Controlling the center versus occupying the center - What is the difference?

Hypermodern theory , or controlling the center from a distance rather than occupying it immediately, came about in the early part of the 20th century as a new way of addressing the old problem of center control.  However, as many knowledgeable people have pointed out, it's easier to try to get something from the start rather than giving it away first and then trying to get it back, and hypermodern openings are not seen that often at higher levels of play now.  In other words, they don't feel that it's as good as the classical approach of contesting the center immediately, and I would certainly suggest that you first become proficient with those openings before attempting to specialize in hypermodern openings. But books from the early hypermodern period by Reti or Nimzowitsch for example will go into detail about that type of play.  I haven't kept pace with what the more modern books on this subject might be. Distant center control is done by fianchettoing the B's on the "b" and "g"  files. Attacking the enemy center pawns is done with the "c" and "f" pawns supported generally by the B's. Or you can control the center before your opponent has occupied it with initial prophylactic "c" pawn (Sicilian Defense) or "f" pawn (Dutch Defense) moves.  Attacking the center this way would have to be done fairly early before development has been completed and it has been too solidly defended.  The rationale is that by diverting/removing the enemy center pawns, you will then be left with the more important center pawns of your own with which to subsequently occupy that area.


Qd1 hits the bishop on d6 and the knight on h5. One of those will be won.

Btw, I think this a famous game between Larry Christiansen and Anatoly Karpov. Famous, of course for this early blunder. Here, you can see the whole game and maybe find out more about the players.


Does the Lomonosov Tablebase (and others) include extra material positions such as KQQvKQQQ?

The Lomonossov tablebases include all 7-man positions with the exception of 6 pieces vs lone king.

Most material distributions you consider "ridiculous" are in fact required to evaluate "interesting" positions because of possible pawn promotions. This works recursively, so if you want to solve e.g. KPPPvKPP, you need (among others) the table KPPQvKPP first. To solve KPPQvKPP, you need (among others) the table KPPQvKPQ first, &c.

Ultimately, you need KQQQvKQQ and all other 4-man vs 3-man tables to solve the endgame KPPPvKPP. So it is necessary to have all possible material constellations, even those who seem to be uninteresting.


abe books

used bookstores
but you have to contact them as most have no online web site to order or check inventory


The answer to your question

Korchnoi is alive. And playing! He played a match against Wolfgang Ulhmann last week (15-16 February 2015) in the Veterans section of the Zürich Chess Challenge. He won two games and lost two.

However, today (22 February 2015) the oldest active GM is the American Arthur B. Bisguier (Elo 2170) born in 1929. Korchnoi was born two years later.

But the most veteran player title is for Lourenço Joao Cordioli (Elo 1928), a Brasilian lawyer born in 1916. And he plays still; he actually got the 100th place in the Floripa Chess Open 2015 on January.

The youngest FIDE rated players are two boys born in 2010, an Indian boy rated 1036 and an Iranian boy rated 1340. I prefer not to give the names to protect their privacy, since they are so young.

The youngest GM is Samuel Sevian (Elo 2531, born in 2000), the youngest USA GM at the age of 13 years, 10 months, 27 days. There are also two WGMs born the same year:
Zhansaya Abdumalik (Elo 2379) from Kazakhstan and Gunay Mammadzada (Elo 2334) from Azerbaijan.

Some details on how I found the information

To answer your question I have used the latest FIDE list of active players of February 12th 2015. But it has been more difficult than expected because of errors and missing data in the list.

For example, there was one player in the list born in 2049?! (maybe 1949?), another one in 205 (2005?), another in 1881 (1981?) and another in 1895 (1985?). Then, quite a lot of players had 0 or 1900 as birth year, which surely means that it is unknown.

And finally, according to the FIDE list there are 1 active player born in 2015 (?!), 3 born in 2014, 5 born in 2013, 3 born in 2012, 19 born in 2011... all of them unrated (of course). I confess I don't know what this means.

Anyway, I started looking for the oldest player. The first serious candidate was Carl Weibrecht (German, born in 1911, no FIDE rating). Although he appears as active in the list, I found a message in the website of Schachkreis Zugspitze dated May 1st 2011 saying

  "Chess Circle Zugspitze mourns chess friend Carl Weibrecht from
  Garmisch" (Google translated).

So he might not be active, after all...

The second candidate to the oldest player title was Dr. Horst Reichel, professor in Computer Science (also German, born in 1912, no FIDE rating). I have found some of his games for the period 2003-2006, but not later. So I am not sure if he is still playing. However, if the birthdate is correct he played till well passed 90 years old.

Then, there are other apparently active players born in 1915 (all without FIDE rating)... And at this point I decided to restrict the search to rated players and GMs.


Is it OK to look at the list of played moves during the game to determine the status of the 50 move rule?

The rules for this and how it works are spelled out in articles 9.3, 9.4 and 9.5 of the FIDE Laws of Chess. They don't mention whether or not you are allowed to check your scoresheet to do this because you are always allowed to check your scoresheet. You would be very foolish to not check your scoresheet first because there are penalties for an incorrect claim.

Here are articles 93, 9.4 and 9.5 of the FIDE Laws of Chess:

  9.3 The game is drawn, upon a correct claim by a player having the move, if:
  9.3.1 he writes his move, which cannot be changed, on his scoresheet and declares to the arbiter his intention to make this move which will
  result in the last 50 moves by each player having been made without
  the movement of any pawn and without any capture, or
  9.3.2 the last 50 moves by each player have been completed without the movement of any pawn and without any capture.
  9.4 If the player touches a piece as in Article 4.3, he loses the right to claim a draw under Article 9.2 or 9.3 on that move.
  9.5.1 If a player claims a draw under Article 9.2 or 9.3, he or the arbiter shall stop the chessclock (see Article 6.12.1 or 6.12.2). He
  is not allowed to withdraw his claim.
  9.5.2 If the claim is found to be correct, the game is immediately drawn.
  9.5.3 If the claim is found to be incorrect, the arbiter shall add two minutes to the opponent’s remaining thinking time. Then the game shall
  continue. If the claim was based on an intended move, this move must
  be made in accordance with Articles 3 and 4.


It is relatively easy for these websites to generate many thousands of tactical exercises: they run an engine over a corpus of games (for example, games played on the site itself) to look for blunders, and then turn the punishment of the blunder into a tactics puzzle (usually after additional filtering for example to choose only positions where there is only one move that is clearly best). They don't even need to worry about grading the puzzles for difficulty, because they determine that empirically after the fact, based on the ratings of the users who are able to solve the puzzle or not. The leave it to users to flag dubious machine-selected exercises for review.

The same is not true for strategy puzzles, since strategy is not so clearcut that you could let an engine search for strategically interesting positions. Therefore, strategy puzzles need to be laboriously created by experts. I know chess.com does have a "lessons" section, but you need to be a paid subscriber if you want unlimited access. Many of the lessons are about strategy, for example Roots of Positional Understanding by IM Jeremy Silman has 300 hundred brief "challenges" which you could use as daily puzzles for a while.


In the UK the busiest chess forum is the English Chess Forum. They have an Adverts topic which would be suitable for you to use.

I should stress that despite the presence of the letters "ecf" in the url it is independent of the English Chess Federation which has its own web site, although senior members of the board do from time to time make announcements and answer questions on the English Chess Forum. This independence allows a much broader range of opinions to be expressed.


When to mutually agree a draw depends on the skill level and the position in question. An agreed draw is most logical when neither side believes they have real winning chances (Sometimes people just chicken out in complex positions...). In the case you describe, practically speaking, there are no real winning chances for either side. Alternatively, 2 GMs may rightly agree a draw in many drawn theoretical endgames where mortals such as you and I should probably play on.

For the rulebook perspective... the rules state that "The game is drawn upon agreement between the two players. This immediately ends the game." It is correct to offer the draw after making the move but before pressing the clock. You and your opponent may agree to a draw at any time. In terms of etiquette, it is generally considered poor practice to offer a draw when losing or significantly worse. It is also poor etiquette to repeat draw offers and the TD may penalize you for "annoying the opponent".  As a matter of preference, I offer a draw only when I believe that I have no real chance of losing. Rules such as 3 move repetition and the 50 move rule are there to ensure that your opponent cannot meaninglessly torture you in a position such as the one you describe.

In your given situation, it may be useful to claim a draw by the fifty move rule. The fifty move rule states: "The game is drawn when the player on move claims a draw and demonstrates that the last 50 consecutive moves have been made by each side without any capture or pawn move." The case of B and N versus King is a classic example where 50 moves may elapse without a pawn move or capture.


Most basic first - this rule is the reason that King vs King is an immediate draw. Neither side has a piece to check with, let alone checkmate with. A position that is a draw because neither side can win is called a "dead position".

Playing against a bare king, a bishop or a knight is insufficient to checkmate with, and therefore K+B v K and K+N v K is always a dead position. Most online playing sites end there, and consider everything else winnable.

K+Q v K, K+R v K, K+B+B v K, K+B+N v K are all endings in which white can even force mate (see an overview of basic checkmates on Wikipedia). Because you ask for it explicitly, here is an example of a mate with N and B:

[FEN "k7/8/NKB5/8/8/8/8/8 b - - 0 1"]

There are some special cases. K+N+N v K is tricky -- white can't force mate, but mate is still possible:

[FEN "6k1/8/6K1/4N3/4N3/8/8/8 w - - 0 1"]

White plays 1.Nf6+, and black avoids mate by going to f8. But if he goes into the corner with 1...Kh8??, then 2.Nf7# mates.

So K+N+N v K is basically always given an immediate draw by the player with the knights in a slow game, because he knows he won't win. It will be awarded a draw by the arbiter if black claims one based on rule G.6 [the old "10.2", before july 1 2014], if the other requirements of that rule are met, and it's trivial to make 50 moves without losing. But if black runs out of time, black loses. And in a blitz game where nobody is writing down moves to count them, that may happen.

K+B v K+B is also tricky:

[FEN "5B2/8/8/8/8/7K/8/6bk w - - 0 1"]

With the bishops on the same color, mate isn't possible. It's an immediate draw.

[FEN "8/5B2/8/8/8/7K/8/6bk w - - 0 1"]

But with opposite colored bishops it is: 1.Bd5# mates.

In most other endgames it is possible to think of a way that one or both sides can be mated. In particular, if there are pawns, it is usually possible that one of them promotes and checkmates later. but there are exceptions:

[FEN "4k3/8/8/p1p1p1p1/P1P1P1P1/8/8/4K3 w - - 0 1"]

To a human it's immediately obvious that the kings will never be able to cross to the other side, so this is a dead position. Engines have no clue, though. Mine thinks white is minutely worse.

And in the recent question about sequences of forced moves, limulus proposed this position with an "infinite loop" of forced moves:

[FEN "8/6p1/1p3pPk/1P3Pp1/1Pp3p1/KpP3P1/1P6/8 - - - 0 0 "]

Neither king can break out of its jail -- so this is just another example of a dead position. Immediate draw.


