what the #$%^was he playing and how did he win?

I am a tactical player by default,I know next to nothing,positionally.

Just because a piece or square is defended doesn't mean one can't or shouldn't "target" the piece or square. For instance, say your knight is on a particularly nice square that I covet... it's defended by a pawn. If I take with a bishop(or knight etc.) then you take with a pawn and I take back with my knight....as long as my knight is in the position I deem necessary for future endeavors and I can defend it adequately? That's a good exchange and I'm up a pawn.

If you defend a piece(lets say a knight) with a bishop and your other knight and I attack with my knight, bishop and rook..... then my knight takes your knight, you take back with your bishop, I take back with my bishop, you take with your knight and I finally take with my rook? I traded a bishop and a knight for your two knights and a bishop. I'm up. Especially if that results in a superior position for me. Think of it as escalating attack/defense. You defend with a piece, I attack with a piece, you defend with another piece, I attack with another piece, etc. Eventually, either a massive bloodletting occurs or De-escaltion where we both start looking elsewhere for targets and slowly move pieces to other areas of contention. Brinksmanship.

Sometimes it's advantageous to trade for a lesser value. Say I'm up a piece but your king is defended adequately behind two pawns. It might be good for me to trade my knight for the two pawns covering your king. At the end instead of being up a piece(3 points) I'd only be up two pawns. But those were critical pawns in defense of your king. I've been known to take a pawn in exchange for a bishop if it breaks down the kings defenses and allows me access to a mate solution. I'm not saying trade your pieces or make sacrifices willy nilly. Have a PLAN and be DAMNED sure the plan is sound before making any serious moves like that. Work it out in your head. Hard to do at first, and you will make mistakes. Grand Masters miscalculate. Just pick yourself up and get back into the fight... :)

I try like hell not to sacrifice or trade pieces unless it's absolutely necessary to my plan to better my position or pave the way for a mating chance. Others will trade every chance they get. I don't let it bother me as long as it's an even trade or I'm up at the end. But I don't go looking to trade off pieces unless it's part of a plan. A plan to mate the king, a plan to trap the queen, or a plan to take possession of a square I really covet etc. If you run into one of these type of players, try to get the best trade possible and play on :)

One final thought. In your last game you were REALLY concerned over what bishop was “bad”. I personally don't look at pieces as bad or good. I understand the concept. I just don't embrace it. Perhaps I will as I improve as a player.... For now I suggest you try to develop your pieces to good squares and don't even think about good/bad bishops. Their all good in the hood :) If one is trapped behind a pawn formation, eventually that formation will change and.... surprise you have a bishop that can now enter the fray. And yes, it's not doing a ton of good in the meantime but it IS backing up those pawns it's lurking behind. So it's not as useless as some might make out....

Good luck in your next contest. Have fun man. Peace

Peace.  and yes badgersong: I too am a tactical player 'by default'.  Not much contest actually. At least I can see some smothered mates, some Queen Knight mates, a tiny few pins when the force is with me, some bishop rook mates, knight forks (of course), Queen forks (for some reason, much much harder for me), pawn forks (love em to death and missed one on my first posted game...they were one of the first tactical moves I discovered, and I loved surprising my opponent with a pawn fork...). Those are hard facts. a tiny supply, but they are facts. My positional knowledge is fantasy. There's no other word for it. Okay, better is 'Its delusional'. 

That should be on my checklist for my next game. Check my delusions at the door. 

Including the delusion that I'm not allowed to win. We proved that one wrong last week. 

Ok, thats good, if you add time management issues into the mix it becomes even more difficult. You are one of the lucky ones in that area.

The reason I asked was just to confirm or eliminate a source of distraction at the board, now that is cleared up we know you can devote maximum effort to the other problems.

You are 100% correct in that most beginners play too fast but there is also no point in sitting there overthinking the situation, that leads to other problems.

I don't want to go against what this thread has been focused on so this is purely what worked for me in the early days & what my family has found helpful. If it fits then good.

