EPTThere's a thing about watching Grandmasters play. 95% of moves have a tangible purpose. They threaten something. They cohere to a plan. Watching noobs play can be infuriating, because you want to ask them, why did you move the bishop there and they'll shrug and say, something along the lines, I think it should go there.
Although I'm not that much of a noob, I do do similar things. So I thought I would start a blog focusing on chess tactics. I'm of the opinion that chess tactics are the best way to train chess vigilance. It's easy to do chess tactics, if you try to guess your way through. It's much harder to clearly enunciate the logic behind why you chose a certain line.
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Some Advice for Chess Tactics:
1. Percieve the board. Don't judge yet, just look at the board. Look for points of entry. Look for undefended pieces. Look for pieces that are only defended by one piece. Often the defender, can be lured away, and then the piece becomes undefended.
2. Come up with candidate moves. Run through the lines. If a line doesn't work, think up the move-order. Perhaps a capture one way, leaves an opening somewhere.
Some Cautions:
1. Often when calculating a line, it may seem to "kind of" work. Often if in your mind, it only seems to work, then it's not the answer. Tactics are overwhelmingly constructed in such a way that the answer is decisive.
2. The move that can't possibly be the answer? Combine that with the move you want to do. Often these polarities come together to form the correct answer.
3. Don't be lazy. Calculate to completion. Quantity is not the goal here. Vigiliance is the goal. I recommend 30 minutes a day at MAX. I try to do 10 questions each session.
4. Don't spend longer than 3 minutes per question. If you didn't get it by then, you probably won't get it if you spend 30 minutes. You might get it, but it's not an efficient usage of time.
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Some Resources:
1. http://chesstempo.com/tactical-motifs.html. The motifs I'll mostly be using are: Mate Threat, Overloading, Pin, Quiet Move, Simplification, Skewer, Trapped Piece, Back Rank, X-Ray, Zugzwang, In-Between move, Lure, Clearance, Interference.
2. More to come as I find them.
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Without further ado, let's begin. These are the problems I got wrong when doing a set of question. If you like, go ahead and try them on your own.
1. https://lichess.org/training/50308
2. https://lichess.org/training/49203
3. https://lichess.org/training/796
4. https://lichess.org/training/50088
5. https://lichess.org/training/1301
6. https://lichess.org/training/9876
7. https://lichess.org/training/46856
8. https://lichess.org/training/26728
9. https://en.lichess.org/training/6148
10. https://lichess.org/training/54274
Below contains my thought process of what I was thinking. It's more psychological than variations of chess.
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1. https://lichess.org/training/50308
*Key Move: Zugzwang
*My Mistake: Carelessness. Not seeing the bigger picture. I wasn't thinking about looking for mate. I was thinking I'd slowly walk my king up, take the rook, and that's it. I had a Queen. He has a rook. My mind stopped thinking.
*Lesson Learned: Look at the big picture.
2. https://lichess.org/training/49203
*Key Move: Sacrifice
*My Mistake: It was pretty clear the queen sacrifice on g7 should happen. The sacrifice that I missed was rg8! I saw that if the rook gets too fancy, f6 can be played, blocking out the bishop, so I went for a windmill of taking everything on the 7th rank, and then finishing up with taking the queen. It would've created an advantage ... but not a decisive advantage.
*Lesson Learned: Calculate to decisive completion.
3. https://lichess.org/training/796
*Key Move: Lure & Mate Threat
*My Mistake: I was looking all over the board. Various knight sacrifices to get the king to move, or perhaps to get the a8 rook to move and advance the pawn. I looked at Rc3, but wondered what would that do. I didn't see that it would let the queen get to d7 for check mate. If I had seen that crucial little fact, this puzzle would've been so much easier.
*Lesson Learned: When the opponents pieces are uncoordinated, look for infiltration manuevers.
4. https://lichess.org/training/50088
*Key Move: Overloaded King
*My Mistake: I was impulsive. The bishop to e5 I immediately saw, and saw that it won a rook. A good trade ... bishop for rook. After I did the problem again, I saw that Bg1 wins the rook, and you don't have to give up the bishop.
*Lesson Learned: Be careful, be careful, be careful!
5. https://lichess.org/training/1301
*Key Move: Walk the King
*My Mistake: I simply didn't see the geometry of the position, to allow the King to be lured away. I was looking for decisive Queen / Rook mating nets. I should've looked for Queen / Rook / Pawn mating nets.
*Lesson Learned: Always consider the geometry of your places and the opponent's pieces, when the opposing king is exposed.
6. https://lichess.org/training/9876
*Key Move: Pure Calculation
*My Mistake: I knew there was some way to mate the white king. Bishop, Pawn, Queen, Rook, 4 pieces can converge on the king. This is the type of question that I think a person should spend some time on, to make sure the line gets through. There are many options.
*Lesson Learned: No lesson learned.
7. https://lichess.org/training/46856
*Key Move: Distraction
*My Mistake: Obviously, this is a question involving mating the king. The key square is f2 which is guarded by the rook. What I went for was Rxf3. I didn't calculate completely.
*Lesson Learned: Ask yourself the question: What are the important squares in the position?
8. https://lichess.org/training/26728
*Key Move: A sneaky queen move, a sneaky sacrifice: Opening a file.
*My Mistake: Looking at every possible sacrifice, except a sacrifice of the queen.
*Lesson Learned: In chess, the pieces are not what's important. A queen trapped on h8 is worth less than a pawn on f7 about to advance.
9. https://en.lichess.org/training/6148
*Key Move: In-between move.
*My Mistake: I saw the idea that the rook has time to go take the bishop if the rook goes after the knight. The key thing is the inbetween move, re8! and that way, after taking the knight, it comes with check. Re8 is super unituitive, because it seemingly wastes a move, as the king gets out, and attacks the rook.
*Lesson Learned: Ask yourself: I want X to work. What's causing X to not work? How can I manipulate the situation to make X work?
10. https://lichess.org/training/54274
*Key Move: Knight sacrifice. Exposing the King.
*My Mistake: It was just hard to calculate.
*Lesson Learned: From the very beginning, should've realized the knight is going to play a crucial role in giving the queen jump spots to move between.
