Playing with Ranks Advantage [FEN "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR/8/8/8 w - - 0 1"]

I was planning to play white against the computer, starting with the positional advantage as shown above. I don't know how to set up the game yet with my chess apps, but I am hoping to win with fewer and fewer moves if I keep playing with the same opening. What first move would you recommend?

My computer likes the cowardly Kd3 putting the king safe, which made me laugh. It's second favourite move was d6 which has more of a point - fight for the center and let the bishop see the f7 pawn directly. Also after d6 then Qd5 would threaten mate on f7.
To my carbon-based eye h6 looks attractive. The cunning point is that the white queen eyes the unprotected black rook on h8. Pawns on e5 and g7 are the only things blocking the queen's gaze. The idea of h6 is to tempt black into playing gxh6.
Here are some sample lines (but check with the computer as the position is very complicated and the silicon monster sees a lot further and a lot clearer than me).
[fen "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR/8/8/8 w - - 0 1"]

1. h6 g6 (1...gxh6 2. d6 {trying to set up the mating threat Nd5, NXc7#} e6 {stopping that plan} 3. Nd5! {anyway!} exd5+ 4. Qxd5 {threatening mate on f7. Stopping it will cost black the queen}) 2. fxg6 hxg6 (2...fxg6 3. e6 {and the rook is lost}) 3. d6 e6 {and white is close to threatening mate with Nf6. Maybe first shift the black knight on g8 with h7.}


Is this position lost for White? 8/8/8/5kp1/p7/P4K2/1P6/8 b - - 0 1

White just played Kf3, thereby gaining the opposition.

If there were no queenside pawns, what is on the kingside would be a "book" draw. That's because the White king can maneuver himself into a stalemate position on his first rank.

But in this position, if the White king can't move, White has to move the b pawn to b3, or to b4 via b3. In either event, Black's a pawn takes it, queens, and wins for Black.

Or does it?

Black wins.

Black has a distant passed pawn and Blacks pawns are more advanced. White is bound to defend against g-pawn, while Black can do anything with a and b pawns. And White cannot win a pawn race, because Black is more advanced.

[Event "Original Position"]
[Site ""]
[Date ""]
[Round ""]
[White ""]
[Black ""]
[Result "0-1"]
[FEN "8/8/8/5kp1/p7/P4K2/1P6/8 b - - 1 2"]
[Setup "1"]

2... g4+ 3. Kg3 { Option 1, defending against g-pawn, fails.}  ( 3. Ke3 { Option
2, counter attack on the other side, which fails also, because Blacks pawns are
more advanced, Black wins the race.}  3... Ke5 4. Kd3 Kf4 5. b4 axb3 6. a4 g3
7. a5 g2 8. a6 g1=Q ) 3... Kg5 4. Kg2 Kf4 5. Kf2 g3+ 6. Kg1 Kf3 7. Kf1 g2+ 8.
Kg1 Kg3 9. b4 axb3

However, if Black wouldn't have a-pawn that advanced, White could catch Black and avoid promotion after dealing with g-pawn.

For example:

[Event "Queenside Pawns Shifted"]
[Site ""]
[Date ""]
[Round ""]
[White ""]
[Black ""]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[FEN "8/8/8/p4kp1/P7/1P3K2/8/8 b - - 1 3"]
[Setup "1"]

3... g4+ 4. Kg3 Kg5 ( 4... Ke5 5. Kxg4 Kd5 6. Kf4 Kc5 7. Ke5 ( 7. b4+ axb4 8.
Ke3 b3 9. Kd2 Kb4 10. Kc1 Kc4 11. Kb2 Kb4 12. a5 Kxa5 13. Kxb3 ) 7... Kb4 8.
Kd4 Kxb3 9. Kd3 Kxa4 10. Kc4 { Black king is trapped. Draw.}  ) 5. b4 ( 5. Kg2
$2 $19 Kf4 6. b4 axb4 7. a5 b3 8. a6 b2 9. a7 b1=Q 10. a8=Q Qc2+ 11. Kg1 Qd1+
12. Kg2 Qe2+ 13. Kg1 Qe1+ 14. Kg2 Qg3+ 15. Kf1 Qf3+ { And black takes
opposition, which is necessary to promote g-pawn.}  16. Qxf3+ Kxf3 17. Kg1 Kg3
18. Kh1 Kf2 19. Kh2 g3+ 20. Kh1 g2+ 21. Kh2 g1=Q+ ) 5... axb4 6. a5 b3 7. a6 b2
8. a7 b1=Q 9. a8=Q { This is a bit complicated, but according to tablebase,
this is draw.}


Database of analysed positions with corresponding scores I am looking for a database with many various chess positions with a corresponding engine score. Something like (position, score):

6r1/3k4/4b1rB/p2p1R2/1pp5/8/PP5Q/7K w - - 1 39   1.25
rn2nrk1/1b2qppp/p3p3/1p2P3/3N4/2NB2Q1/PPP3PP/2KR3R w - - 1 15   0.49
4nr2/r4p1k/4p1p1/p2qP2P/1p6/3B1P2/PPP5/2K3RR w - - 0 25 6.91
2kr2nr/1bq2p1p/ppp1p1p1/2b5/N3P3/4BP2/PPP2QPP/1K1R1B1R b - - 1 13 -10

I am hoping to have a database with significant amount of positions (~1 million), where positions are evaluated with at least 3 seconds of thinking of a strong engine.

The

bigger the number of positions
the longer the thinking time of an engine (or the ply lookahead)
the stronger the engine
the more different score of positions (+0.1, +4.2, + 9.1, -8.7)

the better. I know that I can write a program that gives stockfish tasks to calculate the score of various positions, but it will take a couple of months to calculate scores for 1 million positions.

Here you can find a database with 50,000 games and engine scores after every move. That should translate to 80*50,000 = 4 million positions. Unfortunately the engine evaluations are by stockfish with only one second per position, which isn't very much.

You might also try to parse the Chessok Opening Tree, or to get the commercial version of it. Those evaluations are possibly better.


Ways to share game(s) online In this era of social networking, it is surprising there are no straight forward ways for sharing our games online.

Sharing means a possibility of sending a link to some one, who can just step through the game and the analysis easily or post it to facebook / twitter.

Having an embeddable player to put the game in our blog would be nice. But that's not the main thing I am looking for.

Answering my own question for documenting what I use. I will keep this answer updated as I discover more ways.

lichess This is the simplest and cleanest way I found. Just copy pgn text and paste. It generates a nice little shareable link. Very nice interface to playback the moves. As a bonus, it also provides automatic (stockfish) engine analysis identifying the inaccuracies, mistakes, and blunders for the whole game. (usually within few seconds!)
Chess Pastebin is okay. It is good for games with minimal or no analysis. But the interface is cumbersome for games with a lot of analysis.
Chess Microbase is good for storing many games.
[NOT WORKING NOW] ChessPost is nice and simple. Particularly useful for the purpose the question mentions.
PGN4Web provides a good interface for a broad number of applications.


What Is Controlling The Center? I keep reading about the importance of controlling the center in an opening, however (and forgive me my ignorance), I'm unsure if control means to occupy the center squares or to position pieces such that they are attacking the center squares. If anyone could elucidate the concept of controlling the center, I'd be very grateful!

It means both.  The 'center' is most common defined as d4, d5, e4, and e5.  (The squares immediately around these are also sometimes included.)  Pieces in the center have greater mobility and flexibility than those on the edges.  The knight in the corner versus a knight in the center is the classic example.  A bishop in the center may attack b8 and h8.  The same bishop on g2 is still powerful, but can't immediately control the opponent's king-side.

Putting pawns in the center cramps the opponent and removes his options.  If you control the center squares, you can begin thinking about working pieces into strong-points on the opponent's side of the board.  Pawns on the the 5th rank can protect pieces on the 6th.  These pieces are seriously in the opponent's business.

EDIT

It's hard to keep the queen or a rook in the center (during the middle game) since the opponent's minor pieces will probably be able to drive them away. Also, controlling the center doesn't mean your just plop your pieces and pawns in the center, but that you can keep them there.  Finally, controlling the center is only a means to an end.  Once your pieces are qualitatively better than your opponent's, you must strive for the win.


KID fiancetto variation - reason for c6 after Nd7 I've noticed that when black goes Nd7 in the KID fiancetto variation, then often he follows up with c6. What is the main reason(s) for this? Especially, I'm asking this question as often the d6 pawn afterwards becomes subject for attack by white. First I thought the reason was mainly defensive to hold white knights away from b5 and maybe even d5, but I don't really see this being such a threat. Then I figured the reason for c6 was do go d5 at some point, but rarely does black indeed play this move, so I'm unsure as to why black usually does go c6 and thus creates this target on d6.

[FEN ""]
[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "?"]
[Round "?"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.Nf3 O-O 5.g3 d6 6.Bg2 Nbd7 7.O-O e5 8.e4 c6 ( 8...Re8 9.h3 c6)

First of all, to sit back and wait isn't a good strategy for black, as white has many useful moves to make: h3, Be3, Qc2, Rfe1, Rad1. If white can get these moves in with black doing nothing, white will be clearly better.

So black has to look for counterplay. Most of black's options involve c6 to activate the queen on the d8-a5 diagonal. If you absolutely don't want to move the c-pawn, then one of the few options left is to play exd4 followed by Nc5 and a5. This is playable, but not popular, as white can place an annoying knight on b5, see Giorgiev vs Ilincic, Belgrade 2000.

Black can also try to play exd4 and Nc5 without a5 (instead Bd7, a6, and so on). The game then can get sharp, but current theory says white is comfortable.

In summary: Black plays c6 to get needed counterplay. The other options to get counterplay aren't quite as attractive.


Chess challenge #1: Mate in one This is the first of a series of challenges I'll be posting regularly. In this case it is just a simple mate in one. This is the position:
 [Title "White to mate in one"]
 [FEN "1Bb3BN/R2Pk1pr/1Q5B/4q2R/2bN/4Q1BK/1p/1bq1R1rb w - - 0 1"]

White plays and gives mate. It seems very easy but there are a lot of pieces in the board. I'll be increasing or reducing the level of the challenges based on the answers.

It seems that

   Qa3

is mate in one. It is indeed harder than it looks at first sight, because there are so many pins.


What is the best way to continue the game in this situation and maintain my advantage? White to move. I did a queen sacrifice which took away my advantage and led to a perfectly even game which I blundered. What am I supposed to do that isn't a queen sacrifice? My rooks are stuck and my queen cannot protect the knight unless I go to h5, which chess.com showed also took away my advantage. I have +4.51 so there must be a really good move somewhere, right?

I will expand a bit on the statements above. Just look objectively into the position:

There is no threat to either king. Q+N can be a weapon of mass destruction, but nothing happens here.
Everything is hanging: your Q and N, his Q and R.
Thus the position is very "hot" and you just have to calculate the most urgent things: check, capture, or God save the queen.
1.Nxf8+ and you are an exchange up. After that, you retreat your queen (1...Rxf8 2.Qd4, preferably, or 2.Qd3) and especially hang on to your weak pawns on c4 and e4 until you come to playing Rc1/b3 and Re1/f3. Technically easily won, note that Ba6 does nothing after you consolidated.
1.Nxe7 cxd5 and unlucky recapturing cxd5 hangs your rook, thus 2.Nxd5 Bxc4 3.Rfd1, about += (you are still a pawn up and have the better structure).
1.Qh5 and Black loses the exchange anyway, since he must go out of the fork. 1...Qxe4 2.Nxf8+ Rxf8. Same as variant 1, still won, only Pe4 will write "I hate you" on his tombstone, as you wasted him for nothing. Arguably, call it a sacrifice to quickly invade with your rooks via the e-file, but I'm a materialist.

