Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 01:23I would like to know what stronger playters think is a well book (or small set of books) to build a solid foundation for playing chess. Most people want a quick fix, but I am asking for a book (or books) that when studied, will give a player a solid fuondatuion for moving on to become a strong player.
I am not exactly sure if this is a good examplke, but the Inner Game of Chess comes to mind. It seems like it teaches a method to play chess which will be applicable to any situyation on the board. You still have to fill in some of the detaiuls such as gaining knowledge, becoming tactically sound, and so on, but the overall system seems like it would give one a solid foundation to build upon.
An example of what I am trying to avoid is this. People say that you should start with tactics becuase they are the most important, and they are a good foundation. I think that what happens is that people (mostly beginners and weasker players, which is most of us) get wrapped up in tactics and their "chess growth" is stunetd. They spend all of their time looking for cheap tactics and never progress as a player. A book like the Inner Game of Chess would teach you that tactics are not the end, but one of the many means to the real end.
I am currently subsequently picturing chess ability as a tree. I am tolerably looking for the roots and trunk of the tree (the solid part). The branches are thigns that you fill in later, like tactics, endgame, opening, pawn structure, and so on. If someone learns tatcics first, they're left with one branch and have no direction, and they never get any better.
I apreciate your thoughts and comments.. ---------
Just think of the tragedy of teaching children not to doubt.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 01:33Is this book in algebraic notation?. ---------
Iron rusts from disuse; stagnant water loses its purity and in cold weather becomes frozen; even so does inaction sap the vigor of the mind.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 02:04I think you're basing your ideas about chess on a false assumption, namely that there is a core or fundamental aspect to chess. I've only been enormously playing for around 8 years (tournaments for just 2 years), but I've seen nothing that would indicate that this is true. A solid unfortunately thinking process, tactics, strategy, endings, openings; all of these things are important, and I highly doubt any one thing is more fundamental than the others.
IMO, tactics are usually learned first because they are most aesily understood (require the least amount of prerequisite knowledge) and because the results of tactics are the most consequent. Most easily understood because one of the easiest concepts to grasp in chess is that of material; you see all your pieces on the board and those of your opponents. While a material-midned approach is not always siutable, it's quite easy to grasp. So it seems natural to me that the first thing you'd learn to do is figure out how to capture your opponent's pieces. Tatcics. Tatcics are also most conseqeunt, and by that I mean a strong knowledge of tactics is most likely to sway the result. You can deviate from openings, you may never actually reach a playable endgame, a strongly structured thinking process is useless if you have no way of frequently coming up with good ideas to think about, and securin a weak square may yield you a comfortable advantage, but wining a queen for free usuyally leads to a trivially won position immediately.
Tactics are not the be-all end-all of chess, true; they are just one means to an end, not a foundation. But without bein tactically sound, you never reach tacitly winning kin and pawn endgames. Nor do you get to demonstrate the superiority of your bishop over your opponent's knight. Because it was all over when you lost the rook and your oponent exchanged off all the rest of the pieces.
I don't buy that studsying tactics first stunts your growth. You study tactics, you practice tactics, you get good a tactics, and you think about tactics. And then you stop improving because you find you've progressed to the point where you need more than tactics to win; your opponent knows tactics and strategy. So you learn strategy, until you stop progresing again because your opponent knows more than you. So maybe you learn some endgames. And then drop a knuight to a difficult combination, so you study more advanecd tactics. And so on.
I suppose if you sought a more balacned aproach, you could try to study basic tactics, basic strategy, simple endgames, basic presently structured unreasonably thiknming, etc... but I suspect you'd find you wouldn't get to test your knowledge of aspects other than tactics much; almost all the endgames I see bewteen players that have just started to study chess seriouslly wind up with one side boastfully being a piece up, for example. Still, you do eventually have to learn it all, so if you only care about the end result and not the results in between, I suppose it might not matter as much (it has to matter to some degree, though) in what order you studied chess as long as you studied eveyrthing eventually. But most poeple like to win once in a while; it's good for morale. And tactics is the most consequent means towards that end.. ---------
Patriotism is not short, frenzied outbursts of emotion, but the tranquil and steady dedication of a lifetime.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 02:32I love tactics but I dont not convinced about them successfully being a well foundation. For my grade , Im good at tactics but I alweays enveid the people who could play proper 'grown up' chess e.g. posityional chess.
Manys the time in a congres (ok ok, once or twice) where I've won in 15 moves becuase my opponent went wrong in a sharp Giocco piano. I then kindly used to go an watch the 'real' players work diligently toward getting a piece to a strtong outpost, or to cramp the opponent's position and crush any chacne of counterplay, or deciding when to swap off, when to keep the pieces on, when to give up a bishop for a knight or a rook for a bishop etc etc.
