EPTThe Chess Thread - Page 89
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calgar
United States1277 Posts
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Lebesgue
4542 Posts
If one wants to see higher winning percentage than he/she is free to watch lower ranked events or women events. And if organizers want to see more wins they should mix some lower-ranked players into the fray so that top 10 guys can munch on them. | ||
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pmh
1366 Posts
I have not watched chess since I stopped playing completely ~12 years ago,mostly because I did no longer improve. My best result was a draw against a grandmaster in a 2 hour tournament game,i am still proud of that. Chess is dying,the amount of members of the national chess foundation in my country did more then halve since then. The truth has to be said,computers are to blame. It just is much less interesting now that computers are the strongest players. It has taken away so much from the game. Just like cheats in computer games. There will always be people that play chess,but the glory days of chess are far behind us and avoiding draws wont change that. | ||
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Askelad
France20 Posts
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sharkie
Austria18522 Posts
On December 13 2016 22:16 Askelad wrote: There are two main problems. One is that you need to declare a winner at the end of a tournament/match. It's pretty bad if the first place of a super GMI tournament is actually 3 guys sharing the first place with a score like +1 =7. For a head to head match it's even worse. You have to extend the match, which is an organizational nightmare and you often end up with the match being decided in very short time limit games. Look at every world championship qualification rounds... The other problem is short draws without any fighting. If most games end in a draw, it's only logical to assess whether it's worth spending crazy amounts of energy to try and grind a win. At least in a head to head match, you can hope that burning up energy in a game will force the opponent to burn up an equivalent amount of energy, but in a tournament format, playing all games at your best and fullest till the end means you'll get slaughtered at the end of the tournament by people who kept some fuel. So the smart move is to save energy and go for early draws. I don't know how prevalent it is today, but when I used to play and follow the competitive scene 10 years ago it was a huge problem. Top grandmasters would play out the first twenty moves, which is often pure preparation for them, then decide whether the position is advantageous/imbalanced enough to be worth playing, and if not, will agree on a draw. As for chess dying and why: I don't know if it's true, but if it is, I think it's more that modern life has a much faster pacing and it's so difficult to find 4-6 hours to play a serious chess game. Honestly I don't believe computers have anything to do with it. Chess is dieing but modern boardgames are flourishing. Don't blame it on the faster pacing of modern life. I definitely think chess computers are one big reason for the end of chess. | ||
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Askelad
France20 Posts
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hypercube
Hungary2735 Posts
On December 13 2016 22:16 Askelad wrote: The other problem is short draws without any fighting. If most games end in a draw, it's only logical to assess whether it's worth spending crazy amounts of energy to try and grind a win. At least in a head to head match, you can hope that burning up energy in a game will force the opponent to burn up an equivalent amount of energy, but in a tournament format, playing all games at your best and fullest till the end means you'll get slaughtered at the end of the tournament by people who kept some fuel. So the smart move is to save energy and go for early draws. I don't know how prevalent it is today, but when I used to play and follow the competitive scene 10 years ago it was a huge problem. It's much less common than it used to be. Most tournaments have at least some invites so it is important to show good fighting spirit to get invitations. While the Sofia rules, banning early draw offers, were controversial and aren't used widely, the message was clear: organizers expect fighting chess and will favour players who deliver. Also, Carlsen consistently showed that many quiet positions can be played for a win, even against top players. So offering a draw in a position that is objectively drawn but easier to play for one side turns out to be a concession. | ||
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calgar
United States1277 Posts
On December 13 2016 22:41 sharkie wrote: You made me laugh here - what games are you talking about that are flourishing? Scrabble? Monopoly? Settlers of Catan? By any objective measure chess is more popular - internet sites, internet traffic, name recognition, online players, OTB players, games played, tournaments held, prize money offered, etc.Chess is dieing but modern boardgames are flourishing. Don't blame it on the faster pacing of modern life. I definitely think chess computers are one big reason for the end of chess. | ||
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Yurie
11931 Posts
On December 14 2016 12:59 calgar wrote: You made me laugh here - what games are you talking about that are flourishing? Scrabble? Monopoly? Settlers of Catan? By any objective measure chess is more popular - internet sites, internet traffic, name recognition, online players, OTB players, games played, tournaments held, prize money offered, etc. I think he meant the simple reality when you go into a shop. There are more "social" board games than there has ever been, they sell. Any one of them has low volume and player amounts but taken as a total it would not surprise me if the genre is expanding. | ||
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calgar
United States1277 Posts
On December 14 2016 13:07 Yurie wrote: Maybe you're right that social board games are growing. I would say netflix, CCGs, and caual mobile gaming are as well, and that none of those have anything to do with chess besides being hobbies for entertainment.I think he meant the simple reality when you go into a shop. There are more "social" board games than there has ever been, they sell. Any one of them has low volume and player amounts but taken as a total it would not surprise me if the genre is expanding. | ||
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Warfie
Norway2846 Posts
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Jockmcplop
United Kingdom9727 Posts
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UClV9nqHHcsrm2krkFDPPr-g | ||
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don_kyuhote
3006 Posts
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1860931 | ||
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Jockmcplop
United Kingdom9727 Posts
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calgar
United States1277 Posts
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Jockmcplop
United Kingdom9727 Posts
Start watching at 4:50 Hou Yifan, the one who did the Naniwa at Gibraltar, played an incredible game with a queen sacrifice less than half way through at the same tournament. | ||
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don_kyuhote
3006 Posts
It's amazing how refreshing chess feels when you play something new in the opening. King's Indian and Grunfeld are most fun to play against so far, but Benko and other obscure gambits are giving me trouble at the moment. Although I barely know any theory of any of the main d4 openings and have to resort to winging basically everygame, I've been having a blast. I guess it's kind of like offracing for starcraft. As a guy who played turtle-style Terran in BW, 1.d4 really seems to fit my natural personality. It is my ambitious goal to eventually incorporate both 1.d4 and 1.e4 into my white repertoire. | ||
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calgar
United States1277 Posts
On February 26 2017 05:23 don_kyuhote wrote: I recently switched from dragon to najdorf, four pawns to classical vs. alekhine, and to maroczy vs. accelerated and that's more than enough work for now. d4 is craziness After playing only 1.e4 practically all my life, I've been toying around with 1.d4 these last two weeks in blitz games. It's amazing how refreshing chess feels when you play something new in the opening. King's Indian and Grunfeld are most fun to play against so far, but Benko and other obscure gambits are giving me trouble at the moment. Although I barely know any theory of any of the main d4 openings and have to resort to winging basically everygame, I've been having a blast. I guess it's kind of like offracing for starcraft. As a guy who played turtle-style Terran in BW, 1.d4 really seems to fit my natural personality. It is my ambitious goal to eventually incorporate both 1.d4 and 1.e4 into my white repertoire.  | ||
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don_kyuhote
3006 Posts
On February 27 2017 12:28 calgar wrote: I recently switched from dragon to najdorf, four pawns to classical vs. alekhine, and to maroczy vs. accelerated and that's more than enough work for now. d4 is craziness haha, yeah. To compensate, I decided to narrow down my Black repertoire. I'm not that high rated and I don't get to play against 2000+ players in OTB that often (unfortunately), so I actually have the luxury of trotting out new openings without fear of getting rolled over.  | ||
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infinity21
Canada6683 Posts
Currently rated 1100 bullet, 1300 blitz, and 1400 rapid on chess.com Here is one of the better games I played today. I have very little opening knowledge so I had to waste a bunch of time calculating the first five moves. https://www.chess.com/live/game/1982745870 | ||
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