In blitz I'd play Nxf8+ in a second.


Engame trainer software I am learning chess endgames, and I am looking for a software/website, where I can just practice end games with a computer having limited pieces.

For example, if I want to practice queen mate with a lone king. I should have only my queen and my king along with the opponent lone king, and the computer should play the opponent move.

Is there any software or website which have this functionality?

For Android you have the 7-piece chess endgame training App, with sets of exercises against Lomonosov tablebases and classified by remaining material per side.


Did any other language than English ever use Descriptive notation? Which languages have always used Algebraic? Descriptive notation seems to be limited to certain languages like English, and I found a Wikipedia article that mentions Spanish and French.

I have never seen a Russian book that uses Descriptive, and in fact, I can go back to the 1800's in Russian books, and they all use Algebraic.

In particular, I would like to see a list of languages that used Descriptive before finally adopting Algebraic, but I would also be interested in a list that have always used Algebraic.

Originally there was ONLY descriptive and it was used in ALMOST ALL languages, if not actually in ALL of them.

Each language used the letter from their words for the pieces to use to describe moves.

EG  Spanish would say AxT  for Bishop takes Rook
French and other languages used their words to identify the letter for the pieces.

I never saw Russian magazines using algebraic before it became the standard but they may have been part of the movement to transition away from descriptive. Can't speak to Russian books as I never had any of those.  And  I am positive that if you go back far enough that descriptive was the only method used.

And I never saw algebraic used anywhere until long after the 50s.  Not sure when it became popular but it did take a while to displace descriptive and really needed FIDE to make it happen.

Michael West noted elsewhere a German book for Carlsbad 1923 and said he had no problem playing through the games.


Sicilian Najdorf 6. Bg5 line In the Najdorf can white play 7. Qd2 and plan later 0-0-0 for faster development? It looks very interesting. But we do not find such games with these move orders. Chess experts, please explain with variations and explanations so that it can help many budding players.

[FEN ""]
[StartPly "13"]

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6  5. Nc3 a6 6. Bg5 e6 7. Qd2

This line is not very popular because black can challenge the bishop with 7…h6.
Now white is forced to exchange his bishop against the knight, either by taking right away 8.Bxf6 or after 8.Be3 Ng4. This is something you'd rather avoid, though its not immediately problematic for white.

If you try to avoid this with 8.Bh4 you run into 8…Nxe4. I actually lost a game like this, if I remember correctly, some 10 years ago.

rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1
1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nf6 5. Nc3 a6 6. Bg5 e6
7. Qd2 h6 8. Bh4 Nxe4


Is this endgame a draw? 2 Bishops + 4 Pawns vs Queen + 1 Pawn I had this position playing as Black, with Black to move:

[FEN "8/5pk1/6p1/2pQ1b2/1p1b1P2/5K2/8/8 b - - 0 1"]

I had both bishops + 4 pawns =  6.5 points + 4 points = 10.5 points. The opponent has a queen + 1 pawn = 10 points.

I know how to challenge a queen with 2 rooks but not with 2 bishops supported with pawns. That's why I played to get the draw and I got it by claiming repetition.

My Questions:

Do black or white have a way to force a win, or is it a draw?
Does comparing with points matter here, with the “score” being 10.5 vs 10?

The whole game is here:

[FEN ""]
[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2015.07.06"]
[White "IRINA777"]
[Black "bigother"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[WhiteElo "1396"]
[BlackElo "1427"]
[TimeControl "5|0"]
[Termination "Game drawn by repetition"]

1.e4 d6 2.d4 g6 3.Nf3 Bg7 4.c3 Nf6 5.Bd3 O-O 6.O-O b6 7.Be3 Bb7 8.Qd2 Nbd7 9.Na3 c5 10.d5 Re8
 11.Nc4 Qc7 12.a4 e6 13.e5 dxe5 14.Ncxe5 Nxe5 15.Nxe5 Qxe5 16.dxe6 Qxe6 17.Rae1 Qc6 18.f3 Nd5 19.Bh6 Rxe1 20.Rxe1 Re8
 21.Bb5 Rxe1+ 22.Qxe1 Bxh6 23.Bxc6 Bxc6 24.c4 Be3+ 25.Kh1 Bd4 26.cxd5 Bxd5 27.a5 Bxb2 28.axb6 axb6 29.Qd2 Bd4 30.Qd3 Bc6
 31.h4 b5 32.h5 b4 33.hxg6 hxg6 34.f4 Bd7 35.Kh2 Bf5 36.Qc4 Kg7 37.g3 Kg8 38.Kg2 Kg7 39.Kf3 Kg8 40.g4 Be6
 41.Qa6 Kg7 42.Ke4 Bxg4 43.Qb7 Bh3 44.Qb5 Bf5+ 45.Kf3 Kg8 46.Qe8+ Kg7 47.Qb8 Kh7 48.Qb7 Kg7 49.Qb5 Kg8 50.Qc4 Kg7
 51.Qb3 Kg8 52.Qc4 Kg7 53.Qd5 Kg8 54.Qd8+ Kg7 55.Qd5 Kg8 56.Qa8+ Kg7 57.Qd5 1/2-1/2

Black is winning handily from the diagram position, and has a fairly straightforward strategy going forward: force the b-pawn's advance to b2 with the support of the bishops (starting with 1...Be6 to gain control of the b3 square), and then slowly push for a new queen, making use of the facts that (1) White must always keep guard over b1, and (2) Black has plenty of material to shield from a potential perpetual.

The following is lightly annotated over the first few moves, and from move 5 on is just one line illustrating how Black can make steady progress with nothing to fear from the White queen.

[Event "?"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "?"]
[Black "?"]
[Result "*"]
[FEN "8/5pk1/6p1/2pQ1b2/1p1b1P2/5K2/8/8 b - - 0 1"]

1...Be6
    {Taking control of the b3 square with tempo, preparing to advance the
    b-pawn.}
2.Qb7 b3 3.f5
    {White needs to try this, as otherwise Black can simply follow with
    ...b2, ...Bf5 and queening. Playing this immediately forces Black to
    occupy f5 with the pawn, since ...Bxf5 drops the b3 pawn.}
    ( 3.Ke2 $2 b2 4.Kd2 Bf5 )
3...gxf5
    {Still, Black will be able to get in ...b2 from here, which will tie
    White to guarding against promotion on b1. The only hope for White
    would be a perpetual, but Black has plenty of material with which to
    shelter the king.}
4.Kf4 b2
    {What follows is just one illustrative line showing how Black can keep
    the king safe while pushing toward a new queen.}
5.Qg2+ Kf8 6.Qa8+ Ke7 7.Qb8 c4 8.Qc7+ Bd7 9.Qb7 f6 10.Qb4+ Ke8 11.Qb8+ Kf7
12.Qb7 Be5+ 13.Ke3 f4+ 14.Kd2 Kg6 15.Qg2+ Kh5 16.Qh1+ Kg5 17.Qg2+ Bg4 18.
Qb7 c3+ 19.Ke1 f3 20.Qg7+ Kf4 21.Qh6+ Kg3 22.Qg6 f2+ 23.Kf1 b1=Q+ 24.Qxb1
Bh3+ 25.Ke2 f1=Q+ 26.Qxf1 Bxf1+ 27.Kxf1 c2 *


What is this opening/position called, and what is white’s best move? [FEN "r1bqk2r/pppp1ppp/2n2n2/2b3B1/4P3/8/PPP2PPP/RN1QKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

Do you know the name of this opening/position? Additionally, please tell me what white’s best move is in this position. I ask this because I play aggressively, and I need help with finding my next best move.

It looks like you arrived at this position with the moves

[FEN ""]
[StartPly "10"]

1. e4 e5 2. d4 exd4 3. Qxd4 Nc6 4. Qd1 Nf6 5. Bg5 Bc5

White is already worse here because you're behind in development. There's no reason to have your queen chased around like that; therefore, it sees very little play and the position does not have a name. If you want to play aggressively, play 3. c3 instead (the Danish Gambit), and there are plenty of aggressive options after 2. Nf3 as well. This question lists more options you might be interested in.

Right now, you should concentrate on completing your development, e.g. with 6. Nc3. Playing aggressive moves in this very position will for sure lead to a quick defeat.


Is there a name attributed to this type of checkmate pattern? I was going over an old lichess.com game when I realized that the checkmating pattern seemed familiar.
[FEN "5rk1/p4pp1/1p5p/2p4Q/2P3R1/P4q2/6RP/4r2K w - - 0 1"]

Here it is boiled down, although the White rook could be replaced by any White piece.
[FEN "4k3/8/8/8/8/5q2/6RP/4r2K w - - 0 1"]

I wondered if this mating pattern his a particular name. However, Wikipedia is of no help. Is there a name for this checkmating pattern?

The OP had two different patterns.  One is simple mate with two pieces attacking two files.

The other one is just a pin and a back rank rook mate.


What are minimum number of moves needed to checkmate a king using king and rook? Assuming that both players do the best move, I want to know the minimum number of moves needed in the worst case scenario when checkmating a lone king using king and rook.

Edit: The worst case does not include "stalemate" or "king able to capture rook" positions, as it will be clearly draw in that cases.

According to this site, the worst case for King + Rook vs. King is the following position, requiring 16 moves to mate (White to move):

[FEN "8/8/8/8/8/2k5/1R6/K7 w - - 0 1"]

There are other positions which require 16 moves, e.g. with the White King on a1, Rook on e2, and the Black King on d3.

You can play these endgames with an online database viewer, e.g. Shredder.

The worst case scenario (for White) with Black to move is when Black is stalemated or can capture the rook, when it is a draw. With White to move, all positions are won.


Is there a live streaming of the WCC2018 of the players themselves? I was able to find on YouTube several live streaming videos of GMs commenting the Carlsen-Caruana games. But I wanted to see the actual players and the real board! Is there any streaming of that? I mean, there must be at least one camera on the guys themselves. Thanks!

I'm sure the official website (https://worldchess.com/) has it, which you'll need to pay.

Please note video of the players are copyright owned by World Chess. The games have no copyright but the video of the match is absolutely covered. YouTube users are not in a position to show you anything unless authorized.

It's like finding live World Cup soccer match on YouTube. It didn't happen, and won't happen to chess as well.


How to avoid falling into unfamiliar traps in the opening stage? I will be playing with a player in a few days and his level (1400ish) is slightly lower than mine (1500ish). However, he is very familiar with dubious gambits and opening traps and I can easily lose the game in the first 10 moves if I am not careful. On the other hand, if I can survive the opening stage and enter a quiet and equal position, then I have good chances to win the game.
I am planning to play the London system (if I play white) and have studied some possible gambits (traps) that he may play, including the Englund gambit and Old Benoni Defense. But there are so many traps to avoid and I am not sure if I can study all of them. I have even considered starting the game with the very rare Saragossa Opening if I am planning to enter the London system anyway. Here I am asking general principles when facing unfamiliar gambits/traps.

What should I do if my opponent plays a seemingly unreasonable gambit if I am unfamiliar with this position? Is it generally safer to decline the gambit and solidify one's own position instead?

