Choosing how to try to gain an advantage

Don't be fooled, sometimes one move threats are the best, when they create multiple problems. They are one of the simplest ways to gain an advantage, its just a matter of seeing them.

thanks for this comment and the link. very helpful.

Sure, if your threat creates multiple problems in your opponents position then Heisman would say this is "Real Chess".  Heisman is mainly directing his articles to patzers like me who make moves as black like the one in the diagram.  Black checks white, hoping white will do what? Block check with his queen? Thats obvioulsy not going to happen so white plays c3 and forces black to lose a tempo.  I see this exact move played daily with opponents at my level.

Although Black may say: "hee hee now your knight cannot go to c3!"  Some strong people do play moves like that for such reasons.

True but since I played 1.d4 I am probably not looking to put my knight on c3 right away blocking in my c pawn. c3 is where I want my pawn in this London setup and my knight will be happy on d2.

Anyways, that is not really the point.  The point is, at my level, my opponent will play a move like this cause they saw a check, so they made a check, hoping white does something dumb.    Rinse and repeat for the majority of the moves in a game.  Like I said, I imagine at your level you and your opponents have a general idea where your pieces should go in a given position, when should you push a pawn and when shouldn't you, etc.  At my level, its mostly just shuffle peices around the board until someone blunders.

free cat--  thanks for posting your game.  very helpful.

one question-- why did you do 22....Bxf3?   maybe I'm missing something?

nameno1had-- great question -- thanks for starting this conversation.

After me and my opponent have gone through our "book" opening we are now focused and are playing through the center. We are both looking down the road for an advantage that would be in our favor, that road is a Tactical minefield for the tactically challendged or the positional weaklings ! My opponent and i are making plans to undermind pieces and pawns to gain access to centrally advanced squares (posts) and open files and diagonals for our forces.

      At some point somebody is going to impose their will on somebody !

       :At this point WHO has the advantage and what is the nature of it, i.e. space, mobility, two-bishops , etc.

        : if i possess an advantage where are my canidate moves to expand on the nature of it.

        :if my opponent possess an advantage; plan my counter-attack !

                  JUST SOME THOUGHTS       always play to win no matter what !

Warning: Long winded book recommendation. Read at your own risk!

I hope I am not oversimplifying the general idea, but I see the question as posed as how to choose a plan in a game of chess. As far as I am aware, a plan is the same thing as a strategy. There are a few books I have read that have given me much insight on exactly this subject. The first is 'How to Reassess Your Chess' by IM Jeremy Silman. An immensely popular book, it has helped thousands of class players such as myself to better understand openings, planning, strategy, and position play. From this book I learned that the plan I should adopt is contained in the very opening moves that are played, the purpose of the opening not being to merely develop pieces but to create differences that I must try to prove are advantageous to me. Generally, the area or squares I should attack is based on the 'imbalances' or differences in the position. IM Silman lists seven imbalances to identify in any given position to help choose a plan: Superior minor piece, pawn structure, space, material, control of key files, diagonals and squares, better development, and initiative. The book explains what these imbalances are and why (and how) they can be used to choose a plan.

I do not know what 'hope chess' and 'real chess' are, after I finish this post I intend to look them up to see what everyone is talking about.

Two other books that helped me in this regard:

'The Logical Approach to Chess' by Max Euwe, in collaboration with two amateur players Blaine and Rumble. This was my first chess book, and contains a lot if instructive games played at the amateur level. 

'My System' by Aron Nimzowitsch, possibly a bit more advanced then Reassess Your Chess but most GM's have read it. I should probably have another crack at it.

I hope you find these reccomendations useful.

I tend to see pinning the knights to the king and queen as good moves and if your opponents' only way to take back, wrecks their pawns structure, it is perhaps a worthwhile venture...

I first of all wanted to say thanks. Secondly, I think that you are onto something with the suggestion of a way a strong player formulates an assessment to begin an attack, for any given position.

I think maybe to some degree, I am perhaps a little burned out. The positions sometimes seem the same to me when I look at them, though I know they each have their own set of of strengths and weaknesses. I think part of my problem is that I am not always sure as to what I should give more creedence to when choosing a point of attack.

