Chessville
logo by
ChessPrints
Chessmaze
International
"Premier Manufacturer of
Tournament Chess Products"
Largest Exporter to the USA
Offices in China & UK |
Chess
Supplies
at the
Chessville
Chess
Store!
Sets, Boards,
Clocks, Bags,
Books,
Software,
and Much
Much More!
Place Your Ad
in Chessville
or in
The Chessville
Weekly
Advertise to
thousands
of
chess
fans
for
as little
as $25.
Single insert:
$35
x4 insert:
@ $25 each.
Submit your
ad here!
Pablo's
Chess
News
Problem
of the
Week
Reference
Center
Book
Reviews
Annotated
Games
|
An Introduction to Chess Strategy
for the Novice Player
by
Bill Whited
One of the more engaging debates that rage between chess
players revolves around chess strategy versus chess tactics. Chess is one of
those games that takes a few days to learn and the rest of your life to
master, and most new players, whether they be adults or scholastic players,
learn very early on that losing a significant amount of material is a sure
path to disaster. Since many authorities equate losing material with chess
tactics, most books that teach beginners emphasize learning tactics over
strategy. It doesn’t do a whole lot of good to have the strategic advantage
of a strong knight posted on d6 if you lose your Queen on the next move. You
will find that most of your opponents can easily overcome this “strategic”
disadvantage with the extra material.
Once you move beyond the “dropped material” stage though, understanding
strategy becomes much more important. I want to emphasize here that chess is
a mixture of strategy and tactics. Whether you favor or one or the other
depends on your skill level, your personality to some extent, and the
current stage of your development.
This article is intended to help a new player develop a “chess style”. To
stronger players, the idea of a “class” player developing a “chess style”
may seem somewhat premature. It is important to remember though that you
must be comfortable with your style of play, no matter what your playing
strength. If your favorite opening is “The Wilkes Barre Variation” of the
Two Knights Defense, you aren’t going to be comfortable trying to play like
the late Tigran Petrosian. Things are completely different if you enjoy
chess as a slow steady buildup of your forces, marshalling your pieces as if
you were on a two-year plan for the invasion of Normandy and then gradually
grinding your opponent into a king and pawn ending. For you, the ultimate
compliment will be the complete befuddlement of your opponent to the point
where he doesn’t even know why he lost.
The argument of positional vs. tactical style has probably been going on
since the days of Greco and Ruy Lopez and the invention of Western chess in
the 15th century. The powerful new Queen opened up all kinds of tactical
possibilities and tactics ruled until the age of Philidor in the latter half
of the 18th century, who was probably the first Master to truly understand
positional play as we define it today. He certainly understood pawn play and
his positional knowledge of the game made him the most formidable player of
his day.
Philidor stood in stark contrast to the Romantic school of chess, which had
held sway since Greco’s day in the early 17th century. The Romantics lived
for the attack and in an era of poorly understood defensive techniques,
their slashing attacks and brilliant sacrifices often succeeded. Greco, La
Bourdannais and Anderrsen are examples of this school of play. It wasn’t
until Morphy in the middle of the 19th century that the importance of
strategy and positional play began to be more clearly understood &
recognized.
Morphy, as a player, and later Steinitz, as both a player and a
theoretician, began to write finis to the Romantic school of chess by
establishing certain positional principles that needed to be in place if
attacks were to succeed. Until this time, most players believed that
brilliant combinations & attacking play were simply a matter of imagination
& genius. Morphy and Steinitz showed that in fact, they were the product of
positional play that had set the stage for them. Steinitz took the concepts
farther and laid out the principles for defending a position. In the early
20th century, Siegbert Tarrasch synthesized these ideas into the “Classical”
school of chess and the battle over a “positional” style versus a “tactical”
style has been raging ever since.