In general, how to avoid being a victim of opening traps?

What are some opening options that are relatively "safer" that one is less likely to face ambitious gambits?

As a practical matter, if you're playing to win, and you encounter a gambit you haven't seen before, don't take the material. Play defensively. This will be sub-optimal by engine standards, but will usually lead to a position that is easier to play. This is particularly true in your case, where you expect to outplay your lower rated opponent given enough time on the board.
That said, personally, at ~2100 Lichess Rapid, I almost always accept gambits, even if I'm unfamiliar with them, because it gives me good experience trying to stubbornly hang onto the material or punish my opponent's shaky position, And then, when I inevitably lose to some silly line that I never studied, I analyze it after the game, and try to remember the refutation next time. This is how I've treated the King's Gambit, and I'm slowly getting better at refuting it. I don't care much about winning or losing a single game, if I can learn from it and improve.


How to deal with time-control pressure? I find myself frequently running into time trouble. Even though mentally it feels like I didn't use that much time, when I look at my clock it says otherwise. When this happens I start rushing to try and make up for 'lost time' with blunders soon to follow.

I have an idea of where the time is going -- usually it's when I'm analyzing a critical position and I'm calculating the moves out. Many times I can't seem to find a clear plan to carry out because of time pressure.

Are there any techniques or ideas to try out and practice to help with this problem? What do you guys do to tackle this issue?

Edit: To answer Akavall's comment on when it happens. I certainly don't run into time-pressure in every game -- eg. if my opponent made a big blunder and I'm up in material. Usually it happens when the position is about even. I take too long coming up with a plan and the most accurate candidate move. Other times it happens when I'm in an inferior position trying to size up a defense.

The two main things I do to avoid time trouble are:

I write down the remaining time for each player after every move. This both keeps me very aware of the amount of time I have left, and lets me know how much time I have spent thinking so far on the current move, so I can take appropriate action if I've already been thinking for 5 minutes. I also try to have a few checkpoints; for example, if the first time control is at move 40, I try to have at least half my time left at move 20.
This one is harder: in a non-critical position, I am willing to take less time than I'd like and just make a decent move in 2 minutes instead of spending 10 minutes looking for the best possible move. Of course you don't want to do this when the difference between the best move and second-best move is very large, which you don't know in advance, so you have to use your experience and intuition.


Importing and analysing games played on chess.com How to import entire game from chess.com game to stockfish?

I think chess.com has in-built Stockfish engine analysis, so I don't understand why you'd want to do that.

Don't like chess.com? lichess is easy. Just grab PGN of your game, import it into lichess. Select engine analysis.


First play in middle game I have a problem when I have developed all minor pieces and castled. The position looks perfect for me and my opponent. I don't want to move a piece since that would ruin the position and create weaknesses. Most often I end up with an unclear attack that works or not, i.e. I jump out and see what happens. Is this an unknown problem? Am I just lazy in calculating? Is there some good source to help me (drugs, books website, rules of thumb)? What should I look for? Should I think in some special order? Does this stage have a special name?

You're having issues with the transition to the middle game. I'm not sure what your current skill level is, so this advice is going to be a bit scattered.

First World Correspondence Champion CJS Purdy (Art of Chess Annotation vol 1 and/or Search For Chess Perfection) details a thinking process which consists of things to think about when on move and when your opponent is on move. Jeremy Silman (How To Reassess Your Chess) has a modified version of it. There's another approach in Alexander Kotov's Think Like A Grandmaster.

If your problem is more what to think than how, Former World Champion Max Euwe (with Walter Meiden) did a two-volume set (Middlegame) and the Soviet school was fond of a two-volume set from Romanovsky of the same name.

They all say it better than I can, but the tl;dr of it is that once you have completed development you look first for the tactical opportunities your opponent will give you. Everyone you play will give you those opportunities, you just need to be able to recognize them when they happen.

Sometimes there will be nothing specific to do. If that's the case, then proceed with a more general approach.

Try to "read" the position, the way a golfer might read a green; look for strengths and weaknesses in your opponent's position and your own. Your task is to weaken your opponent's strong squares, and use their weak squares to advance your pieces across the the center of the board. As for your own, you eliminate your own weak squares and keep the strong ones strong.

As you might expect, you can't do all four at the same time, so your thinking centers around what weaknesses you can exploit that will gain you more than you lose by exploiting them, and whether your own weaknesses can be easily exploited. (A weakness isn't real unless it can be exploited.) As you locate tasks (undermine this point, occupy this one with a knight, defend this) you'll see that some fit together into a sequence (can't occupy this outpost until I control this other square, need to defend this point so the opponent can't get around me, etc.) and that "sequence" is called a plan and you decide to follow it until/unless something better presents itself.

Kind of vague, I know, but so was the question.


Did any authors ever try to adopt Hans Kmoch's pawn structure terminology? In response to an earlier question, I mentioned the 1959 book Pawn Power in Chess by IM Hans Kmoch. One of the book's most well-known aspects it that it introduced a glut of less-than-useful terminology that is rather more encumbering than enlightening. For instance, Kmoch introduces terms like dispersion, distortion, interspan, leucopenia, melanpenia, pincer lever, quartgrip, telestop and more that never really caught on. (A further sampling can be found here.)

Ultimately, Kmoch just ends up trying to be too exhaustive, giving names even to things that don't really need them, as far as understanding pawn play is concerned. In the long run, needless to say, this quirky jargon didn't really catch on in the chess literature. But I don't know that it didn't have some impact in the short term. So my question:

  Did any chess books appear, perhaps not too long after the publication of Pawn Power in Chess, that did try to adopt some of Kmoch's unusual (and now largely ignored) terminology?

By the way, it seems that the Austrian-born Kmoch isn't entirely responsible for this litany of unnecessary terms. An acknowledgement at the beginning of the book reads:

  We wish to express our gratitude to Dr. Walter Meiden of the Department of Romance Languages of the Ohio State University for his careful reading of the English manuscript and for his numerous suggestions both as to subject matter and to style.

You may also know Meiden from Chess Master vs. Chess Amateur by Euwe and Meiden.

I was asking myself who else tried to use Kmoch's terminology; I never find in my books other authors using most of his terms (only some of them).

I am probably the only guy who thinks that the terminology is useful. We all are used to works like "candidates", "Luft", "Zugzwang", "passed pawns", "pawn chain". We could also say that these terms are not completely necessary, as we could always describe what zugzwang or a passed pawn is. Since we are used to these terms, we are happy to use them. We are able to save time when we can use specific terms (instead of explaining them all the time).

The problem is not Kmoch's neologisms, but the fact that he proposed all these terms in one single work. If these terms would be proposed by several authors during decades and slowly adopted by other chess author, we would today use terms like "sneakers" (an unfree pawn or fake that may become a passer through a sacrificial combination) or "wedge" (two converging chains reaching into enemy territory) without thinking about them as neologisms.

New terms are often used in specialized areas, for example in science, to facilitate communication. If you take a dictionary with biological or medical terms, you will probably perceive them as unnecessary - until you begin to work with biology or medicine.


Plans in the Petroff Defense What are the typical middlegame planes for black/white in the Petroff defense, more specifically in the variations:

Petroff three knights: 1. e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nc3.
Classical Variation: 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 d6 4.Nf3 Nxe4 5. d4 d5.

2.1. Classical Variation with 5. Nc3.
Steinitz Variation: 1. e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.d4.

This is really really wide and there are entire books written on this topic. But a few words of comment from me:

ad 1: First of all, it's not necessarily Petrov's anymore. 3. ... - Nc6 transposes into Four Knight's / Scotch for example (yeah, entire books here as well). 3. ... - Bb4 is a bit more "Petrov's" move. Then something like 4. Ne5 - 0-0 5. Be2 - Re8 6. Nd3 - Bc3 7. dc3 - Ne4 and we have a kind of Ruy Lopez with a tempo more.

ad 2: a) I think there's no point in typing here whole lines of theory. In this variation, IMHO, you need to prepare c4 sooner or later. Otherwise it's unlikely to get advantage. The second line you mentioned 5. Nc3 is about getting ahead in development. The cost of it isn't that high. It's doubled c-pawns which are not an issue as long as there are pieces on board. (Fortunately, black has d-pawn. With e-pawn those structures might be problematic when it comes to endgames. So a tip from this sentence might be "rather don't exchange on e5 letting black capture with d-pawn"). Usually White is able to launch some attack on black's kingside castle.

ad 3: I have never played those lines in my life. Sorry.

Anyway, Petrov's defense is rather logical and quite easy to play. You don't even have to know theory very well to get slightly advantageous position by thinking at the table. As I mentioned before, you should narrow your question a bit. To get a really valuable answer we would have to rewrite whole books here :)


What resources are there for connecting engines to play automatically on remote servers? What resources are there, e.g. tutorials, for connecting engines to play automatically on remote servers such as ICC?  There are certain opening variations that I want to have a strong engine test and refine on a significant basis.  Modifying an engines book is another matter, though material on that would be nice.

But the material I find, either on engines and interfaces themselves, or on automating engines to play on ICC, is either piecemeal, or far from comprehensive.  This link is the best I can do, and as you can see, it in turn refers you to other material.  But I'm concerned about how up to date this is.

WinBoard is the way to go, also check out...

http://www.gnu.org/software/xboard/engine-intf.html

http://www.open-aurec.com/wbforum/

The WinBoard forum is probably the best place to ask this question or the answer can be found there.


Chess engine with an ELO of less than 1800 I am looking for an UCI compatible engine with an ELO of less than 1800. Not a version of Houdini or Stockfish with an ELO of 1800. I want a engine with a real ELO rating of 1800 or less. If you can help me with links, that would be great.

Take a look at numpty. It claims to have a ELO of about 1500-1800. I've played it on FICS before and it usually has a blitz rating of 1900-2100. Note that FICS ratings are usually horribly skewed by all the cheating that happens on there.


What are the winning chances of every pieces? (6men egtb) Is there a site or document which shows what the winning chances are of every "Specific Pieces vs. Specific Pieces" endgame?

e.g. What are the winning chances of Rook & Bishop vs 2 Knights?

I don't know a single source tabulating the winning percentages for all 6-piece endings, but at least some amount of summarizing information can probably be found scattered throughout Nunn's Secrets of ... Endings series of books, which are essentially translations from tablebase to human-usable information. But there is a spreadsheet available from Tamplin's chess endgame site, 3-5 Man Results and Maximals, that contains the percentage winning statistics across all < 6-man endgames. A sample of the data:

Endgame     wtm(=)  btm(=)      wtm(1-0)    btm(1-0)        wtm(0-1)    btm(0-1)

KK          100.00  100.00      0.00        0.00            0.00        0.00
KBK         100.00  100.00      0.00        0.00            0.00        0.00
KNK         100.00  100.00      0.00        0.00            0.00        0.00
KPK         23.49   41.91       76.51       58.09           0.00        0.00
KQK         0.00    10.32       100.00      89.68           0.00        0.00
KRK         0.00    9.97        100.00      90.03           0.00        0.00

...

KRNKP       1.53    17.10       98.45       78.39           0.01        4.51
KRNKQ       41.12   19.71       35.44       2.10            23.43       78.19
KRNKR       63.29   93.60       36.63       3.24            0.07        3.16

...

The first, third and fifth numerical columns give the percentage of white-to-move positions that are, respecitively, draws, white wins or black wins. And the other columns give similar information for the black-to-move positions. I'd think it unlikely that a similar table for 6-man positions doesn't already exist out there in the ether somewhere, but I don't know where such is located.