Hide the moves when clicking on a game the "games" pane of a database in ChessBase 15

Would suggest performing a quick search via google
All information can be found at: http://help.chessbase.com/CBase/15
Hide Notation:
View Tab > Notation [Untick]
Hide Movement Arrow:
http://help.chessbase.com/CBase/15/Eng/index.html?moves_highlighted_with_a_yello.htm


Is there any chess engine that can show if one side has a forced draw?

The short answer to your question is no, there is not a chess engine that can reliably show if one side has a forced draw.  For example, this locked position is quite clearly a draw to the human eye:

However, notice that the evaluation is 0.17, not 0.00.  Houdini also give 0.05 - ever so slightly good for white.  This is very important.  This suggests that the evaluation of 0.00 is reserved by these programs for a specific reason, and indeed it is.  Basically, even in an "equal" position, the computer will not ever say that the score is 0.00, instead it will give a minute edge to one or the other side.

So with that background, on to the specifics!  First, if the game is just a draw due to the position (i.e. stalemate, insufficient material, etc.) most GUI's will pop up a message that says "Game Drawn", or something to that effect.  That leaves the more complicated cases that you mentioned in your question.  In order to cover most of those, I'll introduce another position.  This is taken from Morphy-NN 1-0, New Orleans Blindfold Simul:

Notice that Morphy currently has mate in 6 starting with 18.b4+!.  However, if Morphy somehow missed that this was mate, he still had a forced draw by repetition, which the computer quickly sees.  By increasing the number of variations that the computer displays, it is possible to see that after white plays a move like 18.Qxc3+?, white can still force a draw, despite being down a rook and a piece.  The evaluation of 0.00 again tips us off that this is a special position in that the computer can calculate a perpetual check.  If the moves 18.Qxc3+? Kxd5 are made on the board, then the evaluation will be 0.00, indicating that white's best continuation is to force a draw.  Failure to do this will lead to loss of the game with best play.

So to summarize, no existing engine can say with exact certainty that a position is a draw.  However, the evaluation of 0.00 is special, and if that shows up as either the main score, or the score for a variation, that means that a draw is probably being forced in that specific line.  The easiest way to check is playfully called "spacebar analysis" - when the user hits the spacebar over and over again to force the computer to play the top recommended move.  Eventually you will get to a position that is obvious to a human as well as the machine.

And finally, to address your point about "contempt"

  Another example is that if you need a win (i.e. a draw is just as bad
  as a loss) you might want to play a move with a slight negative
  evaluation to avoid giving your opponent the opportunity to force a
  draw. Even though this increases your chance of losing, it also
  increases your chance of winning.

This is quite simply referred to as contempt among chess programmers.  Most engines will allow you to set the level of contempt in the settings.  A positive contempt setting (100 is usually a reasonable level for analysis) will tell the engine to try fairly hard (a pawn's worth) to avoid a draw.  A negative setting will cause the engine to seek a forced draw (i.e. insufficient material, stalemate, or perpetual).


Is this a chess variant? Chess without taking pieces!

I followed the profile of Thunder_Penguin in chess.com and found a blog post about this: some  variation.

Ady and I made this.
Rules:
To win, get your king to your two corners (a1 and h1 for White,
h8 and a8 for Black)

You can't capture pieces*
You can't put pieces on the last rank (1st or 8th)
You can't castle*
You can capture if it's mate in 1
You can't control the enemy squares (ie, white can't put a knight on b6)

Let the analysis begin!

So according to this, answers to questions would be:

Is this a chess variant? What is its name? Is it quite well known?

It's a recent attempt to create a variation , made up by the 2 players. not named, not known.

What's the objective of the game, still checkmating?

The objective is not checkmating but escorting the king to one of your side corners following the rules cited.

Any hints for a winning strategy?

I can't answer that.


How should one respond to the Sodium attack?

Play whatever.

Two-three moves like that hardly constitute an "opening". It could help if you told us what kind of set up white tries to achieve in the center (e.g. which of the central pawns are moved.)

Generally moves like that are nothing I'd worry about. Playing just normal moves (occupy the center, develop pieces, take it from there....) should be fine. If you have a favourite black opening against say d4 or e4 you might be able to follow it.

You might want to make the somewhat fundamental decision on whether you prefer to block the b2 bishop by playing e5 at some point or to limit the space for the a3 knight by playing d5.


With a pawn rush, should I take the knight?

Take the c3 knight. Since white has developed only one piece, he can't punish you.  If he takes back with the d pawn, trade queens. Now he can't castle.  Then you develop, move your rooks to the center, and push him off the back of the board.


here's a list of some famous chess players who were able gain fame in other areas.Just to mention ,none of them are actors or politicians.

Former world Champion Mikhail Botvinnik was a famous computer scientist and electrical engineer. He was one of earliest pioneers of AI.

Attacking player Extraordinaire Rashid Nezhmetdinov was also a checkers player,strong enough to participate in Soviet Checkers Championships.

Fred Reinfield was an author who wrote several books ranging from Philately,Numismatics to Physics,Geology and medicine.

Milan Vidmar was a very well known academic and electrical engineer who actually became an university's Chancellor(Equivalent to Dean) and went on to build a Institute which now bears his name.

Former world champion Max Euwe- Mathematician

Mark Taimanov- Concert Pianist

Robert Hübner is a papyrologist and was recognised as a leading player of Xiangqi(a chinese board game) who was not from China.

Here are some players who does not fit "famous in other areas" bill, but still were able to build their own career in other fields.

Lajos Portisch- Opera Singer

John Nunn- Mathematician


The FIDE President's role is defined in one of the FIDE Handbooks on the FIDE website. The relevant part is Chapter 09 - The President and Deputy President in the FIDE Statutes.

There it says -

  9.1.  The President represents FIDE officially and can solely sign for FIDE.  All contracts signed by the President shall be subject to prior
  approval or subsequent ratification by the Presidential Board. Any
  contract that commits FIDE to an obligation or exposes FIDE to a
  potential liability of more than €100,000 must be submitted for
  ratification by the Executive Board or General Assembly.
  9.2.  The President presides over the meetings of the General Assembly, the Executive Board and the Presidential Board.
  9.3.  The President presents an annual report to the General Assembly.
  9.4.  The President’s decisions may be appealed to the General Assembly, Executive Board or Presidential Board.
  9.5.  If the President is unable to act or if he duly authorises, then he can be represented by the Deputy President who shall exercise the
  powers of the President. The Deputy President can thus represent FIDE
  officially and can solely sign for FIDE.
  9.6.  In certain cases the FIDE President can also delegate specific tasks to other persons; this includes authorising in writing other
  FIDE officials to sign contracts on his behalf.

Details of the General Assembly, the Executive Board and the Presidential Board are given in the FIDE Statutes.


When you are winning, is it ethical to not go for a checkmate right away?

There is no rule or law that says that you have to try and checkmate in as few moves as possible and so there is no ethical requirement either.
In fact, if there are just a few pieces left on the board and you are very short of time it makes a lot of sense to take all the opponent's pieces as quickly as possible and only then worry about how you are going to checkmate.
Otherwise if you run out of time while your opponent still has some material left then you are going to lose on time. If your flag falls after you have taken all their pieces then you still get a draw.


Why isn't Gata Kamsky considered the first American since Bobby Fischer to fight for the World Championship?

Kamsky played Anatoly Karpov for the championship during the time after Garry Kasparov and Nigel Short had split from FIDE to form the Professional Chess Association and hold their championship match under its auspices. Thus, the World Championship was "split" at the time - Kasparov held the PCA title and Karpov the FIDE title. In a sense, a split title such as this is no title, so Kamsky misses out on credit for playing for the championship.

This is partly commentary, but hopefully adds a little insight: While my skills are nowhere near good enough to say, it seems that Kasparov is generally seen as the stronger player (vs. Karpov). Thus most people who pay attention probably see Kasparov at the "true" world champion from that time. Between the fact that Kamsky played for the FIDE championship at a time when the title was split and also when the FIDE champion was not the then strongest player, he doesn't get credit for playing for the World Chess Championship.


Chess dot com says this was my best move yet I don't have a clue why

Black has an undeveloped queenside, a weak bishop on g7, lots of weaknesses on the light squares and consequently a very weak king position. This suggests potential tactics.

The point of 1. Nxe5 is that it opens the way for the white queen to h5. Together with the white bishop on c4 this should remind you of Scholar's mate or variations of it. Even though you don't end up with immediate mate here, the position with the white queen and bishop entering black's position looks extremely dangerous for black and moves like Nxe5 or potentially moving the knight to other squares should certainly be considered.

Concretely, whichever way black captures the knight on e5 (dxe5 or fxe5), white can regain material by 2. Qh5+ Kd7 (2...Kf8 or 2...Ke7 are answered with 3 Qf7 mate) 3. Qg4+ Kc6 (or Ke8) 4. Qxg7 and end up with a winning position due to the extremely weak black king.

If black does not capture the knight on e5, white still has a decisive advantage due to threats like Nf7 and its dominance on the light squares. Also white is up a pawn, though that is not essential here.


Could you estimate Napoleon's (or other historic persons) Elo on the base of his known games?

There are efforts to calculate the playing strength of pre-Elo players on the basis of their games. See for example this paper by Kenneth Regan.

But if you look at the "intrinsic performance rating" of historic players on page 5, you will find that they vary quite a bit even for the same player at different points in time.

Personally I find it quite unlikely that the performance of Zukertort or Steinitz varied by over 300 points against different players.

To estimate the playing strength of a player who left only very few (and selected at that!) games, these methods seem to be nowhere precise enough.

Edit: I found another paper but this method seems to end up with a rating between 2700 and 2800 no matter what, which doesn't inspire much confidence.


Why do engines run faster if you only have one line of analysis open?

That's normal, commonly known as multiPV analysis.

Without getting into too much technical details, analysing N number of principal variations require running the engine N times, one for each PV. We need to do that so we can estimate a precise score for each PV.


Is there a good strategy to achieve a draw?

The best strategy to try and draw against a stronger player is also the best strategy for all your games:

Play the position not the opponent
Try and aim for positions which you know and are comfortable with
Always try and find the objectively best move
Particularly important for weaker players - play prophylactically. When it is your turn always first ask yourself the question "What is my opponent trying to do?" and then "How can I stop their plans?"

Although all four are important the last one is the most important. If you counter all your opponent's plans and don't make any mistakes then you are going to get at least a draw.
Problems arise when you aren't good enough to work out your opponent's plans and when you don't recognise a mistake but if you are always asking then you are already one very big step ahead of the player who is not playing prophylactically.


Why 6.Nc3 in the following position in Grob opening?

I don't think there is a drastic difference between playing 6.c4 than 6.Nc3, but from my perspective, I don't see much utility in the move 6.c4. What are you trying to achieve with 6.c4? It may seem as though you are expanding and gaining space and challenging Black's center, but Black can immediately put pressure on the d4 square with 6...Nc6 and you must defend with 7.Be3. Now, if you had played 6.Nc3, and after your opponent plays 6...Nc6, you still need to defend with Be3, but you have an extra developed piece. Note, you obviously don't want to play d5 (if you've already played c4) after 6...Nc6 since Black can play Ne5 or Qh4 and will have a better position than White. I'm no chess expert, but those are the very small differences I see.


