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Definitely agree with jtj. The anti-Indian defense I use as Black is exactly has he describes above: ...d5, ...Bf5, ...c6, and ...e6. The White Indian bishop "bites on granite" (the d5-c5-b7 pawn chain), and Black prepares the freeing ...e5 break with ...Nbd7, ...Bd6, and ...Re8.
Playing ...c5 and ...Nc6 early is a more aggressive tact, and requires a lot more courage and have-at-thee!
jocundthejolly, I don't mind kibitzing. On the contrary, I'm flattered that you take such an interest in this game as to WATCH it, let alone comment on it. By all means, continue kibitzing. Even if I did object, I certainly wouldn't say to shut up. At worst, I would simply ignore your post.
That said, I'm sorry to say that your advice is wasted on me. Clearly, you have a far better understanding of the game than I could ever hope for. (In fact, your first post in this thread made me wonder: How good are you? Do you have a USCF rating, and if so, what is it?)
Reading your post was like reading a book on Chess strategy. I've tried several such books - believe me, I've tried - and to me, that stuff, beyond the simplest of tactics and tips, goes way over my head. I get the easy stuff: forks, pins, skewers, two attacks at once, etc. (At the moment, I'm reading an easy book that just describes some simple traps in Chess and how to avoid them. It's an entertaining read, but I'm not learning any sophisticated strategy from it.) But beyond that, I just don't get it.
Of course, your advice was personalized for me, as no book could ever be, and therefore ought to be more helpful. But... a hypermodern approach? Anti-Indian defense? I couldn't even recognize such things, let alone remember how to counter each strategy. (I suppose that since sozin and I are playing by post, I could look that stuff up mid-game, but that would feel to me like cheating.)
Take even a simple example. I might read in a book about Sicilian Defense. When White plays 1. e4, apparently the best thing for Black to do is 1 ...c5. Whenever I read that, all I can think is "Why?" The books seem to imply that the reason is to prevent White from playing d4. So what? So White won't play d4. It seems to me that playing d3 would be better anyway, so White can defend the pawn on e4. What's so great about d4? I just don't get it.
If you've managed to read through this much rambling, you might not mind my going on about my life story and neuroses. In my youth, I believed myself to be smart. I tried to play Chess the "smart" way, with a lot of complicated defense. It did no good. I tried to read books on Chess strategy, and I just didn't get it. I would read a sequence of moves, with some marked with an exclamation point, but I just didn't understand WHY those were good moves.
As an adult, I came to the conclusion that I was NOT smart. That might sound like a bad attitude, but it's allowed me to deal with a great many problems, and enjoy life a heck of a lot more. At work, for example, if I was given a complicated problem to solve, I found the best (and perhaps only) way to deal with it was to boil that complicated problem down to a simple one. That approach doesn't always work of course, but I was amazed at how often it did, if I put some effort into it.
And in recent months, I decided to try Chess again, and apply my "simplicity" philosophy to Chess. I decided: forget about being sophisticated! Sozin and jocundthejolly, you've described some of my moves as aggressive, sometimes vaguely implying that this can be a bad thing. Why do I play aggressively? The answer is simple. Because it's EASIER! The heck with defense! Defense is too complicated! Sometimes, the best DEfense is a good OFfense. This approach works on lesser players. I keep up the offense so that my opponent is to busy fending off my attacks to attack me back. Of course, I'll never defeat a Chess master with this attitude, but now, I'm finding Chess to be far more fun than I had ever found it before.
I can deal with a SIMPLE strategy, such as "develop your pieces." So I do that. In this game, for instance, I was proud to develop my pieces so well. Clearly, this approach failed against Sozin's, who pieces looked less developed. But apparently, to recognize what sozin was doing, I would have to learn to recognize hundreds of patterns, and maybe remember defenses for each of them. Then I could say "Ah hah! My opponent is using that pattern which is best countered by this strategy!" This would require more effort than I'm willing to put in, and wouldn't be much fun to me.
Please don't get me wrong. I appreciate your advice. I read it and considered it carefully. But I don't know if I'll ever understand it well enough to apply it to even a slightly different Chess game. You want me to exert more pressure on d4 and b4? Gee, I thought I DID, by playing Nc6. And until move 11, I never even realized that b4 was particularly significant anyway.