EDIT: Sure enough, the second edition of Nunn's Secrets of Pawnless Endings (and not the first edition which predated available 6-man tablebases) does go at least partly toward what you're after. There is a summary table (pp. 325-329) that, while not providing the numerical detail of the table above, does include for each 6-man piece combination at least an indication of whether it is generally won or drawn (presumably based on whether a majority of positions are theoretically won or not, as above), along with information about the longest win and longest reciprocal zugzwang for each ending.

To use your example, Nunn notes that KRBKNN is generally a win for White, while the longest win is 223 moves from the following position:

[fen "1K6/5BR1/2n5/2n2k2/8/8/8/8 w - - 0 1"]

Some of the endings also get discussed in the text. For instance, Nunn gives an optimal line from the above position and attempts to give annotations that make the very complex play involved understandable. (Partial spoiler: 1.Kc8! is the only winning move at the start.)


Is the pawns only variant a draw? In the pawns-only variant of chess, each side starts with 8 pawns and a king on the usual squares, no pieces,
with other rules being the same as in regular chess, including promotion.

While general consensus is that chess is a theoretical draw, with best play by both sides, this is not proved because of
its complexity.

The pawns-only variant looks more amenable to computer analysis.

In the pawns-only variant, is it possible for Black to imitate White or otherwise create a blockade?
Is the pawns-only variant a theoretical draw?

I setup the position using this FEN String

4k3/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/4K3 w - - 0 1

Using a grid engine cluster with 24 nodes, each node having 16 cores at 3.2 Ghz with 60gb of ram

The engine used was Houdini 4 pro (allowing multiple cores)

After analyzing for several days ( 4 days 12 hours 2 minutes and 15 seconds to be precise)
the engine scored the position 0.00 flat with the suggested move line

1.d4 d5 2.Kd2 Kd7 3.Kd3 Kd6

Of course this is not nearly a bruteforce method, but i believe it is safe to say this is a draw. Of course @Rauan Sagit is correct. Correct play comes with intimate knowledge of pawn endings and will be even harder to achieve correct play against a skilled opponent


What is the effect of aging on chess ability? Based on documented evidence, at what age would someone normally expect to see his chess results start to decline?

According to this study chess grandmasters peak at age 31.4.

This study confuses the hell out of me, but there is one sensible chart at page 20, that seems to indicate that you can still improve a little bit in your thirties and generally hold your playing level into your mid-forties. After that the decline becomes noticable.

The slight discrepancy between these two studies is easily explained by the fact that the first only looks at grandmasters, whereas the second examines more than 40,000 players. In fact I would assume that the very top players peak even earlier these days.

I found a very good chess.com article about this topic. This guy analysed more than 71,000 players and found a rating peak in the late twenties. Until you are eighty you'll lose 200 Elo points on average, which really isn't all that much.


What is black’s compensation in the main line of the Caro Kann? After move 10 in the main line of Caro Kann, black has already moved its light-squared bishop four times, while white manages to develop quite a bit.

What exactly is blacks compensation for the lack of development?

[fen ""]
[Startply "21"]

1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 dxe4 4. Nxe4 Bf5 5. Ng3 Bg6 6. h4 h6 7. Nf3 Nd7 8. h5 Bh7 9. Bd3 Bxd3 10. Qxd3

At a basic level, what we want from an opening and a defense, is: we want to be fighting for the center squares (1), we're trying to develop our pieces and get good squares for them (2), and thirdly, we want to have a safe king (3). This is as modest a expectation as one can have for a good opening.

Now roughly speaking, there are two types of defenses (say e.g. against 1.e4): First type: we attack the pawn on e4, like the Scandinavian, the French, and the Caro-Kann,..., in other words, any defense where we immediately set out to immediately attack the pawn on e4 is the first type of defense. The second type of defense is to leave the e4 pawn alone and basically, black's saying I'll go and take my fair share of the center, typical example is the Sicilian (1...c5 first dark-square claim).

In diagram you've posted, we see a typical Caro-Kann structure where black's trumps are:

we have successfully managed to exchange one of white's central pawns (e4), which was the primary goal of our defense.
There's definite prospect for challenging white's 2nd central pawn (d4) with a timely c5 or e5 advance in the middlegame. And the d5 square is a nice post for a knight.
In case white aims for c4 to control d5, then d4 being in a semi-open file, becomes a bit of a soft spot which black can target, and the extra expansion on the queenside by white means their queenside castling is less likely or at least less safe.

So it's fair to say expectation (1) is ticked off. Now onto (2):

Black is clearly behind in development: white has 5 developed pieces (pawns and nonpawns), black has 3, moreover, white's ready to castle kingside and 1 tempo away from queenside castling whereas black's kingside castle is at least 3 tempi away.
However, thanks to our successful neutralisation of the e4 pawn, the central struggle has quieted down, and our path to finishing development is rather clear (and resolved for the most part), namely: e6-Nf6-Be7-O-O.
It's not just that we are finishing development, but we are in fact achieving decent piece activity: most importantly, the knight on f6 which plays both a very important defensive role for the king, and provides good central control. The d5 square could in certain cases be a good outpost for either the knight or even sometimes the queen. In case of the former, then f6 square becomes free for our d7 knight to jump to.
The knight on d7 is not poorly placed as it is ideally placed to eye both c5 and e5, the two pawn advances black will be aiming for next in order to challenge white's d4 pawn (dark-square control).
Same holds for the bishop, which more importantly, is not hemmed-in inside our own structure.

These points tick off expectation (2). Now onto (3):

As said, we have no trouble in castling kingside, where the king will be well protected by our minor pieces (knight on f6, bishop e7 and knight on d7 which can go to f8 if need be).
Thanks to white's over-advancement of the h pawn all the way to h5, their prospect of exploiting our hook h6 on the kingside is not so easy anymore. Ideally, to exploit the h6 advance when pushing against the king, is to have the h4-g4 setup. All to say, tempo-wise, white is sufficiently away from amassing a major threat on our kingside.
Last but not least, white has no means of decoying our minor piece defense on the kingside, and the somewhat weakened light squares are less of a concern since the respective bishops have been traded off.

These points all suggest that we have in fact a solid structure and our kingside castling remains safe, so (3) is ticked off as well.

In conclusion, we have seen why the structures that emerge from Caro-Kann (in particular for the posted variation) are solid and more importantly, we see that black's opening has successfully achieved our 3 basic expectations, so we can give ourselves a tap on the back and claim to have played a successful defense.

Extra bonus aspects about the position:

The queen can easily swing over to the queenside b6 or a5 and create threats, in general you want to be inducing additional pawn advances from white on the queenside to make it more difficult for them to castle safely on the queenside. So manoeuvres like Qa5 and Qb6 are much needed!
The d-file is semi-open for black, which gives us a pressure point and rook activity.
The c5 advance (and sometimes e5) should be a part of your middlegame strategy in order to neutralise white's remaining central pawn and dark square control.
The h5 pawn can sometimes be a real weakness, that you can easily target.
A queenside expansion is almost always perfectly valid.
Last but not least, I highly encourage you to study Caro-Kann games for inspiration. For example, look into the games of Vassily Ivanchuk, Jovanka Houska, Yasser Seirawan or Aleksandra Goryachkina, who've produced many instructive Caro-Kann games.


Looking for a comfortable DTC endgame database The only online endgame database supporting DTC (Depth To Conversion) that I know of is jaet.

Unfortunately for me, the positions can only be entered by FEN. It is not possible to drag pieces, as I would prefer. Being able to drag the pieces around would be comfortable for me.

Does anyone know a comfortable online endgame database supporting DTC, i.e. you can drag the pieces around?
Does anyone know where I can download DTC-supporting files ?
(I only have downloaded the Nalimov files, which only support DTM)

After some extensive Googling, it appears to me that the the DTC tablebase named jaet that you linked is the only one that is online currently. As such, there may not exist "click and drag" DTC tablebases out there.

However, if you are still adamant about using a "drag" feature, you're best bet is to use the Lichess board editor to create your position, and then copy paste the FEN into jaet.

I'll demonstrate this easy process using some pictures for the benefit of any who do not understand how to do the above mentioned process. Some people are visual learners, so you never know.

Go the Lichess board editor.

Use the "drag" feature to create your position.

Copy the FEN.

Paste the FEN into the right bar at the jaet site

Click the "Lookup FEN" button that's next to the FEN bar and check the results.


KN vs. KN: can I force my opponent to take my knight? Position with KN vs KN aren't automatically drawn because checkmate is possible, even though it can't be forced; however, KN vs K is automatically drawn because checkmate isn't even possible with the lone king's co-operation.

If my opponent won't agree to a draw, can I force them to take my knight to reach the automatically drawn position, rather than having to wait for the 50-move rule?

This question is based on a comment on a question about KN vs KN.

If you can fork your opponent's king and knight with your knight, then your opponent must either take your knight or allow you to take theirs on the next turn.  Since that gets you down the KN vs K one way or the other, this forces the draw.

However, the answer to the literal question is no: there is no situation in KN vs KN where the only legal move is to take a knight.  Here is a case analysis, assuming White to move.

White is checkmated. Then, by definition, White can't take anything.
White is in check, but not mated.  The check must be from the knight, so White can't take it with their king.  If white's king is not in the corner, they can simply move their king out of check (there are at least five adjacent squares; the black king might block three of those, and the white knight one more, but that still leaves an escape square). If the king is in the corner, the black king covers at most two of the three adjacent squares, and the third one can't be occupied by the white knight because that would be checkmate; so there's still an escape square.
White is not in check.

If the white knight is not in a corner, it can move to at least three squares.  The white king could be on one of these squares, the black knight could be on another, but the black king can't be on any of them (it's White's move, so Black can't be in check). Therefore, white has at least one possible knight move that isn't taking the black knight.
If the white knight is in a corner, there are two squares it can potentially move to. If either of these is empty, White has a non-capturing knight move. If they're both occupied, we're in a position such as the one below.  Wherever the black king is, White has at least one king move that doesn't capture the knight. But note that this position is another one where the white knight can be captured on the following move.

[FEN "8/8/8/8/8/6n1/5K2/7N b - - 0 1"]

So perhaps the more interesting question is whether we can force the transition to KN vs K, rather than specifically forcing the opponent to take our knight. Again, the answer is no: as long as you keep your knight out of the corners and avoid having your king and knight forked, you can force the game to continue for 50 moves. The only way this could go wrong is if your knight starts in the corner and the opponent can force it off the board before you can get it out, as in the following position

[FEN "K7/8/2k6/8/4n3/8/8/7N b - - 0 1"]


HElp! Can i still reach master level? I started playing chess when i was 13,  year 2009. After a year and a half i reached 1850 peek ncfp(philppines) rating, i was 14 turning 15 that time. Due to personal reasons, I stopped playing chess when i was 16. Leaving my ncfp rating 1805. Now im turning 21. I started playing again. I stopped for nearly 5 years without playing. And just got back my interest in the game recently. The question is can i stil be at leastt ba national master or is it too late. I practiced almost everyday again and have a 1860 rating in chess.com. is it still possible for me to get into master level?? Because since i started playing. I dreamed to be a master. Its a broken dream for me that i want to continue. I have a hard time playing because i think that im left out with my batchmates from chess . Some of them are masters already. Thankss!

