Handling Losses and Feeling "Not Good Enough"

So you guys think maybe I should just keep at my practice like I have been doing and see what comes of it; and IGNORE the rather nasty things rybka,( according to someone on another thread rybka is sort of upity for a computer and thinks all humans play lousy chess  ) and the chess.com site too to a much slesser degree had to say about my last game? Or at least, not take them so much to heart? To be sure there ares ome things i can learn from analysis, but... not let it get to me. I was feeling pretty good about the improvements I had seen until that, to be honest... I posted the game on here, by the way. If what I have been doing works...

Hmm you need a good training program or training schedule. Chessmaster Grandmaster edition could improve your game a lot. You need more information on the basic principles if I look at your games. The game we started for instance you lost a few tempo moves and if you are white that's giving me the initiave in the opening, dangerous.

Do you have an opening repertoire or do you just wing it :P?
I just started playing blitz because it's reeeaaaly exhilerating. The first six games or so I lost and then I came back and now slowly building up my blitz rating. I won with a checkmate on the last second in my last blitz game. That's what chess for me is all about. Time pressure, tactics and the exhilerating feeling you have won.
 

Here was my last blitz game, just fun:

my handling of loses goes into three categories:

1. My opponent was much better... cant be helped

2. I did stupid blunder.... rage but blunders happen so nothing to do about this too

3. Miscalculations, not knowing openings well and being outplayed by opponent of simmilar skill... this can all be improved by playing and/or studying more (when playing online chess and not live one most of this can be avoided by carefully analizing before makin a move)

Well... to be honest I don't really have an opening repetior... especially since i have no real idea of what ones would best suite me. It is like there are so many, and noone can agree as to which are best, so... I have always tended to wing it. 

I am honestly not even certain how I would go about developing one.

Besides... it would almost seem too scripted, replaying moves out of a memorized sequence, wouldn't i? On the other hand, knowingn that my opponant was trying to direct the game in adirection not to myu liking and being able to do something about it would help, I think.

Learning an opening doesn't mean you have use that opening move for move. In studying openings, you should learn why the moves are made in the order they are made. If you know the logic behind them, then you can learn to modify and develope. I would like to recommend to you a website called Chessopenings.com. A good resource for seeing and hearing the logic behind many openings and their counter play. It has helped me in studying the Najdorf Sicilian.

I'm not a very strong chessplayer, but if you want, we can play an unrated online game (you know, 1 move per x days) with takeback enabled. So we can play a bit and I can give you some pointers. You won't become a grandmaster playing with me, but it might give you some insight what needs to be done to get a 1100-1200 rating. My own rating is around 1300 for online games with clock and a bit above 1400 now for the turnbased and 960 games. Blitz and bullet I only tried a couple of times and I suck at those. (Don't like them either, so that's ok).

Just let me know, I enjoy talking thru a game with others and trying to learn something.

My tender JavaTigress

Your endearing honesty makes a beautiful song of words. You have a heart for chess and I love that in you. I want you to remember you are not alone. Treasure your wins with your best analysis. And if you can help it, do not dwell on any type of loss. Only lose heart if you no can longer savor your wonderful wins.

I wish you the best my precious angel.

Your Good Ghostess Lola

Where did my post go? Oh well here we go again :)

I strongly suggest you develop an opening repertoire. Basically by not choosing an opening you will let your opponent have a better middle position of his pieces because he used the opening in a consistent structured matter( that's what makes openings sound). By choosing a few openings and create a small repertoire you can get more middle game board positions you like to play instead of all randomness :).

Nonetheless on a lower level of chess playing the opening isn't all that important because a lot of games are decided in a middle game where one player makes one mistake too many. You don't see total destruction from openings often below <1000 rating.
One misconceptions about openings. 1.e4 is for tactical players and 1.d4 for positional players. Although this is true a lot of times it just depends on the specific variations chosen because d4 openings can be pretty wild too and sometimes e4 openings get completely closed. 

I don't agree to be honest. Sure, it's good to know a bit about 1 or 2 openings. But for now I would stick with a very basic 4 knights or bishop game... Maybe learn the first 4, 5 moves.

Instead of studying openings, you could better invest in tactics training. Openings are important, but if you recognize patterns and tactics... you'll get to the midgame just fine.