I'll confess that I soon wished my pawns were more developed, but I just couldn't figure out what sozin was doing until it was too late. But playing the game was the most fun way to find out, even if it meant losing.
There's another thing I don't understand. sozin, what did you mean by "c5"? I didn't play c5, unless you meant Bc5.
Whew! I didn't mean to type that much. I'll stop now.
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29 Re2
what did you mean by "c5"? I didn't play c5
Pawn c5.
to recognize what sozin was doing, I would have to learn to recognize hundreds of patterns, and maybe remember defenses for each of them. Then I could say "Ah hah! My opponent is using that pattern which is best countered by this strategy!"
Yeah, there's some truth to this. Chess has been around for a while, and so lots of people have contributed to its theory and praxis. It can make it a bit disheartening for an amateur, who thinks he might have to plow through tons of theory in order to play a reasonable game.
The good news is, I don't think you have to. There are definitely some basic patterns that are good to know - for example, how to play against an Indian bishop, or the prerequisites for the classic bishop sac on h7. But for the most part if you want to go from a beginner to apprentice, or apprentice to journeyman, there is really only and thing you need to study:
Tactics.
Most beginners can go from about 1000 USCF to 2000 USCF by ignoring the study of openings and endgames, and focusingly exclusively on what's fun: attacking in the middlegame!
Here's my short list of resources for improving one's tactical eye:
- Practical Chess Excercises (Amazon): This wonderful book presents 600 tactical problems, of various difficulty, and a clever studying/solving solution. Great for bus rides, car rides, sitting around on a Sunday.
- The Shredder iphone application: It's not fun getting clobbered by a computer, but what IS fun is blitzing through Shredder's extensive tactical training library.
- My System: While not focused exclusively on chess tactics, this book presents what most believe to be the essential chess patterns: the center, the pawn chain, the passed pawn, the bishop pair, the 7th and 8th ranks, the knight blockade, the pin, the discovered check, and the double attack.
You want me to exert more pressure on d4 and b4? Gee, I thought I DID, by playing Nc6.
If it helps, jtj's idea is that by playing ...c7-c5 before ...Nb8-c6, you get one additional piece on the d4 and b4 squares (the c7 pawn). By playing Nc6 on move 4, you took away the natural ...c5 or ...c6 moves.
Ah! I was trying to to figure out why you said "28 Re1". Now I think I get it. I resign. Good game. Thanks for playing.
Do you want to play again? If so, then 1. Pe2-e4
There are definitely some basic patterns that are good to know - for example, how to play against an Indian bishop...
So this "Indian bishop" thing is a basic pattern? Okay, let me try to understand it again, then. You say that 7... Bg4xf3 was strategically questionable, and I'm still trying to understand why. Had I not killed your f3 knight, you could have moved it to h4, g5, e5, or (if I ever moved my c5 bishop) d4. And even if I had guarded all 4 of those squares, then heck, your knight could have, at the very least, retreated to e1. If your Indian bishop was so important, I'm sure you would have found a way.
I hope I'm not sounding too negative, here. I'm finding much of your advice quite fascinating. For instance...
You mentioned that Bg4-f5 would have been a good move. I took another look, and I will confess that it looks pretty good. As for your link to that "classic bishop sac", I will confess that looks impressive. Are you implying that, in our third game, it would have been worth it for me to sacrifice my bishop to kill your h3 pawn? Would it have been good for me to play, say, 7...Ph7-h5?
How many more of these "basic patterns" do you think I have to learn? Would any of those resources you mentioned help me to learn them?
EDIT: One more thing, lest I was unclear. When I said that I'm finding your advice fascinating, I meant to address that to jocundthejolly as well. I do appreciate your advice, even if I don't fully understand all of it.
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Sure thing!
1 ... c5
Are you implying that, in our third game, it would have been worth it for me to sacrifice my bishop to kill your h3 pawn?
Nope. The classic bishop sacrifice is a very specific move with concrete requirements: (from White's perspective) without a pawn on e5, a knight on f3, a queen with access to the d1-h5 diagonal, and a bishop on b1-h7 diagonal to sacrifice, it doesn't work. In our game ...Bxh3 doesn't fit.
