tactics vs. strategy

I have an idea  what tactics are about but what of stategy?

Whats your idea? and why is it in a form of a question? Does Canada love Jeopardy?

For me, chess is 1% tactics, 1% strategy, 1% luck, and 97% blunders.

According to what I read, tactics are a series of moves that involve threats, counter-threats and usual tactics such as forks, skewers, in-between moves and so forth. Strategy is something like planning by observing the chessboard for center control, light and dark square control, control of space, structural weakness in your position and in your opponent position. From there, you evaluate what you should do next and you achieve it with tactics.

For example, you rarely know exactly what will happen in the opening so you follow your strategy of developing your pieces, controling the centre, getting your king to safety. But at the same time, these strategy can't be applied blindly as each position might have threats and traps which you need to calculate in depth so you can choose a move that is appropriate for the particular position. Thus tactics and strategy always go together. I usually skim through the board when it is my opponent's turn and some moves will be suggested to me(i.e to move my knight to occupy a powerful outpost in the centre). Then, I'll figure out the tactics to see what I should move next. Usually the process is not that distinct between strategy and tactics. Choosing the right strategy and tactics for the given position, however, will only come with experience and studies.

Hopefully, I make my explanation clear enough for you to understand...:) But don't think too much about it when you are playing but just let your thought 'flows' with the current of the game.

Tactics is what you must do when there is something to do,

strategy is what you must do when there is nothing to do.

Blaaze wrote:

According to what I read, tactics are a series of moves that involve threats, counter-threats and usual tactics such as forks, skewers, in-between moves and so forth. Strategy is something like planning by observing the chessboard for center control, light and dark square control, control of space, structural weakness in your position and in your opponent position. From there, you evaluate what you should do next and you achieve it with tactics.

This pretty much hits the nail on the head.