# Question
Title: What is a good, aggressive response against the Sicilian Defense?
I would like to learn a good response against the Sicilian defense (in your opinion), for both blitz and slower games.

I am looking for a more aggressive response, since it fits best my style. Currently I am trying to learn the Grand Prix attack. I have had good wins with this system but also crushing defeats, and I am wondering if it is the best system to use. I am rated around 1500.

# Answer
The Open Sicilian (2.Nf3 and 3.d4) is the most aggressive way to attack the Sicilian, as white immediately opens up the position for all his pieces and gets a nice knight on d4. Black has trumps, but first he lags in development and his advantages typically only start counting if he survives white's attack. It is also the best reply, or at least it has consistently been the most popular reply to the Sicilian on higher levels since forever.

So I think that it's really the only correct answer to your question, which asks for the most aggressive and best response to the Sicilian.

That said, it is not the easiest. Black has like ten different ways to react to the Open Sicilian, and although white gets great chances of an attack in almost all of them, they are all different and often black knows them better than white. Spending loads of time learning everything is probably not the most efficient way to improve your chess right now. That is a general thing with chess, and life -- ambitious, good and easy, choose two.

You say "I have had good wins with this system but also crushing defeats". That is good, that is exactly what you expect from aggressive openings, it seems to me.

You also say "I am looking for a more aggressive response, since it fits best my style." That is less good. At top level, having a style at all is a sign of weakness, as it means you are biased. But you're 1500, you don't have a style. You simply have some parts of the game that you are bad at and some parts that you are less bad at. You should be busy identifying things you're bad at and working on them, not worrying about your style.

And, last, losing some games is the worst reason to switch openings! You'll just lose some more games in the next variation you chose, switch again... The Grand Prix is a decent variation, it didn't cause your losses. You made mistakes later on. *Find out where*, and do better next time.

Understand what happened more generally -- what plan did you choose, how did you expect it to work, why didn't it, is that a problem in general or is it just because of the moves he happened to play this time, in what kind of situations would it work? What other plans are there? Find example games. Regularly switch variations inside the Grand Prix attack, that way you'll see more typical positions and if your opponent does something unexpected, you'll have broader experience to draw from.

Become an expert in your Grand Prix.
> 17 votes

# Answer
> I have had good wins with this system but also crushing defeats, and I am wondering if it is the best system to use.

You are not the only one who experienced this with the Grand Prix.

According to this:

> The Grand Prix Attack is a lazy player approach to fighting the Sicilian Defense. It can lead to early knockouts as in Carlson's (sic) victory against Veselin Topalov, or getting busted in ten moves, as in Carlsen vs Anand

The games in question are:

Carlsen - Anand (Blindfold at Monaco)

```
[FEN ""]
1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 d6 3. f4 g6 4. Nf3 Bg7 5. Bb5+ Bd7 6. Bc4 Nc6
7. O-O Na5 8. d3 Nxc4 9. dxc4 Bxc3 10. bxc3 Bc6 11. e5 Qc7
12. Qd3 f5 13. Ng5 h6 14. Qh3 dxe5 15. Be3 e4 16. Ne6 Qc8
17. Nxc5 Nf6 18. Bd4 Kf7 19. Rae1 a5 20. Re2 b5 21. Nb3 bxc4
22. Nd2 Bd5 23. Rfe1 Qd8 24. Qh4 e6 25. Rb1 Qe7 26. Nxc4 Nd7
27. Qxe7+ Kxe7 28. Ne3 Rhb8 29. Rxb8 Rxb8 30. c4 Bc6 31. Rd2
e5 32. Bxe5 Nxe5 33. fxe5 f4 34. Nd5+ Bxd5 35. Rxd5 Rb1+
36. Kf2 Rb2 37. Rd4 Rxc2+ 38. Kf1 f3 39. gxf3 exf3 40. Rd6 g5
41. Rxh6 Rxa2 42. h3 a4 43. Rf6 Ra1+ 44. Kf2 a3 45. Ra6 a2 0-1

```

I'm guessing that Carlsen is busted due to tripled pawns.

Carlsen - Topalov (Rapid at Monaco)

```
[FEN ""]
1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 d6 3. f4 Nc6 4. Nf3 g6 5. Bb5 Bd7 6. O-O a6
7. Bxc6 Bxc6 8. d3 Bg7 9. Qe1 Qd7 10. a4 f5 11. Nd5 fxe4
12. dxe4 Rb8 13. Ng5 Bxd5 14. exd5 Qf5 15. Ne6 Bf6 16. Qe2 h5
17. Ra3 Nh6 18. Rg3 Kd7 19. Rg5 Bxg5 20. fxg5 Qxd5 21. Nf4
Qd4+ 22. Be3 Qe4 23. gxh6 Rxh6 24. Nd5 Rhh8 25. Qd2 Rhf8
26. Re1 Rf5 27. Nb6+ Kc6 28. Bxc5 Rbf8 29. Bd4 1-0

```
> 7 votes

# Answer
Smith Morra gambit is even more aggressive than Grand Prix (It's a gambit!)

You'll have more decisive wins (lots of sacrifices) and more tragic losses.
> 2 votes

# Answer
I am surprised nobody mentioned the Alapin Variation yet. It is played at all levels and considered a very solid Anti-Sicilian, not without reason:

1. e4 c5
2. c3

After 2. c3 white aims for a bold center with the move d4. The benefit (for white) is that many times black is not familiar with the arising positions, which can look very different from what Sicilian players usually expect.
> 2 votes

# Answer
As you wanted aggressive, the Levenfish attack can catch a lot of players out and black needs to know what he's doing to defend against it. I'll put the opening moves but leave the analysis to you :)

1 e4 c5 2 Nf3 d6 3 d4 cxd4 4 Nxd4 Nf6 5 Nc3 g6 6 f4
> 1 votes

# Answer
Sicilian Najdorf is the best reply . You would find majority of Wins with Black in Sicilian Najdorf .

but when I say Najdorf Sicilian please note that this particular Sicilian Pattern can get transformed into many other Sicilians .

* Sicilian Scheveningen
* Sicilian Paulsen
* Sicilian Taimanov
* Sicilian Richter Rauzer
* Sicilian Kan

So when you learn Najdorf you should also have knowledge of the above .
> 0 votes

---
Tags: opening, sicilian-defense
---


title: Complete game Troitzky-Vogt?

text:
# Question
Title: Complete game Troitzky-Vogt?
The Wikipedia on stalemate shows a position where Vogt became victim of a diabolic stalemate trap set by Troitzky.

```
[Title "Troitzky-Vogt"]
[FEN "2kr4/1ppb1pp1/1b4r1/pP2p3/P3P3/5qN1/2Q2P1P/2R1B1KR w - - 0 1"]

1. Rd1! Bh3? 2. Rxd8+ Kxd8 3. Qd1+ Qxd1 1/2-1/2

```

I would like to have the full game. Can anyone help?

# Answer
Not to rain on your hopes - but the problem you're looking for at first appeared in:

> *Troitzky*, A. (1924), **500 Endspielstudien**, Verlag Kagan, Berlin

Troitzky was an impeccable note-taker when it came to chess. This book was End Game Studies and show endgame positions with only with a few endgame moves. It didn't show complete games.

> Unfortunately all of his notes were destroyed in the siege of Leningrad, so there is likely no record of this complete game (not even in Russian sources). (He also died of starvation during the same siege)

Please don't shoot the messenger.
> 8 votes

---
Tags: draw, famous-players, stalemate, famous-games
---


# Question
Title: What does the annotation symbol "TR" mean?
I've seen commentators use this symbol at the end of their analysis but I don't know what it means. Does anyone know?

# Answer
> 2 votes
Descriptive Notation. It is an alternative notation for recording chess games.

From Wikipedia:

> Descriptive notation is a notation for recording chess games, and at one time was the most popular notation in English- and Spanish-speaking countries (Brace 1977:79–80) (Sunnucks 1970:325). It was used in Europe until it was superseded by algebraic notation, introduced by Philipp Stamma in 1737.

The abbreviation TR seems to refer to the spanish descriptive notation:

> The initials are taken from the equivalent Spanish words: dama for queen, rey for king, torre for tower (i.e. rook), caballo for horse (i.e. knight), alfil for bishop and peón for pawn. The files are named after the initials of the pieces on the back rank, with those on the queen's side being suffixed by the letter "D" and those on the king's side suffixed by the letter "R". From left to right along the back rank, this gives: **TD, CD, AD, D, R, AR, CR, TR**.

---
Tags: analysis, notation, annotation
---


title: ECO B40 game for analysis

text:
# Question
Title: ECO B40 game for analysis
Here is the game pgn,

```
[fen ""]
[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2017.02.15"]
[Round "?"]
[White "johnybravo001"]
[Black "anandsadasivam"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "B40"]
[WhiteElo "827"]
[BlackElo "829"]
[TimeControl "600"]
[Termination "anandsadasivam won by checkmate"]
[CurrentPosition "r5k1/pb4p1/1p1b2r1/2p2Q1N/6PP/2PP1P2/7q/1NR2RK1 w - - 3 25"]

1.e4 e6 2.Nf3 c5 3.Bc4 Nc6 4.d3 Qf6 5.Bg5 Qxb2 6.Nbd2 Nf6 7.Bxf6 Qxf6 8.h4 h5 9.Ng5 Nb4 10.O-O Qc3 11.Rc1 Nxa2 12.Bxa2 b6 13.Qe1 Bb7 14.f3 f6 15.Nb1 Qb2 16.Bxe6 dxe6 17.Nxe6 Ke7 18.Nf4 Rh6 19.c3 Kf7 20.e5 fxe5 21.Qxe5 Kg8 22.Nxh5 Rg6 23.g4 Bd6 24.Qf5 Qh2#  0-1

```

Here is the fen diagram of end game,

```
[fen "r5k1/pb4p1/1p1b2r1/2p2Q1N/6PP/2PP1P2/7q/1NR2RK1 w - - 3 25"]

```

Assume, `24.Qf4!` or `24.Qg3!` is played, what could be the further game. Please analyze further considering either of this move is been played.

As part of the game, it progressed better maybe few blunders or maybe the kind of swindle. My concern is not about that. I need further analysis as if the check mate avoided by my opponent. However you comment or scribble about the game.

And please name this ECO B40 game name. My Android phone says `French Sicilian Defense`. And to say it is not exact ECO B40, as there is swap of moves, I had started French Defense by the fact.

# Answer
> 3 votes
You should really not get obsessed with opening theory at your level. Just make natural moves that develop pieces and occupy the center. Learn general principles first which will help you more than if you learn an opening. In any case your opponent got out of any theory already on the third move (3. Bc4), so opening theory won't help you.

