Will Leagues make me better at chess?

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Theooolone
I’ve recently noticed I’m in bronze rank and it seems like a fun challenge.
I’m rated 490 and would like to try leagues for its clear sense of progression and achievement, is this a sensible idea if I also want to improve at chess?
ChesswithGautham

For me, leagues bring a whole lot of stress and you have to play bullet which is bad for you. Don’t join leagues unless you are a person who just plays chess for fun and wants a challenge.

CrypticPassage
ChesswithGautham wrote:

For me, leagues bring a whole lot of stress and you have to play bullet which is bad for you. Don’t join leagues unless you are a person who just plays chess for fun and wants a challenge.

Who says you have to play Bullet?

ChesswithGautham
CrypticPassage wrote:
ChesswithGautham wrote:

For me, leagues bring a whole lot of stress and you have to play bullet which is bad for you. Don’t join leagues unless you are a person who just plays chess for fun and wants a challenge.

Who says you have to play Bullet?

No one, but people just get stressed they are not moving on, so they have to play bullet.

ChesswithGautham

You can still play rapid at leagues if you wish.

uubuuh

good grief, just play whatever you want.  analyze your games.  I'm a weak player that got to "silver" just by playing my normal amount.  it doesn't matter.  once I realized what that league thing was I played a bunch of games since it was the weekend and got to crystal.  so ok yeah it is sort of fun to have a motivation to play a bit more than I usually do.  but I confess I wasn't analyzing my losses lately so in a way leagues disrupted me for the worse...

Kowarenai

it can or it might set you frustrated, you just gotta keep going for it friend happy.png

Dr_Risiko

Playing a lot of games should be helpful to improve at chess. But only if you take the time to analyze the games afterwards. And try to stick to certain principles of solid play (castle early, control the center etc. etc.)!

Gorgonops

If you have to ask, then probably no

YellowVenom

Your performance in leagues has almost no correlation to how good you are at chess. Anyone can fly through the leagues by grinding bullet games 8 hours a day. Speaking of which, if you ever join me in Crystal... God help us.

XOsportyspiceXO

The lichess 4545 league seems pretty serious. Nice long time control to think on.

Twurple
I am currently in Champion League, and I am planning to aim for legend in a few weeks. In my opinion, leagues can be really fun when you are racing a friend. It doesn’t take much skill (I’m pretty terrible myself), but it does take time. I would recommend playing blitz in tournaments for the highest time efficiency. However, if you don’t like doing repetitive things, I wouldn’t recommend it.