How do you analyze master games without annotations?

How? Yourself :-)
This should not discourage you from getting the help of an engine - afterwards §. Also, to me it seems critical to what end you are analyzing master games. There are many answers to this question, almost as many as masters. You analyze a Morphy game? Great choice, learn how opening sins (especially underdevelopment) are punished mercylessly. You analyze a Tal game? Great choice, delve into the variant chaos and show this Rigan swashbuckler you can defend better than his lame-o opponent. :-) You analyze a Capablanca game? Great choice, learn to crush an opponent from an almost equal position without him understanding what hit him.
Generally, it's far easier to analyze with regards to tactics. When it comes to positional play, methinks without annotations you are lost as a beginner. I suggest to edit in your learning goals into the post. It never hurts to analyze GM games but it will make the answers more precise.
§ Dangers of meta-playing, especially when engines are present. From Haukes infinite surplus of chess stories. I played a training match with a kid and his trainer. We were post-morteming. The trainer (having an engine): White has a brilliant move here. I, not even thinking for a second: e5. The trainer is baffled (especially because I'm a strong and very original player who nuked many a GM, but never reached even IM strength). "How did you know?" (He knows I can't calculate even remotely.) "Easy, it's always e5 in the Sicilian!" (In the Bxf6 gxf6 Najdorf, for the experts.) "And since you gave away the fact that a move exists, it is good and I don't see any peculiar one, it must be e5." Don't let such habits sip into you, you don't have an engine when you are playing a tournament.


Is an Arabian mate possible without the king’s help?

I don't think it is possible to forcibly mate the king with rook and knight only.

Proof: The only mating position is with the white king in a corner, the rook giving check from an adjacent square and the knight protecting the rook and covering the escape square.

For simplicity let's say Ka1, Rb1, Nc3. There are 7 other equivalent positions to this one.

If you retro-analyze the position the last move must have been with the rook along the b file from somewhere between b3 and b8. For the following analysis it does not matter from where it came.

Then what was white's last move? It certainly was a king move from a2, b2 or b1 to the corner (a1). However, since white was not forced to move the king to the corner but could have moved to a3 or c1 (or to b3 if the rook was standing there), the mate cannot be forced.

[fen "1r6k/8/8/8/8/K7/4n3/8 w - - 0 1"]
[StartPly "4"]

1. Ka2 Nc3+ 2. Ka1?? (2. Ka3!) Rb1++


How should I read chess books that show games or parts of games?

It depends on what you want to get out of the book.

If you're reading for enjoyment, read the text, try to see the point behind the nice sacrifices, and relax.

But for study, you need to do something else: set up the position on a board, put the book away, then try to understand the position on your own. What are important features of the position? What is each side trying to achieve? Are there any tactics or threats? What's the best move?

Then play through the moves in the book. Try to understand them, how do they related to what you thought each side was trying to achieve? What was it you missed? Why are these moves best?

Basically, for study, treat every diagram you ever see as an exercise. The improvement in your chess skill will be directly proportional to the amount of work you put in.

Of course one doesn't always feel like doing that, and that is fine too (I love just browsing chess books). Just don't expect much real improvement then.


World championship games where underpromotion was necessary


Queens Gambit Accepted 3rd move Side Lines (White)

Short answer

3.Qa4+ and 3.Bf4 are reasonnable enough moves but not dangerous for Black.

3.Nd2?! and 3.b4? are very dubious.

1. "Traditional line"

I don't know why you name it that way, 3.Nf3 or 3.e4 are much more common than 3.Qa4+. By the way your "novelties" are certainly not that "new" either.

The idea of 3.Qa4+ is to regain the pawn at once. Its minus is that the queen goes out too early and will lose some tempi later on. Note that beside 3...Bd7, 3...Nc6 is possible too.

2. "Novelty 1"

3.Bf4 is just a developing move, so it cannot be too bad. However, it doesn't adress the main issues in the QGA (fight for the center, for the light squares, for the Pc4...), so it should be pretty harmless for Black after, say, 3...Nf6 4.e3 c5!?, or 4...Bg4!?, or simply 4...e6 followed by a6,c5 in traditional QGA-style.

3. "Novelty 2"

I suppose 3.Nd2?! aims at taking back on c4 with that knight. Fair enough, but it becomes a real (double-)gambit after 3...Qxd4!? 4.Nf3 [or 4.e3 Qd7 5.Bxc4 e6 and White doesn't have enough for one pawn.] Qc5, and White has to prove his compensation. If Black is less adventurous, 3...Nc6 4.e3 e5 should already be advantageous for him: he has more influence in the center and White hasn't got his gambitted pawn back yet.

4. "Novelty 3"

3.b4? sets a record: There is no faster way to give your opponent a passed pawn after only 5 plies. It also doesn't develop, doesn't make a threat and weaken your queenside.

If Black takes en passant, White will get a bit of compensation for his pawn but probably not enough. If black just develops with 3...Nf6 or 3...e6 (already hiting b4!), he enjoys a great position with as much of an advantage as you can dream for on move 3 as Black. The solid 3...c6 planning either 4...a5 attacking the weakness on b4 or 4...b5 securing an extra protected passed pawn also looks logical to me. 3...e5!? is a more aggressive option, and a tempting one as well since 4.de5 Bxb4+ 5.Bd2 Qd4 6.Bxb4 Qxa1 is probably just winning for Black.

Maybe White's idea is the trap 3...Nc6?! 4.d5 Nxb4?? [even here, 4...Ne5 should be okay.] 5.Qa4+ winning the knight, but well, that's just a cheapo and once Black avoids it he can be very happy.


What is this battleship-style chess variant called?

This is similar to Crazy Screen Chess:

Screen Chess - Before the game, both players set up their pieces on the last 4 ranks, with the following restrictions: the bishops must be placed on opposite colors, and only 1 pawn can be placed on a file. Once the game starts, the rules are the same as regular chess, with no castling and no en passant.
...
Crazy Screen Chess - Same as Screen Chess, except with no restrictions on piece placement.

Source: ItsYourTurn.com


Reasons why king and rook mate quicker than king, knight/bishop and bishop?

King and Rook mate faster because the 2 pieces coordinate better together.

Recall that the mating procedure for King and Rook is about making a box with the Rook, then making that box smaller. This is quite straight forwards. Compare this to mating with King, Bishop and Knight, which is hard even for masters!

This brings me to discuss your misconception on the point value of the pieces. They relate to trading pieces. So if you trade Rook and Pawn (6 units) for 2 minor pieces (6 units), then on a point only basis, material is even.

Note also that the point value system is a guideline. It is not a cast iron law of the universe. In the example above, which side is better after trading Rook and Pawn for 2 minor pieces depends on the concrete position. But that is a different topic.


Will computer knowledge reach a perfect game, after expanding prepared openings/endgames?

To my mind, what you are asking is can a computer ever "know" the correct move and evaluation in every conceivable position. Without such complete knowledge, it wouldn't be possible to play perfectly because every evaluation is dependent on evaluations of the multitude of possible upcoming positions. This perfection is what endgame tablebases provide. Outside of contexts where distance to mate can be calculated, tablebases are the only context in which computers have a "perfect" understanding of a position. For reference, 5 piece tablebases (e.g. 2 kings and 3 other pieces) require 7 GB of storage. 6 piece tablebases require 1.2 TB, and 7 man tablebases are only recently completed and require 140 TBs. To solve chess completely, you would need a 32 man tablebase.

The problem is comparable in fictional magnitude to the calculation of the "Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything" as depicted in Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy. In that case an entire planet, was devoted to identifying the question. It seems an equally pointless and gargantuan task to attempt to "solve" chess.

Just to put your mind at ease... even though computers may play well above the level of the best humans today, there are still plenty of decisive games between top level computers today. Check out the ongoing TCEC tournament. Clearly, computers are still quite capable of mistakes.


Openings cannot be copyrighted, but analysis and comments can be.

The best you can do is probably to publish an extensive analysis of the variation online (or in a magazine, but you should make sure it is available online as well). In that article you should explicitly name the variation. You might also want to throw in some engine-engine games, instead of just concentrating on your own games. Real tournament games would probably be more convincing than online games as well.

If you do that you can always prove precedence by pointing out your article if somebody tries to reinvent and rename the variation. If the article is well written and contains high-level games, it is also quite likely that other people interested in the variation will quote/link you, i.e. accept and cement your precedence.


How to know when it is time to trade down to an endgame?

The reason there isn't much information on when to trade down when there isn't a large material advantage is because it is obvious.

If you have a small advantage but you calculate that trading down will leave you with an endgame which you know how to win then trade down. Note that even if you are bishop and knight up (say something like KQBN v KQ) and can trade down to a KBN v K endgame and you know that theoretically it is winning for you but you don't know how to win then there is no point in trading down because it is very easy for the defender to last 50 moves and claim the draw against someone who lacks the knowledge. Try and win some other way while there is more material on the board.

Similarly if you are a pawn or two down but have the chance to trade down to an opposite coloured bishop endgame where you know because of your endgame knowledge that your opponent's extra pawn(s) are not going to be enough for him because you know how to draw that position then trade down.

The difficult part is having the endgame knowledge in the first place.

If you reach a position where you are trying to decide whether to trade down or not but don't know, it is not because nobody has given you the magic answer. It is because you lack the endgame knowledge to judge the final position after the trade down.


Play chess online and get an offical Elo rank

There is one (and so far only one) place where you can get the official FIDE rating - the FIDE Online Arena. It however needs a client. A quick introduction is here and the arena is at http://arena.fide.com

I have not tried it so I cannot comment on how good the interface is but I assume it is good. The killer feature is that it calculates official FIDE rating, which is calculated the same way as the official rating for over the board play thus they are directly comparable. Even better they are linked - every time a new FIDE rating list for over the board play is published this rating is incorporated in the online rating (in other words games played over the boards count to the online rating too). It does not work the other way around.

A very little known fact so far is that FIDE has introduced new players titles, so called FIDE Titles for the Lower Rating Band. Official info here and some basic info here. You earn these titles for online play but the cool thing is that they are valid for life and you can use them in over the board play as well. As an example if you consistently keep your online rating above 2000 you will become an Arena Grand Master (AGM).

It is very likely, and I would bet on it, that in future all most popular online servers will offer calculating the official rating too. This may take some time though.


Has anyone attempted to characterize chess mathematically?

There are many different aspects of chess which can be formalized mathematically. Since the 19th century at least, chess has been mined as a resource to drive mathematical innovation. So when talking about a mathematical characterization of chess, it's not a single modeling that we are talking about, which grabs every feature, but rather a number of models, in which the power of each is paradoxically in the letting go of some aspect of chess which is not relevant for that analysis.

Perhaps the earliest success (not counting the counting :-) of grains of rice on a chessboard) was Zermelo's Theorem (yes by one of the founders of ZF Set Theory) which states that in chess "either White can force a win, or Black can force a win, or both sides can force at least a draw".

