New player and many questions.

Thanks all for the unclear explanation.

@ClaPps84 I'm 44 and started playing January 2020. I found what helped me the most was learning to calculate, visualise, and situational awareness that @blueemu referred to. Being able to look at a position and work out who is attacking who, where the pressure and tension is, what the outcome of exchanges will be. This is a skill that strengthens with practice. Games help, but for me doing 5 to 10 puzzles everyday, without fail, has had the most benefit. The trick is to solve each puzzle in your head before moving the pieces. I stop when I find myself starting to guess continuations as its normally a sign I'm getting mentally tired. Look at forced moves such as captures, threats and checks. Do the lessons on forced and powerful moves. Ignore the clock, it normally takes me several minutes to find the solution, the target times aren't helpful if you are doing hard puzzles to practice calculation. Give it time, months. It takes a while for the brain to develop board vision. A good puzzle book is Chess Tactics for Students by Bain.

Time spent on that particular move.

Thanks you 

Hi jumping on this post - what do you mean by 'board vision'?  Is it the ability to see from one end of the board to the other - eg long open diagonals where a bishop might be protecting a position?  If so, is there anything we can do to improve this?  I think (know) this is a weakness of mine.  I just don't see all the board.

Hi. Visualising or board vision refers to being able to see/imagine/understand the outcome of a sequence of moves before they appear on the board. It gets harder, the further ahead you are looking. You visualise not only where the pieces will be, but the features of the position such as open files, diagonals and weak squares. Whenever you find yourself thinking, 'I'll take, then he'll take, then I'll take, and the file will open, then I can play rook e8 and attack his pawn', you are visualising (and calculating). Hope that helps.

It might be argued that there is a distinction between visualisation and board vision. The term board vision is often used when referring to the position in front of you and being able to see the checks, captures, and threats that exist now. Visualizing normally means looking ahead, at the next move and beyond, so is about 'seeing' change. But you get the idea.

Because a clairvoyant speaks with dead soles which doesn't have much to do with chess (unless I'm missing something). Seriously though, many aspects of chess are about looking into the future. I mean tempo of course, not clock time. Once a player gets to an intermediate level, they understand the basics of advantage, forced and power moves, calculation, visualisation, position evaluation, initiative, and are able to integrate these ideas, look ahead, and consider a range of options/outcomes. How far one can reliably see depends on the position, time management (clock time), skill and knowledge. All of which strengthen with study and experience.

I think it's a cobbler that works with dead soles?

😁 yeah, sabotaged by predictive text. Not sure how to edit posts using the android app.

What if they channel Fischer?

Don't do that, because then my comment will look wierd and out of context

     Yes, most GMs, especially the best, have an ability somewhat like that. Being able to clearly "see" a future position enables superior judgement of which moves are best. The other most important chess talent is visual memory, the capacity to recall positions from past games and study and remember what to do when similar positions arise. 

Blind people have no issues with visualizations.