Can it be proven that 11. 0-0-0+ is legal in this position? Because the chess site this was on takes its puzzles from real games and gives the move numbers, potential solvers knew that the following position was reached after exactly 10 moves by each player.

[fen "2bk2nr/p1p2ppp/2p5/2p5/2P1P3/2N5/Pr3PPP/R3KB1R w - - 0 11"]

  Given that information, can one prove that 11. 0-0-0+ in the above diagram is legal?

(i.e., that neither the white King nor the Ra1 has moved so far)

It seems to me like that's not enough total moves for white to have spent two

moves "shuffling", but I can't come up with any proof or a counterexample-game.

Ok after playing around with a couple of lines, I finally found one line that shows it's still perfectly legal to play long castles for white at move 11, here it is:

[Title "possible 11.O-O-O+"]
[StartFlipped "0"]
[fen "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.c4 Rb8 4.d4 exd4 5.Nxd4 Bc5 6.Nxc6 dxc6 (6... bxc6 7.Be3 d6 8.Bxc5 dxc5 9.Qxd8+ Kxd8 10.Nc3 Rxb2 11.O-O-O+) 7.Qxd8+ Kxd8 8.Be3 b6 9.Bxc5 bxc5 10.Nc3 Rxb2 11.O-O-O+

Added another continuation, taking on c6 with the b-pawn, same position results and same number of moves needed!

To conclude, because I reached the given position in exactly 11 moves, and did not play any redundant moves (e.g. Nf3 then back to Ng1 again), it means that all the played moves were necessary, their order can be different, but point is there was no spare move to use and destroy white's castling (e.g. an impossible scenario would be black exchanging queen on d1, Kxd1, then black plays Kxd8, and white goes back to e1, but that took up 2 more moves than the line I showed, so impossible to reach the position you're looking for in 11 moves after such line)

Long story short, castling is perfectly possible here, and in 11 moves black could not have done anything to prevent us from castling and still manage to reach the final position we want. Interesting post by the way, +1.

Alternatively one can also just look at the final position and count the necessary number of moves, that must take place for this position, I elaborate: have the final position in mind: let's take black's point of view: Pawn moves needed to obtain the final position:

e5
exd4 (why black has to take on d4 and not white on e5 is explained in the diagramm below)
bxc6 or dxc6
b6 or d6
bxc5 or dxc5,

Development moves:

Nc6 (to be captured on c6, otherwise there cannot be a pawn on c6 and not have knight on b8)
Bc5 (otherwise c5 pawn impossible)
Rb8 (otherwise Rxb2 never possible)

Remaining necessary moves: Queen d8 capture and pawn b2 capture:

Kxd8
Rxb2

And we find ourselves at the 11th move again, where all we did was just consider the most straighforward ways our pieces could end up where they are in the shown puzzle.

Let's see if we reach the same position via another path, showing why exd4 is the fastest way to reach the final position:

[Title "Why black must take on d4 and not white on e5:"]
[StartFlipped "0"]
[fen "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.c4 Rb8 4.d4 Bc5 5.dxe5 Nxe5 6.Nxe5 d6 7.Nc6 bxc6 8.Be3 Rxb2 9.Bxc5 dxc5 10.Qxd8+ Kxd8 11.Nc3

Here we are at move 11 and we still have to play Nc3... clearly because we played 2 knight moves for black.

Finally let's demonstrate why in the fastest path to the final position, white has to be taking on d8 (queen exchange) and not the other way around:

[Title "A line white cannot castle but the final position cannot be reached within the 10 required moves (so impossible for our purposes)"]
[StartFlipped "0"]
[fen "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.c4 Rb8 4.d4 exd4 5.Nxd4 Bc5 6.Nxc6 dxc6 7.Nc3 Qxd1+ 8.Kxd1 b6 9.Be3 Kd8 10.Bxc5 bxc5 11.Ke1 Rxb2

We lost 2 king moves(capture on d1 then back to e1) for white in this line, hence the Rxb2 only happening at the 11th move.

So it was shown that the only line leading up the the final position within 10 moves, is one where white still must be able to castle.

EDIT: A summary of the discussed elements in the comments:

The proof presented in this answer is purely deduction based, in the sense that the simple fact of having reached the position in exactly 11 moves without having made any redundant (or insensitive to the position) moves, implies that 11.O-O-O+ should be legal without exception.