Yes, with enough study and practice, it's possible to become a master at any age. There's even a book titled "Chess Master at any Age", written by a player who became a master at the age of 50.


How to pronounce Caissa? I imagine that it might be pronounced

1) kye EE suh

2) kah EE suh

3) KAY suh

4) KYE suh.

Which is it? Or perhaps there is no established way and one shouldn't care too much.

Short version:

I think that your best bet is probably option 2: "kah EE suh" (similar to the pronunciation of "naïve"). The phonemes match the spelling correctly (particularly the umlauted ï in "Caïssa" [ref. 1]), and it fits with the tonal stressing of multiple Thracian-related [ref. 2] languages.

Long version:

Historically, both Greek and and Turkish (largely Hittite and Assyrian influences, in Thracian times [ref.s 3 & 4]) would appear to have likely had the strongest early influences.

Satemization of the Thracian language [ref. 5] would indicate the initial “C” to typically be an “s” sound, though it seems that in the case of “Caïssa” it was more likely a “k” sound.

Given the remnants of the Thracian language available to us [ref. 6], there seem to be insufficient data to ensure “correct” pronunciation.  Thracian words seem [to me] to be equally likely to be most closely related to Latin, Greek, and several Balto-Slavic languages.

If Gottfried Schramm's derivation [ref. 7] is correct, then his Bessian-Albanian link would indicate that the “i” is indeed a “long e” (ï) sound [ref. 8].

References:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/%C3%8F
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ca%C3%AFssa
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thracians
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turkey#Prehistory_of_Anatolia_and_Eastern_Thrace
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centum_and_satem_languages
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thracian_language#Remnants_of_the_Thracian_language
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thracian_language#cite_note-3
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albanian_language#Vowels


Bullet rating fluctuations I play on chess.com and I noticed that at some times I am getting beaten by 1700 pretty easily but other times I can beat 1900 with almost no effort. I broke my record and passed 2000 in bullet recently, now I am fighting with 2000 and 2100+ bullet players. Also, I nearly broke 1900 in blitz.Can I say my game has improved? I recently started to do tactics on chess.com, and it might have to do something with it.

But the problem is when I play my brother OTB, I am slightly better, but he is 1300 blitz rated on chess.com. What is going on with my game?

Bullet is completely different from OTB game. In bullet what tells is your experience, your ability to spot hanging pieces and combinations very fast to make natural moves and not to blunder. Also time management and focus is very important.

In an OTB game things like positional knowledge, and long term thinking are very important, and if it takes you a few minutes to notice, that the move you want to make hangs your queen, it's not a tragedy. Also you can get away with holes in your opening knowledge.

Another point: in bullet setting traps can earn you a lot of points, but in a long game traps are a lot of times counter productive.


In Damanovic-Fischer, 1970, wasn't 66. Ke3 better? In Damanovic-Fischer, it seems like the move played, 66.  bxa4+, made it easy for Fischer. Wasn't 66. Ke3 better?

       [Title "Damanovic- Fischer, 1970,"]
       [FEN ""]
       [startply "130"]

       1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 c5 3. Nf3 cxd4 4. Nxd4 Nc6 5. Nc3 g6 6. e4 d6 7. Be2 Nxd4 8. Qxd4 Bg7 9. Be3 O-O 10. Qd2 Be6 11. f3 Rc8 12. Nd5 Nd7 13. O-O Nc5 14. Rac1 a5 15. b3 Bxd5 16. cxd5 Qb6 17. Rc4 Qa7 18. Rc2 Bh6 19. f4 Rc7 20. g3 b6 21. Rfc1 Bg7 22. Bb5 Qa8 23. Qe2 e5 24. dxe6 fxe6 25. Rd1 Rd8 26. Bd4 Bxd4+ 27. Rxd4 e5 28. fxe5 dxe5 29. Rxd8+ Qxd8 30. Bc4+ Kg7 31. Bd5 Nd7 32. Qf2 Rxc2 33. Qxc2 b5 34. Kg2 b4 35. Qc6 Nf6 36. Kf3 Qd7 37. Qxd7+ Nxd7 38. Ke3 Kf6 39. Kd3 Nb6 40. Bc6 Ke7 41. h4 h6 42. Ke3 Nc8 43. Kd3 Nd6 44. Ke3 Kd8 45. Kd3 Kc7 46. Ba4 Kb6 47. Ke3 Kc5 48. Bd7 Kb6 49. Ba4 Kc7 50. Kd3 Kd8 51. Bc6 Ke7 52. Ke3 Ke6 53. Kf3 Kf6 54. g4 g5 55. h5 Ke7 56. Ke3 Kd8 57. Kd3 Kc7 58. Ba4 Kb6 59. Bd7 Kc5 60. Ba4 Nc8 61. Be8 Ne7 62. Ke3 Ng8 63. Bd7 Nf6 64. Bf5 Kb5 65. Kd3 a4 66. bxa4+ 66... Kxa4 67. Kc4 Ka3 68. Kc5 Kxa2 69. Kxb4 Kb2 70. Kc5 Kc3 71. Kd6 Kd4 72. Ke6 Nxe4 73. Kf7 Nf2 74. Kg6 e4 75. Kxh6 e3 76. Kg7 e2 77. h6 e1=Q 78. h7 Qe7+ 79. Kg8 Ne4 0-1

This was played almost at Fischer’s height of strength, so he almost surely would have won anyway after 66.Ke3 also. I think that white thought two things by playing 66.ba. First, that it reduced the number of pawns, which is almost always good when you are in a worse, or losing, endgame. Second, that the bishop might be able to defend a2 along the a2-g8 diagonal.

After 66.Ke3, white will fall into zugzwang due to his bad bishop, or at least, he believed he would. If that happens, the black knight can do some pretty fancy high stepping. This is what I found, but it turns out there actually is a miracle draw, but it is doubtful that any human would have put his B on a4 (to stop Nc4; bc b3 queening).

So, I guess, considering that miracle possibility, the answer is a firm "yes, it would have been better".

[FEN "8/8/5n1p/1k2pBpP/pp2P1P1/1P1K4/P7/8 w - - 0 66"]

1. Ke3 a3 2. Kd3 Kc5 3. Ke3 Ne8 4. Kd3 (4. Bd7 Nd6 5. Ba4) 4... Nd6 5. Bd7 Nc4 6. Be8 Nb2+-+

At the end of the line, the N either gets Nd1-c3-a2 or the Kc5 gets to d4. In either case, winning easily.


Does Deep Blue give handicaps? IBM's "Deep Blue" computer can beat any human being, including a former world champion such as Gary Kasparov. Thus, it follows that Deep Blue must give a handicap to a human player in order for a human to have a chance of winning.

In games like golf, handicaps are relative to "par," that is, the number of strokes a "scratch" golfer would require to play a hole or a field. By definition, most players require a positive handicap relative to "par;" a few can get by with a negative handicap. In "Deep Blue's" case, all the handicaps would be positive.

Has Deep Blue, in fact, given such handicaps to humans (a pawn, piece, or more)? If so, what were the results? Can a handicapping system be constructed around how large a handicap a human player would need to beat "Deep Blue?"

Note that IBM's chess computer was called "Deep Blue", not "Big Blue". It was dismantled a long time ago and current chess engines are significantly stronger than it anyway.

There have been some handicap matches against computer chess engines, although I'm not aware of any very recent ones.

In 2007 Rybka played a match against GM Jaan Ehlvest with pawn odds, winning 5.5-2.5.

In 2008 Rybka played a match against GM Dzindichashvili with pawn and move odds, winning 2.5-1.5.

Also in 2008 Rybka played a match against GM Milov with two regular games (winning 1.5-0.5), two pawn and move odds games (losing 1.5-0.5) and four games with exchange odds (losing 2.5-1.5).

I'm not aware of more recent handicap matches. At this point I think that the handicap required for a GM to have an equal chance against the strongest chess engines would be large enough that the GM would not find such a match appealing.


Open Ruy Lopez for Black Why there are no good videos on Open Ruy Lopez for Black? Is the variation too bad for Black? There are lots of videos from the White side, but I did not find any good videos from the black side; why is it so?

Why are you looking for video?  How about looking for a game? Checkout chessgames.com then search for Open Ruy Lopez ECO code to look for games won by black. It will show you how black piece should play against open Ruy Lopez


Can you castle with a "ghost" rook? I recently saw this mate-in-2 problem

[title "White to mate in 2"]
[fen "8/8/8/2B5/2p5/1kp5/8/R3K3 w - - 0 1"]

This was posed with the hint that the player of the White pieces was a strong player and Black was a novice. The take away was that White was offering rook odds, started the game without a rook on a1 and the rook now on a1 had started on h1.

The key was that White castles queenside with the ghost of the rook given as odds so the king moved from e1 to c1 and the rook on a1 stayed where it was. This forces Black to play c2 allowing White to play Ra3 mate.

This raises two questions:

Is castling with a "ghost" rook like this legal where there has
never been a rook on a1 because it was given as odds at the start of
the game?
Is castling with a "ghost" rook like this legal
where there was a rook on a1 at the start of the game but it was
captured before it could move?

The replayer doesn't like it. It will only allow castling with a real rook.

The second part of the question is more straightforward, so I'll look at that first.

  Is castling with a "ghost" rook like this legal where there was a rook
  on a1 at the start of the game but it was captured before it could
  move?

Article 3.8.2 of the FIDE Laws of Chess describes how castling works:

  3.8.2 by ‘castling’. This is a move of the king and either rook of the same colour along the player’s first rank, counting as a single move
  of the king and executed as follows: the king is transferred from its
  original square two squares towards the rook on its original square,
  then that rook is transferred to the square the king has just crossed.

This explicitly states that castling involves two pieces, the king and the rook, and it describes how the rook moves in this manoeuvre. If you don't have an unmoved rook on the board then you can't castle. Therefore castling with a "ghost" rook is illegal.

With this clear the first part becomes easier to answer.

  Is castling with a "ghost" rook like this legal where there has never
  been a rook on a1 because it was given as odds at the start of the
  game?

It depends on the rules of the competition or individual game, if the game is a one-off. If the rules state that apart from the initial position of the board the FIDE Laws of Chess apply then clearly it is illegal.

In the absence of such a clarification the best guide is probably the chess historian Edward Winter. In his chess notes for March 2009, note 6029 he considers exactly this question:

  6029. Castling with a phantom rook From Mark Thornton (Cambridge, England):

  ‘In rook-odds games could the odds-giver castle with the “phantom
  rook”? For example, if White gave the odds of his queen’s rook, could
  he play Ke1-c1? And, if so, were the castling rules the same as if the
  rook were present?’

According to Winter there is no conclusive ruling one way or the other. He quotes probably the most sensible approach from Howard Staunton on page 35 of Chess Praxis (London, 1860):

  When a player gives the odds of his king’s or queen’s rook, he must
  not castle (or, more properly speaking, leap his king) on the side
  from whence he takes off the rook, unless before commencing the game
  or match he stipulates to have the privilege of so doing.

There are strong feelings on both sides of the argument. Here is more from Winter:

  However, in a review of the book on pages 88-89 of the March 1890 BCM
  Edward Freeborough disagreed. After stating, with respect to level
  games, that castling should be described as a move of the king and
  that the king should therefore be moved first, Freeborough observed:

  ‘It follows logically that the fact of giving the odds of a rook
  ought not to deprive the king of his privilege of taking two steps to
  the right or left as his first move.’

