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Have you played over the sample games on the first few pages?
GM Larry Evans' method of static analysis
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Jan 27, 2023
0
#103
Charlie8686 wrote:
Very well written and very informative. Thanks for the info!
Agreed, I skimmed through this yesterday and read more of it today, just now in fact, this gentleman has alot of Chess knowledge as we can see and seems very deserved of his 2300 + rating, I'm actually impressed and most comments on this site don't impress me, those comments were filled with Chess knowledge and wisdom!
Jan 27, 2023
0
#104
Chesslover0_0 wrote:
Charlie8686 wrote:
Very well written and very informative. Thanks for the info!
Agreed, I skimmed through this yesterday and read more of it today, just now in fact, this gentleman has alot of Chess knowledge as we can see and seems very deserved of his 2300 + rating, I'm actually impressed and most comments on this site don't impress me, those comments were filled with Chess knowledge and wisdom!
Praise is always nice to hear.
Have you seen my game?
Link > A Heroic Defense in the Sicilian Najdorf - Kids, don't try this at home!
Jan 27, 2023
0
#105
Optimissed wrote:
Criticism of writings[edit]
Larry Evans was a prolific author, with many who both liked and disliked his works.
Noted chess author and trainer International Master John L. Watson made the following observations on Evans's books and columns: "huge bias"; "long histories of ignoring and distorting evidence" and "Evans' absurd arguments".[20]
By contrast, chess author and International Master Anthony Saidy noted that Evans brought to his journalism a "taste for intriguing chess", his personal experience at "the summit of US chess", and "sharp opinions" regarding the politics of chess, which contributed to his "spicy, concise columns".[21]
Author and USCF National Master Bruce Pandolfini described Larry Evans's New Ideas in Chess as influential and a "first-rate chess book".[22]
Leading chess historian Edward Winter, however, has noted numerous factual errors in Evans' work as well as several examples of possible plagiarism.[23]
On page 175 of Evans' book, Modern Chess Brilliancies, he claims Lodewijk Prins adjourned a clearly lost position against Cuban master Quesada and was lucky enough when the latter died of a heart attack the "next day". Prins noted that he had actually resigned the position, as is proven by the tournament crosstables showing it as a loss for him, and that Quesada played three more games in the tournament before dying five days after the game against Prins. While Evans acknowledged the error, he defended it with "you must admit it makes a good story."[24]
Every one of the people the Wiki quotes is rated hundreds of points below Evans. Every one.
Even if you were to prove that Evans was a cannibal and that he molested children, what does any of that have to do with his understanding of chess (an understanding that gained him both the US Championship title and the GM title)?
Ad hominem much?
Jan 27, 2023
0
#106
Optimissed wrote:
For instance, space is never an absolute positive. Even with more pieces on, it can make the job of defending the space too difficult, because it can give the opponent the room to operate *within* the space you have to defend.
If the opponent is operating within your own Pawns, then where is this "space advantage" of yours coming from? You don't seem to be counting space the same way I explained. Are you just looking at the extended Pawns? That isn't how space is counted.
There was an obvious one too ... the idea that someone behind with force is always losing. When you separate time from force, that isn't true.
Where did I (or Evans) make that claim? This sounds like a straw man that you've set up specifically to knock down and declare victory.
Interesting and excellent article, thank you for sharing .
Jan 27, 2023
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#108
Optimissed wrote:
"Behind in Force: The other side of the coin. Avoid unnecessary exchanges. Try to play for an advantage in Time (development) since Time is the easiest advantage to convert into a winning attack. If necessary, sacrifice additional material for counter-play... why not? You're losing anyway."
Taken together with the immediately preceding sentence, the last sentence obviously implies "if down in material and left without counter-play".
I thought you had studied Philosophy? Are you seriously telling me that your professional training consists only of dissecting sentences, searching the lining of every syllable in hopes of finding some out-of-context quote that you can object to?
You must be very bored.
Jan 27, 2023
0
#109
blueemu wrote:
Chesslover0_0 wrote:
Charlie8686 wrote:
Very well written and very informative. Thanks for the info!
Agreed, I skimmed through this yesterday and read more of it today, just now in fact, this gentleman has alot of Chess knowledge as we can see and seems very deserved of his 2300 + rating, I'm actually impressed and most comments on this site don't impress me, those comments were filled with Chess knowledge and wisdom!