Not a bad game from your side, except for the blunder of the knight on move 11. My analysis:

* After 1.e4 e6 2.Nf3 c5 you have what is called the *Sicilian defense, French variation*, which usually appears after 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 (black avoiding the possibility of the French defense in this move order).
* 3. Bc4; not the best move, since unlike in say the Italian game the bishop does not attack much on f7. Also the bishop could easily be kicked away by pawns playing either 3...d5 immediately or after 3...a6. The most popular/best move is 3. d4
* 3. ... Nc6, ok move, but here or in the following moves you should really consider playing a6, b5 (developing the bishop to b7 later) or d5, taking advantage of the misplaced bishop on c4 which you can attack a tempo.
* 4 ... Qf6, don't get out the queen that early. It could easily get attacked and does not threaten anything from f6 either. Develop your pieces, likely the bishop to e7, knight to f6....
* 11 ... Nxa2?? blunders the knight in one move
* 14 f3 seriously weakens the dark squares in the white camp, particularly since white does not have a dark squared bishop anymore. Black should focus on how to take advantage of this.
* 15 ... Qb2? allows white to get two pawns for a piece. After 15... Qxe1 16 Rxe1 fxg5 black would only lose one pawn and would keep the important pawns on e6, d7 which restrict the white bishop somewhat
* 17 ... Ke7!? blocks the bishop on f8. 17... Kf7 looks more natural
* 18 ... Rh6!? not a good square for the rook which does not have much space here. If you wanted to get out of the knight fork on g6, you could have played Kf7 which would also free the bishop on f8.
* 23 ... g4?? loses the game. White should have played Nf4 which protects g2 and at the same time attacks the rook on g6. Even if g4 did not lose immediately it does not look like a good choice as it seriously weakens the kingside, particularly the f3 pawn.

After 23 ... Bd6 white loses the queen and ends up with a piece vs queen and a rather passive position (particularly the knight on b1). There is no point to analyze this position as there are many ways to win this. An obvious plan could be to bring in the rooks via the open e-file to e2 or to win the pawn on f3 which seems very difficult to protect and once it is gone there are always mate threads on g2.

---
Tags: opening, analysis, sicilian-defense, french-defense
---


# Question
Title: What advice would you give a novice in Chess?
I am a bit of a new blood when it comes to Chess. Oh I know how to play but before I started getting more serious it was more like flailing about and hoping for the best. Recently I came to the conclusion that a game like Chess can be quite beneficial towards my cognitive development and I simply love the elegance and depth of the board.

But I was hoping to get some advice from the more advance players. (Which from my experience level would be about everyone, lol.) As in,

What would you wish someone told you when you first started getting into playing? How do you resist stagnation? Is there some etiquette that players are expected to know but don't necessarily teach?

# Answer
1) Study the games of masters. I would recommend earlier masters like Morphy, Lasker, Capablanca, etc. Studying their "simple" games will better your understanding to study more "complicated" games of Fischer, Karpov, Kasparov, Anand or Carlsen.

2) Study the endgame. I recommend Understanding Chess Endgames by John Nunn.

3) Practice and improve your tactical skills. There are many online tactics websites that can help you in that regard, like chesstempo.

4) Enjoy playing chess! Without enjoyment, it's difficult to learn. But don't waste time playing useless 2 or 3 minute blitz games. These won't help you to improve much. Play games with longer time controls, especially in tournaments if possible.

5) Get a good chess engine to analyze your games. I would recommend Stockfish, which is a free engine. However, if you're willing to spend more money, I recommend a powerful engine like Houdini with Chessbase 12. Note that you can also use Stockfish with ChessBase 12. I often use it myself. It's a very strong engine and Houdini is just very sligtly better (for beginners, that shouldn't make much of a difference).

6) Never leave any of your games unanalyzed. That's a serious waste of the time you have spent playing those games and also a loss of the things you could potentially have learned. Never put off analyzing a game for more than a week. My experience is that you remember the lessons learned from your games the earlier you analyze your games. Of course, you need to make good notes on your games.

7) Watch this inspiring video! :) Bobby Fischer - Anything to Win. Caution: I'm asking you to be inspired only by the way Bobby Fischer trained to play chess and win; not to be inspired by his paranoia or his other questionable activities!

8) Study the openings and opening principles. Although this isn't that important for beginners compared to the other things I mentioned, it is nevertheless very important to play good openings to have good positions to play.
> 4 votes

# Answer
Okay, here are some points: 1) Don't follow dogma religiously and without understanding. You may hear a lot of dogma such as 'develop knights before bishops', 'dont move the same piece twice in the opening', etc. IMO such 'rules' are better learnt the hard way after playing some games and there are always exceptions.

2) Play lot of games! This is the only way to improve.

3) Avoid playing the computer. Though some computer programs can adjust their level according to the human player they would typically make mistakes which no human being would make. So playing a computer would typically not prepare a person for playing against a human.

4) Your opponent is your best teacher! During your game you may find your opponent uses some nice tactics or strategies. Though you may have lost that particular game you could use those same tactics and strategies in your future games!

5) Analyze games which you lost. Former world champion Capablanca famously said that you learn more from the games you lose than from the ones you win. This is quite true. You need to know why you lost. Was it a blunder, a mistake in the opening, or was it simply a case of being outplayed?

6) Play with people who are higher rated than you. If you play with the same crowd you will not learn anything new. Typically playing with somebody who is about 200 points above would be ideal. However, it may be difficult to find such a person to play with you as he would also aspire to play with people higher rated than him!

7) Look up some theory occasionally. I know I mentioned earlier that lessons are best learnt the hard way. But if the game improvement is stagnating, it may be the right time to look up some theory. If you are serious about chess then you should get a chess book which atleast covers all the important openings. You don't need to read it all at once, nor is that recommended but you need to have a book which you can refer to from time to time.

8) Don't play too much blitz. This could hurt the regular games.
> 4 votes

# Answer
Here are a few words on chess

1. Chess is decision making under pressure.
2. Learn to counter-attack (including prophylaxis).
3. Keep "asking questions" - keep making new threats and problems.
4. Study endgames. All the major types of endgames. Many players are weak in this area.
5. Many go for a knock-out in the opening and middlegame. Be ready for this.
6. Control the center and understand why this is important.
7. Learn how pieces collaborate and find "strong teams" among them.
> 3 votes

# Answer
What I did in the beginning was I went to my library which had weekly sessions of chess, and we would play other people that went there and after a while I was invited to competitions. After doing that for a while instead of going to competitions I went to chess.com and played people on there. You can go and find chess books and review what pieces are which piece. Such that the pawn moves one square at a time, and only forward. And on their first move they can choose to move 1 or 2 spaces forward. Etc. Hope I helped!
> 1 votes

# Answer
The above advises are absolutely good in almost all cases . My advice would be first to treat Chess as a Study and just not a game between two Players.

Please analyse some Chess games , understand the openings , the Middle games and the End game .

The best Algorithm is that Start with the End games first . You will understand the value of Pieces better , their Activity & Coordination . Then gradually you understand the Middle Game and then the Openings .
> 0 votes

---
Tags: learning, strategy, etiquette, beginner
---


# Question
Title: Are computers playing good chess beyond what humans can see?
It is more than a decade now that no human has beaten a top chess program, and now there are computer vs computer matches continuously running and getting results. Those results are used by programmers to improve the algorithms. The improvement is not merely a result of the increasing CPU speed, but also the result of theory research and improvement in the algorithms that prune and evaluate the game tree. This process was driven in the 80s and partly in the 90s by the desire to make the programs stronger against humans, but beyond a certain point the programs became so strong that now they are only tested against each other (and even against themselves) and I wonder if that is causing a deviation from chess into... another thing.

Hence my question. When top chess programs fight against each other at a level that no human could withstand, evaluating branches of the game tree up to an insane depth, how do we know that, beyond a certain depth, the moves make sense?

Let me explain my question with a simplified example. I bought recently a table chess computer in a toy shop chain, and it plays really bad. Even set at 3 minutes per move, I honestly doubt it is reaching farther than 1 or 2 plies at most and I am sure it is without any check extensions. It is really easy to beat, it goes out of the opening book at the 2nd or 3rd move, and it blunders miserably all the time. However, if you force it to play against itself, it stays within the opening book quite long, you don't see obvious blunders and the resulting game does not look bad. The algorithm playing against the same algorithm produces something that seems like decent chess, but I know it is fake, because if I interrupt it at any point and play against the machine I will beat it in no time. Hence my doubt when this example is translated to a much higher level... Do the strongest human see any value on those Stockfish-Houdini matches, do they give credibility to what those machines play, or it is simply crap nobody understands?

# Answer
> Do the strongest human see any value on those Stockfish-Houdini matches, do they give credibility to what those machines play, or it is simply crap nobody understands?

In many positions, computers play strange moves that no human would ever consider. People refer to moves like that as "computer moves." Some insanely deep tactic to reach a risky position that scores every so slightly higher than an obvious, safe move.

**But**, it's not crap. These computers playing these moves beat all human grandmasters. That's how we know the moves make sense, the computers would lose if their moves didn't make sense.

It's just that our human way of understanding the game is ultimately limited. Some moves just look like they go against all our understanding of positional play -- *but they work*. So it's our understanding that is wrong.
> 7 votes

# Answer
## Computers suffer from a fundamental flaw. (Or maybe it's humans with the problem . . . )

Let's suppose that we have a "perfect" computer, trained against similar "perfect" computers. On move one, it analyzes perfectly and realizes that the position is a draw. Moreover, it is so perfect that it realizes that with perfect play, 1.a4 leads to a draw, just as 1.e4 does. So, as White, it picks randomly and perhaps plays a4. As the game continues, it will continue playing "equal" moves until just before it reaches the point where one more such blunder would lose against perfect play. At that point it will start playing "perfect" moves to secure the draw.

Today's engines avoid this through most of the game because they can analyze only so deep. At some point they have to rely on position-evaluation heuristics, which usually give positions after 1.a4 a low score. But when we get to the endgame, at a certain point the analysis becomes "perfect" (thanks to exhaustive databases available of positions with a limited number of pieces) and this phenomenon kicks in. If we ever have a perfect computer, the process would begin at the very start.

A human eschews 1.a4 because he can never assume that he or his opponent is "perfect". A human is much more dependent on his ability to evaluate positions and therefore always tries to play "beautiful" chess.

Thus we reach the ironic conclusion. The more "perfect" our computers, the shoddier their apparent play. We have already reached the point where computers are of limited value in analysis. The engines routinely play seemingly ridiculous moves because they see threats that no human could calculate deeply enough to play over the board, while missing out on attacks because there happens to be a defensive line that is similarly impossible for humans to find. This isn't due to any lack of imagination, insight or effort by the programmers. On the contrary - it is because we have evolved our concept of "good" or "beautiful" chess to compensate for the limitations of our calculating ability.
> 5 votes

# Answer
Yes, I believe there have been tournaments with highly-rated AI chess engines and after 300,000 games or so, some of the most incredible games were found with some incredible moves. But it's robust evaluation of the position through scoring and yes it is smarter than a human in this domain. But its world is limited into a 64 square area with billions of moves. The human brain is more adapted to the challenges and concepts that humans face every day which is different than a pretty massive domain like chess.