Combinatorial Game Theory (developed by celebrated mathematicians John H. Conway, Elwyn Berlekamp and Richard Guy) has been successfully applied to chess. A couple of assumptions in this theory go against its general applicability to chess though. One is that a win in CGT is solely if your opponent can’t move which does not address stalemate. Secondly there is the notion of “entailing move” (e.g. check) where if one person plays, the other player must respond rather than the first player playing again. But Noam Elkies has derived some non-trivial results in chess endgames by computing their CGT value - references given in his chess page http://www.math.harvard.edu/~elkies/chess.html: "On Numbers and Endgames" and "Higher Nimbers [sic] in Pawn Endgames on Large Chessboards".

You mentioned group theory - well curiously the set of combinatorial games under composition does form an abelian group! To be fair, the two obstacles mentioned above do prevent chess itself from behaving in this way.

There is a massive amount of combinatorial work which has been done around the chessboard. Vaclav Kotesovec has published online an 800 page book just on the subject of non-attacking chess pieces (generalizing the 8 queens problem massively). See http://www.kotesovec.cz/ for the link. This is related to Magic Squares, Experimental Design, etc.

There is also, starting in Finland with Eero Bonsdorff, a long lineage in path enumeration chess problems, counting the number of ways that a position can be reached. This often involves the analysis of Standard Young Tableaux, which also underpin representation theory of symmetric groups. Fibonacci numbers, Catalan numbers and Euler numbers are all frequently found here, together with other combinatorial identities whose realization can be found lurking in ingenious chess compositions. See https://pdb.dieschwalbe.de/search.jsp, and type g='mathematics' in the search box.

The knight's tour problem is also famous for helping to push the study of Hamiltonian graphs, and particularly the challenge of counting the number of such objects. See https://www.mayhematics.com/t/t.htm.

The theory of computation also asks about whether chess is determinate. This is all about arranging sets of pieces in much bigger boards to try to make machines that are equivalent to Turing machines. This brings us to the subject of the limits of computation, which is where I would make the point that if a mathematical theory characterized chess completely, then we should be no more able to reason with it than we are to play at chess itself. That might allow us to escape some of the linguistic challenges of the current laws (e.g. whether pawns can be oriented).

I think there is also research value in a mathematical description of how chess conventions apply consistently to chess problems including fairy chess. Guus Rol has a very ambitious  program which reduces each turn to “micro-phases” and claims to be able to determine with great accuracy how fairy conditions interact in complex “retro-active” situations, where both retro and forward logic is necessary. I don’t know if he will ever complete his theory.

I personally would like to see a more modest theory, which treats each move as atomic and although it doesn’t cover fairy chess so well, at least can cover retro-active aspects of problem conventions such as castling and e.p. Even that has not been done yet.

The mathematical physicist Roger Penrose published a chess position about 2 years ago which was intended to argue his long-held position that there is a fundamentally different kind of reasoning displayed by humans than an AI grounded in "computable functions" can demonstrate. See https://en.chessbase.com/post/a-chess-problem-holds-the-key-to-human-consciousness

Even though the theory of random graphs, and Monte Carlo analysis has been applied very successfully to engines, particularly the most recent generation, I don't think this disqualifies it from being considered a mathematical theory.

There is also a linear algebra approach to counting moves and positions. “If chess is a graph, what is its maximum eigenvalue?” is a very real and interesting question. See Francois Labelle's site at http://wismuth.com/chess/statistics-games.html

Linear algebra can be applied successfully to other chess related questions e.g. how many ways are there for a rook to move from a1 to h8 in exactly n moves? How about a king?

For many years, Noam Elkies & Richard Stanley have been collaborating on a book on chess and mathematics. I don't know when it will finally emerge, or whether they have given up on this. But "The Mathematical Knight" given on Noam's chess page linked earlier perhaps gives a foretaste of that book. Richard Stanley is one of the leading lights in Combinatorics: see http://www-math.mit.edu/~rstan/chess/queue.pdf, and Noam's birthday article https://arxiv.org/pdf/math/0508645.pdf

There is also already a book "Mathematics and Chess" by Miodrag S. Petkovic, but I am not familiar with its contents.

Some of these ideas are listed in a Wikipedia page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Mathematical_chess_problems, and there's a more specific page https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mathematical_chess_problem.

If anyone else has other examples of chess and mathematics, please mention them in comments and I will try to incorporate them in this response. If anyone has links that illustrate the topics I am mentioning, please add them, thanks.

Finally: math.stackexchange.com has 62 pages of chess entries!?!


If you have your database in clear text format such as pgn, and if you are satisfied with any knight move to g8, you could just search for the string "Ng8" (and potentially "Nfg8", "Nhg8" and "Neg8") in the pgn.

This does not help if you want to filter for Nf6g8 only, unless there is a way to save the pgn with long algebraic notation. Also you would find both black and white knights moving to g8 (probably a lot more black than white moves though).


First of all, I think this is a bad question (similar to StackOverflow "Give me the code" questions).

That being said, the subject itself seemed interesting, so I threw a quick and dirty (and inefficient - feel free to optimise) script together to do this. I ran it on PGN file of world championship games between 1895 and 1985 from this page (this should fit OPs requirements). The results:

The overall average value for the data points in the World Championships PGN is roughly 0.35 (0.349341653669).

EDIT:
Results on much bigger PGN sample (~275.000 games) - chess db grandmaster collection (although most likely includes games with non-classical time control).

I am making the script available, so that you can run it on PGN of your choice. It depends on the python pgn parsing package.


What I thought was winning tactic, apparently was mistake

First of all, I don't think it is productive to call moves "blunders" when they're just not the best moves according to the computer. Chess is a game between humans. I like to reserve "blunder" for moves that are really terrible.

That said, after 20...Bxh3, Komodo 9.02 recommends 21.Qe3 for White, forcing Black to exchange queens, after which material is equal (remember that you were down a pawn to start with) and it likes White's position better.

It prefers to delay the discovered attack on the queen by playing 20...e3, threatening 21...Bd3 (winning an exchange), which is really hard for White to deal with. Komodo's line is 20...e3 21.fxe3 Bd3 22.Qxd4 Bxf1 23.Qxb6 axb6 24.Rxf1 Rxe3 and Black is up an exchange for a pawn.


Why are these sacrifices good moves? What are the winning follow-ups?

This is a very long question. And you can use Stockfish to check tactical solutions.

Solutions of all positions except the 5th ends with mate or huge material gain. In position 5, Black plays a positional sacrifice, to turn that cramped position into a nice attacking one.

Position 1 - Black to play, why Rh2?

[FEN "1r2k2r/p4pp1/2n1p3/q2pP1N1/3P1PB1/1Pb5/P1Q5/1K1R2R1 b - - 0 1"]

1... Rh2 2. Qxh2 Rxb3 3. Kc2 (3.Kc1 Qa3 4. Kc2 Nb4#) (3. axb3 Qa1 4. Kc2 Nb4#) Qxa2 4. Kc1 Qb1#

Position 2 - White to play, why Re8?

[FEN "r1bq4/1p4kp/3p1n2/p4pB1/2pQ4/8/1P4PP/4RRK1 w - - 0 1"]

1. Re8 Qe8 2. Qf6 Kg8 3. Bh6 Qf7 4. Qd8 Qf8 5. Qf8#

Position 3 - White to play, why Nd7?

[FEN "2rq1rk1/1b2bppp/p1n5/1p1BN3/5B2/P7/1P3PPP/R2Q1RK1 w - - 0 1"]

1. Nd7 Re8 2. Bxf7+ Kxf7 3. Qd5+ Kg6 4. g4 Bg5 ( 4... h6 5. Qf5# ) 5. Qf5+ Kh6
6. h4 g6 7. Bxg5+ Kg7 8. Bf6+ Kf7 9. Qd5+ Re6 10. Bxd8

Position 4 - Black to play, why Bf6?

[FEN "r4rk1/p6p/2q5/1p2pnB1/3p2Q1/P2P4/1P5P/R4RK1 w - - 0 1"]

1. Bf6+ Kf7 2. Rxf5 Ke6 3. Rxe5+ Kd6 4. Re6+ Kc7 5. Qg7+ Kb6 6. Rxc6+ Kxc6 7.
Rc1+ Kb6 8. Qc7+ Ka6 9. Rc6#

Position 5 - Black to play, why e5?

[FEN "1nr5/2rbkppp/p3p3/Np6/2PRPP2/8/PKP1B1PP/3R4 b - - 0 1"]

1... e5 $1 { Black has a cramped position. White rooks are dominating d-file,
bishop and knight pressing hard on queenside. Black can't move.

With ...e5,
sacrificing pawn, Black vacates e6 square for bishop and doubles  and isolates
White's pawns in the center. After fxe5, White's pawns are not threatening any
more.}  2. fxe5 Be6 { Now it's the Black is attacking the c4 pawn, and c2 pawn
with doubled rooks. Black turned a cramped position into attacking one with a
very clever pawn sacrifice, which ruined White's pawn formation.}

Position 6 - Black to play, why Qh6?

[FEN "2r2rk1/pp2pp1p/2np2p1/q4P2/2PBP1b1/2N5/PP1Q2PP/R4RK1 w - - 0 1"]

1. Qh6 Nxd4 2. Nd5 Qd8 ( 2... Rfe8 3. f6 Ne6 4. fxe7 Qc5+ 5. Kh1 Qd4 6. Nf6+
Qxf6 7. Rxf6 ) 3. Nxe7+ Qxe7 4. f6 Qxf6 5. Rxf6

Position 7 - Black to play, why Bxf3?

[FEN "2rr2k1/p4p1p/2n3pb/2Ppp3/3Pb3/P1R1PNqP/4Q1P1/B3RB1K b - - 0 1"]

1... Bxf3 2. gxf3 exd4 3. exd4 ( 3. Rcc1 Bxe3 4. Qg2 Qxg2+ 5. Kxg2 Bxc1 6. Rxc1
) 3... Nxd4 4. Qe7 ( 4. Qd1 Bf4 5. Re2 Nxe2 6. Qxe2 Re8 7. Qg2 Re1 8. Qxg3 Bxg3
9. Kg2 Rxa1 10. Kxg3 Rxf1 ) 4... Bf4 5. Re2 Nxe2 6. Qxe2 Rb8 7. Rc2 Rb1 8. Qg2
Qxg2+ 9. Kxg2 Rxa1


I would read it as "Pawn takes something on a1 and promotes to a Queen".

Strictly according to the Laws of Chess the = sign should not be there (see article C.11).

  C.11
  In the case of the promotion of a pawn, the actual pawn move is indicated, followed immediately by the abbreviation of the new piece. Examples: d8Q, exf8N, b1B, g1R.

However this is a PGN file, which has its own rules for game notation and it uses the = sign for pawn promotion (see paragraph 3 of article 8.2.3.3 in the PGN standard specification also available here, which should probably be the official reference).

  [...]. Pawn promotions are denoted by the equal sign "=" immediately following the destination square with a promoted piece letter (indicating one of knight, bishop, rook, or queen) immediately following the equal sign. As above, the piece letter is in uppercase.

Draw data is handled in so-called  EPD records for describing chess positions, using verbose opcodes like draw_offer.  Although it isn't included in PGN proper, specifics are included in articles 16.2.5.8 - 16.2.5.11 of the standard.


