Tactics Trainer, the value of time pressure?

I just realized yesterday that I can do unlimited Tactics Trainer here with any membership.  That is cool!

Is it necessarily a good thing to do tactics training with time pressure? 

As far as I can tell there isn’t any way to adjust time settings.  Taking too long on a puzzle and getting it right gives me a negative adjustment to my rating, the same as if I got it wrong.  So I can’t move up to harder puzzles until I can solve them fast. 

I have mixed feelings about this.  On the one hand, time pressure may somehow improve focus and learning.  On the other hand, it may encourage me to move before I’m sure.  Same issue as playing blitz vs long time control.

What do you think?  Can you explain the value of time pressure in tactics training?

well I guess time pressure may help to replicate the feeling in OTB when you are down to time pressure or allegro finish.  I agree with you I just play by instinct w/o being positive I know all the moves and so get moves wrong, my blitz chess is also erratic for the same reason (rating there is 400 less).  Further, in a real game you know the lead up to the position so you have effectively more time on the position.  Given all that speed and ability are mostly linked, no surprise that a GM is highest in the list here.  Having said that the trainer listing also shows that tactical ablility is not enough by itself as there are a few people with very high tactic trainer ratings who are relatively poor in turn based.

You do know that you can adjust your settings to play unrated/untimed and then set the level of problem you want to work on?

In OTB tournaments, even in long games, there is a clock. So I think there is value in learning to think in limited time.

More important is the educational aspect. Many people have studied and have personal experience with the best way to learn tactics. Many people believe that sitting and thinking about a problem for a long time (5-10 minutes) is not as efficient a learning tool as thinking about it a shorter amount of time (1-2 minutes) and then being shown how to solve it.

If you're not on the right track in the first 1-2 minutes, all your brain will do for your long think is ponder wrong ways to go about playing the position. What do you think this does for your ability to play tactical positions well? It's much better to fill your brain with the right way to play.

could just be trying to force you to find the solutions quiker?

i suppose in theory the better you are with tactics the quiker you will solve the puzzles

 the problem is, then there is no real way to get an accurate rating. somebody who takes 3 seconds to solve a tactic vs. 30 minutes to solve the tactic isn't rated the same. it would make ratings for tactics totally useless. :(

A clock is necessary for a more accurate rating. This rating would reflect on how well a person plays during an OTB tournament since tournament games are also played with a clock.

A fair rating could not be assessed without the clock. Should a person that finished a puzzle in 10 minutes be rated the same as a person that finished in 2 hours? 

The tactics trainer simulates OTB tournament play by putting pressure as in a real game. By practicing with a clock, a person is conditioned to find the correct play within a given time limit. 

Thanks for your thoughts, everyone. 

Yesterday I tried selecting unrated training mode and entering a rating range for the puzzles.  Somehow I screwed it up and it didn't work as expected, so I went back to rated.  I probably just didn't click "save preferences." Just now I tried it again and it worked fine. 

So this is good.  I get to do both.  I can go unrated and input a rating range if I want to work some more difficult puzzles without time pressure, and I can go back to rated when I want to use time pressure and rating to assess and drive my  skill that way.

The time allotted for the puzzles in the 1000-1200 range seems like about 30-60 seconds.  I think I could use about 2 or 3 minutes, before there would be diminishing returns on my thought process.  And 2-3 minutes would be allowed in the games I play. 

The time scale change I'm suggesting is increase from 30-60 sec to 2-3 min.  I'm not talking about increasing to 10-20 min.  I'm just clarifying the time scale I was thinking of, not lobbying for a change.

I do see a valuable compontent to time preasure.  I think it's a ballance.  The optimum for learning probably depends on the person.  Too much time and you're under stimulated.  To little time and you're over pressured.