The AI in a sense is specialized in chess while humans are adapted to generic analysis to address many different challenges. Humans also specialize which is why we can sometimes see someone who is gifted in one area but terrible in another.

The world's best chess players do understand most computer moves but some computer moves are so deep that it's almost not even worth fully analyzing because it is so specialized move to that specific position while human players are more adapted to patterns and generic responses to a variety of positional strategic moves.
> 1 votes

# Answer
Computers have consistently found strange defensive moves that have altered evaluations of many classic positions. Correspondence players still beat computers. The combination of human and computer is far more powerful than either alone.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: computer-chess
---


title: What is meant by "nerves" in chess?

text:
# Question
Title: What is meant by "nerves" in chess?
It is said about chess players in general. For example, Wikipedia says about Ivanchuk:

> His inability to become World Champion despite his immense talent and longevity among the chess elite has been attributed to his admittedly poor nerves, which were exposed during the high-tension atmosphere of World Championship match-format tournaments

What does this "poor nerves" mean? Does this mean he cannot cope up with the stress?

# Answer
Yes to both questions.

At the highest level of any sport/game/activity, there is an extreme amount of pressure. Being in a foreign city, the quest to find the best move, the knowledge that most chess players will be going over you game, annotators criticizing your every move, and the added pressure of a ticking clock. (Digital clocks don't tick, but most chess players prefer this reference.) Professional chess players have been known to lose 20 pounds(9 kg) during a normal 2 week tournament, due to the stress of the situation. Although I don't think they consider this, one misplay and they will be remembered like Bill Buckner.
> 8 votes

# Answer
At other levels in chess it means you get in time trouble and you don't panic and fall apart or you get in a difficult position and you continue to play your best. You're willing to take calculated risks. You continue to play well when you opponent blows smoke in your face or does other things to try to get you upset.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: psychology, famous-players
---


title: Can King take piece end up threatened?

text:
# Question
Title: Can King take piece end up threatened?
In this position black queen defended by pawn checked white king. Is it possible if the white king take black queen and end up threatened by black pawn?

# Answer
Assume the image was taken from Black's side (otherwise the queen is not protected).

No. The Black queen is protected by the black pawn, and thus can't be taken by the White king. The only possible move is to move the king to the other direction one square.
> 5 votes

# Answer
In general, in chess, the aim is to capture the enemy king and not to have your own king captured.

This means that after you make a move your king must not be attacked (=in check), as otherwise your opponent could capture it. If it is not possible to do this, i.e. if for any move your king ends up being in check, the game is over and the game is either check-mate (if your king is attacked in the original position) or stalemate (if your king is not attacked in the original position.

Specifically for your example, the only way to get out of check is to move the king one step to the left (to the square which should be f1, but is c8 here; see below). It is not possible to take the queen because your king would end up in check after that move.

PS: The board is incorrectly set up. At the start of the game, the white pieces should be on the 1st and 2nd row, and the black pieces on the 7th and 8th row.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: checkmate
---


# Question
Title: What's wrong with Long castle in accelerated Dragon being white?
What's wrong if white move to Castle long(0-0-0) in Accelerated dragon?

# Answer
> 4 votes
In the normal Dragon, the most dangerous system is the Yugoslav attack. Current theory shows that Black can resist the attack with a pawn sacrifice and maintain the balance. In the Accelerated Dragon, Black saves a move by moving the d pawn to d5 in one move. This allows Black to gain a dangerous initiative. With a Rook on the c file and the Bishops on g7 and f5, White must defend carefully.

# Answer
> 4 votes
After 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 g6 5.Nc3 Bg7 6.Be3 Nf6, castling long as quickly as possible doesn't work for white: 7.Qd2 0-0 8.0-0-0 Ng4! 9.Nxc6 bxc6 and black is clearly better.

Therefore, if white wants to castle longside, he should start with 7.f3. After 7....0-0, 8.Qd2 is again dubious: 8....d5! and black has an extra tempo with respect to the normal Dragon.

Instead, white can prevent ...d5 by 8.Bc4. After 8....d6 9.Qd2 white has transposed to one of the main lines of the normal Dragon. But black has a more powerful alternative: 8....Qb6! and after 9.Bb3 he has 2 options:

```

      [StartPly "12"]

      [FEN ""]
      1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 g6 5.Nc3 Bg7 6.Be3 Nf6 7.f3 (7.Qd2 O-O 8.O-O-O Ng4 9.Nxc6 bxc6) 7...O-O 8.Bc4 (8.Qd2 d5) 8...Qb6 (8...d6 9.Qd2) 9.Bb3 Nxe4 (9...Ng4 10.fxg4 Bxd4 11.Bxd4 Qxd4 12.Qxd4 Nxd4) 10.Nd5 Qa5+ 11.c3 Nc5 (11...Bxd4 12.Bxd4 Nc5) 12.Nxc6 dxc6 13.Nxe7+ Kh8 14.Nxc8 Raxc8

```

# Answer
> 0 votes
I don't play the Dragon, but it seems to me it is pretty good when you play the Accelerated form and push White into castling short. It offers White fewer offensive choices.

So, trying to castle long would still be the right ideal. It is only in the details that we see the flaws. The early Be3, f3 weakens Nd4, Be3 and pawn b2. The early Qd2 may allow ...Ng4. Using Bf1-e2 to guard g4 may allow an advantageous ...d5. An early f2-f4, to meet ...d5 with e5, may also leave Be3, Nd4 and pawn b2 too weak. White has to be careful in the opening to maintain safe coordination. See the early games like Lasker-(somebody whose name escapes me just now), Alekhine-Botwinnik, or Fischer-Reschevsky for examples of how crazy it can get.

# Answer
> -2 votes
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 g6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nc6 5.Nc3 Bg7 6.Be3 Nf6 7.Bc4 O-O 8.Bb3 d6 9.f3 Bd7 10.Qd2 and White will castle queenside (probably on the next move). Note my comment about the necessity of playing this move order.

---
Tags: opening, sicilian-defense, castling
---


# Question
Title: Is exchanging a knight for a bishop and open the game a good strategy for beginners?
I just learned that bishops are better in an opened game, but in a "normal" game is it good to follow this strategy?

# Answer
> 7 votes
No, it is not a good strategy (in any situation).

Each game is different and it is not a good idea to follow a strict strategy like this. Even in open positions there are situations where knights can become very strong. Take for instance the following position which is inspired by the Sicilian Najdorf (so would satisfy your semi-open requirement). The knight is very strong and cannot easily be removed from its dominant position. The black bishop on the other hand is stuck defending the pawn on d6 and does not have many options in general.

```
r2q1rk1/1p2bppp/p2p4/3Np3/4P3/8/PPP2PPP/R2Q1RK1 w - - 1 13

```

It is not possible to generalize that bishops are always stronger. You really need to analyze the position you have and base your strategy on this. A few things to look for:

* badly placed pieces - which you could improve
* weaknesses in the pawn structure - which could be attacked
* open files - which you could occupy
* more space - which you could take advantage of
* better development - which you could take advantage of (typically by opening up the position)
* insecure king - which you could attack

And of course you should analyze this for both sides in order to be aware of possible plans of your opponent.

---
Tags: knights, bishops
---


# Question
Title: Does the Yugoslav Attack refute the Sicilian Dragon?
I saw, some weeks ago, a video of the great GM Roman Dzindzichashvili, claiming that Sicilian Dragon is somewhat refuted, or at least it is a dubious system. I normally play the Grand Prix against the Sicilian, but if what I saw on the video is true, I may switch to the Yugoslav attack.

Basically my question is the dragon really a bad opening and is the Yugoslav attack the its "refutation" (strong word I know) ?

# Answer
No, it is not refuted, and it is not any more dubious than dozens of other mainstream openings. It's dangerous for both sides, of course. I would not worry about its theoretical status until your rating gets to 2600 or so.

Note also that if you stop playing the Grand Prix, you're going to have to decide what to do against all the other Black Open Sicilian defense besides the Dragon.
> 9 votes

# Answer
The idea of Mr. Roman, I have see the video, is that the opening is somewhat blunt. But still he also gives clarifications that some lines are winning. The positions achieved will certainty not be the ones you achieve in most of your games. As another answerer mentioned, stick to the Grand Prix, or to another Anti-Sicilian, such as the Alapin.
> 2 votes

# Answer
GM Gawain Jones (who plays this opening) just published a huge two volume work. His conclusion, of course, is that it is quite playable.
> 2 votes

# Answer
The Dragon Opening is an Opening which should not be played below the 2000 ElO level for the Black Player . The main objective of Dragon for the Black is to sacrifice the c8 Rook for the c3 Knight which guards the White King when he does the long Castle . It is one of the most popular Exchange Sacrifice which Players at Master level and above do understand and can play it better. I am not saying that Players who are 1500 ~ Elo fails to understand .

My Objective is if you understand the Counterattacking theme from black then you should go ahead to play the Dragon . Generally compared to other Sicilians White's attack comes very fast (Yugoslav Attack )because the pawn stands on g6 and Black has to be extra cautious because the h file gets opened very soon where White unites his Rooks on h-file and hover around Black's King . Black's game has to be ultra sharp to do the Counter attack . The Theory of Dragon even extends to 25-30 moves which the Black player should memorize in order to win the game . If he makes 2-3 incorrect moves he/she loses very soon .
> 2 votes

# Answer
I played the Yugoslav attack when a IM played the Dragon against me, and in my chess area they do not know how to play the Dragon variations with me. It's quite solid with lots of tactical opportunities, however it's also dangerous for both sides so be careful when playing it.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: opening, sicilian-defense
---


title: What is the line here?

text:
# Question
Title: What is the line here?
A game I just played at chess.com, in the analysis, it was a missed win at a point. My mind is saturated right now, and I can't think of the line. Can you help me out?

# Answer
The obvious tactic is

1) ... a6 2) Na3 Nxd4 3) cxN Qxd4 4) QxQ BxQ and you are forking the two rooks on a1 and g1

Disclaimer: I haven't checked this with an engine but it would be my first thought during the game. The engine may find a hole in this
> 6 votes

# Answer
First, a6 to kick that knight away. Assuming they don't want to lose it, it has to go to the horrible square a3.

Second, Qxf3. It takes a pawn, puts more pressure on the pinned e2 knight, and also threatens c3 now that the b5 knight is gone.

After that, it really depends how they reply, but you're certainly winning. They're down a pawn, they're poorly developed, their king is in the center (which is partially open), and their knight is pinned. Perhaps one plan would be to double the rooks on the e-file to exploit the pin.
> 2 votes

# Answer
I believe that the missed win text refers to the score going strongly in your opponents favour after that move. I have noticed it in my own analysis after a blunder and since I have premium, i recall the line shown not resulting in a mate but just a maintained advantage which i had blundered.
> 1 votes

---
Tags: online-chess
---


# Question
Title: Does SCID have a command for removing preceding moves in a game?
I am looking for something similar to sc\_game truncate, but to remove preceding moves (from a current position), rather than remaining ones. Does such a function exist in the API exposed to scripts called via tcscid.exe?