Praise is always nice to hear.
Have you seen my game?
Link > A Heroic Defense in the Sicilian Najdorf - Kids, don't try this at home!
I took a look at it, a very unconventional game, alot of those moves I simply didn't understand.
Jan 27, 2023
0
#110
No doubt I am indeed excessively touchy, but I can't for the life of me see what the two ideas have in common:
1) Evans getting the details of a chess story completely wrong and publishing a fictional account rather than researching the facts.
2) Therefore Evans' work within his own field (chess theory) must be entirely worthless.
These two ideas just don't link up for me.
An analogy:
Bobby Fischer was a horrible human being. His anti-Semitic views in particular were morbid and repellant. Does this mean that his ideas on chess were worthless? His games not worth studying and emulating? His opening innovations should be discarded, out of distaste for his politics?
Jan 27, 2023
0
#111
CHIEFofLEMONS wrote:
Interesting concept. Can you give spaces evaluation numbers like pieces?
Not sure of your meaning.
The numbers (ie: the space-count, the time-count) are not that important. It's an understanding of the basic concepts that is important, along with the advice for each possible outcome (ahead in Time, behind in Time, ahead in Space, etc).
Naturally no general advice (and no set of general rules) will apply in 100% of cases. Chess would be a very easy game if all you needed was a list of rules to follow.
Jan 27, 2023
0
#112
Optimissed wrote:
Do you mind if I answer your comment? I'm sorry, I should have remembered you can be touchy and I also know you're basically alright but touchiness can lead to inventing things. Here, the invented thing was "therefore".
<<Therefore Evans' work within his own field (chess theory) must be entirely worthless.>>
Evans was well known for invention and even lying. However, that anecdote isn't the main reason for criticism of him: it's his lack of accuracy which annoyed other GMS.
Also "entirely worthless" is an invention. He was just a bit dodgy. There were some chess writers in the 70s and 80s who used to come in for similar criticism. Andy Soltis springs to mind. Probably helped many players but considered inaccurate and dodgy. There was another one too. Raymond Keene had his critics but not to the same extent. When a chess writer seems just to want to sell books ....
Guilty as charged... you never said "therefore". I just added that little flourish.
I can't take the "inaccuracy" criticisms of Evans very seriously, though. Note that all of the "slightly dodgy" writers you mentioned were from the 70s and 80s (and Evans wrote in the 50s to 60s, too).
The 80s was the last decade before Chess computers became a major factor. That means that Evans' critics had access to chess computers for tactics-and-blunder-checking, but Evans himself (nor Soltis, and perhaps Keene) did NOT. This is hardly a level playing field for determining a person's accuracy.
Jan 27, 2023
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#113
I certainly have no trouble believing in pre-Columbian Phoenician explorers. The Phoenicians rivaled the (later) Polynesians in long-range exploration.
In fact, if I'm a die-hard fan of any controversial chess writer, it would be Kmoch and his Pawn Power in Chess masterpiece... which many players (including some GMs) absolutely hate.
hi
Jan 27, 2023
0
#115
The Space-Time-Force static analysis is NOT intended to replace the I-go-here, he-goes-there dynamic analysis. I said that very clearly, quite early in the thread. It is intended to guide your positional judgements, not to REPLACE move-by-move calculation. Do you criticize a cruise ship because it can't fly? It was never intended to. The flaw is in your expectations, not in the ship.
An unscrupulous person could pretend that they have refuted ANY and EVERY chess convention just by offering an appropriate Mate-in-1 diagram. "Control the center"? Just offer a diagram where any central move gets mated immediately. THUS I REFUTE CONTROLLING THE CENTER! How about "Develop your pieces"? Just offer a diagram where any developing move gets mated immediately. THUS I REFUTE THE CONCEPT OF DEVELOPING YOUR PIECES! How about "Castle early"? All we need to do is offer a diagram where castling gets mated immediately. Infantile.
But this is just sophistry, not logic... and certainly not chess.
Capablanca covers that in his book he calls it the element of position.
You can be ahead in force, space and time but still have a lost game because of position
Jan 27, 2023
0
#117
CHIEFofLEMONS wrote:
I gave that as an example to show the piece value doesn't matter. Realistically speaking, both piece value and what I am proposing, space value, should be considered. I don't know why pointing this out makes people feel they have to give up their religion to believe what I am stating.