What does redundant mean here? "Redundant moves": here, are defined as moves that do not bring us any closer to the final position, or would even deviate us from it. For example playing Nf3, then back to Ng1, would be redundant. Playing Be2 then back to Bf1 would be redundant, and so on.

Point being, in any variation, you may come up with, that would take away white's castling rights, will imperatively entail redundant moves, that will in turn delay reaching the final position by a couple of moves. (As an exercise, try some of your ideas, it is interesting, and see how many moves it takes you.)

Looking at such problem from a combinatorics point of view, may be possible, but would be too complicated as we're looking at a depth of moves(tree lines) resulting from 11 moves. Instead, like most chess puzzles, one has to look at it from a purely heuristic point of view, and find the right ideas that would go in the direction of proving the question at hand. Finally, in chess, one usually has an easier time looking for counter examples(proof by contradiction), which is why it is encouraged to look into some of the lines on your own.

Sorry, no, White -cannot- castle queenside in this position.  Retrograde analysis has nothing to do with it.  The official rules of Chess explicitly state that, in castling (either side), neither the king -nor the moved rook- is allowed to pass over a threatened square.  The Black rook on b2 ruins it.


Moves per depth in search engines I have been implementing a chess engine myself and it is playing pretty good but it seems to calculate way too many nodes.

I was looking at this post: Stockfish nodes

And tested it with my engine.

Nc3[48.0]:     depth: 01(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:059 total:        64    terminal :        21    fullNodes:        22    qNodes:        21
d3[-5.0]:      depth: 02(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:006 total:       157    terminal :        48    fullNodes:        61    qNodes:        48
Nc3[43.0]:     depth: 03(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:010 total:       771    terminal :       224    fullNodes:       323    qNodes:       224
Nc3[-5.0]:     depth: 04(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:010 total:      1494    terminal :       415    fullNodes:       664    qNodes:       415
Nc3[15.0]:     depth: 05(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:010 total:      2827    terminal :       787    fullNodes:      1253    qNodes:       787
Nc3[-10.0]:    depth: 06(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:029 total:     11695    terminal :      3128    fullNodes:      5439    qNodes:      3128
Nf3[15.0]:     depth: 07(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:163 total:    100382    terminal :     28074    fullNodes:     44234    qNodes:     28074
Nf3[-1.0]:     depth: 08(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:205 total:    152551    terminal :     42087    fullNodes:     68377    qNodes:     42087
Nf3[6.0]:      depth: 09(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:01:267 total:   1594238    terminal :    451868    fullNodes:    690326    qNodes:    451956
Nf3[-5.0]:     depth: 10(+0)    time[m:s:ms]: 00:00:982 total:   2470195    terminal :    690833    fullNodes:   1087889    qNodes:    691153

(These are results for a search to depth 10 using iterative deepening and no quiescence search.)

Basically at depth 10, the amount of nodes I am searching is almost 100 times the amount of nodes stockfish has searched.

Enabling transpositions brings this number down to 1.5 million which is still way more.

Maybe some information about my search:

- PVSearch
- LMR: if node is one of the first 4 or a capture, no reduction is done.
       if depth > 4, I reduce by depthLeft/3
       else I reduce by 1.
- Move ordering:
       I sort the moves in the following order:
       pv moves > good captures > killers > bad captures > no captures
- Null moves

One problem is that I do not use bitboards for move generation so I do not know if a move puts the king into check or not. (legal moves are only used for the first 2 plys)

I do not know how I could further decrease the amount of nodes.

  Is this only the effect of a hyper-aggressive LMR? What else should I
  try?

UPDATE:

So I just tested some things and realised that I sort the pv move first every time I sort the moves. So I implemented that the pv move should only be sorted first if and only if it is the first node (like the left most node in the tree).
I went down to 150000 nodes.

There’s no reason for you to scale down your engine doors if it’s fast. Why would you do that?

I am sure Talkchess used to have a post about how chess engines report searched nodes differently. I can’t find it now it was a few years ago. Read it before... their search function is not good.

If you are interested in the difference you will need to read the SF source make sure how they increment the node counter is consistent to yours. Also you may want to test SF on your own machine.