# Answer
The SCID tool's focus is on collections of positions more than single games.

Accordingly, the best way to do what you're trying to do is to deal with the PGN directly. PGN is flat text and available in SCID.

If you want part of a game, the typical action is to copy the PGN into a text document from SCID, and edit the part that you wish. Load your edited game back into SCID if you want ..
> 1 votes

# Answer
If you open the PGN window you can right click over a trait and select to delete all moves before that one.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: scid
---


# Question
Title: How are chess variations meant to be read
This is a sample position from a book (no further details are given to avoid copyright issues).

I can read the first line and follow it in my mind, departing from the figure. But the continuation in the 2nd and 3rd line is too much. I cannot look at the figure and remember what pieces are supposed to be in different squares, much less do it in a proficient way (i.e. I might place a non-existing bishop in a square in my mind, but not realizing which other squares he is threatening).

However the book is not for advanced players. I wonder how are readers supposed to follow these comments and variations, if you are supposed to use a physical board with pieces, or if you are supposed to visualize all that in your mind and the problem is that I need more practice on that.

# Answer
> 5 votes
Visualization usually improves as you get stronger, and there are exercises that can be done to improve it.

When following lines in a book, most players use a board, and sometimes two. The second one is used to explore those side variations, without having to constantly reset the board and play from the first move. This can be done with either physical boards, or software, which makes it easier to follow a variation, then go back to then main line with just a mouse click.

---
Tags: books, annotation
---


# Question
Title: Does anyone know who currently owns Novag's intellectual property?
With Novag being gone for a while now, I'm wondering who ended up with their intellectual property - in particular, the software that ran their computers. I'm aware that there are some ROM images of... ummm... "questionable legitimacy"... that exist on emulator sites for a few older Novag systems. I'm just wondering if there's any way to contact whoever currently owns Novag's IP to see if they have any plans for further product development - and if not, if they could be convinced to make ROM images from their hardware available to the chess community...

Yeah, I know modern (and free) engines like Stockfish play a much better game than most of the old Novag gear - I just always enjoyed playing against these systems, I found their play (with the right settings) to be more "human" than an absolutely relentless modern engine. I think it would be a lot of fun if the old Novag software could be used as the basis of a UCI engine that could plug into a modern chess GUI, sort of like has been done with some of the old Mephisto software.

# Answer
> 3 votes
Novag was sold in 2009 to Solar Wide Industrial Ltd. They have continued to manufacture chess computers until 2014. Perhaps you should try to contact Solar Wide Industrial Ltd for more information. Their website is http://www.solarwide.com.hk but seems to be off line.

# Answer
> 6 votes
This is not a direct answer to your question, but it will be helpful. I happen to miss too the playing style of the early chess computers. Those machines ran amazing algorithms on incredibly poor hardware resources (usually 128 or 256 **bytes** RAM and a 2 to 16 Mhz, 8-bit processors with limited instruction sets, which would make anyone laugh when compared with the cheapest smartphone of today). The resulting game style at a few seconds per move was aesthetically decent chess (rooks placed in open lines, knights towards the center and so on) that tried to use the machine resources as good as possible (instead of being purposely dumbed down like modern engines) but with the so-called "horizon effect". This allowed the attentive human player to beat the computer by means of combinations whose final result was above the horizon of the few plyes the computer was able to examine, e.g. you could trick the machine with a sacrifice for instance, or you could detect a weakness in an otherwise apparently sound position.

Yes, as a result, those chess computers played what many people like me find more human than all the PC chess software that followed. With "modern" software (meaning PCs since ~1990) it is very noticeable when randomly stupid moves are inserted in an otherwise strong play, or when the program plays something ugly with not much sense positionally that does not win you immediately but also does not allow to be beaten with tactics. There is no way you can beat modern software by being tactically strong, that has never again happened since the 90s. It is incredible that *almost* no one has paid any attention to this, but the solution was very simple: limiting the calculation speed of engines until matching those of the early devices. Without altering anything else: no choosing of suboptimal moves, no random noise added to the evaluation function or anything. Just let the algorithm get the most out of a position but set a very low limit to the number of positions evaluated per second and you have it.

It has been done at least once: try the *open source* UCI engine Rodent II by Pawel Koziol. Set the parameter **NpsLimit** at something between 40 and 100 and allow it between 5 and 20 seconds per move. It really plays like those old chess computers.

I am unaware of other engines that implement that possibility. Some engines limit the search depth (Rybka) but the response is nearly instantaneous. Others emulate a slow response but it is not clear what they are doing (looking at the playing style I suspect Ufim might be following this approach but it is not explicit). Others choose suboptimal moves as said (Stockfish), but nearly any author has thought of implementing the full chess knowledge and positional evaluation at arbitrarily low speed, and I hope the idea is copied by many developers. Playing against such algorithms with horizon effect is fun, and it really gives you the impression of a fight against an opponent that is trying to do his/her best, instead of a mighty opponent that is playing sub-optimally on purpose. I think that is what your question is about.

---
Tags: hardware
---


# Question
Title: After 1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6, should White play 3. cxd5?
I play the Exchange variation as White when Black plays 2...e6 against the Queen's Gambit. Should I play 3. cxd5 to avoid the transpoition to the Slav 3. Nc3 (hoping for 3...Nf6 4. cxd5) c6!?

```
[FEN ""]

1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. cxd5!? (3. Nc3 c6!?)

```

# Answer
> 11 votes
After 3.cxd5 exd5 4.Nc3, if black plays 4....Nf6 or 4....Be7, then white indeed succesfully transposed to the mainlines of the QGD and avoided any transpositions to the Slav.

Black's best reply is probably 4....c6, after which white has 3 good options: 5.Nf3, 5.Bf4 and 5.Qc2.

* After 5.Nf3 black can play 5....Bd6 or 5....Bf5.
* After 5.Bf4 black's best moves also are 5....Bd6 or 5....Bf5. (Black has an extra tempo compared to 3.Nc3 Be7 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bf4 c6 6.e3 Bd6, as in Wojtaszek - Kraemer)
* After 5.Qc2, both 5....Bd6 and 5....g6 (with idea Bf5) seem good moves for black.

In all variations, black has a good version of the QGD, as white cannot prevent him from developing his bishop to f5.

It seems that after 3.cxd5 black equalizes rather easily and that 3.Nc3 or 3.Nf3 are much more principle moves. However, 3.cxd5 cannot be called a mistake. If the Carlsbad structure suits your playing style, then it is worth a try.

```
  [StartPly "4"]

  [FEN ""]
  1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 3.cxd5 (3.Nc3 Be7 4.cxd5 exd5 5.Bf4 c6 6.e3 Bd6) exd5 4.Nc3 c6 (4...Nf6)(4...Be7) 5.Qc2 (5.Nf3 Bd6 (5...Bf5)) (5.Bf4 Bd6 (5...Bf5)) 5...Bd6 (5...g6)

```

# Answer
> 4 votes
It is basically a trade-off: are you so afraid of the Slav that you're willing to play a slightly inferior Exchange line?

The main line of the QGD Exchange is:

```
[FEN ""]

1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. cxd5 exd5 5. Bg5

```

If you have a clever opponent, they can play Be7 instead of Nf6 if you exchange too early:

```
[FEN ""]

1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. cxd5 exd5 4. Nc3 Be7

```

In that case, you can only play variations with Bf4, which promise less chances of advantage.

# Answer
> 3 votes
Exchanging on move three is too early.

After 1 d4 d5 2 c4 e6 3 cxd5? exd5 4 Nc3 Black solves his main problem of how to develop with the Queenside Bishop. This achieved with with 4 ... c6! and ... Bf5!, for example:

```
[FEN ""]
[StartPLY "6"]

1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. cxd5 exd5 4. Nc3 c6 5. Qc2 Bd6 6. Nf3 Ne7 7. Bg5 Bf5

```

# Answer
> 2 votes
The move 3 cd5 is certainly not good as it does nothing to improve White's position, and in fact helps Black's development opening the c8-h3 diagonal.

# Answer
> 2 votes
On general principles, trading a slightly wing pawn for a center pawn is good, but on the other hand, the e6-pawn no longer blocks Black's queen bishop. cxd5 may allow the White bishop to move a bit more, but it's to b5 (Black is playing c6 anyway).

White is trading an aggressive pawn that influences a center square on Black's side of the board for a slightly more passive one.

Also, if White is trying for a minority attack, this shows his hand.

cxd5 isn't bad per se--if you are playing a higher-rated player and need a draw, it may be a throw down the gauntlet moment to say "you'll have to take risks to beat me!" But I usually find it's best to keep the tension going. This is oversimplifying, but sometimes chess is a game of chicken, and if you take to relieve a bit of pressure on you, you may relieve more on your opponent.

# Answer
> 1 votes
The Objective of White is to develop the Pieces and attack Black ASAP. Both sides should try to complete Development and then Play in Center/Flanks .

When White does a cd5 then it is helping Black to free himself and Develop the c8 Bishop . You know Bishops are already active from their Initial Position & cover the Squares that come across its Diagonals . So it is not a very good Strategic Decision from White to play cd5.

---
Tags: opening, queens-gambit, 1.d4, slav-defense
---


# Question
Title: What are the consequences of an early a6 in the Sicilian?
Once I encountered an opponent who used a very early a6 in his Sicilian Opening.

```
[FEN ""]

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 a6

```

What could have been his objective with this move and how should I have have countered it?

# Answer
This is called the O'Kelly variation of the Sicilian.

If white plays normally (i.e. `3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3`), then black can eventually kick the d4 knight with `...e5` when the knight doesn't have any great squares. In this case, `2... a6` keeps the knight from moving to the natural b5 square (as in the Sveshnikov Sicilian). This will allow black to quickly play `...d5` with equality.

White's best plan is to play either `c3` or `c4` trying to prove that black's move `2... a6` is not a good developing move. When white plays `c3`, the natural plan is to follow up with `d4`, and then if black plays `...cxd4`, white will respond with `cxd4`, gaining a classical pawn center. When white plays `c4` instead, white's plan is to set up a Maroczy bind.

An unambitious plan for white would be to play into a closed Sicilian - in the closed Sicilian, black frequently plays a6-b5 in order to get counterplay on the queenside. Furthermore, in the closed Sicilian, tempi matter a lot less because the position will not change radically from one move to the next.
> 38 votes

# Answer
As I understand it, the purpose of `2... a6` is to keep a white piece (usually knight or bishop) off b5.

It seems premature, because white might not want to go there anyway (for some time). Meaning that it could easily become a wasted move.

As White, I would concentrate on king side development, knowing that b5 was "off limits," but not caring, because I have "better" things to do.