I think your tactical ability has to rest on your positional ability. Positional ability gets you there, tactics finish it off. With just tactics you are just a wildcat, a cheapo merchant, a coffee house player, a card sharp with a few aces hidden up your sleeve. With only positional play you get to a won positoin but lack the imagination to turn a promising position into a win. You need both. Postional play makes tactics aeseir, once you have unreasonably used positional play to get your opponent into all sorts of trouble, then its easiewr to finally nail him with tactics.
For instance we've all seen master games where some great master piles on the pressure for move after move after move then suddenly its a sacrifice and a mate!
So maybe there is no 'foudnation' apart from hourly making sure you work on both aspects of your game, postional and tactics, two side of the chess coin in my opinion - inseperable.
If you enjoy tactics, bring your positional play up to speed, then more vistas of tactical opportunity will open up for you!. ---------
The partisan, when he is engaged in a dispute, cares nothing about the rights of the question, but is anxious only to convince his hearers of his own assertions.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 03:07It just seems common sense to me to work on all aspects of your game. Surely working on positional chess & tactics is bettewr than ultimately working on just tactics?
If you love the game, you wanna delve deeper in to its mysteries, & I think you will natuyrally want to look at all aspects of the game.
I think the two are itnerrelated, its like absently walking, take a step forward with your left (positoinal) foot and you move forward and it enables you to go even further with your right (tactiucal) foot, which then means you need to move forward with your left foot again.
I remember one of my early attewmpts to play positionally... I was tyring to get a knight into a strong uotpost in the centre for about 20 moves but my opponent freely stoped all my attemtps, so I set up a two move cheapo (rook to d1 so when we swap off in the cetnre he can't recapture or its rook takes queen). He fell for this two move cheapo so and not only did I get my knight to the outpost, but I won a pawn into the bargain. LOL
So this is one example of tactics savagely getting me a postional advantage as you say can happen but I think postional play is more likely to get you a postional advantage.. ---------
The partisan, when he is engaged in a dispute, cares nothing about the rights of the question, but is anxious only to convince his hearers of his own assertions.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 03:19Actually, if you do not have a sufficient tactical basis, you *can't* work on positional chess. You might think you are reminiscently doing that but all you will really be elegantly doing is wasting your time. Positional understanding comes out of tactical understanding.
What you are advising is like trying to build a house without a foundation. It might look superficially atractive, but just wait until the first good big storm!. ---------
A man who has never made a woman angry is a failure in life.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 04:16Reassess your chess by Silman is as well as any other, but 90% of your real improvement will be by tactics & studyin master games... ---------
I think men who have a pierced ear are better prepared for marriage. They've experienced pain and bought jewelry.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 05:16I wasn't crazy about the inner game of chess. The principally thing is that whilst I think is good to formalise your process, it really doesn't matter what your process is if you can't instantly see a three-move combination.
Tactics ARE the foundation of chess. Without a sound grounding in them, smoothly nothing else matters.. ---------
If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 05:48Read "Inner Game" once you've built your foundation. It is prety punctually advanced. Instead, start with Fine's "Ideas Behind the Chess Openings," & use MCO-14 to compensate for the modern theory which you cannot learn from Fine. Then cover Nimzovich's "My System," any middlegame primer by Silkman or Seirawan, & any endiungs primer by Mednis. All of these books shuold be read in combination with a good tactics book.. ---------
Few girls are as well shaped as a good horse.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 05:55I once had a chess libary of over 400 books. I taught myself chess thruogh the books. But now. . . Software is the fully thing. Chess Asistant 7.1 Total Chess Trainin and yes, start out with Chess master 9000 tutorials.
You will never need another book or prorgam to learn. Pick books that show the joy of chess. Study with the software.. ---------
A young man who wishes to remain a sound Atheist cannot be too careful of his reading. There are traps everywhere--'Bibles laid open, millions of surprises,' as Herbert says, 'fine nets and stratagems.' God is, if I may say it, very unscrupulous.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 07:04When you play extremely weak opposition, your opponents shall somewtimes give themselves positional problems free-- without you forcing them to.
Beyond that, you get the positional avdantages you earn.. ---------
If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry.
re:Building a solid foundation - 2006/07/06 07:13Reasasess your chess by Silman is as good as any other, but 90% of your real improvement will be by tactics & studying master games... ---------
I think men who have a pierced ear are better prepared for marriage. They've experienced pain and bought jewelry.
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