Yes to both questions.

At the highest level of any sport/game/activity, there is an extreme amount of pressure.  Being in a foreign city, the quest to find the best move, the knowledge that most chess players will be going over you game, annotators criticizing your every move, and the added pressure of a ticking clock.  (Digital clocks don't tick, but most chess players prefer this reference.)  Professional chess players have been known to lose 20 pounds(9 kg) during a normal 2 week tournament, due to the stress of the situation.  Although I don't think they consider this, one misplay and they will be remembered like Bill Buckner.


It's probably first worth revisiting why the "standard" moves are normally preferred.
A white knight on c3 defends white's central square e4 and attacks black's central square d5. That is that knight attacks/defends/supports 2 out of the 4 central squares. In the opening those 4 squares are the most important squares on the board (unless you fall for a cheapo).
In contrast a knight on d2 only defends white's central e4 square. On d2 the knight is only half as effective as it is on c3. By symmetry the same arguments apply to knights on f3, c6 and f6.
In general in open games these four squares are the best ones for the knights on their first move. In closed positions it is not quite so clear cut. Often other factors make other squares better or just make those squares impossible.
In closed and semi-open openings these squares may not all be available and moving a knight there may not be possible. The Advance Caro Kann is probably the best example of this. After:
[fen ""]

1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5

black can't put a knight on c6 because it is already occupied by a black pawn and f6 is also out of bounds because it is attacked by the white pawn on e5.
In the Winawer variation of the French Defence white puts a knight on c3 but this is a very committal move. Black can pin the knight with Bb4 and a double edged tactical battle is likely. Consequently at higher levels Nd2 is preferred heading into a Tarrasch variation of the French. This satisfies the key requirement of the position, defend the attacked white pawn on e4, while also avoiding the pin from the dark squared black bishop and allowing the d4 pawn to be defended with the move c3.
The other reason for moving a knight to d2/7 is to protect the other knight developed on f3/6 when it is pinned to the queen thereby allowing the queen to move without risking doubled pawns if black decides to exchange bishop for knight.
Finally moves like Nh6 use the h6 square as a staging post aiming for f7 or f5. These ideas come up regularly in the French Defence. Here are a couple of examples:
[fen ""]

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 c5 4. c3 Nc6 5. Nf3 Bd7 6. a3 f6 7. Bd3 fxe5 (7...cxd4 8. cxd4 Nh6 {with the idea of Nf7 to put more pressure on e5 and if} 8. Bxh6 gxh6 9. Nh4?! Qb6 10. Bxh6 gxh6 11. Qh5+ Kd8) 8. dxe5 Nh6 9. O-O Nf7

If you play openings like the French or the Caro Kann as black then you will become more familiar with these ideas. In any case you should be mindful of possible advantages in playing Nd2/7 to protect a pinned knight on f3/6 making it easier to break the pin and possible advantages in leaving c3/6 free for a pawn to support a pawn on d4/5 or to kick a bishop on b4/5.


PGN database with games of players with ELO 1000 - 2000

You can find a large collection of games played on FICS archived from the superb site: ficsgames.org Here you can find downloads of games based on rating category and type of games.

Edit: Now we also have LiChess giving out all games! Check out database.lichess.org. Even though it is not already categorized into Elo, you can easily do it via a pgn parser program.


In my opinion, this is a very difficult question, since the piece values in antichess are not as static as in normal chess and usually highly depend on the game phase and position.

However, there are some rules of thumb which pieces tend to be stronger or weaker, see, e.g., http://poincare.matf.bg.ac.rs/~andrew/suicide/StanGold/theory.htm.

You can also try to derive the piece values from the results that are obtained in automated parameter tuning for antichess engines. E.g., there is a paper on automated learning of piece values for chess variants, also including antichess/suicide, which you can find at http://www.ke.tu-darmstadt.de/publications/reports/tud-ke-2008-07.pdf. They got only negative piece values for antichess, so their engine probably was not strong enough to find that it can be good to have more pieces. Due to the simplified evaluation function they used (with basically only piece values), the result is not unexpected, I think.

In 2016, I added antichess to the Stockfish fork with support for multiple chess variants that is also used on lichess. Over time we improved the search and the evaluation function and repeatedly ran an automated optimization (with SPSA) of the piece values. When the evaluation function was very simple and the playing strength rather low, the optimal piece values were all negative. As the search and evaluation got more sophisticated and playing strength improved, the optimal piece values changed and some moved towards zero or even to positve values.

Today, it seems to be the strongest antichess chess, and the piece values mostly agree with intuition of strong human players. You can find the current piece values in the code. Since there are several other evaluation terms (piece-square table, mobility bonus, etc.) that are influenced by the presence of pieces, these values are not completely representative, though.

Here is a summary of my interpretation of Stockfish's piece values (also trying to consider the influence from other evaluation terms):

pawns are usually bad, since they are very restricted in their movements and are easy targets for forcing captures. I would give them a value of -1.
knights are quite dangerous, but for a strong player they can also be very useful pieces. According to Stockfish, the knight's value is about -1 in the middlegame, and +2 in the endgame.
bishops are usually very dangerous in the opening/middlegame, since the opponent can often get rid of all pieces if you have to start taking pieces with your bishop. Their value is about -3 in the middlegame and +2 in the endgame.
rooks tend to cause the same issues as bishops in the middlegame, but are usually very strong in the endgame. Their value is -5 in the middlegame and +2 in the endgame.
the queen can be useful in the opening due to her high mobility and the ability to quickly attack and capture pieces that are covered by the opponent, which might force him to take back in an unfavorable way. In the endgame the queen attacks too many squares and is usually bad. The piece value estimate is 0 in the middlegame and -2 in the endgame.
the king is a strong piece because it can move to many squares, but only locally. In this way, it can be used to avoid zugzwang and to put up local threats without attacking squares in the opponent's camp. The piece value is something like +2 in the middlegame and +3 in the endgame.

You might find that the results disagree with some the rules of thumb I linked above. That only confirms that it is hard to break down the evaluation of pieces in antichess positions to a few numbers.


According to the 365chess database, 5. Bg5 yielded a 6-2-0 record for amateur players.  There were no master games.

The pawn on e4 isn't too much of a liability as long as Black's King is in the middle of the board.

Here's a game where White is a FIDE(?) 2095 player.  White's cute little combination on move 12 ought to tell Black he's in for a long day.

[fen ""]
1.  e4  e5
2.  Nf3 Nc6
3.  d4  exd4
4.  Bc4 Qf6
5.  Bg5 Qg6
6.  O-O f6
7.  Bf4 d6
8.  Nxd4    Bh3
9.  Bg3 Nxd4
10. Qxd4    Bd7
11. Bxg8    Rxg8
12. Qd5 Qf7
13. Qxb7    Rd8
14. Nc3 Qc4
15. Qxa7    Rc8
16. Rfd1    Qc5
17. Qxc5    dxc5
18. Nd5 Bg4
19. f3  Be6
20. Nxc7+   Kf7
21. a4  c4
22. a5  Bc5+
23. Kf1 Rgd8
24. a6  Rxd1+
25. Rxd1    c3
26. b4  Bb6
27. Nxe6    Kxe6
28. Rd6+    Ke7
29. Rxb6    Ra8
30. Rb7+    Kd8
31. a7  Rxa7
32. Rxa7    g5
33. b5


I thought this is the best for Windows: http://www.amazon.com/CT-ART-Chess-Tactics-Training-Software/dp/1886846677


Where to find Tactical Exercises on the Decoy

The paid version of chesstempo allows you to search the problem database for all kinds of tactical motifs. Depending on your exact definition of "decoy tactic", you should look for what they call "attraction", "distraction", "clearance", "coercion", "sacrifice" and perhaps more.


Why is castling seen as making the king so safe?

The f7 pawn is really only a concern for beginners. It is not easy to attack for white with many pieces and is easily defended.

Generally (in the opening/middlegame) you want to surround your king with pieces or pawns for protection. Usually you don't want to bind your pieces to the protection of the king as they have other (attacking) duties. This leaves you with hiding the king behind pawns.

You want those protective pawns to be difficult to attack and difficult to exchange for other pawns as this would open files and diagonals, leaving your king without protection. A typical motive in chess (particularly with opposite side castling) is a pawn storm where the attacking side pushes its pawns forward in order to open lines around the enemy king. Obviously this is most difficult to achieve if the pawns are far away, i.e. close to their original position.

Another way to attack the protective pawns would be with pieces. This is often easier to do in the middle than towards the border where there are fewer squares available for the attacking pieces.

Now in the opening both sides fight for control of the center; basically in order to gain space to operate the pieces and because pieces can easily move to either side of the board from the center. In order to achieve this central control the players typically move one or two central pawns and concentrate piece activity around the center. This means that often the situation in the center is very dynamic and lines can be opened, pieces exchanged... (another typical motive: ''open lines in the center against an uncastled king''). You don't want to find your king among all this action in the middle of the board.

Taking all of this together in many cases hiding the king behind pawn chains on the side of the board after castling is usually a good idea for king safety. Another added advantage is that castling joins the rooks, i.e. the castled rook can easily get to the central files (c-d-e-f) where  there are often open or half open files to occupy.

There are also cases where players don't chose to castle (e.g. in some Sicilian and French opening lines), usually in positions with static, blocked centers and easily to attack king-/queen-sides.


Explaining middle game computer analysis

In the first position, f3 is good because it will open the white K after Nxf3 Bg4 then Bxf3 or maybe Rf3 in some cases as the light squares will be very weak (the analysis gave up the Nf3 with Ne5 immediately since the position was so bad that giving up a piece was "best"...if that is best, then it is dead lost). What is left is a HUGE Nc5 compared to a pathetic Bc2.

In the second diagram, you still have that Nc5 vs. the Bc2, but white is already down a piece. That is just lost, and a matter of time.


This has been one of my main two openings since it became popular in the 1980's again. With strong computers today, they say, and I agree with them, that black is virtually winning after the following line:

  [fen ""]

 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 e5 5.Nb5 d6 6.Bg5 Qxg5 7.Nc7+ Kd8 8.Nxa8 Nf6 {already -2.05 on Stockfish} 9. Nc3 Nd4! 10. h4 {best per four engines} (10. Qd2 Qxd2 11. Kxd2 b6) Qf4 11. g3 (11. Bd3 Be6 {and there is still nothing to stop the roundup of the Na8.}) Qf3 12. Qxf3 Nxf3 13. Kd1 {is given as best, and the Na8 soon falls.}

It is clear that black's development combined with his soon-to-be material advantage (Na8 falls), makes this winning for black, and there really isn't even much counterplay to make it interesting.

The problem earlier is that the Qg5 is very actively posted, e4 is weak, and the move Nc6-d4 is not only keeping the white queen from being active due to c2 being weak, but it blocks white from getting at many critical weak squares like d5, d6, and the d8 square where the black king is.


http://web.archive.org/web/20100605121529/http://www.dnevnik.bg/sport/2010/05/31/909514_organizatorite_na_macha_topalov_-_anand_ochakvat_pone/

It says (in Bulgarian):
"The match Topalov - Anand (2010) made an absolute record on the Internet. For all 12 games together recorded 2 million links to the live broadcast of individual computers, but for just the last party - 300 000. Usually it is assumed that three people on average watched on a computer..."