When you get a bit higher and starting to see that you lose in similiar openings, well, then by all means, have a look at them.

But I wouldn't devote more than 5% on openings. It far more important to learn how to avoid hanging pieces, getting pinned, getting forked and recognizing those things so you can also take advantage of them.

Yeah but the problem is, he still needs to learn those basic 4 knights and bishop game -> learning an opening. 

I agree with you that tactics are a really important facet of training.

Actually something I learned from The art of Learning is that if you study endgames a lot you will learn much quicker then memorising the openings. In the endgame you are not only taught the basic tactics with few pieces but also the power of each piece (and pawn) individually, a good learning process.

Ah ok, now I understand you. Yeah, if he really doesn't know the first 4 good moves then he should practice that a bit. In fact with this explanation I think we agree :) Ah well, if he accepts the takeback-game I offered we'll take a look at it.

Been doing that this evening with another fellow, rated around 900. Been good fun and also a learning experience for myself. And allthough as my rating shows I am not an expert or even a good player, I could point out his weakenesses, just by exploiting them and explaining why :)

I see, you could probably give me some tips :P nice rating. It seems it's pretty hard for me to reach the 1200 rating on live ches. It's my next goal but I have the feeling a lot of time that every time I try something my opponent uses a prophylactic move and basically most of my games are decided in the endgame. I like the long struggles but I have the feeling I am overlooking forced checkmates and combinations a lot of times.

Nice to see a fellow dutchie on the forums :) 

Well in live chess I always get close to 1400 and then back to middle 1200's lol. In the games with no clock I do better. But feel free to add me! We can always play an unrated game and discuss it together. You're so close to my level that I'm not sure if I can really teach you something, but at the very least I can point out the situations where I think I can gain an advantage! I have the same feelings as you btw... I just know that I am missing things and it becomes really obvious when my opponents are around the 1500 level.

And no worries, there are lots of Dutchies on here. We used to come from 'holland' when you would hover over the flag... After I revolted against this (I'm a limburger :P ) we Dutchies, are from the Netherlands :D

Yeah I have the same problem I'm between 1000 - 1200 all the time. I'm too hasty for online chess, I don't analyse it enough and I miss obvious tactics. A good lesson for me is to slow down a lot. I have added you! Well you can probably strengthen my game more by giving some obvious pointers I miss. Maybe I will see some weaknesses on your game as well who knows :). Let's see each other in the battlefield! I will send an unrated game invite to you.

Hehe I'm originally from Frieslandd ( from the north of Holland), we revolted against the Dutch! 

Accepted! Won't be playing much this evening though (been up since yesterday night... drinken a glass of wine now and trying to keep my eyes open until 20.00) And good to know you're a Frysian. I always was fonded of those people. We share the same mentality and both have always had their roots more in their own tradition than in the Dutch tradition.

Nice, let's see what our game teaches! Yes I like the people from Twente too, they also aren't really dutchies but really their own folk. Limburg is nice too, I was always fond of the accents in the southern parts of Holland :)

as for learning opening i usually play Italian game if possible... why? it happened something like this:

1. quite a long time ago i hear from someone/read somewhere that when opening you should aim for center

2. i prefer e4

3. if opponent brings out e5 i prefer to attack it fast so Nf3

4. usually Nc6 followed so next we move bishop thats on f1 so we can castle in near future

5. only 2 places i considered decent here were Bb5 to hinder that knight (this is Ruy lopez opening btw) or Bc4 to fight for center and so it is attacking pawn on f7 ...important point if opponent will castle king side

6. liked to open this way so used this way of playing a lot and some time later (idk like half a year) learned this is called Itallian opening so i stick to it on 1. e4 e5 games

btw best way to learn some basic opening or at least starts for them is opening explorer on this site... once you see something new you check if that is actuall opening and if it is you llok up how to respond to what opponent did (doing random stuff at start might not impact much at low rating players but it will still effect your play a lot since if you do well in opening and opponent just does some random stuff you can get quite advantege for middle play)

Me too!

Don't worry stress is a no.1 killer ( alright drugs kill more but who cares [maybe the plp dying from drugs care]) but relax a games a game treat it as like homework you don't need to do it but if you don't ... you know what happens