Middle game tips.
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I am terrible at “mid game”. I can usually control the center squares, but after that i’m pretty much lost. I am a beginner and will gladly take some constructive criticism.Thank you
Jul 3, 2018
0
#2
Oh man, such a broad topic. Whole books (even series) have been devoted to the topic. It's hard to give advice for a very new player, hmm.
I'll start by talking briefly about what each piece likes. In short: pieces like to control many squares (they don't like pawns blocking them for example).
Knights like outposts.
Bishops like long open diagonals, and if friendly pawns are blocking them, they'd like to move out in front of them.
Rooks like open or half-open files
The Queen can be bullied by any pieces less valuable than it, so it doesn't like to be on the front lines
The king likes to be castled and to keep the 3 flank pawns on their original squares
Pawns like to be in few islands.
Pawns like to be in chains for extra protection, or abreast to control lots of squares.
Pawns dislike being backwards, isolated, and doubled.
Pushing a pawn majority can create a passed pawn.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pawn_(chess)
Pieces (in chess lingo a "piece" typically means non-pawns) tend to work together in 1 of two ways. They either work together to control a group of squares (think two bishops)
Or they focus their power on one square or line (think two rooks)
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In a real position it would look more like the picture below.
This is from a Sicilian Dragon. Black's g7 bishop and c8 rook work together covering squares on white's kingside, and combine on the c3 square.
With opposite side castling it's often a race for both players to attack the opponent's king, so this bishop and rook are key players in this position below.
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Pawns also give clues for where to attack.
The position below is an advance French structure.
The pawns are locked, and white's main pawn chain "points" to the kingside while black's "points" to the queenside.
This simply means that is the side of the board where each player has more space (as afforded by their most advanced pawn). So seeking play on that side is usually the best strategy.
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And the last thing I'll mention is pawn breaks. Imagine a game where it's illegal to capture pawns. The game would quickly be a boring draw as each side is protected by an invincible wall.
This is why pawn breaks are so important: they open files, ranks, and diagonal (usually just called lines). These are inroads for your non-pawns to use to infiltrate into the opponent's position.
The picture below shows a pawn structure that might arise from a caro (or slav if we put c2 pawn on e2).
After developing and castling, an early strategic middlegame goal for black is to play either the pawn break at c5 or e5.
This is really not an option. If black fails to successfully play either of those, then his game will be cramped, and if there are still many pieces on the board, white will simply have a much better position.
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Jul 3, 2018
0
#3
Ok, so that post was a lot of detail if you're new. Now I'll talk more generally.
Sometimes in chess the position allows us to make long term plans. Like in the opposite side castling diagram above, the plan to attack the opponent's king will be the main theme tying all the moves together for the next many dozens of moves.
But other positions are more equal. There doesn't exist any long term plans. In those cases it's enough to make small improvements. For example if one of your knights or bishops is out of play, then you'd form a short term plan of only 1 or 2 moves to improve its position.
Or if there's a pawn break, your plan may only be to play the handful of moves to achieve the pawn break.
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But mostly at a beginner (or near beginner) level, tactics dominate middlegames. It's mostly an exercise of:
1) checking what your opponent's last move threatened
2) checking if any of your moves can win material or checkmate right away
3) Imagining your intended move as if it's already been made, and checking to see if its safe from tactics
The winner will be the person who is better at avoiding material loss, which basically means the person who is more consistently following the 3 steps listed above.
Even so, I hope that was a helpful intro to the world of strategy (long term plans) and positional play (short term improvements). What makes the middlegame so rich, and chess so great, is the interplay of all these elements.
Jul 3, 2018
0
#4
Roan44 wrote:
I am terrible at “mid game”. I can usually control the center squares, but after that i’m pretty much lost. I am a beginner and will gladly take some constructive criticism.Thank you
Opening Principles:
1. Control the center squares – d4-e4-d5-e5
2. Develop your minor pieces toward the center – piece activity is the key
3. Castle
4. Connect your rooks
Tactics...tactics...tactics...
Pre Move Checklist:
1. Make sure all your pieces are safe.
2. Look for forcing move: Checks, captures, threats. You want to look at ALL forcing moves (even the bad ones) this will force you look at, and see the entire board.
3. If there are no forcing moves, you then want to remove any of your opponent’s pieces from your side of the board.
4. If your opponent doesn’t have any of his pieces on your side of the board, then you want to improve the position of your least active piece.
5. After each move by your opponent, ask yourself: "What is my opponent trying to do?"
Thank you guys !!! I appreciate the tips and i will try and use them in my games from now on .
Here are some reading possibilities that I often mention:
Simple Attacking Plans by Fred Wilson (2012)https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090402/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review874.pdf
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Simple-Attacking-Plans-77p3731.htm
Logical Chess: Move by Move by Irving Chernev (1957)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708104437/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/logichess.pdf
The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played by Irving Chernev (1965)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/most-instructive-games-of-chess-ever-played/
Winning Chess by Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld (1948)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708093415/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review919.pdf
Back to Basics: Tactics by Dan Heisman (2007)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708233537/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review585.pdf
https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-back-to-basics-tactics
Seirawan stuff:
http://seagaard.dk/review/eng/bo_beginner/ev_winning_chess.asp?KATID=BO&ID=BO-Beginner
http://www.nystar.com/tamarkin/review1.htm
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708092617/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review560.pdf
Maximize The Usefulness of Your Moves...some good tips here...
http://www.mark-weeks.com/aboutcom/aa06b18.htm
Study fundamentals.....some suggestions here...
Good Chess Books for Beginners and Beyond...
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell/good-chess-books-for-beginners-and-beyond
https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell
Preggo_Basashi wrote:
Ok, so that post was a lot of detail if you're new. Now I'll talk more generally.
Sometimes in chess the position allows us to make long term plans. Like in the opposite side castling diagram above, the plan to attack the opponent's king will be the main theme tying all the moves together for the next many dozens of moves.
But other positions are more equal. There doesn't exist any long term plans. In those cases it's enough to make small improvements. For example if one of your knights or bishops is out of play, then you'd form a short term plan of only 1 or 2 moves to improve its position.
Or if there's a pawn break, your plan may only be to play the handful of moves to achieve the pawn break.
---
---
But mostly at a beginner (or near beginner) level, tactics dominate middlegames. It's mostly an exercise of:
1) checking what your opponent's last move threatened
2) checking if any of your moves can win material or checkmate right away
3) Imagining your intended move as if it's already been made, and checking to see if its safe from tactics
The winner will be the person who is better at avoiding material loss, which basically means the person who is more consistently following the 3 steps listed above.
Even so, I hope that was a helpful intro to the world of strategy (long term plans) and positional play (short term improvements). What makes the middlegame so rich, and chess so great, is the interplay of all these elements.
I agree. Can get up to 1200 by just not hanging pieces.
What strategy or strategies should I use during mid game?