Now all this is very interesting, but it really doesn’t address the reason
you are reading this article in the first place. The reason you seek to
develop a style is to get better at the game. In order to get better at the
game, you have to co-ordinate four elements, which are space, time, force,
and pawn structure. The difficulty is that all these elements shift like the
sands of the Arabian Desert. In order to take advantage of them, it becomes
necessary to evaluate the position, come up with a plan, carry out the plan
and win the game. The first step to accomplishing this is to learn tactics
and learn them well. Tactics are a combination of pattern recognition and
calculation. The more familiar you are with the pattern of a particular
tactic, the more likely you are to recognize it over the board.
Pattern recognition is an acquired skill. Some people may have it to a much
greater degree than others, but unless you are planning to contend for the
World Championship, you probably have more than enough innate pattern
recognition ability to bring your rating up two hundred points or so in well
under a year if you want to take the time to work at it. Rapid Chess
Improvement by Michael De la Maza outlines a complete player improvement
program for club players interested in improving their ratings by 200 points
or more, using only tactical improvement as the basis. While this may strike
some people as radical, most club players or “class” players lose most of
their games because of tactical oversights. This having been said, they end
up making the tactical oversight because of a failure to understand their
position.
Force or material is a pretty straightforward concept. If I have an extra
piece, this additional force should allow me to win. You usually acquire
this superior force through the mistake of an opponent or through a
brilliant tactical device of your own. Tactics involve elements such as
skewers, forks, x-ray attacks, and sacrifices. Mastering these tactical
motifs thoroughly will add hundreds of points to your rating and is the
reason that many players go through large jumps in strengths before hitting
a plateau. The inability to master tactics probably stalls more players in
the lower classes than anything relating to positional play or the opening.
Over the last thirty years there has been an increasing emphasis on opening
books. More recently, several excellent books detailing positional play have
come out. This is a great thing although it is something of a letdown to
have achieved a won game and then lose because you overlooked a mate in one.
Mastering an opening without adequate tactical ability usually means that
you will find yourself in a complicated position that your opponent may very
well understand better than you do. Tactical players love situations like
this one, since it facilitates their main objective of putting you at a
significant disadvantage.
A key element in raising your rating is to play in tournaments. Tournaments,
whether they are Over-the-Board (OTB), online, or correspondence events,
have the advantage of giving you the opportunity to play stronger players.
Losing to stronger players is not completely a bad thing as long as you
rigorously analyze your games afterwards, either with your opponent, your
coach, or just your friends at the local chess club. Losing to weaker
players has no discernible advantages, other than as a lesson in humility.
Assuming for the moment that you have mastered the tactical intricacies of
the game, you are left with other style issues to ponder. We have talked
about force or material. The other elements of the game relate to space,
time, and pawn structure.
“The seeds of defeat lie in a cramped position” –Siegbert Tarrasch
Wilhelm Steinitz essentially invented most of the positional concepts that
are still quoted in chess manuals today. Tarrasch modified these ideas and
codified them into instructional manuals that are still valid today. He
didn’t understand all of Steinitz’s ideas, but he did get most of them.
Steinitz created the following positional concepts that are basic to the
game. Thousands of pages have been written in chess literature explaining or
trying to explain these ideas with various degrees of success. Some of them
were not original but it was Steinitz’s interpretation and explanation of
them that made the difference. Gaining a fundamental understanding of these
ideas, combined with a strong amount of effort on the tactical side of your
game, will lead to a gradual increase in strength.
Positional concept 1: A lead in development. This relates to time since a
lead in development will eventually dissipate with time. The opening phase
of the game is concerned with development and an opening where you don’t end
up developing your pieces properly will usually lead to an attack by your
opponent.
Positional concept 2: Superior mobility. Your pieces have free movement and
good squares where they can be effectively posted. The bad bishop is the
most notorious example of a piece without good squares because of the
limitations placed on it by its own pawns.
Positional concept 3: Occupation and control of the center. This is one of
the oldest principles of chess and has been subject to a number of
interpretations over the years. Because all of your pieces are more
effective if they are in the center of the board, controlling the center
usually means that you will have control of the game. Resolving the tension
in the center is a precondition for an attack.
Positional concept 4: Unsafe king position. If your king is liable to
attack, you have a significant positional problem. Steinitz always
considered the King to be a strong piece. It is also a juicy target, so
beware!