Too many nodes?  As long as the response time is fast enough then more nodes is better.


Is FIDE president Kirsan Ilyumzhinov a good chess player? What's his Elo rating? On this page it says he is not rated: http://ratings.fide.com/card.phtml?event=34123811

I could only find one game featuring Ilyumzhinov, in which he played a 2300 Elo player and lost: http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1600034

That's not very impressive for someone who owns FIDE and who boasts of having played a few games with aliens...

According to the source provided by @Lynob, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov had a rating of 2300 and was local champion of Kalmykia at the age of 14 (see also here). The game you mention against Alexander Zakharov took place in 1978, when Ilyumzhinov was about 16 years old.

However, and as you say, Kirsan Ilyumzhinov is unrated at the moment according to FIDE. But according to the same source he has played 9 rated games (not enough to get a rating). Making some research I found he played these games in the Members Appreciation Blitz Tournament in Skokie (USA) in 2012 with a result of +4 =1 -4.

Appart from that, I think he mostly plays friendly games. If you search "Kirsan Ilyumzhinov plays chess" in Google you'll find some images of him playing with different people, such as Gaddafi, Steven Seagal, the Minister of Sports Affairs of Oman or a Paraguayan student.

He has a rating of 2300

  As a competitor, he had a FIDE rating of 2300, just shy of earning the
  title chess master.

Source Al Jazeera report


Is there a computer program that generates quality chess problems? Is there a chess engine that automatically generates quality chess problems. For example I will input 3 - it produces a mate in 3 problem. But the problem shouldn't be so obvious that one can solve in microseconds.

I don't know if such an engine exists, but there probably might not be one yet and here's why-

It's hard to explain to engines what is "obvious". What might be obvious to you might not even be obvious to me. However, there is some recent research in the area of beauty in chess problems. Even if one takes such factors as "depth appeal", "visual appeal", etc. as outlined in this research, there still remains the fundamental problem of generating chess positions.

Considering the fact that there are at least 10^43 chess positions, it is not yet computationally feasible to generate positions and apply "beauty" analysis to them to see which ones are "quality" problems.

However, we do have endgame tablebases. It could be possible that one could use the already generated 6 piece tablebases and apply the algorithms of the research on them and generate quality problems. However, I do not know if anyone has done that yet.

yes! check out this chessbase article
 http://en.chessbase.com/post/computer-generated-chess-problems-for-everyone


Can computer analysis really understand human behavior? I just finished a game. I got into a pretty convenient position at move 17 (I play white):

I noticed that in order to checkmate, I only need to remove the black bishop from protecting e7 and then I can get my knight there and checkmate. So, I figured that if I push the pawn on the b file to the c file, there's a good chance my opponent would capture the knight on c3 "for free" and would allow me to checkmate. My plan worked like a charm but the computer analysis tells me that was a blunder.

I do realize that it might not have been the best move if I would have played against a GM. But in this scenarios which we're both around 1400+, this seemed like the most logical move.

So, I wonder how could I really trust an engine if it only plays GM level and doesn't understand the potential move for a human on a specific level.

Here's the PGN for the game with the analysis:

[fen ""]
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 d5 3.Nf3 dxc4 4.Nc3 e6 5.e4 Bb4 6.Bg5 h6 7.Bxf6 gxf6 { (+0.60 → +1.11) Inaccuracy. A better move was Qxf6. } 8.Bxc4 Nc6 9.O-O O-O 10.Qd3 e5 11.d5 Bg4 { (+0.94 → +2.81) Mistake. The best move was Na5. } 12.Qe3 { (+2.79 → +1.53) Inaccuracy. A better move was dxc6. } 12...Na5 13.Be2 Kh7 14.Nh4 f5 { (+1.48 → +2.08) Inaccuracy. A better move was Bd7. } 15.Nxf5 Qg5 { (+2.31 → +4.92) Blunder. The best move was Bxf5. } 16.Bxg4 Qxg4 { (+5.23 → +9.72) Blunder. The best move was Qxe3. } 17.Qxh6+ Kg8 18.b3 { (+11.64 → +3.66) Blunder. The best move was d6. } 18...Bxc3 { (+4.09 → +318.00) Blunder. The best move was Qg6. } 19.Ne7#

This response will be very critical of OP's attitude to chess analysis, and I realize that it may even come across as somewhat harsh. However, it is assumed below that OP is interested in improving, and thus I feel that some level of harshness is justified here.

