Can't transition to OTB chess

I started playing chess around 2 months ago and I learned off of my PC, I have never played chess OTB.

I purchased a chess set, and have been trying to play on that instead of the computer because I want to play in tournaments and such. I have played 3 games and keep making super obvious mistakes that I would usually catch.

Any suggestions?

take your time.  develop your pieces harmoniously. (LPDO = Loose Pieces Drop Off).  be sure to see the whole board  [otb the board is in fact larger and if so used to online chess i recall at times i had tunnel vision, missing or forgetting about stuff at the edges of the board :-)].  note changes in the position as they occur.  have fun.

Persistence will pay off.  You will need far more than 3 exposures to acclimate to a physical board & set.  Practice, paractice, practice ...

Real board definitely can change vision. The less experienced the player the less the translation from 2d to 3d

I had the same problem in reverse.  Just keep practicing. Three games isn't enough to mentally switch from two dimensional to three dimensional.

the awesome GM Hikaru said on his reddit ama:

"When I see the board, it is usually the blue board from the chess program chessbase with the white and black pieces. I suspect that for most modern day players, blindfold chess is a lot easier because of the endless hours we have all spent studying chess on computer screens."

I wonder if us less-than-awesomes can't use a simillar idea. Get the position from those weird pointy wooden things that stick out in unnecessary dimensions, then look at some flat surface and visualise our favourite chess gui.

When reviewing master games, play through the games on the board. You may prefer to study on the computer and I would not abandon computer use for study as it is a useful skill in modern chess, but you might find it a useful exercise to recall the moves of a master game you have studied. Try to see how far you can replay the game without referring to the moves. The objective should not be rote memorization, but to recall the reasons and the tactics behind each of the moves.

Another exercise is to set up positions from a challenging problem book and then attempt to solve them as though you were playing a game. This way you can accustom yourself to calculation during an OTB game.

I think these two exercises may help with playing OTB games while improving chess skill in general. If you watch chess videos online, it may also help to play the moves over the board as you watch the video. This can sometimes help you remember the lecture better as you are doing something active related to the lecture. If there is a local club in your area, you can also gain experience before playing in tournaments.

Good point. I find that now that my pieces are physically closer to me, I have a tendency to not look at the back two ranks of the opponents side.