Check my edit above. The piece value only "doesn't matter" in very specific and (usually) contrived positions.
Your point that "not all squares are worth the same" is of course correct, but this is not something that can be formalized to a count because it depends on the location of the two Kings, the activity of the opposing forces, and precise dynamics of the tactical interplay.
I think there's a confusion of granularity levels here. Let's try a Gedankenexperiment, and hope I don't lose you completely.
Consider Chess as an abstract vertical stack of concepts.
The bottom few levels of the logical stack are all tactical. The bottom-most granularity level is the actual possible moves of the pieces in their current position. The next level up considers those moves as threats and strings them together into sequences of moves. The next level up attaches meaning to those sequences. And so on. Many, many levels above that you will encounter concepts such as "Pawn Structure", "Space Advantage" and "King Safety".
The point of the STF static analysis is to roughly approximate the output of ALL of the lower levels of that logical stack and present the player with information that would normally only be available if you patiently worked your way up through the stack, starting with the current position and the possible moves of each piece.
The important point is that all of the inputs to your STF analysis (material count, space count) are PRIMITIVE data. You just point. Then count. Then write it down.
But assigning different values to different squares depending on the two King's position, the activity of nearby pieces, tactical I-go-here-he-goes-there calculations... this requires ALREADY PROCESSED information. It requires OUTPUT, from intensive previous calculations.
We're supposed to be talking about INPUT. You are putting the cart in front of the horse. You can't do your calculations using the output of your calculations... you don't HAVE that data yet.
I noticed Larry Evans doesn't count the 4th rank in his space count he starts at the 5th rank but it makes sense to start at 4th rank because it is no man's land at the start, in point count chess you only count the space behind your own front lines because it basically splits the subject up into smaller topics like centre control, superior development and open files etc.
These tips are really useful. I'll leave a post here so that I can refer to this later.
OK, now we get down to the nitty-gritty: What do these numbers mean? How are they useful in a real game?
Well... the numbers themselves aren't important. It's the concepts that are important. In fact, you should only have to do those formal counts on a few occasion, and after that you can just LOOK at a position and say to yourself "Hmmm... I've got a big Space advantage, but my opponent has two center Pawns against one, and I've lost a bit of Time".
Here's how you interpret the results of the Static Analysis:
Ahead in Force: You should have a winning endgame, if you can reach it. Trade off material, or at least operate with THREATS of exchanging material, in order to force additional concessions from your opponent. If you are far enough ahead (eg: a Rook up) you can skip the endgame and head straight for mate.
Behind in Force: The other side of the coin. Avoid unnecessary exchanges. Try to play for an advantage in Time (development) since Time is the easiest advantage to convert into a winning attack. If necessary, sacrifice additional material for counter-play... why not? You're losing anyway.
Ahead in Time: Time is the most dangerous element, the easiest one to convert into an attack. Almost all gambits involve sacrificing Force to gain Time. Develop rapidly and look for combinations. Most combinations are based on a Time advantage.
Behind in Time: Be careful! Watch the WHOLE board. Calculate... and watch out for enemy combinations and threats. Try to exchange off the most threatening enemy pieces, or at least try to gain back some Time by threatening exchanges. Operate with economy of weakness... try not to defend by pushing Pawns unless the other options lead to disaster.
Ahead in Space: Try to convert your Space advantage into a Time advantage, by using alternating threats against widely separated parts of the board. Use your superior lines of communication to run the opponent ragged. Since he has less room to maneuver, his defensive maneuvers should be less efficient than your attacking maneuvers, and sooner or later you will be attacking over HERE while his defensive pieces are still scrambling around over THERE. Remember: Space advantage => alternation => Time advantage => combination.
Behind in Space: Play carefully, using the principle of economy of weakness. Trade off some pieces if possible... three pieces rattling around in a cramped position are much less constricted than seven pieces stuffed into the same cramped position. If exchanges are impractical (eg: if you are in a must-win tournament situation and want to keep the game dynamic) then try to slowly recapture the lost space, only advancing Pawns when they are well-supported by pieces. You are trying to gradually break out... don't let your opponent suddenly break in!
Tomorrow I'll post a game or two illustrating these ideas.
These are great, I'm going to try and keep these in mind when I analyze my next game.