Playing for cheap tricks - because that is exactly what 18.b3 is - is not something a computer would do. You will never find an engine that "understands" the "motivation" behind playing such a move. It calculates variations, and notices that the move is just not good.

However, you seem to be under the erroneous impression that this is not a desireable property for the engine under these circumstances. In the example position you give, of course 18.b3 is a bad move in every respect. It is good if and only if black is careless enough to take on c3. The move doesn't threaten anything, and it only gives black time to defend a lost position. As you have other ways of playing that, unlike 18.b3, won't jeopardize your winning chances, the move is correctly classified by the computer as a mistake.

So basically: you get a winning position, and you don't know how to win. Seeing no way to win, you play a move that isn't very good if black just ignores the knight on c3, hoping that your opponent blunders. You don't try to play the best move in the position. And yet you feel like there is a reason to object when the engine picks up on this? Remember that there is an iron clad rule when playing chess, that should always be followed:

NEVER UNDERESTIMATE YOUR OPPONENT!

I would absolutely not put it past a 1400 player to spot that 18...Bxc3 is a bad move in that position. Furthermore, playing in a way that relies on your opponent falling for 1-move traps, because thinking of better ideas is too much of a bother, is no way to improve. And if you don't want to improve, why does this question even need to be asked? There is no other obvious point in reviewing the games that you play.

If you were in a lost position instead of a winning one, then your doubt would have been justified, as sometimes in such a situation, only the cheap tricks have a chance at succeeding. But if you have a good position, you shouldn't bash the computer for criticizing your way of handling the position. In analysis, you should under no circumstances assume that one side will make bad moves. Analysis is about finding the truth - not about making yourself feel better about your play.

One final note: if you really want to improve using analysis, you shouldn't rely on the computer for analyzing your games. Focus on trying to find the best moves in the position yourself. The computer can never explain the "why" of a position. That is something you need to figure out for yourself most of the time if you don't have the help of a strong human player.

"Can computer analysis really understand human behavior?". My answer is 'Yes, I believe so - as least as well as any person can'. I have studied many chess games over the past 50 years with a view to understanding how natural thought processes occur, so I think that I am qualified to make such a bold statement.

If we assume that intelligence is essentially a matter of information processing - based on knowledge about the world - then the conclusion must be that computer programs will be capable of emulating natural intelligence to a large extent. I am also assuming of course that human beings will be able to comprehend what goes on 'behind the scenes' and I dare say that I have developed some useful insights in that respect, at least in the domain of chess.

In this particular scenario, the knight move to e7 could satisfy a goal of mate, given that the program/person knows about checkmate situations from prior experience or study. Likewise the black bishop at b4 may be 'activated' (i.e. the internal concept relating to it would be), such that it could counter the proposed knight move. That in turn could lead to a sub-goal of moving the bishop away, perhaps via placing some tasty morsel in its path so to speak.

The last paragraph is deliberately tentative, as the actual behaviour depends upon the relevant knowledge available (which will vary from player to player) and the speed of information-processing involved. It is conceivable that a computer could be equipped with knowledge equivalent to that of a poor human player and thus exhibit similar behaviour. Whether it could actually think in linguistic or pictorial ways is another matter but I don't see why not.

Thus my conclusion is that a suitable computer program could also play in the manner described and might also be able to explain its reasoning. Then we might reasonably decided that it also understands human behaviour.

There is a lot more theory that I could write about but I this is not the best place to do so.


What's the name of this opening for white? What's the name of this structure after white castling ?

This is generally known as the Glek System. It looks like Nc3 and Nf6 were omitted.