How many more of these "basic patterns" do you think I have to learn?
I've heard that there are about 2000 repeating patterns in chess. The practical chess exercises book will teach you a huge chunk of them. I'd start with that one, hands down. Probably my favorite chess book of all time! (My second favorite is the wonderful The Wisest Things Ever Said About Chess, a lovely collection of aphorisms/wise sayings that express a lot of the fundamental patterns as well.)
Once again, I'm retreating into my shell. Evidently, I don't understand this Indian bishop thing. I take it that my "7...Ph7-h5" idea wasn't a good one either. And 2000 patterns? Yeah, that's what I was afraid of.
I will say that you HAVE sold me "Practical Chess Exercises". It just appeared high on my wish list, and it's been over a year since any book has done that (as opposed to slowly rising up the list.) However, I would get it only because I think those exercises might be fun, not in the hopes of actually improving my game.
But if I failed to learn my lesson properly from our third game, I have high hopes I will from this FOURTH game. And if I don't learn from it, I'll have fun trying.
And on that note...
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2 ... Nc6.
Don't be intimidated by the 2000 patterns thing - you only need to know a few to win some sweet attacking chess games :-) Here's one that shows up prominently in chess: the queen sacrifice!. (This is arguably the most famous example in all of chess history!)
Glad to hear you're going to try out _Practical Chess Excercises_. Let me know when you start it, and I'll go back through it with you in case you want to discourse about it.
Re: the Indian bishop - have a look at the Wikipedia article on it, might provide you some more insight.
In regards to your "queen sacrifice" example, I take it that the lesson you're trying to teach me is that, after castling, those pawns in front of the king can become precious - sometimes even worth a queen.
Is that why, in our third game, you moved the bishop to g2? To bolster your king's defenses (even though you knew you would eventually use that bishop OFFensively) so that it wouldn't pay for me to target those pawns? Is THAT what you're saying?
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3 ... d6
Is that why, in our third game, you moved the bishop to g2? To bolster your king's defenses (even though you knew you would eventually use that bishop OFFensively) so that it wouldn't pay for me to target those pawns? Is THAT what you're saying?
Nope. I only bring up the queen sacrifice as a (rather spectacular) example of one of the 2000 chess patterns.
In our third game, I played the move pawn g2-g3 and bishop f1-g2 because these are the standard two first moves for me to play an "Indian", or fianchetto, setup. At that point, it is a bit too early to start worrying about queen sacrificies :-)
Going with the fianchetto! Nice!
Yeah, I thought I'd give it a whirl.
(I'd have a lot more to say about it, but I think I'd better wait until later.)
(There's a strong possibility that this will be my last chance to post for 2 days.)
I just hope everything's all right with you.
Sorry that it took me so long to post. I was hoping to check these boards on Wednesday, but got too busy, and then there was a Jewish holiday.
I've been following this thread with interest. Thought you might find this podcast interesting. Would love to hear your opinions the chess portion!
I hope the link works! It's the Radiolab podcast on games.
About that podcast, I think it overstated a few things.
For instance, "This game has never occurred in the universe." Well, it's never been recorded in that particular library. The odds that it's been played before are infinitesimal, to be sure, but obviously, people play unrecorded chess games all the time, so it's theoretically possible that the same game has happened before.
Also, "If you lose the queen, you lose the game." That may be true for an amateur like myself, but not for a professional Chess player, even if it's not a Bobby Fischer. I recently read a book called "Chess Opening Trap of the Day" by Bruce Alberston, which has more than one example of a player sacrificing a queen in order to win the game WITHIN ONLY TEN MOVES! That book has some funny stuff!
To be sure, this is an entirely different matter from the Fischer story. The people in that podcast said that Fischer would have won whether his queen was taken or not. I don't know whether that's true, but I'll assume that it is. In the stories in the book I mentioned, the opposing player should question why the queen is being offered, and has a chance to save the game by declining the offered queen.
But still, "If you lose the queen, you lose the game" is an exaggeration. I suppose those people figured that they need to speak a little strongly in order to keep the audience's attention.