For Anand - Carlsen 2014: https://www.chess.com/news/an-interview-with-ilya-merenzon-organizer-of-anand-carlsen-4530

"The total number of unique visitors was 10.5 million with the highest traffic on the last day of the match: 2 million visitors."

I make no warranty as to the validity of the accounting of these numbers.


I play 1... Nf6 after 1. e4.  Then 2. e5 d5 3. exf6 exf6.  I have had great scores with this opening versus Chess master.

[FEN ""]

1. e4 Nf6 2. e5 d5 3. exf6 exf6

The idea is to have strong king side with 4 pawns for defence. The second advantage is the development. Bishop in c8 is ready for attacks. If white castle king side u can put pawn in h3 if gh3, Bh3 or @Nf3+.


There are several reasons having to write down the moves in standard chess games:

as a document, proof of the game and result (in some cases but not always the players also have to sign)
in order to confirm 50-move and 3-fold repetition rules
in order to count the number of moves which can be relevant for the time control (e.g. sometimes you have say 2 hours for the first 40 moves plus 1 hour for the next 20 moves plus 30 min for the rest)
to prevent cheating (players changing position of pieces, etc), though this is usually not much of an issue
for storage (so that you can later analyze your game or sometimes it might even be entered into a database)

With short time controls there is simply no time to write down the moves. Also with some longer time controls, it is sometimes allowed not to write down moves when the remaining time drops below some limit.

Just for information the technicalities on how to record (and how not to) moves are laid out in article 8 of the FIDE laws of chess


The key to tackling these kind of positions in a game is to imagine where you would like to put your pieces and then see how you could achieve that.
In this position for white the first aim would be to get the king to e5 to attack the e6 weakness and at the same time threaten to infiltrate on either f6 or d6. The problem is that black will have no problem defending the e6 weakness and defending the infiltration by keeping the king on e7 meanwhile shuffling the bishop.
Another weakness will be required to make progress. As it happens there is also no way of getting the king to e5 while the f pawn is on f4 so any plan will have to start with sacrificing the f4 pawn.
If it were white to move then the immediate f5 would force open the g file, a second weakness. Black would have to accept the sacrifice and ef would expose the black king to check from the rook so gf is forced. Then there is no way for black to both prevent the rook penetrating on the g file and prevent the king from infiltrating via f6 or d6. One line could go like this:
[fen "8/4k2p/p1b1p1pP/Pp1p2K1/1PpP1P2/2P1R3/8/8 w - - 0 1"]

1. f5 gxf5 2. Kf4 Be8 (2...Kf6 3. Rg3 {and black can't prevent the rook coming to g7 next move}) 3. Rg3 Bg6 4. Ke5 {Black is in zugzwang. Either the white rook is going to penetrate on the g file or the king is going to infiltrate on f6 or d6}

So, black's first task is to stop this simple plan. The only way to do that is with Kf7 which unpins the e pawn and allows the recapture ef. The problem for white with this is that it gets rid of the weak e6 pawn and replaces it with a weak d5 pawn.
The now open e file is nothing like as good as the open g file because of the white pawn on h6. The only way for black to defend an open g file is to block the file with the bishop on g6 but for the open e file all black needs to do is to cover the entry squares of e6, e7, e8 which can be done either by the king on f7 or a combination of the king on f6 and the bishop on c6. The weak d5 pawn can be protected by the bishop on either c6 or b7 and the white king can be prevented from infiltrating via e5 by the black king on f6.
If white could both threaten to infiltrate with the king to e5 and threaten to take the d5 pawn with the rook then a zugzwang could be possible but unfortunately the only way for the rook to threaten the d5 pawn is from e5 and if the rook is on e5 then the white king can't go to e5. Hence this position is a fortress.
This is what the lines would look like:
[fen "8/4k2p/p1b1p1pP/Pp1p2K1/1PpP1P2/2P1R3/8/8 b - - 0 1"]

1...Kf7 2. f5 exf5 3. Re5 Bb7 4. Kf4 (4. Re1 Bc6 5. Re2 Bd7 6. Kf4 Kf6) Bc6 5. Re1 Kf6 6. Re2 Bd7 7. Re5 Bc6

Going back to the initial position is there anything white can do to prepare the f5 push to make it work? Or, to put it another way, what must black do to stop f5 from working. The answer is that black must keep the king on f7, ready to both defend the e file if it opens and to play kf6 if white threatens to play Ke5. At the same time black's bishop must defend the d5 pawn from either c6 or b7 whenever the white rook is on e5 and it must defend the e8 entry square from d7 or c6 whenever the rook is not on e5.


The furthest distance is from one corner to the opposite one.  You can get from a1 to h8 in six moves, for example a1,c2,d4,f3,e5,g6,h8.  There are few pairs of squares that take more than four moves.


In the endgame KQ vs K, can you premove your way to checkmate?

If the enemy king is cut off at the edge of the board, it is possible to mate him using only premoves. For example:

[StartPly "1"]
[FEN "2k5/Q7/8/8/8/8/8/K7 w - - 0 1"]

      1.Ka2 Kd8 2.Ka3 Kc8 3.Ka4 Kd8 4.Ka5 Kc8 5.Ka6 Kd8 6.Qb7 Ke8 7.Kb6 Kd8 8.Qc7+ Ke8 9.Kc6 Kf8 10.Qd7 Kg8 11.Kd6 Kf8 12.Qe7+ Kg8 13.Ke6 Kh8 14.Kf6 (14.Qf7??=) Kg8 15.Qg7#

Just make sure you don't stalemate your opponent with 14.Qf7.
Note that there is of course a much quicker path to mate, the sequence of moves just shows it is possible to exclusively use premoves.

If the enemy king is not cut off at the edge of the board, I doubt if it is possible to premove the entire sequence. In order to mate him, the quadrant in which the enemy king is located has to be narrowed. And that is the problem: whenever the queen is moved, the king might escape the quadrant.


Classical Scheveningen: Why is ...Ne8 so rare in this position?

Haven't checked, but I would guess it is due to a combination of weaker players (the classical Scheveningen is not all that popular nowadays), most games being blitz or bullet and the move not being obvious.
While it might be the strongest move in the position, the maneuver Ne8, Bf6 is not obvious at first glance.  It comes with some downsides which have to be carefully considered before deciding on it:

the move removes one attacker from the pawn on e4 (even though it cannot be currently taken)
the move blocks the rook on f8
it moves an active piece backwards (at least a psychological factor)
white could reply e5?! at one point which is not easy to calculate. It could either be a strong move blocking the knight (and therefore the Rf8) and lead to an attack on the black king. Or it could turn out to be weakening with black freeing himself and moving the knight via c7 to strong light squares in the center. In any case it is not easy to calculate.

Other factors could be the mentioned shorter time control, player strength, or perhaps some players preferring to move the Rf8 before Ne8.


Conceptually, what makes the Sicilian opening sensible for black?

Note: Discussions are primarily from black's perspective.

It may be relevant to remind that one way or the other, most often, the Sicilian continues with white preparing the d4 pawn push, which leads to a trade of the c5-d4 pawns.
Common starting lines are shown in the following diagram:

 [title "common starting lines"]
 [fen ""]

 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 (2...d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6) (2...e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 Bb4) (2...g6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Bg7 5.Nc3 Nc6 6.Be3 Nf6) 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4

At a very basic and fundamental level, the Sicilian 1.e4 c5 achieves the following:

Claims immediate control over the center, otherwise white would happily take the full sweet center with e4-d4.
Leads to a trade of a non-central pawn (c7) for a white's central pawn (d2)!
Provides a certain degree of flexibility in how to commit the central e-d pawns. And also breaks the symmetry right from the start, which tends to make the continuation of the game more dynamic.

For the purposes of your question, I will further expand on the first two points:

Expanding on point 1:

Claiming their share of control over the center: white's e4 actives the queen and bishop, but more importantly it provides light square control in the center as it takes away d5-f5 from black. That does not mean d5 is unplayable, in fact that opening exists (see Scandinavian Defense) but it simply means black can't establish a pawn on d5 and maintain it, as white will immediately take. Similarly, black's c5 in return, provides dark square control as it controls b4 and more importantly d4. On the plus side, it stops white from landing a pawn on d4 without having had to commit their central pawns (black's e & d pawns remain flexible still). But on the other hand, c5 is not a move that provides activity to any minor piece, in fact it only activates the queen, therefore, the setback of it is that it doesn't directly contribute to black's minor piece development, as you also hinted at in your question.

And on point 2: not all pawns are equal

At a basic level of pawn consideration: the Sicilian almost always leads white to trade a central pawn for a non-central pawn, and that in itself is a gain for black!

To see why consider the following thought process: generally, we say pawns have a value of 1, as a means of quantifying their worth relative to the other pieces, which are dynamically faster and move reversibly. But amongst the pawns themselves, do they all have the same value still?

Well let's consider e.g. white's queenside pawns: the a2 pawn which is at the boundary of the board, only provides control over one square, namely b3. In contrast, the b2 pawn being slightly away from the boundary, provides control over 2 squares, a3 and c3. And even when you push these pawns, the relative control they provide remains similar. However, things become more interesting towards the more central pawns: the c2 pawn, also provides control over 2 squares, but when pushed for example to c4, it also provides us with control over a central square, namely d5, and a non-central and less important square, b5.

And finally, the pawn on d2, when pushed to d4, it provides control over a central (e5) square and a near-central (c5) square, meaning it secures more central space than a c pawn is capable of doing2. So, with all that in mind, doesn't it stand to reason that the central pawns are in fact worth more than the side pawns? and indeed it does. Intuitively, if you imagine the b2 pawn being worth 1, then the a2 pawn is something like 0.9, and the d and e pawns are probably close to 1.1-1.2. But the absolute values you assign to them do not matter much, it's more important to remember conceptually their differences.
To conclude this point, in the Sicilian, black is in fact exchanging the pawn on c7 for the pawn on d2, so clearly, black's getting away with a better deal in that regard1.

I guess the common denominator of all these discussions and different points boils down to the control over the center. This cannot be emphasized enough: Having the center, your pieces move and reroute more efficiently across the board, they also see a larger portion of the board when centralised. So much like the pawn comparison above, it's as if their relative worth increases when they are placed more centrally. Compare a bishop on e5 which sees 13 other squares distributed over two diagonals (so sees both the king and queen side), to a bishop on h8 which sees 7 squares only, and all of them along the same diagonal.

Two Caveats:

1: All things considered, it begs to ask: doesn't all this mean that black should even be better by playing the Sicilian? What does white have to gain by allowing all this?
Short answer: tempo and initiative.
Longer answer: To understand these things you need to always remember than chess is never that linear, and that there are many more angles to consider before we can fully assess a position. In this case, white has the better activity and develops more efficiently. These stem from the fact that in the Sicilian white's first 2 pawn moves in the game are (often) e4 (by definition) and d4 (after being prepared by Nf3). Thus, both our bishops are activated, and nothing prohibits our knights from being developed centrally. Sure, white trades a better d2 pawn for a c pawn, but in return the d file becomes semi-open for white, along which white will exert pressure (and so should do black along its own semi-open file, namely the c file). Being up in development means we castle faster, and have more pieces in play, so white will still be for the most part dictating the flow of the game.

