Looking to learn about basic strategies.

Brussels Sprout

Hi I just started playing chess on chess.com a few weeks ago. I'm very much a beginner and strategy noob. My rating is hovering around the 950 mark after 30 or so games. Can anyone recommend some good strategy sites for someone of my level? Something like a problem of the day which I could mull over and then get a detailed answer the next day or something like that would be good.

eclipsechaser

Brussels Sprout wrote: »

Hi I just started playing chess on chess.com a few weeks ago. I'm very much a beginner and strategy noob. My rating is hovering around the 950 mark after 30 or so games. Can anyone recommend some good strategy sites for someone of my level? Something like a problem of the day which I could mull over and then get a detailed answer the next day or something like that would be good.

Hi there,

950 is really good if you're only starting off - well done! At that level, tactics are probably the most important thing to learn for quick improvement. A book of tactical puzzles might be a good idea. I really liked "The Art of Checkmate" which catalogues most of the major checkmate patterns. It should sharpen your tactics and give you an insight into sacrifices and combinations. I also recommend "The Mammoth Book of Chess" as an excellent general book. It covers all aspects of chess to a good standard.

Aside from that, play tournaments and join a club. Learning from others is the best way I think! The Gonzaga Classic is coming up soon - plenty of beginners in the bottom section. http://icu.ie/events/display.php?id=587

Past sell by Date

hello Brussel,
chesscafe.com has 3 daily puzzles and various links to a vast array of chess sites.
youtube has a lot of chess lectures to whet your appetite.

reunion

http://www.chess.com/tactics/ is a good place on chess.com to learn (it also gives you feedback on what type of tactics you miss and what you get). It will give you tactic problems suited to your level (based on other people doing the puzzles and it has a rating). I would suggest that you would want to do that and get a tactics rating of about 1100. Then I would learn a basic main line for an opening (I suggest this; though everyone likes different opening based on how they like to play), play a few games with an opening and get a feeling for what side variations come up frequently and then look into those variations a little more.

I have a premium account with chess.com so I can't remember what you have access to for non-premium accounts (I know only 3 tactics puzzles a day). I would suggest if you do like chess and play on chess.com every evening/most evenings then I would purchase a premium membership for one month.

cdeb

It's worth noting that the chess.com ratings aren't really comparable to, say, Irish ratings. I think chess.com can be quite inflated actually. So do bear that in mind when looking for the strength of problems you're taking on, or indeed if you decide to enter a real-life tournament.

Other than that, the advice given here is quite good. Make sure you know your basic mating patterns first - all the tactics in the world won't help you if you don't know how to mate with a rook against a king!

Brussels Sprout

Thanks for the responses. Is there a website or a free software tool that I could use for reviewing my games? I'd like to set up the board either manually or using a .pgn file and then be able to manipulate both colours freely so that I can toy with alternative moves.

(thanks for the chesscafe link above as that led me to the daily puzzles on shredderchess which have been a great help to me)

Edit: on that note, in today's medium puzzle why does white not take the queen on c7 with its pawn after the suggested correct first move? Surely it'd be better to gain a queen then to put black into a check that is fairly easy to get out of.

Ciaran

Brussels Sprout wrote: »

Thanks for the responses. Is there a website or a free software tool that I could use for reviewing my games? I'd like to set up the board either manually or using a .pgn file and then be able to manipulate both colours freely so that I can toy with alternative moves.

(thanks for the chesscafe link above as that led me to the daily puzzles on shredderchess which have been a great help to me)

Edit: on that note, in today's medium puzzle why does white not take the queen on c7 with its pawn after the suggested correct first move? Surely it'd be better to gain a queen then to put black into a check that is fairly easy to get out of.

Google "scid chess" or something similar and you'll find a decent database programme that you can use to review your games. It comes with an engine, I think, that you can use to pinpoint mistakes too.

The point of the shredder puzzle is that black is threatening Bxf2 checkmate. A nasty surprise for white I'd imagine!

Brussels Sprout

Never even saw that-makes perfect sense now-thanks