Why do Blitz players play like hustlers?

Hi everyone,

I'm new to live chess, and I've been playing the faster blitz games, mainly for time reasons.  Mostly 2-12 or 3-6.  Its frustrating to me because everyone pulls out the queen right away and tries to jam me up in 4 or 6 moves.  OK, sometimes they get me and sometimes I get them, and occassionally I actually get a good game out of it.

I play fundamentals, an e4 opening, control the center, all that jazz. I rarely see an classic e5 or d5 response, and maybe once saw a Sicilian response.  Most of my opponents wouldn't recognize a fork if it was stuck in their eye or a pin if they sat on one.  Always with the queen right away.  So I feel like I'm learning a lot less than I should be. So my question is... why does EVERYONE I play have to play like a hustler with the quick draw on the queen? 

Thanks for letting me vent.

I think playing with slower time control, especially turn based chess instead of live chess would solve your problem.  You would get better games and learn more.  Anyway with 2-3 minutes time control your opponnents (and yourself) will always blunder badly.  That's the way it is, human brain is slow.  At least mine is.  If you still absolutely want to play blitz then play against a computer.

really short blitz like under 5 minutes with low or no extra time I really don't like. Trying to think fast probably won't help. It's not real chess. I just can't get anything done in that short time. You could say it's all tactics, but even if your up a rook it's very hard to finish off moving every 5 seconds. I can't figure out a strategy for that time.

First let me clarify... I'm playing the form of blitz where you get extra time after each move, maybe an extra 6 or 12 seconds. 

So by playing fundamentals I have my first several moves already figured out and the added time helps relieve the pressure.  The time contstraint is in fact helping me see moves and positions more clearly.  I just wish I had opponents who could think beyond their queen and bishop.

BTW I do play turn chess on facebook, but I want to prepare for tournament play also.

To get points off of new players

Why do you think you aren't beating these guys consistently. Perhaps we shouldn't look down on someone's style if we aren't any better than they are.

I agree with you on the aspect that you can't call it "real chess", if you define real chess as the game where you see variations, best ways to improve your position, and discover clever tactical attacks.

Blitz chess does not help you with this, instead it relies alot of the player's routine (patterns they can easily recognize, or positions they have played before), intuition (rather than seeing if the knight has a good variation on f3, you play it becourse it looks good - it makes sence) and element of surprise (play moves that threadens pieces, construct mating attacks so that the opponent will narrow his focus to his king's castle, and generally think to much of his own pieces rather than yours).

These are strong traits in the game of Blitz. If you find yourself being easily fooled by these queen moves, show them why it's wrong to play chess like that, and beat them. Then play against players on a higher level to get real games going.

them bringing their queen out early should not be a problem if you know what your doing

Learn how to punish an early queen move and your eyes will light up when you see it instead of getting annoyed. A good queen hunt can be a very enjoyable thing

Why do you think you aren't beating these guys consistently. Perhaps we shouldn't look down on someone's style if we aren't any better than they are.

I'm not looking down on these people because I'm losing.  I started out poorly but have worked my way past many of the gimmicks I have been beating these guys consistently. 

If you find yourself being easily fooled by these queen moves, show them why it's wrong to play chess like that, and beat them.

I've been starting to chat about it with a few of the players.  Its a little tough in a fast game, but sometimes we chat afterwards.

if you want to get a blitz player that brings his queen out early, mad, then put your queen in front of his, make him exchange queens.

Yes I've been doing that.  Oddly most of these guys are lost without their queen.  I've even started looking for opportunities to trade queens, its become an odd strategy, yet one that works.

Thanks everyone for your feedback, and I'm interested to hear more.

I got a question. What's your rating?

People over 1300 don't bring their queen out right away.

I'm not formally rated.  After about 35 blitz games here I'm at 987 on chess.com live chess.  I've been trying to match with players between 800-1300, but it seems too many at that level are not putting up an interesting fight.  I think I'll look for higher rated players and see how it goes.

If you go down a dark alley, and two gangs start shooting at each other,

do you...

duck your head and stick to a classic opening?

pull out your air pistol and hope for the best?

or find the biggest cannon you have and start firing at anything that moves?

I won't play a live game under 20 0. I feel that it's the perfect time control for me.

Personally, I love when people bring their Queen out early. You can often chase her around and develop at the same time.

Not sure if it's been said already but...

Making moves that startle the other person is a good thing in the blitz games. Especially if time is running down for someone. A piece sack or something really unexpected makes someone think and thinking is not always a good thing in blitz games. That's what I would do when I played the Blitz live chess. ALmost always I would win on time because of making unexpected random moves.

It's not a good way to learn chess but it works.

I guess I might try to turn around.

˙ƃuıʎɐןd ɟo ǝןʎʇs ʇɐɥʇ uo ǝzıןɐʇıdɐɔ uɐɔ noʎ ʎןןɐnsn

you must be on the southern end of Grenada

mogator88

This is the DUMBEST thread EVER! You're playing a blitz game and complaining that your opponent's have a poor playing style AND that you're not learning very much from the games. Well what did you expect from a two-minute game?

First of all, you shouldn't be complaining if your opponents don't play well. If your opponent is playing White and opens 1. e4 e5 2. Qh5 then use your superior play skill to beat them. I would drool if I saw an opponent run out his Queen on the second move against me :))

Second, of course you're not learning anything. Blitz is a game that is played solely from memory. I can blitz off an entire game with five-second moves against inferior players. I don't learn anything new, but I can do it because I know how to execute a winning game plan against lesser players.

Blitz is a lot less about good chess and more about catching your opponent off-guard. Because I know the classical openings so well, I can probably fire off the first 10 moves in like 10 seconds, leaving me LOTS of time in the middle game to analyze games and ensure that I have a big lead going into the endgame, if it lasts that long. But if you can catch an opponent off-guard, then they eat up valuable time in the opening, and will be more prone to mistakes in the middle game.

Blitz by its very definition is all about lightning fast play, confusing your opponent, swindling wins away via checkmates out of nowhere and being able to fire off 20 moves with five seconds remaining on your clock to secure a win. It's a hustlers game. If you want to learn and get better, play like a man, and play some real chess and stop whining.

it seems to be in blitz sacrifices and/or unconventional play are more common in blitz and quick chess. Often times players play from the start hoping to run you out of time rather than checkmate you, if this style of play is really bothering you play longer time control, as has been suggested already. But, you really shouldn't complain, because until that opening is easy for you to handle you will benefit from playing against it until you figure it out.

Again, I'm not playing fixed time blitz, I'm mostly playing where you add time for each move.  So the play is at least a little more genteel than a 120 second shoot 'em up.

And now that I'm keeping an eye out for the tricks, my classic opening is plugging up the cannon and I'm mostly winning now.  My air pistol is getting more and more accurate.