  Page 36 of The British Chess Code (London, 1903) stated:

  ‘In the absence of agreement to a different effect, a player may
  castle (by moving his king as in ordinary castling) on a side from
  which, before the commencement of the game, the player’s rook has been
  removed, provided that this rook’s square is unoccupied and has been
  unoccupied throughout the game, and that the same conditions as to
  squares and as to the king are fulfilled which are required for
  ordinary castling on this side.’

  The above text was quoted on page 275 of the June 1916 Chess Amateur
  when a revised edition of the Code was envisaged. Comments were
  invited, and on page 305 of the July 1916 issue ‘Simplex’ wrote:

  ‘This I think sheer nonsense. If a player gave me a rook and wanted
  to castle on this rook’s side, I should say, “No, you don’t, you can’t
  castle without a castle”. Let’s have no pretence. If a player gives a
  rook, let him give it totally not half. Receivers of odds are not
  strong players, and to see the nominal giver of odds move his king a
  couple of squares would be disconcerting. No; if a player gives odds
  let him give them without pretence.’

  A contrary view was expressed by W.S. Branch on pages 333-334 of the
  August 1916 Chess Amateur:

  ‘Re Chess Laws, page 305 (July), and as to “castling without rook”, I
  would say, first, that you can’t “castle the king” – the full and
  proper term, of which “castles” is an abridgment – without a castle.
  The phrase should be “moving the king as in castling”. I believe that
  the right of the odds-giver to move his king, once in a game, as in
  castling, has always been upheld since “castling” was invented
  (sixteenth century). It existed, as part of the “king’s leap”, long
  before “castling” was invented, and long before the rook was ever
  called a “castle”. The giving of the rook as odds should not deprive
  the king of any of his rights.’

  Branch then gave further historical details regarding the king’s leap.
  By 1916, however, the practice of giving odds was disappearing,
  without any formal resolution of the ‘phantom rook’ question.

Winter revisits this topic in note 6035. "Castling with a phantom rook (C.N. 6029)" with some interesting anecdotes regarding castling with a ghost or phantom rook.


How to weakly solve Tiger Hunt, Atlantis Chess and Peasants' Revolt Tiger Hunt is a chess variant where an entire army without a queen fight against a royal amazon (tiger, queen+knight). I believe it is certainly a win for the army just like Marahaja and Sepoys. I also believe this can easily be solved. Perhaps we can modify stockfish code to do so..
Atlantis Chess is a variant where one can sink an empty space on the edge of the board (which changes as more spaces are sunk) as a legitimate move which is intuitively a draw simply because both sides can sink the board to protect their own king since nothing moves across sunk spaces. Putting the king in absolute safety requires at least 14 steps. I believe it is easily solvable. If we can generate all moves up to depth 40 or 50, I believe it can be solved since most attempts to disrupt the 14 steps involve bad piece trades or sacrifices.
I have also been looking at a variant called Peasants' Revolt Chess for a while. I strongly believe that the original four knights form is a black victory based on results of Stockfish, even as the author of the variant believes it to be biased towards black. A search depth of 80 may be required based on what I have done, also a tablebase of K3N against K+several pawns will be very helpful and can reduce search depths by at least 20.
In addition, I believe the three knights form might also be a black victory based on what Stockfish tells me. But this time search depth may have to be 110 or more.
So how do we weakly solve these chess variants? Any strategy?

Even without a computer one can prove that
"Tiger Hunt" (a.k.a. Maharajah Chess) is a forced win.
Certainly the "tiger" can't hope for more than a draw
if White starts with 1 Na3 and then repeats with say
Nf3-g1-f3-... ad infinitum.  But in fact the "tiger"
can be gradually corralled as BlindKungFuMaster suggests;
for instance:

[Title "Tiger Hunt"]
[fen "4q3/8/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNB1KBNR w - - 0 0"]

1.Na3 null
2.c3 null
3.d3 null
4.Nf3 null
5.g3 null
6.Bg2 null
7.h3 null
8.Rh2 null
9.Nd2 null
10.Ndc4 null
11.Be3 null
12.Bd4 null
13.b3 null
14.Nc2 null
15.Nb4 null
16.Nd5 null
17.Nf4 null
18.Bd5 null
19.Rg2 null
20.f3 null
21.h4 null
22.Kd2 null
23.Kc2 null
24.a3 null
25.a4 null
26.e3 null
27.e4 null
28.Re1 null
29.Re3 null
30.Be5 null
31.Ne6 null
32.Rge2 null
33.d4 null
34.Nd6 null
35.Kd2 null
36.Re1 null
37.Rh1 null
38.g4 null
39.h5 null
40.g5 null
41.f4 null
42.h6 null
43.f5 null
44.g6 null
45.h7 null
46.Ree1 null
47.Ra1 null
48.b4 null
49.a5 null
50.b5 null
51.c4 null
52.a6 null
53.c5 null
54.b6 null
55.a7 Qe7

The tiger is now limited to the squares d7 and e7.  White can now finish
immediately by Zugzwang (56 f6 or 56 c6 respectively) or continue in
the same fashion:

[Title "Tiger suffocates"]
[fen "8/P3q2P/1P1NN1P1/2PBBP2/3PP3/8/3K4/R6R w - - 0 55"]

1.Ra6 null
2.c6 null
3.Rh6 null
4.f6

and the tiger is completely out of squares (NB there are no legal moves from
d7/e7 to a8 or h8), QEF.


In chess.com analysis, why is a rook promotion better than a queen promotion? I was analyzing a game on chess.com and it showed me that, in the below scenario, it is better to promote to a rook instead of promoting to a queen. It also shows that it has a mate in 6 with the queen, but it also a mate in 4.
I am not sure why chess.com thinks it is mate in 6 and why the rook move is better. I am only ~1200 so I could be missing something obvious. Do you have any ideas?
The game can be seen below, or here on chess.com.

[fen "2k3r1/ppp4P/3rp1Q1/8/3P4/4q3/PPP5/1K1R2R1 w - - 0 1"]
1. d4 d5 Bf4 Nc6 Nf3 Bf5 e3 Nf6 Bd3 Bg6 Nc3 e6 Ne5 Be7 h4 Nxe5 Bxe5 Qd7 g4 Bxd3 Qxd3 O-O-O g5 Ne4 Nxe4 dxe4 Qxe4 Bd6 Bxg7 Rhg8 Bf6 Be7 Bxe7 Qxe7 O-O-O Qd6 Qxh7 Qa6 Kb1 Qd6 Qxf7 Rgf8 Qh5 Rxf2 g6 Rff8 g7 Rg8 Rhg1 Rd7 Qh8 Rdd8 Qh7 Qd5 h5 Qf3 h6 Qxe3 Qg6 Rd6 h7 Rgd8 g8=Q Rxg8 hxg8=Q+ Rd8 Qxd8+ Kxd8 Qh7 Qc1+ Rxc1 c5 Rg8#

There's no reason why the rook promotion is better. Don't listen to engines in positions where there's such a big imbalance


Share a board in realtime to teach chess A user of our community with solid experience in the game wants to teach others. There is a video broadcast in our site. I need to attach a shareable chessboard to the broadcast. Where a coach can manipulate with figures and students can see the changes simultaneously.

Is there any online service which allow to share a board in real time (I suppose to show it in a frame)?

Is there any online service which allow to share a board in real time
  (I suppose to show it in a frame)?

Have you tried sharing your desktop in a Skype conference call?

Another alternative might be Google+.


Is there a root tree of openings based on response by Black and vice versa? I'm enjoying my study as a relative noob into chess (1000 rapid in Lichess and on Chess.com in the last month or so) and am getting very interested in openings.
Is there a relative root tree that you can use to approach openings e.g. if x is played, the optimal is to play y? (that obviously assumes you have the knowledge to play them as well). With obvious cut across moves to transpose?
E.g. my thoughts made me think of this clip from Person of Interest https://youtu.be/ttRuzAaAURA & it how it tracks an opening in chess.com e.g. against games on the database and how that adjusts the percentages.
Easiest examples of switching or transposing (I think that is the correct term) I could think of as a noob:
Set out to play the Vienna; black goes 2.Nc6 and then you go 3.f4 and play the  Gambit instead of going 3.Bc4 (not sure if that works out better on an engine but I'm thinking as an example).
Other one I could think of - open with e4 trying to play the Vienna again, get c6 back & then play 2.d4 and switch to a Smith Morra (again not sure if that is better than 2.Nc3).
I just wondered if there was some kind of approach or path for transposing or switching?
Thanks in advance for any advice or suggestions.

I think what you are looking for is something like
https://chesstempo.com/opening-training/
or
https://openings.chessbase.com/
In both cases, you can build opening move trees (either for White or for Black - you train/drill one side per tree) by picking moves for any given position and the site will automatically handle transpositions for you if you reach matching positions (one branch will then point to the other).
If you specifically look for a tree with "optimal y's": Sorry, but that is still up to a lot of debate.


Have there been brilliancy prizes awarded to the losing player? Have there been brilliancy prizes awarded to the losing player? Preferably, it would be at a grandmaster level.

Not exactly a prize, but answers your question in spirit: Immortal Losing Game Wikipedia's summary of the game is:

The Immortal Losing Game is a chess game between the Soviet grandmaster David Bronstein and the Polish International Master Bogdan Śliwa played in 1957 in Gotha. The name is an allusion to the more famous Immortal Game between Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritzky. The game acquired its name because Bronstein, in a completely lost position, set a series of elegant traps in an attempt to swindle a victory from a lost game, although Śliwa deftly avoided the traps and won.


Why does Lichess only tell me my "inaccuracies", "mistakes", and "blunders", and not e.g. my "brilliancies"? A computer analysis of a game in Lichess lists your "inaccuracies", "mistakes", and "blunders".  An example is below:

What I don't understand is why Lichess doesn't point out my good moves.  It seems there is some inherent problem identifying strong moves, which is not present when pointing out poor moves.

Question: Why does Lichess only tell me my "inaccuracies", "mistakes", and "blunders", and not e.g. my "brilliancies"?

It's really hard to tell what a brilliancy is. For example, you might try to say that a brilliancy is a move that's much better than any other move on the board.  Well, if you offer me a queen exchange and I play queen takes queen, you taking back my queen is probably a much better move than any alternative, but it's definitely not a brilliancy. So maybe a brilliancy is a non-obvious move that's much better than any alternative. OK, but what's non-obvious? Maybe you could do something based on the depth you have to go in the search tree to prove that the move is good, but that probably still isn't right because a long sequence of exchanges is usually obvious but, by construction, goes deep into the tree. Or, suppose you trap my queen: by the proof depth metric, that would be a brilliancy if I can insert a long sequence of pointless checks before you take my queen, and a normal move if I can't.

In contrast, bad moves are easy to detect: if a move is suboptimal, you just compare its score against the score of the best move and use a more negative word for bigger differences.

Fundamentally, there's only one best move in any situation. As far as the computer is concerned, you either played it or you didn't.  Bad moves are bad moves, but brilliancies are good moves that most players wouldn't have seen, and that's as much a statement about "most players" as it is about "good moves".


Can someone explain to me how I can develop my tactical ability, and what type of practice I should do? How do I develop tactical ability and what procedures help to develop it?

How can I improve my chess?

Depending of where you are right now, there are a few steps, you may feel free to skip, if you think you've already good at that.