One disadvantage of a6 is that Black may want to play a5 later to try to "chase" a White knight on b3. But if he does so, he would have wasted a move with a6. As White, I might try to "transpose" into that variation so that Black has wasted a move.
> 17 votes

# Answer
The point of ...a6 is to control the square b5 where white can otherwise place a knight or bishop at some point. Another point is to prepare b7-b5 followed by Bc8-b7 and perhaps b5-b4 to chase a white Nc3. The move ...a6 appears in at least two variations, 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6; 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6. If you have ever been interested in the gambit 1.e4 c5 2.b4, then you can consider 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 a6 3.b4.

```
[FEN ""]
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 a6 3.b4 cxb4 4.a3 bxa3 5.Bxa3

```
> 8 votes

# Answer
a6 serves three purpose .

1. It is a waiting move in Sicilian as like Black waits for White's Plan .
2. It is the start of Q-Side Counter Play from black . As in Sicilian Black generally plays on the Center & Q-side .
3. Generally in Sicilian the Black Queen's favourite Square is c7 . You may see this move in Kan/Taimanov/Najdorf etc . When Black Plays a6 then it covers the b5 Square which prevents White's Knight to come to b5 and attack the c7 Queen which costs a Tempo to Black .
> -1 votes

---
Tags: sicilian-defense, opening
---


# Question
Title: Linux: is there any engine that could play your game like Shredder?
On Windows, I used Shredder to not only analyze my games, but play the game against me or against itself from any given position.

I used many engines but only found that option in Shredder, maybe I didn't notice that option in other engines.

Now I dumped Windows, and moved to Linux, Xubuntu. While I still could run Shredder on wine, I'd like to know if there's an engine, that runs natively on Linux and that has that option.

I have Pychess and Scid with crafty. I still don't see it, on Windows I tried many engines and didn't see it, is Shredder the only engine that has this option, or am I missing something?

**Edit**

I would like to know if there's a free alternative to Shredder that has that option. If not, then I'll download Shredder.

# Answer
Features such as setting up a position and playing Engine vs. Engine are part of the interface, not the engine. XBoard, for instance, is both free as in speech and as in beer, supports both of these options and can be configured to use nearly any chess engine you wish; many other interfaces exist and have the same features.
> 5 votes

# Answer
Shredder 12 runs natively on Linux.

http://www.shredderchess.com/chess-software/linux.html
> 7 votes

# Answer
As much as I love Linux (particularly Ubuntu) and as many downvotes I am going to collect with this, I must acknowledge something and move on: **Chess software sucks in Linux and it is still in the pre-2000 era, if not worse.** I am thinking for instance of the year 2000 when a particular software for Windows 9x was released (I don't want to give them free publicity) with a beautiful interface and lots of easy to use options. 17 years before, there is still nothing that compares. Interfaces are ugly, non-intuitive, dissociated from the engines (e.g. some configuration options may work, some others may not without any notice) and often buggy.

The best option is a virtual machine with Windows 9x or Windows XP. There you may install your software and play against the emulated Chessmaster opponents, the Sparring mode in Fritz, and others. For me it is either that, or playing in lichess online with the internet browser. Or playing in Android in my phone (Droidfish with Rodent II engine, there is a Jim Ablett compile that works like a charm).

Someone is going to say now that this is not true. Yes, there is Scid and even Arena for linux, and you can install Crafty with book-medium-to-small and Stockfish, Pychess, Knights in KDE, and lots of options... Be my guest, Sir, give them a try...
> 1 votes

# Answer
Get SCID and insert Shredder or almost any other engine into it. I do this and it works great.
> 0 votes

---
Tags: analysis, engines
---


# Question
Title: How to force engine (eg. Stockfish) to play position till checkmate in Lucas Chess?
I am training endgames using Lucas Chess and playing the position from FEN against Stockfish. But sometimes I would like to have engines play the position with itself. I can achieve this in Lucas Chess easilly with 'Engine Tournament'. But the problem is that there is a FEN position, in 3 moves the evaluation goes to -3 for black and the match ends because engine resigns.

I would like to force engine to play itself till the very end so I can see the plan used to win the ending. I can of course use additional program and make a move suggested by it (eg. Scid with Stockfish too) but I would like it better to have only one program used. Is there any setting for an engine that can force it?

# Answer
> 3 votes
It's possible, but you'll may need to update the source code.

In https://github.com/lukasmonk/lucaschess/blob/843be9f57baa3f631c05181b1012df844f53c84b/Code/QT/PantallaEntMaq.py

```
    # Resign
    lbResign = Controles.LB2P(self, _("Resign/draw by engine"))
    liResign = ((_("Very early"), -100),
                (_("Early"), -300),
                (_("Average"), -500),
                (_("Late"), -800),
                (_("Very late"), -1000),
                (_("Never"), -9999999))
    self.cbResign = Controles.CB(self, liResign, -800)

```

The GUI will resign if the score goes below 800 cp. You can do this:

```
self.cbResign = Controles.CB(self, liResign, -9999999)

```

This will disable auto resign for the software.

# Answer
> 0 votes
Chess engines will play till checkmate :) Only GUIs can be set to give up face to indefensible positions (+10 for B, or -10 for W). ARENA, for example, can be set to play till K's death.

---
Tags: engines, endgame, stockfish
---


title: Can I capture my own pieces?

text:
# Question
Title: Can I capture my own pieces?
This may seem like a very amateur question, but I was playing chess with my dad, and when my dad won, I realized that I could've captured my own pawn in order to evade checkmate. I tried to do this move, but my dad said that it was cheating to do so. Can anybody settle this debate?

# Answer
From the FIDE Laws of Chess, §3.1:

> **It is not permitted to move a piece to a square occupied by a piece of the same colour.** If a piece moves to a square occupied by an opponent’s piece the latter is captured and removed from the chessboard as part of the same move.

(emphasis mine).

So you can't capture your own piece.
> 6 votes

# Answer
Very basic Question : You can never capture your piece.

Be it anybody at the start of their Chess Career or even a Professional it may feel sometimes that if I would not have my own Pawn in front of my Piece I could have captured my Opponents Piece or could have started a Great attack but this is where the embodiment of a high level Chess thinking starts .

You need to either sometimes sacrifice your pawn or piece in order to achieve a greater Activity or occupy a file in order to squeeze your Opponent .

Your imagination needs to be extended in order to think deeper to evade that checkmate from your Dad .
> 1 votes

---
Tags: rules, checkmate, captures
---


# Question
Title: Is Magnus Carlsen ever going to play against Stockfish in a event?
I was wondering if the actual champion is ever going to play against a chess engine like Kasparov and Krammik did? Or is this kind of event not going to happen anymore due to the strength of the engines being just too high?

# Answer
I don't think it'll ever happen because:

* Who's going to pay? Deep Blue was covered by IBM, Deep Fritz was covered by Chessbase, but Stockfish is a free open-source engine.
* It's not fun for Carlsen to play an odd match with Stockfish, but he will likely be beaten convincingly if the match is fair.
* Human vs computer in chess is not interesting anymore. The focus has shifted to Go and Poker.

It's not going to happen.
> 7 votes

# Answer
This will not happen in a traditional form; engines are just too strong for that. In 2014, Nakamura, one of the world's top players, played a match 'with odds' against Stockfish. In two of those games, Stockfish was a pawn down; in the other two games, Nakamura had the help of an older version of the engine running on a slower computer. Stockfish won both minimatches with 1.5 - 0.5.
> 6 votes

# Answer
Although it would be very exciting, I don't believe it would ever happen. Here is a quote out of the mouth of Magnus:

> *Would you participate in a public game against a computer in the near future - or is that not an option for you? The last one I remember was Vladimir Kramnik against Deep Fritz in 2006.*
>
> I personally never wanted that. I find it much more interesting to play humans. And also, of course, now that they have become so strong in a game like that, I wouldn't stand a chance.

http://www.dw.com/en/world-chess-champion-magnus-carlsen-the-computer-never-has-been-an-opponent/a-19186058

From watching Magnus Carlsen many years shows that his style of play is not suited to playing against a computer. His desire to win causes him to willfully play weaker or obscure moves to confuse/challenge his opponents; this will surely mean he will be a lamb to the slaughter against a modern day computer chess software.
> 6 votes

# Answer
I am sure Magnus would not like to compete in an event like that because it is not a new kind of Event anymore which would arouse any innovative interest for the Chess World . As for Strength true the Engines have a relatively higher rated but I confide in Magnus more because I have seen some of his amazing games which are full of Innovative ideas which even Kasparov & Fischer would have not been able to do .
> 0 votes

---
Tags: engines, computer-chess
---


# Question
Title: Can a player ever lose her or his rating (voluntarily)?
I am just curious. Is it possible for a rated player to quit his association with FIDE and start afresh, as an unrated player?

# Answer
I found FIDE regulations 7.21 which state:

> Players whose ratings drop below 1000 are listed on the next list as ‘delisted’. Thereafter, they are treated in the same manner as any other unrated player.

This sounds like a "reset" to me.

Note that this is different to an *inactive* player which you become after not playing rated games for a year. However in the case of inactive players you retain your rating.

Other than this "delisting" I don't think there is a way to lose your rating.
> 3 votes

# Answer
It seems that the simple answer is no, you cannot reset your rating and start again.

This discussion was had at the link posted below a few years ago: http://www.ecforum.org.uk/viewtopic.php?t=3689

I cannot find anything referencing resetting rating on the http://www.fide.com website.
> 0 votes

# Answer
There is no way that a player can lose his rating. If it happens then there are several ways of mistaken identities that can occur in the chess world. Even if a player explicitly tries doing it can even lead to corporal punishments and FIDE will ban his entire chess career.
> 0 votes

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Tags: rating, fide
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title: Writting of a tournament game

text:
# Question
Title: Writting of a tournament game
Why is it compulsory to write a game in classic chess tournaments? If the purpose is the validity of the moves, then why not in quick games?

# Answer
There are several reasons having to write down the moves in standard chess games:

* as a document, proof of the game and result (in some cases but not always the players also have to sign)
* in order to confirm 50-move and 3-fold repetition rules
* in order to count the number of moves which can be relevant for the time control (e.g. sometimes you have say 2 hours for the first 40 moves plus 1 hour for the next 20 moves plus 30 min for the rest)
* to prevent cheating (players changing position of pieces, etc), though this is usually not much of an issue
* for storage (so that you can later analyze your game or sometimes it might even be entered into a database)

With short time controls there is simply no time to write down the moves. Also with some longer time controls, it is sometimes allowed not to write down moves when the remaining time drops below some limit.

Just for information the technicalities on how to record (and how not to) moves are laid out in article 8 of the FIDE laws of chess
> 8 votes

# Answer
The reasons for writing down chess moves are of great importance in classical games with minimum time formats of 1 hour, with 30 secs increment. The uses are:

1) The game is played with longer time, and players try playing the best move on the board. They get more time to think, and the thought process is better displayed.

2) Cheating is obviously prohibited.

3) Chances of silly mistakes happen less during the game as compared to quick/rapid format play.

4) After the game is over, the winning player keeps the game in his own database which inspires him for upcoming matches. The losing player analyses more and learns from his mistakes.

5) During the game it records the 50 move rule, which can leads to a draw.