One of White's general plans is to play d3 and Be3 hoping for the trade to open the f-file, and also to play Nf3-h4-f5. .

i played black with this against an expert

he started with p-kn3
shredder says it is the benko opening 1)p-kn3

so whatever that move is called would be it
although it may have transposed to something else which would also be a proper name for it

that was one of my best wins
i sacked a rook for knight an a pawn in a semi-closed position and got an advantage in the center while his rooks were not doing much while my extra bishop guarded key squares

p-kn3    p-k4
b-n2     b-b4
p-k4     p-q3
0-0

not sure which order i played the knights
but that was essentially our opening position


How should one take advantage of the "premove" function on chess.com? Chess.com has a function called "premove". When pre-moves are enabled, while it’s the opponent’s turn you can make a move to automatically be played as soon as they make their move. The premove will play automatically even your opponent does something unexpected. If your opponent's move makes your pre-move illegal (such as putting your king in check), then your pre-move will be canceled).
My question is, under what circumstance should I use the premove function? I can think of the following scenarios:

My opponent has only one legal move. In this case, if I can determine my reply to this move, I may consider making a premove.
When I am in a very safe endgame (for example, KR vs KB, where I will not lose even after blunders by my rook) and I am running out of time.
In the early opening stage of a blitz game, when my opponent has only one reasonable move and for most of his "unreasonable" moves, my premove is still a good reply. For example, after 1. e4 c6, 2. d4, as white I can more or less safely assume black will play 2... d5 and (pre)play 3. Nc3 before black makes his second move. Even if black played 2... g6 or 2... d6 or 2... Na6, 3. Nc3 is still a sound reply.

Why is there such a function "premove" in the first place? What is the "best" way to make the most of this function?

I think case 4: Your premove is illegal unless your opponent does something very specific but entirely expected, is the most common case that I've seen. Like you offering a trade, and regardless of what they take with (including if there is only one way they can take), there is only one specific way you want to take back.
As an example, IM and chess streamer Eric Rosen, when he gets to play the Stafford gambit as black (1. e4 e5, 2. Nf3 Nf6, 3. Nxe5), he always plays 3. ...Nc6, then premoves 4. ...dxc6. Because if that capture is legal, it must be because the white knight captured the black one, and in that case he always wants to take back with the d-pawn.
Also notable example of useful premove (and the converse of case 4, more akin to your case 2) was a drawn endgame where Carlsen had the black pieces during this his 2020 online tour (can't remember which game, or the exact piece placemens, sadly, but I believe it was KQP or KQ versus KRP). He had established a fortress and could premove his rook back and forth between two squares on the sixth rank. The only cases where such a move would lose the game were cases where performing that rook move would be illegal. He had only seconds left and no increment, so he couldn't wait and see what move his opponent would make.

Premoves should only be used if the move is illegal if not for a very specific move the other player makes.
An example would be
e4 e5
Nf3 Nf6
Nxe5 Nc6

Here black can premove dxc6 because it will only be legal if white’s move is  Nxc6.
Another reason would be if you are low on time, as the other answers so aptly described.


Can playing blindfold chess be learned or is it a natural skill? Any blindfold players here? Just wondering if blindfold chess is a skill that can be learned by amateurs like me or a natural skill by chess GM's, IM's, etc.

In essence, you are asking-

  Can memory (or other brain functions) be improved or is it a natural trait?

The answer is yes to both. While it is true that one's memory can be improved, it is also commonly observed that some people are more "gifted" when it comes to memory (and other brain functions) than others.

To play blindfold chess, you need three things -

A decent memory
A good ability to visualize
A decent level of chess playing strength (if you want to play decent chess i.e. or one could simply have a fantastic memory and make legal yet nonsensical moves).

Memory

I never "practiced" blindfold chess to learn it. I simply observed that as soon as my chess level got to FIDE 2000 level (for example), I could easily replay moves in my head and think "blindly". I don't have a great memory. I suppose my memory is average or slightly above average, but chess has surely helped to improve it to some extent.

Visualization

The way I do it is by visualizing a 2D board in my head (like a computer screen). The board doesn't have to be crystal clear (it's often hazy), but as long as you can "see" the pieces in their places, it's fine. I suppose that a chess player's ability to visualize increases the more chess he/she plays. This is normal brain development. The more you exercise a muscle, the better it gets. So I would suggest you practice visualization to get better at it.

Playing Strength

The real point of blind chess is to play chess blindly and yet play it well. So playing strength is indispensable or else there is no point in playing blind chess. If you play blind chess badly, you only prove you have a good memory and visualization power and nothing more. So, as an amateur, I would say your top priority is to improve your playing strength. Work on that and your memory and visualization will automatically improve.