When choosing an opening & your choice of the Cato-Kann is a perfect example you can't memorize enough of the lines to be able to handle what comes at you OTB but understanding just a bit about what the opening is trying to achieve can help. My Wife is playing the QGD & to sharpen it up a bit I have been throwing the Grunfeld defense back at her. At roughly the same point in each game she ran into the problem of what do I do next followed by similar problems of move choice such as you mentioned. So we sat down with some books & videos & looked at the basic concepts behind the QGD & the Grunfeld. We kept it ultra simple & kept her tactics training up. Finally she made a quantum leap (it happens & usually is when you suddenly jump a level in the game) She 1st initiated a discussion on the d4 square & its pawn & then on being too passive in the centre & voila! next game she didn't lose control of the center & actually managed to produce some pressure. I eventually beat her in the endgame so in a sense it was a victory for her.

Its little things that sometime link all the other things together, the question is what is the link that works for you. I feel that you are going to make that quantum leap to the next level in the near future, its just a matter of time.

Jaglavak

What a small world, before I got a coach I was working entirely by myself & I found a copy of "How to Think Ahead in Chess" I adopted its 3 opening strategy & had quite a bit of success with it. I gained a good understanding of the 3 openings it used & to this day the patterns are still imprinted in my brain. Of interest may be the fact that it overcame my problems with the What to do next? issue, particularly with the Stonewall attack as White. Once I understood what it was about I could plan my attack based on what the opponent was doing. My tactics were pretty good for the level I was playing & that made all the difference.

It set me up very well to expand my opening repetoire as my play improved.

I also had a copy of 1001 checkmates or something with a very similar title. Do you remember the Author, I may get another copy for my wife

I'm just going to say one more thing before saying goodnight. If I play in the next five days it will be, in the slow chess league on chess.com,  to a guy rated 1700 standard. I don't know how I'm supposed to feel about playing someone rated about 1000 points higher than me. 

Alright alright, I know the answer, I can hear the answer already.  Here is the answer, to the best of my ability, without consulting any notes. 

1st and primary question: (Opponent's Intentions) What is my opponent's plan? What is he targetting? Look hard. Don't rush. What am I vulnerable as a result of the move my opponent just made, on my opponent's next move, assuming I do nothing? Look long and hard here. Expect that my opponent wants to destroy me. Are any of my pieces pinned?  This isn't just obvious. This is also thought about. 

2nd question: ("One Against":Visible 1 mover Tactics against my opponent). What pieces of my opponent are looking vulnerable? Do any tactical motifs jump out at me? If none jump out at me...

3rd question: ("Two against. Opponent's piece Relationships.": Two mover tactics against my opponent). Do I see potential for any tactical motifs that I can set up against my opponent? In other words, are there any two pieces of his on the same diagonal or file or rank or within knight fork that I can take advantage of? What is his best response to a set up move on my part? Are there any obvious potentials for pins against me, or pins against my opponent?

4th question: (emotional/hand position check).  How am I feeling? Am I feeling frustrated, stupid, dejected, confused, impulsive.  Recalibrate emotions. Take a breath.  I'm here as an act of generosity to teach my opponent how to play chess better.  Keep sitting on my hands. 

5th question: ("Review questions. See about Improvement": Review of all 4, then  Piece Improvement potential).Now that I have sat on my hands, and reviewed the above questions, all 4 of them, IF I do not have any new answers to the above, is there a piece that I can improve? How can I be sure this is an improvement? Is it possibly a weakening of its placement?

6th question: (Pawn move? Impulsive? Emotional? Answerable? Calculated?) Still sitting on my hands, am I making a pawn move that I will have to answer to my team for, and that I will find I have no good answer for? Am I making a clueless pawn move?

7th question: (Don't rush. Go about this deliberately, and methodically. Is the candidate move safe?) Now that I have narrowed down to a move I'm about to make, recheck it slowly and carefully for safety. If it proves to be not safe, START AGAIN. Then

8th step: "make the move" and now listen to the sound of the game. (Give yourself over to possibility. Listen to the music your opponent is making) Give the game over to the opponent, with generosity and grace. Invite the opponent to think long and well. You're in this together.  

That's my list. Can we prune this list? Let's not make it longer.  And I'm comfortable memorizing it as is, and I'm open to suggestions of how to improve any of the steps, without adding a step, and without removing a step, unless you think there's something unimportant in the list, or unless you think there's something important I've left out. 

I think OTB checklists are a very individual thing, what works for you is all that matters.

Mine used the KISS principle to the extreme

Look!

Think!

Calculate!

Recheck!

Move!

