given the chance, if I lost previously I'd try to make a small adjustment to fix that. 

I'm not the biggest believer in letting a playstyle define you. I plan on improving, which will mean learning to do new things. Do I play gambits? No. But that doesn't mean I'm not willing to try and learn them. Some things are obviously going to have to happen, such as getting an opening for black, etc. I need to find those holes in my play and correct them. 

Sounds good - thats kind of like me as well. I was just wondering so I could figure out what you could work on, and give actionable steps to improve.

Chessable is a great way to improve btw, I got two courses for my birthday, and they've been amazing. You said you like to get a small advantage and grind the endgame - in this case, I would recommend you get Magnus Carlsen's Endgame course. It's taught by the world champion, and imo it's really good. 

For now, just study the Aagard book - he has several other books too, on Attack and Defense, and on Positional Play; all of which I think would be beneficial. He's a very good author and most of his books are available for free online.

If you just want to improve your overall understanding of chess, it's important to just watch a lot of chess. You get exposed to a lot of playstyles, openings, etc. That's how I improved quickly.

The Youtube Channels you are watching are excellent. Just keep that up  Just make sure to avoid "opening trap" videos - they're fun to watch, but are detrimental in the long run (I fell into the trap of watching them when i was ~600 and I tried them in every game. Things didn't end well)

As for openings, I play a ton as well. It helps to have a diverse repertoire. Just watch some games, experiment on your own, and see what you like. Experimentation is an important part of chess, so I would recommend you get an account on a different site, where you don't care about the rating as much, and just practice openings, or new ideas you learned. Failing fast is, surprisingly, a very good way to improve.

I have a lichess account. I have grown surprisingly attached to my "1500?" rating (I think I like just having an unknown rating, haha, 1500? is just the default for "we have no clue how good they are). But that's just a silly thing, I've thought about playing lichess and getting an actual rating to use for testing different openings. Considering trying the Scandanavian for black, hear it gets similar positions each game and open positions. I didn't like the idea of the queen returning to the original square, but I've heard there are other squares to plop the queen to continue play without the queen getting bombarded, so I may try that out. 

I play the Scandinavian. This variation: 

I've had success with it. Here's a game I just played now

(ik I missed like 6 wins, but I was in class and couldnt really pay attention - we're doing a debate right now lol)

If you're interested, I cna help you learn it

Sure. The first question I have is why that isn't a hanging pawn. I'm almost certain I will have to justify that at my level, players will definitely try to hang on to their point. I know that would be my first reaction. 

Ill post lines after class to show why. I'm assuming you mean after White plays c4? (thats the only way to keep the pawn)

Yeah, since the pawn is attacked twice the one defense has to be by something they'll still feel bad about recapturing at the price of a knight, like a second pawn.

Alright so:

This is pretty brief. Even if you don't follow this exactly, just know the ideas. Playing this also helps you to learn how to play with material deficit in exchange for initiative, so it's instructive as well as fun.

Where is white's d4 on move 5 coming from? I get something like the knight move as a developing play on move 4, but d4 just seems overly aggressive for no reason and gets punished for it. Still a nice line to know how to punish, but already a pawn up it seems white can just make a developing move like moving the knight out, or more likely they will move d3 or a3 to stop a knight to b4 line allowing two attackers on a weak square. Lots of players sensitive to fried liver type attacks. This isn't the mirror image, but the set-up is not dissimilar. 

bassicly. im not going to say tht think before every move because at a person at your level its hard to remember and do that (but if you can that's good and i recommend it) but playing ten minutes games so there not as boring. as well as doing puzzle battles. i don't recommend studying opening or endgames at that level. but checking Jose Raul Capablanca's chess fundamentals could help. hope this helped

https://youtu.be/B-k2fRVYeFg

its a video by Gm. Igor Smirnov of most common mistakes