Positional concept 5: Weak squares. Weak squares can be defined as squares
where your opponent can safely post his pieces. Weak squares provide an
entry point into your territory and are often the precursor to an attack.
Naturally, if you can exploit the weak squares of your opponent, then they
will work for you.
Positional concept 6: United pawns and isolated pawns. Pawn structure is a
key to understanding positional chess because the characteristics of pawn
structures determine the nature of the entire game. Connected pawns support
one another and control squares. Isolated pawns are unsupported and are
subjected to being blockaded by enemy pieces. The actual impact of an
isolated pawn depends on the formation in question.
Other positional concepts include the Q-side majority, open files,
preponderance of material and the conversion of small advantages into a
winning position. As far better writers than your author have addressed
these in detail, we will now return to the creation of a personal chess
playing style as a way to improve your chess strength.
Positional concept 7: The Queen side Majority. The queenside pawn majority
often plays an important role positional because the side that possesses it
going into the end game can force a passed pawn on the far side of the
board. This can be enough to win a lot of king and pawn endings, assuming
you know how to play king and pawn endings, which are among the most
difficult ending in all of chess.
Positional concept 8: Open files. Open files are vertical lines designed for
use by the rook. An open file has no pawns blocking it. Open files are often
crucial during the middle game and many games have been decided by which
side controls them.
Positional concept 9: The two bishops. This particular concept is severely
overrated but the Classical school fell in love with them early on, so it
has become part of the positional lore. Modern authors stress that the
advantage or disadvantage of the two bishops depends on the position.
Personally, my opinion is that the only thing a bishop is good for is
killing knights. This may seem a bit extreme but I have an itsy bitsy
problem seeing knight moves…
Positional concept 10: Preponderance of material. If I have more material
than you do, and I don’t blunder into a mate or a draw, I should win,
assuming I have decent “technique”. We will save a discussion of technique
for a later article, since it is beyond the scope of this one.
First and foremost is the development of tactical vision. This means that it
is absolutely critical to master tactics. First, you have to quit hanging
pieces. This comes with time and experience, but you can speed the process
up considerably through the use of chess training programs such as CT-ART or
specialized programs from Chessbase. If that is not an option, there are
numerous tactical puzzles, preferably from real games that will help you
improve that area of the game. For a more formalized approach, check out
Michael De La Maza’s book Rapid Chess Improvement from Everyman.
[Also check out our article on "Practicing
Tactics." - Webmaster]
I am a pragmatist when it comes to the opening. I would suggest that if you
are under 1800, play open games starting with e4. Answer 1.e4 with 1...e5 and
play tactically with an eye toward developing your tactical vision. Learn to
play the Open Sicilians as white. You will be pleasantly surprised to find
that your opponents with Black may be considerably more inept than you are.
Seek to get a playable game out of the opening and don’t worry about the
latest theory on move 34 of the Najdorf. If your opponent knows it that
well, you are probably doomed anyway.
Work on basic positional ideas. Start with pawn structure and king safety
and work your way up. Try not to lose tempos in the opening if possible.
Make an attempt to understand weak squares and don’t view your pawns as
hapless victims to be moved when nothing else is available. Above all, play
for fun! Whether you win or lose is really not all that important when
compared to something really important. I am still trying to figure out what
is more important though!
In future articles, we will take each concept and illustrate it in greater
detail through the use of diagrams and games from the past. These little
tutorials will not take the place of a complete book but we will review
those for you and include them in a bibliography at the end of the article
so you will know which books will provide the most guidance. In addition, I
will be reviewing older books that may be out of print but still available
at the library. In the long run, hard work and good study habits will help
you improve rapidly. I hope this article will help in that endeavor.
Next: Development
|
search tips
The Chessville
Weekly
The Best Chess
Newsletter
On the Planet!
Subscribe
Today!!
The
Chessville
Weekly
Archives
Discussion
Forum
Chess Links
Chess Rules
Chess Wisdom
|