But that was what I took to the board, at home I had far more extensive list that I had worked until it became part of me. Then all I had to use at the board were the above abbreviations.

thank you aronchuck. Great advice. And, I have a game at 1530 GMT (1030AM EST) on Saturday. It is a 45/+.45 game, so time trouble could be an issue indeed. 

aronchuck, which of the following do you do on your opponent's move, and which on your own? Here is your list. 

1.  What is my opponents idea?  what is he trying to do.  I 'imagine' I do this on my move, after my opponent has moved. 

2.  Where are the weaknesses?  This will guide you to focus on looking for the targets.  I imagine I look at my opponent's weaknesses on my move, and my weaknesses on my opponent's move. Would this be correct? 

3.  Where is the worst placed piece?  If there is nothing else for you to do you can improve its position. I imagine you meant this as referring to my worst placed piece, and I could do this on my opponent's move?

I plan to try to start applying a consistent thinking method when I do tactics puzzles in the next three days, leading up to my Saturday game. I will be able to report on how I do with thinking about disciplined questions as I practice it during tactics puzzles. I will have time to do no chess today. 

Regarding Jaglavak's questions, 1.  combinations, 2. targets, 3. improvements

I imagine I could do all of them on my opponent's move, as long as I do them again after my opponent moves. That's where aronchuck's #1 "what is opponent's idea" is important, as it asks 'what did my opponent just do'. 

regarding Yaroslavl's questions, his #1 'what is my opponent threatening?' is the same as aronchuck's. his #2 'are all my pawns defended' is a variant of my pawn question (actually, I came up with my pawn question following Yaroslavl's suggestion) and is a variant of aronchuck's #2 where are my weaknesses. Also, I imagine, from previous discussion, that if one of my pawns is defended by one of my pieces, then that is a weaknesses if that piece can come under attack.

Yaroslavl's #3 is a unique and special question, to be used during my move. His #3 is 'is the square that I am considering moving my piece to defended by me, (and/or attacked my the opponent'). In other words, it is a blunder check for my move currently under consideration. 

Yaroslavl's #4 'what are the weaknesses in my opponent's position' is identical to aronchuck's #2 

Yaroslavl's #5 'if I am considering moving a pawn, remember it is non-revokable as pawns cannot move backwards' is clearly a question for during my move.

Remember, folks, my biggest confusion occurs in the transition from opening to middlegame, and is usually prompted by an urge to make a pawn move, initiating an exchange, and difficulty evaluating such an exchange in target terms. Since I will not 'know' my openings by Saturday, I will try to use my time liberally at that time in the game, and I will try to calculate that one out deeply. Since I will not be familiar with any patterns at that point, I will have to do hard calculation. 

my opponent on Sat is 1700 standard on chess.com

@QueentakesKnightoops

the 1001 checkmates is likely Reinfeld.

awesome. thank you for yours. I look forward to your annotation, as I'm sure others will too. and, yes, ships in the night is likely. However, if you have time your comments on my annotation (my thought process) will likely be useful too. 

very important, and, perhaps more importantly, I understand this one. There have been situations in my games where I have discarded a combination because a particular piece prevented it. If I had continued focussing on it and thought of ways of removing/distracting the preventing piece, I could have proceeded with the combination. But I erred by dropping it altogether. 

Some of the other questions you ask above as your supplementary questions are far too sophisticated for me now. For e.g. what pieces do I want to exchange off?...far too sophisticated for me now. I have no idea how to make such decisions. Who has the initiative? Let's say I think I do. So what? What do I do with the intiative? If I think the opponent has the initiative, what do I do with that?

I imagine in either case, I still have to look for targets, look for inadequately defended pieces, and look to improve pieces. 

re: pawn breaks. That is still a big fuzzy cloudy difficult subject for me, and one which I am bound to continue making mistakes on, I believe, until I understand some particular openings and their pawn break themes. 

thank you aronchuck. 

thank you Jaglavak. I will read this over tomorrow when I am more rested. I understand the if not/then stucture of your questions. I have 2 questions already though. 

The first is simple. What do you recommend I do after I have moved? While I am waiting for my opponent to move? On my opponent's time. You outline what I should do on my time, both before I move, and after I have chosen my move but before I move the piece. You do not elaborate on what makes sense to do while I am waiting for my opponent to move. 

Related to the first: why would going through your three questions while waiting for my opponent be 'commiting a grave error'? I simply don't understand, and I imagine the answer is interesting. 

you write:

<If, as you suggest, you did all of them on your opponents time you would be making the grave error .

