There is a "magic" circle that almost all beginners/intermediate players fell. And that is they never improve up to a low basic level. Why, simply because they don't play strong opponents. But to play strong opponents a one must win games vs low rated right? And here comes the problem.
"A" (you) is playing low rated guy "B" in bullet. It's chaos. Pieces everywhere, dropping stuff, checkmate opportunety.. its crazy. But it's fun and you like it. You want more of that, because you play what you want, you win games, some you lose and that's wondefull. But it's called Hope chess. You are not playing correct chess. And when it happens to play real opponent he smashes you, you feel bad and you imidiately start new game searching for that low rated guy to smash him with
"amazing" attack that he could not defend, giving you that ego boost...
Stop playing bullet. Start playing 10 min games or more. Start to study. Start with tactics, because 1800 rating here on tactics its still beginner level. Take lessons, watch videos, try chess mentor really helped me improve. Watch videos on youtube, i have watched thousands of them and that boost me up quick to 2000 level.
, and the games I play against two of these guys who are probably rated 1800 OTB (maybe 1600 or 1700) in blitz, as they do not play long games. They both used to, but one of my friends doesn't like to play long games so he only plays with the clock, unless you are a beginner, then he will teach you while playing a long game.
I actually imagined something like this happening after I made this move in the following game:
This leads to my point. I often make gut decisions in my chess game, and a lot of times my gut is wrong, like in this instance here, as when white retreats his bishop and just takes my knight next move, opting to trade pieces because I am already down a piece, I would have had, you guessed it, absolutely nothing for my sac. Of course this didn't happen in the game, as by move 6 for some mysterious reason my opponent resigned, however, I had the idea in my head, thinking that something could had happened there, but all white needs to do is trade pieces to prevent that from happening, simple trading tactic when up a piece. I think any chess player worth his salt would have just traded away his bishop for my knight to get rid of my attacking potential, which was rather high.
In another game OTB I thought I had a fishing pole type tactic but later after committing a pawn move I realized that he could just move his king out of danger because his king did have breathing room. After making that pawn move my whole structure was ruined and I should have lost the game, but didn't, because my opponent failed to see a simple forcing continuation that would have won him the game.
I've also been told that in a lot of the games where I lost I had a superior position but lost because I didn't see the tactic to win the game.
First off, I already have a tactics regime in mind to partake in in the near future, which would consume a great deal of time each day, but what else do I need? What will cause me to stop making these mistakes of thinking I see a winning continuation in my head but later finding out that it can be parried and I end up losing? I once read that Magnus Carson often knows how to proceed simply by thinking about it for a little bit, but has to check is answer by thoroughly going over it in his head to see if what he see's in his head is correct. I do not ever plan to be on par with Magnus Carson, however, I would like to know how I can get a little better, some sort of regime, to train myself to not just do what I think is right on my head, and to check my instincts with solid calculation. Also, how, in the name, of Operah Winfree's Ass, do I calculate that far ahead, not like the way I did this game, but go over move by move, in my head, from move 6 to the end? How? If I can find an answer to that, then I would have solved my problem. Actually all I would have had to see in this case is that my devastating knight could be traded for his not so useful bishop. So I guess the short answer is that I do not always need to calculate 20 moves deep. The question becomes, how do you know when you have to calculate 20 moves deep? I guess Heisman sort of answers this in his book chess improvement, but I'd like other less formal input before I re-read chapters 2 and 3 of that book. Okay so lets say we know when to think 20 moves deep. Now the question becomes, how do you think 20 moves deep in your freaking head?