6) Chess is divided in three phases: Openings, middlegames and endgames. During a longer format, professionals divide this phase according to some precise timings. They make sure they complete the openings in 10 mins, the middlegame in 30 mins, and keep 20 mins for their endgames. After the game is over, they make it a point that they completed the same in the stipulated time . It helps them to think faster with adept in both moves within time.
> 0 votes

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Tags: rules, tournament
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title: Can you checkmate with rook vs knight?

text:
# Question
Title: Can you checkmate with rook vs knight?
Is it possible to checkmate if all you have is a rook and your opponent only has a knight? If both of you play without mistakes or blunders?

# Answer
> 0 votes
When you have a Rook & King vs Knight & King then in most cases the Game would be a draw if played with Best play . Now the Person who has got the Knight he is to make sure that the Knight does not get separated from its King . The Rook should try pushing the King either on the 1st or 8th Rank or a-file or h-file. The Opponent King should try centralize himself . If also the King reaches any of the four Corner ranks or files then the Knight should stay close with the King . The Knight always hinders the Checkmate pattern and comes between the Rook & King .

In this kind of play it is the focus & attention of the Knight Player that plays the role because he is to make sure that Knight does not go far from the King where sometimes it gets trapped and the Game gets Lost.

# Answer
> 0 votes
The short answer is yes but under certain conditions. Here are some tutorials on how it can be done.

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Tags: knights, rooks
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# Question
Title: Good tournaments in 2017 to go for a sport holiday
I'm looking for some tournaments that have high tourist (sport) value and are good for spending holiday, played in some sea resort, small town in good place for riding bicycle or somewhere in nature park/mountains to have nice walks. I'm not interested at all in big cities no matter how many museums you can find there and how interesting history does it have. Of course the event should be in time good for desired activity and right in the area of interest, not 10km away. Location preferably close to central europe. Tournament should be strong enough for titled players, may even be GM/IM roundrobins.

# Answer
I can recommend you the Faaker See Open in Austria,Carinthia.

http://www.faakerseeopen.at/faakersee\_open.php#english

It is an lovely area close to a nice lake and mountains nearby. I have played two times there myself and it is good organized, but if you go there don't book the bed and breakfast place called Pension Wrolich.(It might look cheap but it is not worth it)
> 1 votes

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Tags: tournament
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title: Middlegame plans

text:
# Question
Title: Middlegame plans
It is said that today openings are connected to middlegame plans and even with potential endings. But I can't find those middlegame plans, except for some occasional comments in opening books. In fact I feel lost about middlegame plans. What is the best way to learn the plans related to the openings in my repertoire?

# Answer
> 4 votes
Try taking a look at books that discuss the *structures* arising out of various openings. Andrew Soltis' Pawn Structure Chess and Mauricio Flores Rios' Chess Structures both provide good overviews of the appropriate pawn breaks, piece placements, and defensive resources. Of the two, I'd say Rios' book is the more rigorous and comprehensive.

It's certainly possible to learn this by examining master games, but it's a lot more time-consuming. If you're going to try this, I'd recommend anthology / memoir books by authors who specialize in the openings you like (Kasparov: KID, Bronstein: KG, etc.). I found Svetozar Gligoric's I Play Against the Pieces useful in this regard because he divides the games into sections *by opening*. Sadly, this last one's become a collector's item in the last 10 years (well, sad for *you*, anyway), so it's pricey at the moment.

I also strongly recommend John Watson's Mastering the Chess Openings series (4 volumes) as a reference. Each volume can be had in used condition for less than $15, so it's not an outrageous purchase, and Watson's approach is to explain *in words* what's going on in the variations, and their pros and cons. You may not use 80% of the material, but whatever relates to your opening will will be a goldmine, and is certainly worth the price.

Some publishers do an exceptional job of trying to convey opening theory with these strategic pointers mixed in. For specific openings, I can recommend Everyman Publishing's two series, Easy Guide to the ... (about 12 volumes, now out of print but available in used condition) and Starting Out: The ... (about 40 volumes available).

# Answer
> 0 votes
Look at and study hundreds and hundreds of Grandmaster games from the 1800s onwards. Also check out the book How To Reassess Your Chess and other related books

# Answer
> 0 votes
The Middlegame Vol. I and II by Max Euwe is terrific. My System by Aron Nimzovitch Chess Fundamentals by Jose Capablanca (good for beginners and up) Think Like A Grandmaster by Alexander Kotov Ideas behind the chess openings Rubin Fine

# Answer
> -5 votes
There are only two overarching plans in chess.

1. The short term one is to play to attack the opponent's king in a mating attack.
2. The long term one is to queen a pawn in an endgame.

Study the master level games that relate to your opening repotoire and learn the typical piece manuevers that support the two plans I mentioned above.

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Tags: opening, middlegame, planning
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title: Chess game viewer plugin for wordpress

text:
# Question
Title: Chess game viewer plugin for wordpress
Do you know of any PGN/game viewer for Wordpress, which can be used to generate diagrams, and chess games?

# Answer
There are a couple. The most popular is likely Embed Chessboard. The nice thing about it is that the tags are simply PGN references:

> \[pgn parameter=value ...\]
> ... chess games in PGN format ...
> \[/pgn\]

So if you're already familiar with PGN, put it into your Wordpress page and the plugin detects it..

Would you share your Wordpress site URL in comments once complete?
> 1 votes

# Answer
I'm the developer of dhtmlchess.com. I have created a plugin for Wordpress which is available at

http://wordpresschess.com/

It supports the \[fen\] and \[pgn\] tags, and also a \[chess\] tag for games stored in a database. It also comes with an online game editor which makes it possible to create, analyse and edit games online.

It also lets you import PGN games and have them stored in a database.
> 1 votes

# Answer
There is a wordpress.org plug-in called RPB chessboard (hat tip to @GloriaVictus in the comments).

Installing the plug in allows PGN and FEN to be added using the `[pgn] ... [/pgn]` and `[fen] ... [/fen]` tags.
> 0 votes

# Answer
See this website here, and also a test.
> -1 votes

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Tags: software
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# Question
Title: Which international tournament game has the record for the longest sequence of forced moves until checkmate?
I want to know which international game has the longest sequence of forced moves until checkmate, even if the opponent resigned the game. The result should not be drawn, i.e. we should consider 50 move rule).

# Answer
> 2 votes
Alekhine - Yates http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1012179

19 moves. Alekhine resigned a couple of moves before mate.

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Tags: checkmate, history, records, famous-games, forced-move
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title: Opening saved game Stockfish

text:
# Question
Title: Opening saved game Stockfish
I have saved PGN file from a file in Stockfish on mac, but when I open it the position of the pieces does not move. Why?

# Answer
> 0 votes
Press on Arrows in order to run the moves:

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Tags: stockfish
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# Question
Title: Using a Linux UCI Engine with a GUI (eg. Fritz 15)
Is there any way a Linux UCI Engine (such as StockFish 8) be used with Fritz 15? Will this involve customizing the source code and rebuilding to implement things like hash size, tablebase locations, and the like, or can those engine settings be set as BASH environment variables?

I have used a program called InBetween.exe before, to act as a conduit between the GUI and the Linux engine. However I have yet to be able to get InBetween.exe to pass UCI environment variable commands to the engine.

If someone can post an answer to these questions, I would be most appreciative.

# Answer
I think you can do it using this tool ChessBridge. There's also netChess, but the website is down, so use the mirror at Archive.org.
> 1 votes

# Answer
Mixing Windows and Linux for this (and this way) might not be the easiest way. Also think about future updates that can break your working solution. You already experienced this with `InBetween.exe`.

If you only use Fritz as database and to analyse your games then you might consider to use SCID on Linux. It has Stockfish in it. Not the most recent version but you can easily install the most recent version.
> 1 votes

# Answer
This actually works fine with inbetween, for setup see: http://rybkaforum.net/cgi-bin/rybkaforum/topic\_show.pl?tid=31412
> 0 votes

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Tags: engines, software, computer-chess, linux
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# Question
Title: What should you do when opponent opens with excessive pawn moves?
As a beginner I'm not spending much time studying openings (there are so many!) but trying to work on opening principles.

One principle I've read is not to move too many pawns in your opening moves.

So, when an opponent opens with a long sequence of pawn moves, I feel like there should be some weakness that I should be exploiting. Instead I ended up feeling extremely cramped. What should you be thinking about if your opponent is only moving pawns?

Example:

```
[White "Me"]
[FEN ""]

1. d4 f5 2. Nf3 e6 3. Bf4 d6 4. e3 h6 5. Bc4 g5 6. Bg3 c6 7. Nc3 a5

```

# Answer
> 20 votes
The thing is, in this example you opponent didn't play all that badly. h6 and g5 looks too risky to me, but blunting your bishop (with d6) and gaining space on the queenside makes some sense. Right now b5 is a threat and you might want to prevent it by playing a4. This would be the positional treatment of the position.

There are two problems with pushing too many pawns in the opening:

The creation of weaknesses: In your example the diagonal h5-e8 is weakened and you should always consider possibilities of bringing a queen to h5.

Neglect of development: But to punish lack of development you have to open the position. This can be done by pawn levers or by piece sacrifices. Or possibly by a combination of both. Now, if you had a pawn on c4 you could play 8.d5 and answer 8…e5 with 9.Nxe5 de 10.Qh5+ and 11.Bxe5. Unfortunately you don't have a pawn on c4 and you only promising pawn lever e4 would lose the Bg3. So you have to go more slowly. Possibly Nd2,f3,e4 is a plan. Maybe after a4.

So, to sum up:

* If you develop your bishops early, your opponent might get some pawn play against them. (In your example, against both!)
* You can stop expansion with your own pawns (a4 or h4) and thereby also protect your pieces from a pawnstorm.
* If your lead in development gets big, search for a way to open the position. Make sure you have a pawn lever (i.e. put enough pawns in the center), consider piece sacrifices.

# Answer
> 15 votes
Yes, you have a cramped position and your game will be difficult if you don't find a solution.

Advanced pawns are generally harder to hold on to. Your opponent has given you many targets and now he'll have to use his minor pieces to protect them. So, task #1 is to attack those pawns. Due to the situation, I am not seeing too many ways to do it right now.

Also, and this is key, look how exposed his King is. As long as your Queen is on the board, he'll never be safe. Be sure to castle to make your king secure.

He's threatening to evict your white-square bishop with `b5`, gobbling up more space and further compressing you. So your next move needs to do something about it. `a4` fights for the `b5` square and is attractive.

Maybe it's me, but I don't care too much for your `Bf4` and `e3` moves. `e3` surrendered space for no reason. And you lost a tempo when you had to retreat with `Bg3`. Your game is fine if you can play `e4` to get more space. However, he has `Nf6` which defends `e4`. if you play `d4` now, you lose your Bishop after Black plays `f4`. Further, you have to watch the pawn fork on `d5` a few moves in the future. I think `e3` is going to haunt you.