2 One might ask whether the relative worth of the e-f-g-h pawns follows symmetrically from the discussion of the queenside pawns.  Partly yes, but major difference is that these are kingside pawns, and as such, their movement leaves behind weaknesses around the king. So if you will, the king is what breaks the symmetry between the left and right side of the board. For example, when the c2 pawn moves, it leaves light square weaknesses behind it but these are squares that are of lesser concern for black as often the king will not lie behind them. In contrast, when the f pawn moves, it weakens the dark squares around the king and exposes it to diagonal attacks (and leaves holes for pieces to land on near your king.)


There are, of course, some players who have been given the title in perfectly "respectable" circumstances like reaching a certain rating or reaching 50% in an Olympiad. However, try this. Go to the FIDE rating website and do an advanced search for titled players sorted by rating ascending.

The first 7 players in the list are WCM with ratings between 1032 and 1143. The next is a WFM with a rating of 1154! Which kind of throws doubt on the WFM title too. Then the first CM with a rating of 1161. Ignoring the WCMs for the moment and just looking for CMs we see that the next ones come in at 1204, 1247, 1282, 1298.

What we also see with these very low rated CMs and WCMs is that they are very young, some as young as 7 years old. And therein lies a clue. Another way to get the WCM and CM titles is by finishing in places 1 through 3 in world and continental championships in age groups going down as far as under 7.

These titles are titles for life so if they give up altogether or just play a few games a year and stop improving they will always have their titles.

You judge if giving out titles to players with sub 1200 ratings devalues those titles or not.


What does "knights have no long-lasting support points" mean in this game?

It is not that the pawn on f5 achieves/helps this. As far as I understand Silman, what he means is that black can play 10...f5, which gives white a protected passed pawn and which weakens the square e6, because white's knights will eventually be driven away when black plays c5, etc

Look at the position after 18.... Ne6 for instance. Black has achieved everything he wanted: blocked the passed pawn with his knight, gained space in the center through his pawns on c5 and d5, has a very strong bishop on a6.... The white knights on the other hand have no good squares  to go to and also the other pieces of white don't do much.

Consider the opposite situation, where the white knights could not be driven away (i.e. where they have long-lasting support points). For instance if white had a (protected) pawn on c5 in the initial position, black would have a very hard time after f5 because the knight on d4 attacks f5, c6 and hinders black from blocking the passed pawn by placing a piece on e6. It also hinders black from play on the queenside (because the c6 pawn might be weak or hanging). Furthermore the second white knight could be moved to e3 further adding to the pressure.

So essentially what Silman is saying is that Kramnik can play 10...f5 which is against the principle of not giving your opponent protected passed pawns, because in this situation here, white cannot make use of this asset. The knights will be kicked away and black's play on the queenside is more valuable than the protected passed pawn, which often only pays off in an endgame.


A lot of endgame work is dry, and there is no getting around that.

I learned endgames long before those books were available, and although it was a lot of work, I loved Ruben Fine's "Basic Chess Endings". In it, there would be a base example, but then often, many other similar examples. By going through it, I saw multiple examples that were similar, thus reinforcing the main ideas of each.

If that is not for you, then probably "Silman's Complete Endgame Course" is a good place to start. I also really like Jesús de la Villa's "100 Endgames You Must Know", and its accompanying workbook.

"Dvoretsky's Endgame Manual" is really for players, who are close to the master level already, and it assumes a great deal of previous endgame knowledge.

A lot of these books focus on theoretical type positions, but you will also want books that pick more positions that are from practical games, as they transition from middlegame into the endgame. You need both types. For example, Shereshevsky's "Endgame Strategy". He also wrote a two-volume series that covered typical endgames from both open and closed games, called "Mastering the Endgame".

Here is a article on "Endgame Strategy".


I am looking for a chess game on nintendo ds that is suitable for beginners

I had a look at the various options a long time ago, and the two I would suggest would be Chessmaster and Fritz DS. Both of these allow you to set the strength of the opponent and don't distract you with "fun" graphics jumping all over the screen. If you don't have the means to test them out and just want a purchase recommendation, I found Chessmaster to be a more complete package.

However, both of these share the problem that is present in all chess programs, which is that at a lower strength level they play in a very un-human-like manner. They'll occasionally make really good moves and occasionally make terrible ones, only the scale is tipped towards the latter as you set the rating lower and lower. As a result, if you are planning to use this as a way of learning the game to play against other humans be away that a real person will play very differently.


How do I find bitboard attack maps non-manually?

Stockfish (https://stockfishchess.org/download/) is open source and uses magic bitboards.
Crafty (https://craftychess.com/) uses bitboards and is heavily commented.
There are other using bitboards, but these two are the best.
Hopefully this helps.


In general, prophylaxis can be used to prevent the rooks getting on the 7th. This is the preferred defense; common challenging moves are to contest open columns with your own rooks, or to guard the 7th rank squares with your minor pieces.

In the case that the rooks are already on the 7th, you should secure the most urgent threats (where your king is or where most of your loose material is), and then trade off rooks or go on the offensive.

Hope that helps!


Is it bad etiquette to decline a draw offer when participating in a simul?

No it's not bad etiquette at all. A player being higher rated does not entitle them to automatically get the result they want, even if the position seems to indicate such a result.

And in the rare case your opponent gets offended by this, congratulations. You've just gained a psychological edge.


Check out Chess Position Trainer. Also Chessbase has a training mode where you can create quizzes for certain moves.


E.Umnov's chess problem, 1944. Checkmate in two moves

1.Re4, threatening 2.Ra4#. Black has many possible moves, but all of them allow either Ra4#, Qa2# Qb7#, or Rxe8# (did I miss any?).

(In the spirit of "teaching a man to fish", if you can't solve a checkmate problem and decide to give up, you can always feed it to a chess engine and get an instant answer without having to wait for someone to reply to an online post. For example, try https://lichess.org/analysis ).


Collusion in a simultaneous blindfold exhibition

Partial Answer

Just in case it gets deleted, @shivksy left a helpful comment that seems to partially answer the question. It would make a good answer in itself in my opinion.

Here is the comment in it's full glory:

"Fascinating topic. An answer may lie within the book amazon.com/Thought-Choice-Chess-Adriaan-Groot/dp/4871877582. One of the observations made in this very scientific treatise on chess thought process is that Grandmaster memory/recall for non-standard/weird positions that cannot be chunked and recalled is surprisingly no better than lower rated players. In other words, they are pattern-recognition geniuses who are a bit more helpless with statistically infrequent patterns. Perhaps one could stress our expert to store (without the power of chunking) a ton of weird positions?"


There are several important points to know when playing a computer:

They will certainly outplay you in sharp positions, and they make nonsense moves in closed positions that involve positional play.
They have an horizon, that is, a moment where they cannot see any further.
They are very, very greedy. A pawn is a pawn they say, and the computer certainly likes material.

Knowing these, a human can try to capitalize by closing the position, simplifying and drying it until the computer has almost no tactical base, and simply makes useless moves. If the human manages to make the computer blunder (because of its horizon it cannot calculate further, but the human clearly sees that his positional advantage will grant him the win) or develops a (positional) plan that simply destroys the computer's position strategically, he most certainly will own the game.

Some famous examples are provided by the top GM Hikaru Nakamura. Here against Rybka you can see how he benefits from the fact that Rybka's programming does not allow it to give a draw when it's up in material (it was two exchanges up and about to arrive to the 50 move rule), and thus blunders several pawns trying to push the game and loses. Here you may look for more information on the match Nakamura (2770 ish) - Stockfish (3300 ish), where the GM had many great closed positions that seemed to end inevitably in a draw, but pushed too hard for the win and ended up losing.


My suspicion is that the computer is calculating at a depth of 3-ply. At 3-ply depth, it sees that the following variations are winning -

1. Nf6+ gxf6 2. Rxd7 and

1. Qxb6 Qxd5 2. Rxd5

winning material.

If it was at 4-ply or more, it would have seen 2...Re1# in both lines and rejected those lines.

To answer your question, no, Black doesn't have a win in this position. White can play 1. Qc1 and white is fine.


Another notable top player was Karpov in the 70s and first half of the 80s. But after Kasparov successfully employed the Sicilian against him and took the world championship title, Karpov switched to 1.d4 mainly.

Kasparov also tended to favour 1.e4, although as he matured as a world champion he played other opening moves too (as any top player should).

Nowadays I can't think of many players who favour 1.e4 predominantly. One exception I can think of though is Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. He is known for being a strong proponent of 1.e4 as White and the Najdorf Sicilian as Black. In general though, most modern top players play 1.e4 and 1.d4 (as well as other moves) since it broadens their repertoire. If you always play 1.e4 then people can prepare to surprise you (and it's harder for you to surprise them).


How close was Seirawan to challenging Kasparov?

There are games on record between the two:

[Title "Yasser Seirawan vs Garry Kasparov (1986)"]
[Event "Dubai"]
[Site "Dubai"]
[Date "1986.11.23"]
[EventDate "?"]
[Round "8"]
[Result "1-0"]
[White "Yasser Seirawan"]
[Black "Garry Kasparov"]
[ECO "D91"]
[PlyCount "123"]
[FEN ""]

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.Nf3 Bg7 5.Bg5 Ne4 6.cxd5 Nxg5
7.Nxg5 e6 8.Nf3 exd5 9.b4 Qd6 10.a3 O-O 11.e3 c6 12.Be2 Bf5
13.O-O Nd7 14.Na4 a5 15.Qb3 b5 16.Nc5 a4 17.Qc3 Nb6 18.Nd2
Rae8 19.Rfe1 Re7 20.Bf3 Rfe8 21.g3 Bh3 22.Bg2 Bxg2 23.Kxg2 f5
24.h4 Nc4 25.Nf3 Bf6 26.Re2 Rg7 27.Rh1 Qe7 28.Ree1 h6 29.Qd3
Rf8 30.Nd2 Qe8 31.Nxc4 dxc4 32.Qd1 Re7 33.Ref1 Qf7 34.Qf3 Qd5
35.Qxd5+ cxd5 36.Kf3 Bg7 37.Rd1 Rff7 38.Rd2 Re8 39.Rdd1 Bf8
40.Rdg1 Bg7 41.Rd1 Kf8 42.Rd2 Ke7 43.Rdd1 Kd6 44.Rh2 Kc6
45.Rhh1 Bf8 46.Rd2 Bd6 47.Rdd1 Bxc5 48.dxc5 Re4 49.Rhe1 Rd7
50.Rd4 g5 51.hxg5 hxg5 52.Red1 Rxd4 53.Rxd4 Rh7 54.Ke2 Rh3
55.g4 f4 56.exf4 Rxa3 57.fxg5 Ra2+ 58.Kf3 c3 59.Rd1 d4 60.g6
d3 61.Ke3 Rxf2 62.g7 1-0