Get a good beginners' book, that explains basic stuff, pins, forks, discover checks and everything. Work on this book for a week, until you grasp the few general concepts most combinations are based on.  Solve all puzzles and answer all questions from that book, those might be "too easy", but it has to be done.
Get some application on your phone, become a member on lichess, maybe some other web sites, that offer chess puzzles for you to solve. Most important are applications, because they are more interactive and have a few crucial features that most web sites don't.
Get solving.
Track your progress.

Things you have to look for in apps/websites that will make your live easier:

Adaptive puzzle level, that tracks your score and does not bore you with simple problems, and at the same time does not start from 2200+ level hardcore stuff.
Various puzzles, including "mate-in-XX", and more broad "find the best move..." type of things. From where I sit, ALL problems have to be of the second kind, where you don't know if you're looking for a mate or just little material, like in the real game.
Preinstalled engine, that allows you to play any puzzle from any move, see what computer response is, learn from it. Sometimes puzzles can be not very obvious and / or have more that one variation you have to think about.
The ability to get a hint, and the ability to continue solving the puzzle once you made a mistake. Apps are a bit better in this aspect, than web sites.

What would I recommend? From the web sites -- lichess, they don't have pre-canned bunch of stale puzzles, they analyse the fresh games and make new puzzles from every blunder or mistake people make -- it's very refreshing, and with their 3+ million game database they'll never run out of puzzles.

iPhone/iPad apps -- don't know, maybe others will chime in.

Android -- I used "Chess Tactic Puzzles" (totally free) and "Chess Tactics Pro" (contains ads) -- these are two different apps from the different authors. Both include built-in engine for the analysis. "lichess" (free) has an app as well.


How long does it take to use opening preparation at top level? A ChessBase report for the ongoing Cairns Cup gives this paragraph:

  The first game to finish was Humpy Koneru versus Ju Wenjun. Out of an English Opening, Humpy quickly found herself out of book with the white pieces. The Indian was on the back foot but managed to keep things under control until a repetition took place starting on move 19. Later on, she explained that it is difficult to face someone who comes from preparing for a world championship match, as their level of preparation is particularly impressive after such an important contest.

The implication is that Ju Wenjun is likely to be very "booked up" for a while after the world championship match, but only for a while, and she'll be easier to face some time in the future.

How long does it take until Ju Wenjun is no longer very "booked up"?
Why doesn't Ju Wenjun stay very booked up for as long as she's playing professionally?

As Brian noted, theory can move on quickly, but that does not remotely mean that everything that was prepared is lost in a short period of time. I think that the biggest issue was just that prepping for the world championship was much more intense, and rigorous, so Ju is going to be that much more prepared, and thus, a much more dangerous opponent than usual for while, but not just because of opening preparation.

On the other hand, I disagree that just because they have outstanding memories, that they do not forget much...virtually all memories do fade, and it can take a long time to use some prep. There is also the enormous volume that they have to memorize compared to a club player. They certainly do not forget the basics, but it is easy to transpose a couple of moves when you are already deep into the opening. I have read about this happening many times, and in the first round of Tata Steel 2020 just last month, it happened to Vladislav Kovalev in the first round versus Alireza Firouzja, and Kovalev went down without a fight (he played 16...c4? when he needed 16...Nd7 17.Ra3, and only then 17...c4). It can happen to the very best: Here is a tweet from Caruana talking about Magnus forgetting his prep. They memorize SO much that it is still human to forget things that they have not looked at for a while.

It can also take years sometimes to be able to use an opening surprise. I remember reading on at least one occasion, it took Kasparov years to use some prep, and I have heard numerous such stories about top players in my 40 years of tournament chess. Here is a link to a story about Kaspy waiting years, and using some prep against Michael Adams. That game can be found here, and 14.Qh4 was the novelty.

I also think that there is another huge factor that Humpy did not touch upon, and that is that when you play a major round robin (relative to your rating), or in this case, a world championship match, it is so intense, and the level of play is so high, that you usually come out much sharper than normal. I played a couple of round robins against all strong masters, and I felt like I was better than ever when I was done each of them.

Of course, professional players at this level continue to work on their openings, maybe daily, but it is doubtful that it is quite as intense as when she was preparing for the match. In essence, she still stays fairly booked up at all times.


Eyestrain - Anyone experiencing eyestrain when playing OTB? As the title says. When playing blitz (3 to 5-minute games), I experience eyestrain after 10 or more games. After that, I start to blunder. I get tired too fast.

In our area, it seems to be only me who has this issue because my opponents can play a whole day without signs of exhaustion. Their plays don't change while my play changes after few blitz games. It is like starting from Elo 1850 then after few games it seems that I am playing like in Elo 1500-1600 while my opponent's strength and any other players' strengths in our area are the same the whole day.

Btw, I work online for at least 10 hours each day Monday to Friday. I play only on weekends. I have computer eyestrain too (a different case, not OTB chess eyestrain). But on weekends I still get eyestrain even when playing OTB only and not using a computer. I get enough sleep on Saturday, so I should not get eyestrain on Sunday when playing OTB, but it still happens.

If anyone here experiences the same issue, I would appreciate your suggestions on how to solve this issue.

Thanks for your ideas.

If you are genuinely getting tired "after 10 or more games" because of eyestrain and not just because you are getting old or you play in a stuffy, crowded room where there isn't enough oxygen then I would suggest you have a problem with the lighting.

In some playing areas I have problems when there is not enough light (maybe I'm in a darker corner of the room) or there is not enough contrast between the colours on the board and / or the colours of the pieces. This can give me eyestrain and make me feel tired but it would happen to me much quicker than after 10 games of blitz. If anything for me it would get a bit better after a while as my eyes and brain adjust a bit to the bad lighting conditions.

Note that some people have a problem the other way with over bright fluorescent lighting so I guess for tournament organizers it can be tricky to get it just right.

If I were you I would try and work out which lighting conditions give you the most problems and either sit somewhere where these problems are minimized and maybe if necessary ask the tournament organizer for help on this.


How do Kramnik and Topalov indicate a resignation when they play together? From What is the correct resignation procedure? it is clear that, although FIDE has no special rules governing on how you resign, it is common to either offer your hand or make some sort of exclamation (i.e. "I resign!"). What is important is that your intention to resign is unambiguous.

Now, the rivalry between Kramnik and Topalov has gone to such an extend that each player refuses to shake the other's hand or engage in any kind of pleasantries. Which raises the question - how do they go about resigning when playing each other without creating confusion about their intention?

If I remember correctly, they either just sign the scoresheet or stop the clock first and then sign the scoresheet to indicate that they resigned. There is no handshake, and they do not speak to each other since the WCC2006 controversy.

Here are two examples:
Candidates Tournament 2014, Rd. 13 (Kramnik-Topalov 1-0),
Norway Chess 2014, Rd. 6 (Topalov-Kramnik 1-0).

Addendum. Not asked in the original post, but one interesting (and related) question is also: How do Kramnik and Topalov agree to a draw? Signing the scoresheet or stopping the clock is not appropriate in this case, since the opponent might want to continue playing.

One obvious way is to repeat the position three times. If there is no threefold repetition on the horizon, the players can offer a draw through the arbiter (like in Sofia rules, used, for example, during the WCC 2010).


Python and Stockfish I am trying to get Stockfish to work in Python 3. Just to get started on my project, I tried to have Stockfish think until a depth of 20. However, the program instantly returns that Stockfish recommends 1.a3 in the starting position. After browsing these forums, I found out that the problem was that there was a missing '\n'. However, after adding it, the program still doesn't work. Can someone tell me what I did wrong?

Code:

Message:

Even though the best answer is to use a pre-existing module instead of reinventing the wheel, just for illustrative purposes here's a version that works using only pure Python Popen(). The key is the use of "isready" and waiting for an answer:

import time
from subprocess import Popen, PIPE

def put(p, msg):
    p.stdin.write(msg+'\n')
    p.stdin.flush()

def get(p, verbose=False):
    put(p, 'isready')
    lines = []
    while True:
        s = p.stdout.readline().strip()
        if s == 'readyok':
            break
        if verbose:
            print(s)
        lines.append(s)
    return lines

def putget(p, msg, verbose=False):
    put(p, msg)
    get(p, verbose)

def go(p, depth=None, t=1.0, dt=0.05, verbose=False):
    depth = 'infinite' if depth is None else 'depth %d' % depth
    put(p, "go %s" % depth)
    t0 = time.time()
    stopped = False
    while True:
        time.sleep(dt)
        lines = get(p, verbose=verbose)
        for line in lines:
            if line.startswith('bestmove'):
                return line
        if not stopped and time.time() - t0 > t:
            put(p, "stop")
            stopped = True

p = Popen("stockfish-8-64", stdout=PIPE, stdin=PIPE, universal_newlines=True)
get(p, verbose=True)
putget(p, 'uci')
putget(p, 'position startpos')
bestmove = go(p, depth=20, t=3.0)
print(bestmove)


French :: exchange variation - but not quite I had the following in a game

  [FEN ""]
1. e4 e6 2. Nf3 d5

expecting White to follow with Nc3 leading to the Two Knight's Variation of the French

Instead, the game continuing with:

  [FEN ""]
1. e4 e6 2. Nf3 d5 3.exd5 exd5 4.d4

transposing, I guess to some form of the exchange variation although the typical  "exchange variation" happens in the French's main line: 1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5. Anyhow, is there a name for this opening and how should Black continue? (e.g. with 4....Bb4+ maybe?). Alternatively, might there be any merit in the adventurous 3...Qxd5 which loses a tempo for Black if followed by 4.Nc3?

The game has transposed to a standard exchange variation, a variation pretty well explained on Wikipedia.
You could try a setup with 4... Bd6, 5... Ne7, with the idea that if white puts his best  bishop on Bd3, you can play Bf5 to change it off. Black is very comfortable.

The move 4... Bb4+ is not to be recommended, since it only helps white, giving them the free move 5.c3.

3...Qxd5 should be avoided since in the Scandinavian positions that arise, it is important to develop the c8 bishop before playing e6.


How to apply handicap given ratings Given a player with an ELO rating of 1200, and another with an ELO rating of 2100, how would you calculate an appropriate handicap?

I know this can vary a lot depending on styles of play. I'm not looking for a globally correct answer. Just a rough rule-of-thumb.

As I said, I'm not asking for an exact science, but a rule of thumb. This question and its answers are discussing an exact method and how it compares to Go, which is not what I'm asking about.

This page presents a table of odds for rough ELO differences, used for games between a human and computer. Since my proposed difference is 900 points, this most closely matches the odds of removing a knight or two pawns.


Resignation methodology Is there a method to determine whether or not a player should continue playing, or resign?

I would currently consider myself a beginner at chess. So when for example I make a bad decision and lose a lot of material early, I will be naturally deflated from the loss and be tempted to resign.

It depends on your level. At the beginner level, most people recommend not resigning and instead playing until there is either checkmate or a stalemate. If you're a beginner playing against other beginners, blunders are so common that even being a queen behind doesn't guarantee losing.

Once you get past the beginner level, an easy way is to ask yourself if you know how you would force a win if you had the other side's pieces. If you do, then you would consider resigning.


How can I identify Zugzwang opportunities? How can I identify Zugzwang opportunities, not only for myself, but for my opponent.  Often times, I run into Zugzwang, whether it is for my benefit or not, by accident.  Is this just a matter of looking at all the possible moves my opponent and I can make or is there more to it?