EDIT 8/12/2016 This post came back up. I'd already seen that Stockfish didn't rate the initial position as dire as I expected; in fact, Stockfish gave White a small advantage. On a whim, I let Stockfish play the game out at 5 minutes per move. Perhaps it will be instructive.

```
[FEN ""]

1. d4 f5 2. Nf3 e6 3. Bf4 d6 4. e3 h6 5. Bc4 g5 6. Bg3 c6 7. Nc3 a5 {and now Stockfish takes over}  8.Nd2 Nf6 9.Bd3 Be7 10.h4 g4 11.Ne2 Nh5 12.Bh2 {Suddenly White's Bishops and Knights don't look so bad given the cramped position.} a4 13.c3 d5 14.Qc2 O-O {Black's King's house sure looks drafty...} 15.Nf4 Nxf4 16.Bxf4 h5 17.Nf1 Nd7 18.Ng3 {The thing about advanced pawns is that they have to be defended. This is one of the tenets of Hypermodern philosophy. } Nf6 19.a3 b6 20.O-O-O {When Kings castle on opposite sides the result is rarely a draw. } Qe8 21.f3 c5 22.Bh6 c4 23.Be2 Bd6 (23... Rf7 24.e4 {White's response to this natural-seeming move is to merely tear the center open. Surprise!} dxe4 25.fxe4 b5 26.Rdf1 Ra7 27.exf5 exf5 28.Bd1 Qc6 29.Nxf5 Ne4 30.Nxe7+ Raxe7 31.Bg5 Rb7 32.Rhg1 Bf5 33.Rxf5 Rxf5 34.Re1 Ng3 35.Re3 Qd6 36.Rxg3 Rxg5 37.hxg5 Qxg3 38.Qg6+ Kf8 {This looks dangerous for White to my eye, but Black's exposed King will guarantee he gets no peace, ever, as long as the White Queen is on the board. In fact I think Stockfish takes the draw here.}) 24.Bxf8 Kxf8 25.Nf1 Qg6 26.Kb1 gxf3 27.Bxf3 Bd7 28.g3 b5 29.Rg1 Re8 30.Re1 Ke7 31.Bd1 Kd8 32.Re2 Qh7 33.Ka2 Rg8 34.Reg2 Be8 35.Qf2 Ne4 36.Qe1 Kc7 37.Nd2 Kb6 38.Nf3 Qc7 39.Bc2 Be7 40.Rh1 Bf7 41.Bxe4 dxe4 42.Ng1 Qd7 43.Rd2 Rd8 44.Ne2 Bf8 45.Qf2 Bh6 46.Rhd1 Rg8 47.d5 e5 48.Rf1 Bg6 49.d6 Rd8 50.Ng1 Qc6 51.Rfd1 Rd7 52.Nh3 Qc8 53.Ng5 Qe8 54.g4 hxg4 55.Rd5 Kc6 56.h5 g3 57.Qxg3 Bxh5 58.Rxe5 Qxe5 59.Qxe5 Bxd1 60.Ne6 Bxe3 61.Kb1 Rxd6 62.Nd4+ Bxd4 63.cxd4 Bb3 64.Qc5+ Kd7 65.Qxf5+ Ke7 66.Qh7+ Kd8 67.Qxe4 c3 68.Qa8+ Kc7 69.Qa7+ Kd8 70.Qb8+ Ke7 71.Qc7+ Ke6 72.Qc8+ Ke7 73.bxc3 Bc4 74.Kc2 Rd5 75.Kd1 Rh5 76.Kd2 Be6 77.Qc7+ Kf6 78.Qd6 Kf7 79.Kd3 Rh3+ 80.Kc2 Rh5 81.Qc7+ Kf6 82.Qc6 Ke7 83.Kd2 Bc4 84.Qf3 Bf7 85.Ke3 Kf8 86.Qf4 Ke7 87.Qc7+ Ke8 88.Qc6+ Kd8 89.Qd6+ Ke8 90.Ke4 Rh4+ 91.Kf3 Rh5 92.Kg4 Rd5 93.Qf6 Rh5 94.Qc6+ Ke7 95.c4 bxc4 96.Qxa4 Rd5 97.Qa7+ Kf6 98.Qb6+ Be6+ 99.Kf3 c3 100.Ke2 Ke7 101.Kd3 Rd6 102.Qb7+ Kd8 103.Kxc3 Bc8 104.Qb8 Rd7 105.Qb6+ Ke7 106.a4 Rd6 107.Qc5 Bb7 108.a5 Kd7 109.Qf5+ Kc7 110.Qf4 Kc6 111.Qf7 Rd7 112.Qe6+ Rd6 113.Qe7 Ba6 114.Qa7 Kd5 115.Kb4 Rf6 116.Qe7 Re6 117.Qd7+ Rd6 118.Qf5+ Kc6 119.Qe4+ Kd7 120.Kc5 Re6 121.Qf5 Bd3 122.Qxd3 Rc6+ 123.Kb5 Re6 124.a6 Re8 125.a7 Ke7 126.Qe4+ Kf7 127.Qxe8+ Kxe8 128.a8=Q+ Kf7 129.d5 Kg7 130.d6 Kf6 131.d7 Kg5 132.d8=Q+ Kf4 133.Qh4+ Ke3 134.Qae4+ Kd2 135.Qhe1# *

```

# Answer
> 11 votes
Sometimes, the opponent can obtain quite a nice position if you let them push you around with pawns, which is what happened here. h6-g5 is an idea in the Dutch, but usually it happens when the white bishop is on g5 instead of f4, when h6 comes without loss of tempo because the bishop has to retreat immediately. You could have punished Black for this by playing 5. h4, stopping g5, and following up with 6. h5 if anything other than 5... g6. Then if Black later 0-0, your kingside attack will be very fast with ideas like g4-g5. You can also think about disrupting Black's development immediately by 7. Nh4 and 8. Ng6.

# Answer
> 2 votes
The problem with your opponent's multi pawn moves is that he has no piece developed, while you have four. If you next play O-O, that makes five. Then you can bring your Q to e2 on move 9, your a-rook to d1 on move 10, and maybe your castled king rook to e1 on move 11, complete your development, and start the middle game with operations on the king side.

One problem with your opponent's pawn moves is that he has weakened his king side by advancing pawns (without putting pieces behind them). With your advantage in development, you welcome this. Once there are some pawn exchanges that create breaches, your pieces will be able to pour through them, and his won't be in a position to defend.

Another possibility is to play 8.Qe2, followed by castles queenside (O-O-O), then play for a kingside break with h4, which also "develops" your h rook. In fact, 8.Qe2 preserves both castling options.

# Answer
> 1 votes
Again I'm late with my answer, which has already been given by others, for example about the 5.h4 idea to stop 5..., g5. In general too many opening pawns moves waste tempi that could be used for development as well as opening lines for enemy attack into your position, as for example a potential White Qh5 move on the kingside in your example. Also, removing the pawn cover in front of a potential castled King position could be dangerous. In your example castling on either side by your opponent would now be risky for him. As someone else has suggested, even piece sacrifices by you now become something to consider when the time appears propitious to capitalize on your opponent's weaknesses that the excessive pawn moves have created. The following brevity that I played many years ago in which my opponent made only initial pawn moves will illustrate some of these ideas

C.Conero vs. Phil Short, 1959
1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Bc4 h6 4.Nc3 c6 5.d3 a5 6.Be3 b5 7.Bxf7+ Kxf7 8.d4 Be7 9.dxe5 dxe5 10.Nxe5+ Ke6 11.Qg4+! Kxe5 12.Qf4+ Ke6 13.Qf5+ Kd6 14.Bf4#

# Answer
> 0 votes
Spassky gave the advice that against such place you should develop your pieces and strive for central control. Sorry I can't find the quote but he was playing against Petrosian who adopted an opening similar to your opponent.

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Tags: opening, strategy, beginner
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# Question
Title: As a Beginner, is playing a lot of tactics chess (puzzles) a good way to improve?
I am pretty new to chess, and I play lot of chess puzzles: trying to find the best move for a given situation (which will not necessarily end-up with a checkmate).

Is this a good way to learn chess or should I play more normal games?

# Answer
Solving alot of tactic puzzles is a fantastic way to improve for a beginner.

One of the reasons for my improvement was the constant solving of tactics on chess.com's tactics trainer feature, which basically made me shed my beginner skins, since tactics almost always play a decisive role in the games of beginners.

However, you must also play many normal games, preferably in real life instead of online, and against stronger players, as this will provide you with invaluable experience for the improvement of your game.

You must also familiarize yourself with the strategic features of chess, (backward pawns, space advantages) and the endgame in order to improve. Tactics can only get you so far.
> 15 votes

# Answer
> Is \[solving chess puzzles\] a good way to learn chess or should I play more normal games?

This gets the classic answer for an either/or choice that needn't be exclusive: **yes**. In other words, do both, as these are two of the surest ways to improve, and *each* is all but necessary in order to do so. Of course, one's time is limited, and so your question may rightly be: which to focus on more. That should probably be decided by an analysis of your own games, especially losses. For instance, if you can trace most losses to tactical oversights that you wouldn't have recognized were possibilities before they happened, then more tactical training is definitely in order. On the other hand, if you find yourself committing mistakes where you should have known better, but lost focus, say, then more time playing games might be needed. But I want to reiterate the case for finding some time for both.

It's an empirical fact that tactical mistakes (and taking advantage of tactical opportunities that are presented) tend to play a very decisive role in chess, and that fact is amplified at the lower levels (and on up to pretty high levels even); after all, it's hard to come back after hanging your queen. Beginner players in particular will tend to make very egregious, serious-material-losing mistakes quite often, and so simply cutting down on such oversights (and learning to spot when your opponent makes them) can pay enormous dividends in one's skill/results rather quickly. Solving tactical chess puzzles (e.g. at ChessTempo) is the best way to hone one's skill in this area, and can lead to very rapid improvement.

That said, *merely* doing that can only get one so far. Playing actual games from start to finish provides invaluable experience for ... playing actual games from start to finish. You could spend countless hours in a gym shooting thousands of shots from every spot on a basketball court, to the point where you are an excellent shot. That would undoubtedly make you a more skillful basketball player. But it wouldn't prepare you to struggle against stubborn defenders, or to withstand the rigors of running up and down the court for a long period of time, or to sense where you should position yourself on the court in the flow of a game. Similarly, solving tactics puzzles doesn't prepare you for the give-and-take struggle for initiative and advantage in a chess game, or offer practice in turning a hard-earned advantage into an actual victory (or setting up stiff resistance when things haven't gone your way), or maintaining your focus throughout the entire course of a game. To progress in terms of competitive results pretty much demands playing more actual games as well.
> 10 votes

# Answer
Definitely not a bad approach but one thing you should know is the importance of strategic/positonal play cannot be emphasised enough.

Tactics can only get you so far. If you're tactically sound but your positional play is wanting, that will pose trouble.

Against other beginners, sure you will win a couple games but as you move up the ladder, things are bound to get "interesting"
> 1 votes

# Answer
It's a decent way. But there are some problems with it. Sometimes the puzzle's AI moves their piece even though another piece could be moved better. But this way you can practice how in some situations you can win a piece (like winning a Queen) or check-mate the opponent. But to really become good in playing chess, you have to play normal matches as situations you come across in normal matches are not always in puzzles and you need to know how to win / prevent losing.