First, since you will have already moved,  you would be ignoring the fact that your move can create a combinational pattern which your opponent can exploit.

Second, your move could be a hafl-move not being aimed at a specific target or at improving yur mobility.

Third, your move might be the most eeftcive way to improve  overall mobility of your pieces or even just the specific mobility of the piece you just moved.

>

I don't understand any of this. Please explain when you can. Don't worry about it being premature, or non-apploicable to me. It will likely be applicable to other readers of this thread.

I will prepare for Saturdays game with tactics puzzles, and with going over my limited openings repertoire, and with practicing thinking processes while doing tactics puzzles. 

My opponent on Saturday is actually rated about 1400 standard on chess.com. He DOES beat other 1400 players, and I looked at a game of his, and he is quite a fighter. I have white. 

A bit more on time management. Roughly 50% of your thinking time is on your opponents move so it is a valuable resource & you can benefit greatly from a plan to optimise that time. For me thats when I look for more subtle things like weak squares, which pieces I am willing to trade & which I want to keep, do I want to keep a bishop pair for the endgame etc etc. Another thing I did was to try & predict my opponents move, I did this last after I had completed my other checks & it helped me understand their plan (if they had one) & to be prepared for at least some of the moves that will be coming back over the board.

Don't forget that if you are getting Brain Fried you can get up for a moment during your opponents move & get a drink, your brain will keep working just avoid big distractions like girls or other games.

You are getting an enormous amount of info at the moment, probably far more than you can absorb but a few basic plans can help you to manage it without becoming overwhelmed.

You mention that your next opponent may have a much higher rating than you, there's nothing you can do about that or make a specific plan for, just focus on your game & learning curve, he's just another player at this point & ratings are very overrated in many situations. However your choice of opponent (if you get that option) can make a difference. My daughter is going through a phase now where I am advising her to limit the rating of her opponents because she needs to get some wins on the board. She plays the opening sensibly & runs into the middle game transition problem but when she does have a good middle game she lacks the knowledge/experience to finish it off & get a win. Wins are very important & often overlooked as part of the learning curve. Nothing will imprint a position on your brain better than a mating combination that works. As you rack up some wins your confidence also goes up, true you may learn more from your losses but never underestimate the value of a win as a learning tool, its the culmination of all the 100's of hours work & study you have put in & you have earned it.

BTW thanks for the info on the 1001 Ways to Checkmate book, I thought it may be Reinfield & thats the one I used years ago before I lost a 6,500 book library (over 200 books in the Chess section) in a fight with a viscious ex wife.

queentakes knight: thanks for the thoughts on the thinking to do on my opponent's time. Much appreciated. 

There is material that I cannot absorb or eve follow immeidately; JAglavak's last post, a couple of Yaroslavl's posts, but I have gone back to such posts a few days or weeks later and found them more accesible. AND other readers on this thread might be finding them accesible, so its not wasted at all.

Since this thread is my textbook, for real, I keep going back and reviewing parts of it, and having that (hope-inspiring) experience of seeing where I was blind before. 

Sorry about the loss of the awesome library. You can pick up Reinfeld for probably about 2 bucks, at a local used book store, or online at amazon. 

I haven't used it, but I know of it. Probably most chess players in the 40+ range who played chess in their childhood cut their tactical teeth on that and Reinfeld's other book, which name I can't remember.

There's a LOT of tactics books out there. I merely do the ones on chess.com, cuz it serves them up to me at my level, and so I can keep pushing the envelope higher. 

good night. I"m looking forward to Saturday's game. I really am. You're going to see some difference, becuase tomorrow I'm really going to work on thinking processes. 

Very interesting, the smothered mate fascinated me & I finally got one in an inter club match thanks to that book. It got me the Prizes for best game & best game with sacrifice that tournament. It paid for the celebratory drinks after the tournament

I  have a small chess book collection,Reinfeld's book is one of the books I own;I think its a very good workbook.

I love books, I saved a 1795 copy of Philidors "How to Play Chess" when we had to sell everything & would you believe it was in the box that got water damage when we spent a couple of years in a Motorhome!

Jaglavak, you answered my questions thoroughly, clearly, and coherently. Thank you. I hope other readers of this thread read what you wrote above in #153. People may disagree with you,  but they can't argue that you don't consistently make sense.