Zugzwang positions happen naturally as you work to improve your own position by taking good moves away from your opponent.  Eventually, when every move is bad (or useless), your opponent will be in Zugzwang.  You'll probably find these positions more often in closed games.  Tigran Petrosian was a master at balling his opponents up so they'd run out of moves.

Here's a recent thread where IMO Black is in zugzwang:  Why did Black resign this game?


Is Bg5 a mistake or inaccuracy there? [FEN ""]
[STARTPLY "8"]

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 d6 3. d4 Nc6 4. c3 Nf6 5. Bg5 h6 6. Bxf6 gxf6 7. Bb5 a6 8. Ba4 b5 9. Bb3 a5 10. O-O b4 11. a3 bxc3 12. Nxc3 exd4 13. Nxd4 Ne5 14. Re1 h5 15. h3 d5 16. Nxd5 f5 17. f3 Bc5 18. Ba4+ Bd7 19. Bxd7+ Qxd7 20. Nf6+ Kd8 21. Nxd7 Kxd7 22. Qc1 Bxd4+ 23. Kh2 Bf2 24. Rd1+ Ke7 25. Qxc7+ Ke6 26. Rd6# 1-0

I do not clearly understand the suggestion by Lichess computer analysis. What is the problem with the move 5.Bg5 if there is one ? Lichess computer analysis suggests me that 5.Bb5 was better, but my idea behind Bg5 was to defend e4 pawn and if you go for Bb5 you sacrifice the pawn and I do not see what compensation I have for it (I played for white). Thanks in advance.

Both 5.Bb5 and 5.Bg5 are reasonable here. Lichess wasn't running multiple move analysis, but it didn't mean the move 5.Bg5 was bad.

5.Bb5 doesn't lose a pawn as 5...Nxe4 6.dxe5 dxe5 7.Qxd8+ Kxd8 8.Bxc6 bxc6 9.Nxe5 is better for White.


Is it true that GM William Lombardy was homeless in the last year of his life? As title above, is it true that GM William Lombardy was homeless in the last year or so of his life?

He was evicted from his New York apartment more than a year ago for non-payment of rent. The New York Times covered the case in an article March 14 2016.
 This section would suggest that it was willful on Lombardy's part -

  Mr. Lombardy did not appear for his initial June 2014 court date, nor
  several that followed, though on some occasions, his student Mr.
  Siudzinski, a 26-year-old filmmaker from Long Island, went in his
  place. Explanations for his absence included a burn on his hands,
  travel in Kansas to teach a chess student and general ailments
  including double-hip replacement and asthma. Both men have filed
  motions claiming a lack of accommodation for Mr. Lombardy’s
  disabilities.

  In July 2014, a judge ruled in favor of the landlord, in part because
  Mr. Lombardy had not appeared in court. The next month, he did arrive
  to contest the new eviction notice, and Judge Anne Katz directed him
  to seek counsel through Manhattan Legal Services. Rubin Englard became
  his lawyer that December and began to work on a settlement. The
  landlord would have received $13,562.46, the balance of rent since the
  case started, with almost all of the money provided by social service
  programs. As the settlement progressed last spring, Mr. Lombardy
  rejected it and fired Mr. Englard (who did not respond to requests for
  comment).

An obituary from Chessbase says this -

  William Lombardy died Friday, October 13th, at a friend's home where
  he was staying, in Martinez, California (approximately 50 kilometers
  northeast of San Francisco) of a suspected heart attack. Another
  friend, Joseph Shipman, confirmed the news to ChessBase and reported
  visiting with Lombardy at a cafe in the nearby town of Berkeley on
  October 6th:

  Bill was in good spirits and looked good. We went over the key
  Caruana-Carlsen game from the Isle of Man tournament and his
  criticisms of Caruana’s play were on target. Although Lombardy was
  hospitalized for several months earlier this year, in recent months he
  was active and travelling, so news of his death came as a shock.

So, it is not that he spent the last year living on the street as has been suggested in some quarters.


How does white mate in two? [FEN "7Q/p1p1b1B1/6r1/2p3kp/4Bp1q/7P/PPP2PP1/6K1 w - - 0 1"]

(source)

In this problem, it’s White to move and mate in two. What is the solution?

I would not normally answer this, but the real answer was deleted by its author for some reason, and is hidden. I also think that the original -3 for the question was more due to the original poster not being a native English speaker so I edited that too.

This is from the game Diaz Carias-Cordovil, 1966 Olympiad. Black resigned after 30.Bh6+, which is the first move of the solution. After Black’s forced Rxh6, White will play Qe5#.

 [Event "Olympiad-17 Final C"]
 [Site "Havana"]
 [Date "1966.11.13"]
 [Round "9"]
 [White "Diaz Carias, Salvador"]
 [Black "Cordovil, Joao Maria"]
 [Result "1-0"]
 [ECO "C50"]
 [StartPly "58"]
 [EventDate "1966.11.04"]
 [EventType "team-tourn"]
 [EventRounds "13"]
 [EventCountry "CUB"]
 [SourceTitle "MCD"]
 [WhiteTeam "Venezuela"]
 [BlackTeam "Portugal"]
 [WhiteTeamCountry "VEN"]
 [BlackTeamCountry "POR"]
 [FEN ""]

 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Be7 4. d4 d6 5. h3 exd4 6. Nxd4 Nf6 7. Nc3 O-O 8. O-O Nxe4 9. Nxc6 bxc6 10. Nxe4 d5 11. Bd3 dxe4 12. Bxe4 Rb8 13. Qf3 c5 14. Rd1 Bd6 15. Bd2 Qh4 16. Bc3 f5 17. Bd5+ Kh8 18. Re1 f4 19. Re2 h5 20. Rae1 Bg4 21. Re6 Bxe6 22. Rxe6 Rf6 23. Qe4 Rbf8 24. Rxf6 Rxf6 25. Qe8+ Kh7 26. Qg8+ Kh6 27. Be4 Rg6 28. Qh8+ Kg5 29. Bxg7 Be7 30. Bh6+ (30. Bh6+ Rxh6 31. Qe5#) 1-0


Simple Openings for Beginners? I'm a beginner and I don't know any openings - what are the best openings for beginners?

I'm going to ignore the "simple" openings and recommend to you good openings for beginners.

It is pretty common for chess instructors to recommend 1 e4 openings to beginners because they tend to be more dynamic and therefore helps beginners improve in their tactical ability.

My following recommendations are in the spirit of fostering tactical and attacking ability.

Against 1e4 e5, I recommend the Italian Game because you will often get the Fried Liver Attack
which will help your tactical ability as well as win you many games.
Against 1e4 c5, you could play the open sicilian though it has a lot of theory if you choose to stick to it. I recommend the Smith Morra Gambit which may not be completely sound, but it will give you great attacking chances.

As Black, you will face 1e4 or 1d4 most often.

e5 has a lot of theory and white can play many things, so I would recommend either the caro kann or french defense.
Against d4, the King's Indian Defense or the Benoni. Those two openings are pretty much the only way for black ensure a dynamic and tactical game against d4. You could try the Dutch defense, but I find it less tactical and difficult for beginners to play with.


Do grandmasters think on every move? While watching Hikaru's Streams/YouTube (GM Chess Twitch Streamer), he's no doubt extremely impressive when it comes to recognizing patterns that win him material and forced mates in like 7+ moves. Things like this require extensive knowledge of certain key positions and a great load of pattern recognition to go on top of that. During or after the sequence, he goes over the sequence fairly briefly to explain his thought process to his viewers, and it's the type of stuff you watch and are really just amazed by. These are usually the flashy calculations that are showcased on highlight channels and things like that.
My concern is for the opposite type of moves, being the less subtle ones. Often, Hikaru will give no thought to a move and say something like "let's just go here" and it often turns out to be the best move there is (Once played a bullet game with 96 percent accuracy). On the surface, these moves don't look like they have any thought to them. Obviously, it doesn't straight up blunder anything, but it doesn't really give him an advantage either. This begs the question: when Hikaru plays these types of moves, does he innately know it's the best move based on his intuition, or is there some kind of hidden calculation/judgment that leads him to make the move? What reason goes into him playing that move?
This also leads to the more general question: do grandmasters have to have a reason for every move they play, or are some moves just "okay" and meant to pass the move to the opponent? Obviously, the opening is an exception to this but even so, there are underlying ideas of center control, development, etc. This might be wrong in some way, so if anyone could elaborate on this that would be great.

I will try to answer this in a different manner, the way I understand this topic.
Do we think on every signal, turn, fork when we drive?
Do we think every time we eat food or walk on the street?
The answer is yes, we do, but that thought process has moved to our reflexes to the extent that our brain does not let us know that it is doing a task (Thankfully!) unless there is a critical alert in our brain that puts us to think about the situation.
Just as a fact, the human brain takes 35000 decisions per day and not every decision we are aware, but is still taken.
Just like this, the Grandmasters have reached a state where the rudimentary positions are into their reflexes and they effortlessly play their game, to the extent that they invent positions and theories on the board itself. Reaching that state is "mastery"


Why Is Black forced to give up the queen in this puzzle? [FEN "1r4k1/3q3p/p2P2r1/4pNNQ/5p1P/P7/6PK/8 w - - 0 1"]

I got this position as a puzzle with White to play. The correct move was 1. Ne7, followed by 1... Qxe7 and 2. dxe7. To me, it seems more logical for Black to simply move the king, e.g 2... Kf8, and then capture the knight with 3...hxg6 after White plays 3. Nxg6.
How come Qxe7 is forced here after White plays Ne7?

If black plays 1... Kf8 he will get mated. Here is one possible line given by the engine:
[FEN "1r4k1/3q3p/p2P2r1/4pNNQ/5p1P/P7/6PK/8 w - - 0 1"]

1. Ne7+ Kf8 2. Nxh7+ Ke8 3. Nf6+ Kf8 4. Nxd7+ Ke8 5. Nxe5 f3 6. Qxg6+ Kf8 7. Qg8#

You can answer questions like that by using an engine, for example here (click on the button "Toggle local evaluation" in the top right). There you can also check all other variants, which you can't figure out on your own.


Around 00-01 Fide had a great online arena. What happened to that? I remember this from the days entering high school ;) Fide.com has this very well made online game room, much like yahoo's in terms of functionality, but much cleaner and with some funky rating system (started at 0 and 20-30 was strong!).

I also remember that the best players there, or those who won some online tournament there, would play on the actual Fide finals -- back in the days when it was knock-out 128 or something like that.

I am just wondering when this got cancelled and the website got crapped into what it's now.

Here is what it looked like then. Just wondering if there is an easy way to get to a top tournament today.

Actually FIDE publish a new chess platform named FIDE Online Area (http://arena.myfide.net/) . Furthermore there are several tournaments to encourage chess players to use this arena such as ;

The 1st FIDE World Online Amateur Blitz Championship 2015
The 1st FIDE World Online Junior Blitz Championship 2015
The 1st FIDE World Online Women Blitz Championship 2015.

Instead, ICC(Internet Chess Club) is the most visited online chess area among professional chess players. (http://www.chessclub.com/)


Blind and Visually Impaired Chess Players Answering this question, I was wondering how visually impaired or blind a player should be to participate at the IBCA Chess Olympiad for Blind and Visually Impaired Chess Players.

Searching the web, I haven't found anything directly answering your question. However, the rules supplements for blind chess apply to games between a sighted player and one who is legally blind. Thus it seems a safe inference that one would need to be legally blind to participate in IBCA events.