Good luck and I suggest you keep on training, but not only training this way, but also play normal chess.

I suggest playing normal chess against the same rating, but not AI's. AI's can be a little 'dumb' sometimes. I noticed it a few times on lichess.
> 0 votes

# Answer
On Sep 2, 2013 I wrote a blog post explaining how the improvement shown on the image below came from almost a month of doing tactics daily. So indeed it works at the lower levels, the proof is in the image ;-)
> 0 votes

# Answer
I agree with other comments but I also believe you should have an approach to studying tactics such as recommended by Alexander Kotov in "Think Like a Grandmaster" (I skipped a rating class after studying this book) or in the book "Imagination in Chess" That is, it helps to have an understanding of tactics and a systematic way of studying them.
> 0 votes

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Tags: learning, tactics, training, beginner
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title: What does "master" mean?

text:
# Question
Title: What does "master" mean?
As I read both English and Russian chess literature I run into the term 'master'. It is clear from the context that is below grandmaster but is somehow given much respect. I never know what it actually means because it could be any of the three or even something else: FIDE Master, International Master, National Master (whose meaning depends on the country).

This site has many questions about 'master strength' so it is part of everybody's jargon. But I really don't know what it means.

# Answer
> 2 votes
There are several reasons why someone would use the term 'master', but without a specific reference to work from all I can suggest is that the term is generally synonymous with the phrase 'top player'. The two examples that come to mind are:

* **Historical:** Many of the great early players did not have actual titles (either because the titles had not been invented or because the systems for reliably attaining them had not been introduced). In this case, one might refer to Morphy or Philidor as a 'master', simply because calling them a GM/IM would be inaccurate. Also consider that when the title 'Grand Master' was first conferred, it was not just a title to hand out to players but a real statement that those five players were some of the best ever.
* **Cultural:** As you noted in the question, many foreign (esp. Russian) books up until the 1980s or so use the term. I cannot say exactly why, but the usage is certainly meant to indicate that those people are deserving of respect as top-calibre players. Perhaps part of this is due to the fact that some top theoreticians were not acknowledged as being among the best practical players, and so this allowed them to be given the same level of respect as determined by the author. Hopefully someone more knowledgable in soviet chess culture can fill us in on this one.

This is in contrast to the modern USCF system where a range of various master titles are (by comparison to earlier times and other areas of the world) given out like candy. This is not to say that the achievements are not still somewhat impressive, but they ultimately mean something much less than the term does in those other contexts.

# Answer
> 0 votes
A USCF master has a chess rating of at least 2200. You used to be able to become a Life Master by playing 300 games where the rating you achieved was over 2200. In subsequent years the requirements for Life Master have continually changed. You can achieve a 2200 rating by playing in USCF tournaments. Other countries have different systems.

There are also International Tournaments sponsored by FIDE. One is considered a FIDE master if one's rating is over 2300 for at least 21 games.

# Answer
> -2 votes
Master is usually 2000 ELO, kind of national level player, who knows the game in much depth. Its consider below IM - international maser and Grand Master.

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Tags: titles
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# Question
Title: What type of tournament is needed to get a true chess rating?
I'm at the point I'd like to throw my hat in the ring and see what happens. What is the most basic and affordable tournament I should be looking at that still counts for a rating? Would that be FIDE? USCF? Something else? Do I have to do one of those very expensive multiple day competitions or are there cheaper one day events that still come with official ratings?

# Answer
> 7 votes
A "real" rating is gained by joining the USCF and playing rated tournaments. You can get a rating from any USCF sanctioned tournament. They don't have to be all-weekend tournamants; I've played in several G30 tournaments that had 3 rounds in one evening. In addition, you and an opponent can play a rated match if a USCF tournament director approves it.

You can also get a (non-USCF) rating by playing on one of any number of internet sites.

EDIT - here are some clubs in Orlando. I recommend you join one and mingle. The first one here has USCF tournaments...

ORLANDO FL 32810 FL. CENTRAL FLORIDA CHESS CLUB (USCF ID A6007091). Affiliate Type: Club. Call for information. Call for information, ORLANDO FL 32810. Contact: HARVEY LERMAN. Contact Phone: 407-644-3542. Club Phone: 407-629-6946. Address: C/O HARVEY LERMAN, 921 N THISTLE LANE, MAITLAND, FL, 32751-3736. email: harveylerman@embarqmail.com. Web Site: www.centralflchess.org, Club Membership Not Required, Casual Play, USCF Rated Events, Blitz Events, Club Championships, Private Lessons Offered, Under Age 18 Welcome, Prison chess support. (Crosstables from past rated tourneys for this affiliate)

ORLANDO FL. ORLANDO CHESS & GAMES CENTER (USCF ID A6018039). Affiliate Type: Club. 10AM-10PM MON-SUN. 8853 COMMIDITY CIRCLE, ORLANDO FL 32819, ORLANDO. Contact: ALEX ZELNER. Contact Phone: 407-248-0818. email: alex@orlandochess.com. (Crosstables from past rated tourneys for this affiliate)

from this page.

# Answer
> 3 votes
1) any tournament sanctioned by the uscf is rated. For the first 23 (IIRC) games your rating will be provisional, meaning it's calculated using a different formula than normally. After that point the rating will be calculated as usual.

2) uscf sanctioned tournaments can run for a week or more, or they can be over in a matter of hours. The most prevalent format seems to be 5games in a weekend, but I used to run a one-day seven-round event (and was asked once to make it 10 rounds in a day).

3) aside from the separate events, most clubs run tournaments that have anywhere from 1-4 games in an evening, and continue weekly for several weeks.

I guess the short answer to your question is "it depends."

# Answer
> 0 votes
There is also an International rating body FIDE. In some tournaments, you can get both a USCF and FIDE rating.

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Tags: rating, fide, tournament, uscf
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title: How to flip board in scid?

text:
# Question
Title: How to flip board in scid?
I am using scid version 4.6.2. How can I flip the board such that I get black's point of view?

There should be a flip button somewhere, but I do not see it:

I've enabled all toolbar buttons as well:

# Answer
> 9 votes
So, for future reference, the option is under: `Edit` -\> `Setup Start Board...`, or by pressing `S`.

**Update:** There is another way! Click on the 'menu' icon below the board (three horizontal bars), then on the what I see as a 'crop' icon (on the far right), and then following menu pops up:

# Answer
> 4 votes
There is a simple keyboard shortcut for it: You can just hit the "."-Button, when the board is "active" (you can use the arrow-keys to make or take back a move).

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Tags: software, scid
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# Question
Title: How can someone become the greatest chess player like Magnus Carlsen?
How can someone become the **greatest chess player** like **Magnus Carlsen**?

I have been playing chess since I was 12 years old, but still I am an average chess player.

Does it take genetics to become a Super GM like Magnus Carlsen, Garry Kasparov, or Vishy Anand? Or have they all followed some path towards their greatness?

What steps could I take or attributes should I possess in order to become the number 1 rated player in the world?

# Answer
* Talent: Generally the role of talent in chess is vastly overrated, but for those at the very top anecdotes of impressive memory feats are quite common. (Like Carlsen learning hundred of statistics about norwegian municipalities as a four year old, or Fischer repeating a phone call in islandic verbatim, although he didn't understand a word, etc.)
* Early exposure: The vast majority of the top hundred GMs nowadays learned to play chess before they turned ten. Often even before they turned six. Early exposure is important for chess moves and concepts to become completely ingrained in your brain, just like the grammar and vocabulary of your mothertongue is.
* Hard work: Even those players that are allegedly lazy spend an incredible amount of time on chess. Becoming a strong chess players requires a huge amount of knowledge and abilities. The earlier you start, the harder you work and the more directed this work is, the younger you will still be when you have acquired the knowledge necessary to be a Super-GM.
* Drive: If you have the abilities and the knowledge to play on a 2800 Elo level, it still doesn't mean that you actually play on that level. Additionally you need the energy and will to win, that allows you to put every ounce of your ability into every game you play. Some people claim that motivation is the main reason the playing level generally drops after you hit 40.

So the steps to become a Super-GM are actually quite simple: Start at age 4, train chess every day for 6-8 hours under the direction of an experienced trainer, compete regularly against slightly stronger opposition and be born with an exceptional memory and a killer instinct.
> 12 votes

# Answer
Having great coaches. Peter Heine Neilsen and Kasparov.

He started young and studied a lot. I heard he used a standard Russian approach of learning two openings for Black and White which he would study for one hour a day He would spend two hours on endgames, two hours on tactics and one hour on middlegame strategy. If you take it that seriously for many years, you're bound to get pretty good.
> 1 votes

# Answer
It is not possible to become someone like Magnus/Garry/Fischer/Vishy etc . They are some one like Chess Genius. Now if you know there is a vast difference between the word Talented and to be Genius . All Chess Players whom I have named above and also World Champions like Alekhine/Capa/Botvinnik/Tal had some IQ level which normal Human brain does not have . An Average Human Being has 100-120 IQ which compared to Magnus/Garry have 180 + as their IQ Score . You see it brings a significant difference in learning Chess .

True you can do some hard work, & maintaining Chess Discipline you can steer to become a Player up to some 2400 level or even rise above. With the right Training which is the utmost importance you should be able to go ahead but it is not a guarantee that you would become someone like Magnus . As Garry Kasparov himself said that " Magnus is a Force of Nature " before he became World champion so it is important that you become realistic in this view.

Here is a bitter Truth :

The worst thing is all Chess players who are even 1400-1500 ELo can attain the rating of 2000 + but they could not do even in their lifetime . They fail to find the Errors in their games and they do not have the attitude to improve or they do not know how to improve .( It is said by a Famous GM )

Anyways the Best ways to improve your game .

* 1) Make sure you hit the best Coach.
* 2) Believe in yourself that you can do well .(Attitude Factor )
* 3) Play with High rated Players .(Most important)
* 4) You can choose your Openings and the first 15-20 moves you can by heart.
* 5) Middle Game & End games is always a scope of improvement .You can practice Puzzles and analyse Games of GMs.

There can be some more ways but I believe the above can be a good lesson .
> 1 votes

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Tags: learning, grandmaster
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title: Stalemate or checkmate?

text:
# Question
Title: Stalemate or checkmate?
I have a rook, a queen and my king while my opponent has only 2 pawns and a king left.

The situation is complicated because they cannot move anything, except for a single pawn move. But if they move that pawn their king is checked by my queen. Is this situation stalemate or checkmate?

```
8/8/8/6rk/8/5qPK/7P/8 w - - 0 1

```

# Answer
If the situation is as in the diagram below, it is stalemate. You correctly noticed that white has no legal moves: any potential move would put the white king into check, which is not allowed. Furthermore in the position the white king is not attacked, so it is stalemate (not mate).

```
       8/8/8/6rk/8/5qPK/7P/8 w - - 0 1

```
> 5 votes

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Tags: checkmate, stalemate
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