How to work on tactics that are realistic?

I feel like there should be a way to work on +1 -1 positions that have many options but have a certain tactical pattern like the tactics that happen in games that are more subtle

..in oppose to the ones that work as automated puzzles where it's you vs. stockfish playing the best defense in a singular-move-to-win-several-in-a-row constellation...

For example in this game:

There is this moment where I didn't see why d5 would be a good square for my knight as it's not attacking anything seemingly ever, and c4 seems to flat out trap it... In reality c4 is a blunder so stockfish would never play it, but it's a mistake only because of the brilliant Nb4 and after h3 back to c6 and the pawn is undefendable.

I wish I could see this stuff (that c3-c4 gives the knight the b4 square). I completely overlook this kind of subtle tactics all the time. How do I work on it specifically?

These tactics which actually happen in games where you are provoking your opponent to make a mistake (after Nd5 ..e4? or c4? both give black an edge). in contrast the solutions of puzzle can never contain opponent's further mistakes.. but in games tactics are often exactly seeing opponent's natural move is an innacuracy and now we get initiative (rather than winning lots of material or mate like all the puzzles).

In the game Nd5 just looked bad to me, knight gets trapped there, couldn't see the b4/f4 theme... I want to target this directly in training to fix this blindness.

Thx for help

Thanks

nice! I was wondering how to work on finding these more subtle tactics... your game features a strong attack that is indeed puzzle- like..

But how do you work on tactics that just win a pawn for a +0.7 position you know? ones that there is no big win, just you place your piece on a nice square, and if it gets kicked out that loses a pawn or something... Those are never featured in puzzles and they so often happen in games! that's the point of this thread I'm sure there's a way to train this stuff I just don't know it

I will use the tally thing tho, thx for this advice.. because my opponent definitely triggered it as early as move 3! like what is this London where you move the bishop again for no reason achieving nothing... yet he did get a game because I couldn't find Nd5

There is an old software program called CT-Art 4.0 that did exactly what you ask. I read that the “updated” versions are of questionable utility in this area. I also suspect that the copyright owners haven’t done a good job of protecting the trademark. I gave up looking for a good, modern version of it a few weeks ago.

If you or anyone happens to take up the search, please post back here. Otherwise I might dig thru some old CD-ROMs and fire up my old WinXP machine that’s been collecting dust.

Hey thx! @Jaybird127 if you find something let me know!

@AlekhinesRazor Thanks for your strategic input on how and when to look for subtle /pawn-winning tactics in principle. I will do this.

I will definitely remember this specific tactic in the London system pawn structure, because I at this point internalized that once e3-e4 or c3-c4 give up the control of the adjacent squares, which seems obvious, but in a game I often have this blindness of (2 move deep stuff)... Now 3 move deep blindness is already acceptable but just 1-2 move deep calculation I suddenly miss very basic tactics (including m1) sometimes... as in I calculate some move as "surviving" when it gets mated objectively in one move, or in this example I deem the knight trapped when in fact it re-routes to a better square (c6), like you said.

I know these seem like unrelated examples but I would like to work on it and it seems like the normal tactics don't really improve that aspect of calculation (seeing and properly evaluating mistakes in future positions) because stockfish never makes mistakes when defending a tactic...