I use another site, which has a "standard" and "blitz" set for questions.  The ratings are seperate (standard questions are also harder at lower ratings). ADMINS!  PAY ATTENTION!  DO BOTH WITH SEPERATE RATINGS FOR MAXIMUM HAPPINESS

"Standard" questions give ratings with no bearing on how long it took you to answer the question.  The lack of time pressure encourages proper form. However, the ratings are useless for bragging, and the lack of time pressure can mean you think about the wrong moves, or think about a move for too long, or continue trying a question you have no idea how to solve (If you don't do this, on the flipside, you can end up with too easy questions).

"Blitz" (default) questions are the standard ones that adjust for time.  The problem with them is due to the fact that tactical questions always have a clearly winning answer people tend to try things likely to succeed in a tactical puzzle, but foolish in a real game.  So people that do this would get more value out of standard questions or blitz chess.  If you make a conscious effort NOT to do this, your rating will be lower then it should be, and blitz chess would help you with your thought process more. 

I think the only arguable advantage of blitz questions is that quite simply your pattern recognition gets better faster, since you will see more questions.

Of the two, I prefer Standard questions with no time pressure.  I also like how I can transfer them to a real chessboard. Most people also prefer to spend too short on a question, then people prefer to look at them for 10 minutes, so if you do the questions like in a real game your rating is better reflective of you with long time controls.

eric says it would make ratings for tactics totally useless by having an untimed rating section as well. I disagree.  That is exactly how CT Art works and that is one of most utilized software training program for tactics.   Rating is solely based on the success rate of problems solved and how fast you solve them has nothing to do with it. Also the rating you get in CT art has zero to do with ratings other players have gotten solving the same problem. It's only purpose is to measure individual progesss because it is set up as study tool, not just a testing tool. Big difference. As far as I am concerned you could keep the ratings private on an untimed rating section. I only want to see a rating to measure my own progress with the program not to just test and compare myself to other players. It seems Eric has a hard time seeing how an untimed rating section would tremendously help ones individual developmet in chess.  It would be much more useful as a study tool that way. Do one rated timed section and one rated untimed section and where the only purpose is to work hard and spend the necessary time to work on our calculation skills. And if bothered by some sense of fairness(like we can actually do anything with our rating in the tactics trainer) keep the ratings on the untimed section private. 

 I seem to remember that Erik once mentioned, in a similar discussion, that the time alloted for a problem is based on the average solution time for that problem. So, if a problem allows you 45 seconds - that's because most people have solved it in under 45 seconds.

Having said that, I do have the same difficulty myself. I find that with the clock ticking, I either solve the whole problem in under 30 seconds or else (more often) sit there scratching my head; and then when I see I'm almost out of time, I panic and say "oh no! I have to do something! Sacrifice my queen somewhere! Maybe this will work!" 

"when I see I'm almost out of time, I panic and say "oh no! I have to do something!"

This is simply a failure in logic. You don't lose any more points per second used at the end of the clock than at the beginning. And once the clock gets to the end, your score stays at 20%. So, in fact, the time pressure doesn't get worse at the end it goes away at the end!

I use tactics trainer this way: I do not move until i am either sure it is right [though i am still often wrong :) ] or I am sure it is beyond me - at least, i wont get it in 15 mins. (depends on how tired i am etc also)

You ppl care about your tactics trainer ratings???? Do you use it to learn, or to show off testosterone levels?????

There is one person who uses an engine to do tactics trainer. Said person (untitled of course) has one of the highest tactics trainer ratings. The way this discussion is mostly going, said person is being quite logical!

 I think this is the correct way to use the tactics trainer. Well, almost. Even if it is too tough, use up every second until the clock runs out. It will be similar to a situation where a person decides that s/he has looked at a position long enough.

 I know . It's similar to my approach to multiple choice tests back in the day ("if I can't get it in 1-2 minutes, make an educated guess and move on"). A queen sacrifice seems to be the right first move for about 30% of the tactics trainer problems - so if nothing jumps out at me, find a reasonable spot to sac the queen and a lot of the time I'll at least get the first move right. Needless to say, I prefer books for serious tactics study (personal preference here, nothing else).

>>You ppl care about your tactics trainer ratings????

I don't. For me the tactics trainer rating has a mild amusement value, nothing more.