Unnerve an opponent?

I watched my first  tournament for a bit a few weeks ago. I noticed that everybody was staring at the board avoiding face contact with the opponent. Some people wore noise cancelling headphones too. So....its not that hard for your opponent to just ignore you.

I notice in videos of which GMs are playing, that they occasionally glance quickly at thier opponent or smile when they know they have won. Do you have a story of a case of intimidation  that worked or went wrong..lol.

I have couple stories of being intimidated. Most of them revolve around elementary schoolers that act exremely professional (ei: "rating?" the tiny Indian asks, then nonchalantly nudges his glasses).

I've also had cases of extreme time awareness, like where my opponent just slaps my hand and hits the clock as fast as possible (on game 90 +30 second interval) when the TD says "shake hands and begin." I'm not sure if that's intimidating or not, but it does offer a psychological distraction. Whenever you can get your opponent thinking about something other than the game, you just decreased his strength.

But my eariler examples are silly examples; most TDs would kick someone out if they were being overly disturbing to others.

Easily. Wink and blow him a kiss, before the game.

Could backfire though....

i read entire topic. laughed all the way

I know you said these are silly examples, but they made me laugh so hard imagining them. Thanks for posting them.

Wear a man-kini and pull your chess equipment out from it to set up.

Give 'em the people's eyebrow.

Lol, thanks guys. =D

I am both unnerved and intimidated.

You're welcome.

that's how.

While waiting on his move, start knitting a sweater that really isn't there.

you could change your name to Tal. In fact, one of my solemn vows is to never play a guy named Tal, especially for money. Never a good idea!

Once I was playing in a tournament and I was one of the few people still playing their games, so there was a crowd all looking at the board. Most of them were on my opponent's team. At first the game was even, then I started to take some of unerved his pieces, unfortunaly I was apparently unerved by the crowd that was mostly rooting for me to lose, and I lost my queen! 10 minutes later I lost. If I hadn't lost my queen, I'm sure I could have won, but it didn't happen, so I know being unerved works!

LOL...didn't think about that sneaky little trick..

The stories of Tal v Fischer are legendary. I mean, the guy made Fisher break out into tears running out of the room in one tournament....That picture is great you posted...Didn't he used to stare through the pieces at his opponents and make funny faces too...lol. ridiculous...but it works I guess...

Just as you're sitting down, make a move like you're pulling away from some creepy person behind you, and say "Stop it, grandma!"  Then, about every third or fourth move, turn away from the board and mutter something like, "I'm DOING it! STOP helping me!" or "Will you PLEASE stop touching me?!"  Then give a brief, embarrassed smile to your opponent before turning back to the board.

How about eating a lot of beans and farting every time they play a move.

If the sound doesn't distract them then the smell should do the trick.

small word of warning (try to not to follow through  you may lose on time)

One of the great masters (Alekhine?) would focus fiercely on the board all through the game until a moment came when he looked up and into his opponent's eyes. It meant he had seen the forced win.  Must have had an effect, I think. (But then he would have already won so more of an idiosyncracy than a tactic.)