Other than praying, how should a patzer play against a much stronger opponent?

be patient and look to defend and use the advantage of being an underdog by being confident there will be oppurtunites, look for them every time they are there

Here (in online chess) 200 rating points isn't that much of a difference and the game will be competitive (i.e., the weaker player will win or draw a substantial amount of the time).  So just play your game and have fun.

Same advice for playing against someone 600 points higher.  You're going to be little more than a speed bump 99% of the time, so you might as well have fun and learn something about what's weak about the way you normally play.

Same advice if you're in a "must win" game against anyone.  There's a great quote from the late world champion Tigran Petrosian which goes something like, "It is easier to play for a win from an equal position you understand, than from a bad position you know nothing about."  The best way to get that equal position you understand is to play your game and have fun.  (If you're not having fun, why bother?  If you are, you're less likely to "choke"...)

My $0.02.

200 rating points OTB is beatable.

It accounts for .75 win rate, that is for the strongest player for example 75% win and 25% loss, or 50% win and 50% draws.

200 rating points he still has to play full strength, and any mistake will be paid dearly.

I have a Blitz game against a 300+ higher rated I will attempt to post here in a few that may give some insight into how to handle this type of situation.

Ok here is the game played about 4 days ago. It is a Petrov line that I knew a little about (there is the first thing to remember: play an opening you are familiar with if you can as this will help boost confidence). I will lightly annotate some ideas that I had (though not all were very sound in hindsight). G/10

In another post, it showed both those as being missed as well

There's no big secret, and I don't know why people seem to think there is. Just play good Chess. Sure, someone with a higher rating is more likely to have more opening knowledge, a better eye for tactics and a finer feel for strategy, but you're not helping yourself if you're going to play overly-aggressively or over-passively to compensate for some deficit in your regular style.

Just play WELL. Or try to, that's really all there is to it.

Yep that pretty much sums it up.

Simon Webb's Chess for Tigers is an excellent book that discusses practical strategies for play between "weaker and stronger".   

sorry to piss on your parade but beating somebody higher rated on an internet blitz doesn't mean anything. Many people don't take internet chess seriously. I even talk on the phone or on Skype while I'm playing sometimes.

Real chess is OTB. When you know your opponent is giving his best.

200 points OTB means nothing if your opponent isnt at least an expert

Actually rating points in general don't mean anything to the game ahead. Only the moves that are made. Don't psyche yourself out !

That is exactly my point Lars

Play the board not the rating.

If you abolished rating systems then everybody would play much better lol .

EDIT: If everybody plays better then there's no difference in relative playing strength. I am sooo stupid on saturdays.

be happy im stupid on all other days.

200 points means something no matter what the ratings are.

I've heard Andrew Martin once say that if a weaker players plays a stronger player, he should always go for tactics (traps and sacs and stuff like that) because otherwise he will just get slowly strangled by the stronger player in positional play.

i think the weaker player should play chess ;)

anyway i think someone should just play and enjoy the game, even so its ofc hard to escape the psychological pressure of playing someone higher rated. 

maybe the stronger one is weaker in positional play but a monster in tactical play, then andrew martins tip is totally suicide. imagine a lower rated master playing a tactical game against nakamura.