I find it difficult sometimes, to choose, when I can only see so far ahead and I stuck guessing as to what my opponent will choose, if there aren't any forcing moves. One of things I have been recently coming to terms with is, violating some of the elementary principles, that you have to learn in order to gain a ranking above 1000, like intentionally putting ones pieces into a potentially vulnerable position, or needing to sacrifice material to gain an advantage. I have been trying really hard to see these combinations more during the opening and middle game, I tend to be better at them in end games or mating puzzles.

This thread is long on text and short on examples.

Regarding text--"[Just] as in the old myth the world stands on three fishes. The three fishes of chess mastery are positional judgement, an eye for combinations, and the ability to analyse variations." Alexander Kotov, "Play Like a Grandmaster," (1978).

Regarding text--you can buy the book cited above for less than $20, assuming you can find it.  It is chockablock with examples of the "three fishes" at work.

As for Strategy exercises, a great book (with short, crisp explanations) is "Mastering Chess Strategy," by Johan Hellsten, (2010); about 500 pages of bite-sized exercises.  Most examples are about 10-15 moves, showing you "how to gain an advantage."

Between these two books, all your chess strategy and middlegame needs should be met.

Just work your way through these two books, especially the latter, and your "chess savy" should soar. 

P.S. I have only skimmed Kotov so far, and done the first 50 (of 382) exercises in Hellsten, but I can see and feel the difference.  It's like eating your Cheerios for breakfast. 

yeah it often is good to pin pieces. But also in such cases: a double pawn in one file gives a (half)open file on the other file, which could be dangerous too: for powerful rooks for example facing your castle.

(ignore the white king in this diagram)

What I'd like to say with this is that wrecking pawn structures with pins is not always good either (like random checks are).

The example above looks lost for white.  After Rc8 by black, white already has big problems.  The g-file is hardly dangerous.  

This is only a fictional diagram, trying to show pressure on a kingside castle due to an half open g-file, which is often caused by taking pins on f3.

Plz don't bother too much with this, it is a bit off topic.

I came from a technical background, so I see this issue in a different way.

I think going by calculation is the most accurate way of playing chess. Going by calculation is often translated by many people as being tactical, which I think is not necessarily a correct label. However, the problem with calculation is that it is arduous, time-consuming, error-prone, and humans can only calculate that far within a reasonable time limit.

Hence, in order to see farther that what we can calculate, we humans develop a heuristic approach. This heuristic approach is a means of approximating the outcome of a move without having to concretely calculate all the possible variations. Some people call this positional chess, which again I quite disagree with the labeling. A heuristic search is only an approximation of the optimum solution. In computers, we use heuristic approach to drastically cut down the searching time by pruning away the alternatives using well-defined rules (For those of us chess players, this should sound familiar). This means less accurate solutions, but we save the time and effort to arrive at the solution.

I mentioned that I disagree with the labeling because those labels tend to make people think as if they are different (the tactics vs strategy, attacking vs defensive, etc.). In essence, they are one and the same. So how do you determine a move? First, whenever possible we should go by calculation. When calculation is no longer possible (due to the time constraint or the number of variations is simply too many), we use heuristics. That I think is the correct approach to chess.

I find that I nearly always play "hope chess" in 5 minute games, but do my best to play "real chess" in correspondance games. It makes sense that one of those ratings is about 400 points higher than the other!

^ Nice post, Paul. More for me to think about, as well as the OP.

However, I would say you're quite far from us "weaker" players! 2300? Never lost a game here?!?

It is interesting to me that you have pointed out the way people relieve their stresses by taking when the burden of calculation becomes so great. I have done this too. It has always amazed me at the amount of "touching" or mutually attacking pieces that are invovled through the courses of masters' games I have watched, yet they all seem to be backdrops for the real action. It is amazing to me that they can calculate that far ahead to not take when they can. I know when I tend to make my mistakes, so I like to simplify games and go to the end game. I like the odds that way sometimes. It seems to involves less calculation usually, but end games that require a lot of it tend to give me fits.

This goes widely beyond my understanding of chess 

Has it got something to do with the fact that if you can choose the moment of breaking a pawn tension (i.e. you have the initiative), you can do so on the moment at which it is most desirable?