[Title "Garry Kasparov vs Yasser Seirawan (1988): You Come at the King, You Best Not Miss"]
[Event "Thessaloniki ol (09)"]
[Site "Thessaloniki GRE"]
[Date "1988.11.22"]
[EventDate "?"]
[Round "9"]
[Result "1-0"]
[White "Garry Kasparov"]
[Black "Yasser Seirawan"]
[ECO "D21"]
[PlyCount "76"]
[FEN ""]

1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 c5 3.c4 dxc4 4.Nc3 cxd4 5.Qxd4 Qxd4 6.Nxd4 Bd7
7.Ndb5 Na6 8.e4 Nf6 9.f3 Bxb5 10.Nxb5 e5 11.Be3 Bb4+ 12.Kf2
Ke7 13.Bxc4 Rhc8 14.Rac1 Bc5 15.Rhd1 Bxe3+ 16.Kxe3 Ne8 17.Bb3
Rxc1 18.Rxc1 f6 19.a3 Nd6 20.Bd5 Nxb5 21.Bxb7 Nbc7 22.Bxa8
Nxa8 23.Rc8 Nb6 24.Rg8 Kf7 25.Rh8 Nc5 26.Rb8 Ke7 27.b4 Nc4+
28.Ke2 Nd7 29.Rg8 g5 30.a4 a5 31.bxa5 Nxa5 32.Ra8 Nc6 33.a5
Kd6 34.g3 h5 35.h4 gxh4 36.gxh4 Nc5 37.a6 Kc7 38.a7 Nb7 1-0

[Title "Cup World: Seirawan vs Kasparov (1989)"]
[Event "Cup World"]
[Site "Skelleftea SWE"]
[Date "1989.08.??"]
[EventDate "?"]
[Round "13"]
[Result "1/2-1/2"]
[White "Yasser Seirawan"]
[Black "Garry Kasparov"]
[ECO "E75"]
[PlyCount "85"]
[FEN ""]

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 Bg7 4.e4 d6 5.Be2 O-O 6.Bg5 c5 7.d5 h6
8.Be3 e6 9.Qd2 exd5 10.cxd5 Re8 11.f3 h5 12.a4 a6 13.a5 Nh7
14.Bd1 Nd7 15.Nge2 Ne5 16.b3 Qh4+ 17.Bf2 Qf6 18.Qe3 h4 19.h3
g5 20.O-O Bd7 21.Kh1 Nf8 22.Bg1 Nfg6 23.Bh2 c4 24.Rb1 Rac8
25.Qa7 Nf4 26.bxc4 Nxc4 27.Rxb7 Nd2 28.Rg1 Nxh3 29.e5 Rxe5
30.Rxd7 Nxg1 31.Qxg1 Ree8 32.Rxd6 Qf5 33.Ba4 Qd3 34.Bxe8 Rxe8
35.Rc6 h3 36.Bg3 hxg2 37.Qxg2 Nxf3 38.d6 Re6 39.Qf2 g4 40.Rc8+
Kh7 41.Nf4 Rh6+ 42.Kg2 Ne1+ 43.Kg1 1/2-1/2

Yasser Seirawan won the World Junior Chess Championship in 1979 in Skien Norway, a year before Garry Kasparov won it in Dortmund Germany. The two were contemporaneous. Seirawan proceeded to train in Switzerland with Korchnoi following his Junior Chess Championship win.

It's not precisely clear why the two didn't meet up in international competition. In the games they played it seems Seirawan was competitive against Kasparov.

In interview's Seirawan stated publicly that he doesn't like the FIDE cycle at all and that he always enjoyed being busy and working on projects (such as writing). Speculating, it could be Seirawan's dedication to editing Inside Chess magazine and his dislike for the FIDE cycle may have distracted him away from international competition.

Perhaps only Seirawan knows.


Story of unexpectedly high (400+) Elo rising in few months (reaching 2500 Elo mark)

Ok, I finally got it!!!
Here is the link I've been looking for:
Zibbit's blog


How can a drawish opening be fashionable?

If I choose a well known drawish opening, it sends two messages to my opponent:

Offer me a draw and I'll accept it
If you play for a win, you'll just smash against my rocks.  If you try too hard, you'll lose.  If you don't, you'll probably just get a draw anyway.

Of course, some opponents won't care and will fight for the win while others will be more than ready to throw in the towel, especially if there's a rating difference in the opponent's favor.

This really only applies to master play.  Amateurs make enough mistakes that nothing is drawish, nothing is safe.


Try using the chessboard on https://szachydzieciom.pl/?page_id=61146 in full screen mode (click the full screen icon). I know that in some schools in Poland it works well with touch whiteboards. But dragging pieces may not work. Instead you should tap the piece to move and then disconnect your hand and tap the target square separately.


Sacrifices, initial loss and a volte-face?

This question might be a little too much in the discussion, no definitive answer category but I will answer anyway.

My answer would be the game known as the immortal game between Adolf Anderssen and Lionel Kieseritzky on 21 June 1851. Anderssen gave up both rooks and a bishop, then his queen, checkmating his opponent with his three remaining minor pieces.

Wikipedia's entry on the game is here

As a side note the list of games here has many games that would fall into this category, I haven't looked at them all but there are many interesting games on this list.


The Dragon Variation of Sicilian is complex and difficult to defend sometimes against White's ferocious King side attack. I will recommend Dragon to those Players only who are not timid enough to sacrifice material against activity. Since in Dragon normal theory Black does a Castling with his fianchettoed Bishop & the g6 pawn is hooked to White's h5 pawn sacrifice.

Unlike Najdorf where White also attacks mostly on K-side but Black has equally good chances to attack White on the Q-side since with a6 on move 5th b5 from Black comes faster and dislodges the Knight on c3. In Dragon the attack from Black is somewhat slow compared to Najdorf.

In Najdorf there is one variation where Black does a Fianchetto also. Below is the variation:

[FEN ""]

1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3 a6 6.f4 g6

and with any other move from White like Qf3 or Be2 Black puts his Bishop on g7 .


Your understanding and judgment about a couple of things is way off.

First, you really need to understand that all isolated pawns are not created equal. If it were on an open file, then you need to worry about it becoming a weakness more (frontal attack by rooks, in particular), but here, because after d5 cd; cd it is shielded by the pd6, it is hard for black to attack d5, let alone win it. Also, again, you are mistaking the famous "isolani" positions, which is an isolated d-pawn on the open file, which can often go to d5 and create k-side chances. This is not that position. This gains space, which in some types of positions can lead to an attack if the center is closed, but here, although I like d5, there are too many open lines in the middle to hope that a k-side attack will work.

I like d5 because it gains more space, and you will have the excellent d4 square for the Nf3 after you finish developing a bit more. That is a tangible and relatively permanent plus in your position.

If you do not do it now, black should play d5, and the position is closer to level. It is now, or never, and you are not losing anything on your development because black has to move the B twice also.

Positions like this typically will come down to who can seize the e-file. Even though the c-file is also open, in practice, it is not as important as the e-file. If you can double rooks, and black cannot oppose them, often due to his pieces tripping over each other in the lack of space, you will win. Also, then, and only then, you may be able to execute that k-side attack with Re3-g3 or h3.

Also, after d5 cd; cd, there is no really good square for the B to go to. c8 undevelopes it, d7 and the Q or N also want that square. f5, and Nd4 will come with tempo. g4, and white will play h3 and either gain the B pair, or at least gain luft with tempo.

Lastly, I also noticed that black's q-side will be vulnerable after the B goes to e3. For the Ra8 to move, then a6 will need to be played, and then maybe Nc4-b6 might happen. Also, if Na6-c5, black might try to secure the N with a5, and then b5 could lead to something.

All, and all, as a Master for 34 years, I really like d5.

The following is in response to the question below. It was too long to just add in as a comment.

First, let’s discuss the idea of Bc8 with b6 and Bb7. It is very bad for the following reasons: You are talking about spending three moves to reposition the B to b7, and you weaken c6, which white will get to soon. Nd4 supported by an eventual Rc1, and then the N will go to c6 severely cramping black. A white Nc6 will be absolutely intolerable, so you will be forced to spend yet another move to trade the Bb7 off for it. This will create a strong passed pawn for white on c6, and it will then expose the black pd6, which will then be on an open file, and possibly give white use of d5 for a piece, although there is no immediately good piece that could go there. Of course, white will not play Nc6 until he is sure that it will not simply be lost. In addition, all these moves are sure to put you way behind in development.

This Nd4-c6 idea protected by a pd5 is a very common idea, and compare it to Yusupov-Kuzmin 1981 (PGN below). Go through that game around the move 15.Ne5. The threat of e5 forced black to take drastic measures, but try to make other reasonable moves, and see just how much that N hinders black, and look at what happens when he takes it because he cannot tolerate it. Neither is a good option.

I do not like the B going to g4 because as white I am happy for you to trade it off on f3 giving me the two Bs. Also, if I do not lose a tempo playing h3 (“luft”, which is German for air, meaning you will not be able to backrank mate me later), which will probably be helpful later, that is another small plus. Chess is a game of accumulating small plusses at least when playing similarly-rated opponents. I am also a very positional player, and like closed and semi-closed positions, so that type of position is right up my alley. I am willing to make your position uncomfortable, and wait for you to crack.

This game comes from the 11/26/2008 version of ChessBase.

[Title "Artur Jussupow-Gennadi  Kuzmi, Moscow, URS Team Tournament-ch15 Final A Tournament, 5/16/1981"]
[FEN ""]

1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 d5 4. cxd5 Nxd5 5. e4 Nxc3 6. bxc3 Bg7 7. Nf3 O-O 8. Be2 c5 9. O-O Nd7 10. Bg5 cxd4 11. cxd4 Nf6 12. Qd3 b6 13. Rac1 Bb7 14. d5 Qd7 15. Ne5 Qd6 16. Nc6 Qd7 17. e5 Nxd5 18. Nxe7+ Kh8 19. Bf3 Rae8 20. Rfd1 Rxe7 21. Bxe7 Qxe7 22. Bxd5 Rd8 23. Qb3 Bxd5 24. Rxd5 Rxd5 25. Qxd5 Bxe5 26. g3 Bd6 27. Qd4+ Qe5 28. Rd1 1-0


Aggressive variation against Queen's Gambit Declined?

Maybe the 5.Bf4 lines are a good fit. In the 5.Bg5 lines, black can often exchange bishops with the Lasker/Capablance maneuver, involving an early ...Ne4 or ...Nd5 forcing the bishop exchange, and it is hard to get aggressive play against that. 5.Bf4 avoids that, with the drawback that there is less pressure on d5, allowing ...c5 by black. Usually white takes the pawn.

There's an all star list of top players who have used it -- Kasparov, Topalov, Ivanchuk, Kramnik, Gelfand, Korchnoi, et cetera.

I should probably add an example game here but I don't know one from the top of my head and I don't have much time...

A recent book that advocates this line is Burgess' "A Cunning Repertoire for White", which is a generic 1.d4 opening repertoire book.