All the best!

This is not a technical answer. Playing blindfold can be practiced and you can gain proficiency upto a level. But beyond that level, as it is with normal chess, you need talent, pure talent.


Difference between a grandmaster and an international master? International chess tournaments are played in many cities in the world. What are the criteria that differentiate a chess grandmaster from a chess international master? Dibyendu Barua of Calcutta [Kolkata] played in London and is a chess grandmaster. In 1982 He defeated the then world number two ranked Viktor Korchnoi. Dibyendu Barua was awarded the grandmaster title in 1991 by FIDE. Dibyendu Barua was the second Indian grandmaster after Viswanathan Anand to become a chess grandmaster.
I would like to know who is greater, a chess grandmaster or a chess international master?

What are the criteria that differentiate a chess grandmaster from a
chess international master?

The current FIDE rules regarding the awarding of international titles are described in FIDE Title Regulations effective from 1 July 2017. Basically there are two ways to achieve a title - via norms or directly via achieving a given result in a world or continental championship or in an Olympiad.
The level of achievement required to be awarded a direct title are described in Table for Direct Titles effective from 1 July 2017.
For instance the GM title is awarded to the top 16 players in the World Cup, the winner of the Women's World Championship, the outright winner of the World S65, S50 and U20 Championships, the outright winner of Continental Championships and the Continental S65, S50 and U20 Championships.
The IM title is awarded to the losing finalist in the Women's World Championship, the silver and bronze winners in the World S65, S50 and U20 Championships, the winners of the World U18 and U16 Championships, the silver and bronze winners in the Continental Championships, the winners of the Continental S65, S50 and U20 Championships, the winners of the Continental U18 Championships.
Qualification via norms requires 3 (or 2 for very long tournaments) "norm" level performances in high level tournaments combined with reaching a certain rating. These rules are complicated and you should refer to sections 1.4 and 1.5 of the document on the the FIDE website.

International Grandmaster >> International master
FIDE explains how the titles are awarded and what has to be done over a number of games/tournaments to qualify.


Can a pawn that performed an en passant capture promote at all? So let's say I capture en passant with a pawn. Using the same pawn, I get to the 8th rank. Can I promote that pawn into anything else? I've heard of this restriction in various ways. Some say it can become a rook at best, and some say it just stays as a pawn, but it moves backwards.

Please let me know if this is a classic case of "I'm losing better make some stuff," or an actual rule.

From FIDE rules (3.7 e):

  When a pawn reaches the rank furthest from its starting position it must be exchanged as part of the same move on the same square for a new queen, rook, bishop or knight of the same colour. The player’s choice is not restricted to pieces that have been captured previously. This exchange of a pawn for another piece is called ‘promotion’ and the effect of the new piece is immediate.

There is no restrictions whatsoever about capturing en passant.

Nothing changes whatsoever to the pawn. It can still promote to a queen, rook, bishop, or knight.


What are the consequences of an early a6 in the Sicilian? Once I encountered an opponent who used a very early a6 in his Sicilian Opening.

[FEN ""]

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 a6

What could have been his objective with this move and how should I have have countered it?

This is called the O'Kelly variation of the Sicilian.

If white plays normally (i.e. 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nf6 5.Nc3), then black can eventually kick the d4 knight with ...e5 when the knight doesn't have any great squares.  In this case, 2... a6 keeps the knight from moving to the natural b5 square (as in the Sveshnikov Sicilian).  This will allow black to quickly play ...d5 with equality.

White's best plan is to play either c3 or c4 trying to prove that black's move 2... a6 is not a good developing move.  When white plays c3, the natural plan is to follow up with d4, and then if black plays ...cxd4, white will respond with cxd4, gaining a classical pawn center.  When white plays c4 instead, white's plan is to set up a Maroczy bind.

An unambitious plan for white would be to play into a closed Sicilian - in the closed Sicilian, black frequently plays a6-b5 in order to get counterplay on the queenside.  Furthermore, in the closed Sicilian, tempi matter a lot less because the position will not change radically from one move to the next.

a6 serves three purpose .

It is a waiting move in Sicilian as like Black waits for White's Plan .
It is the start of Q-Side Counter Play from black . As in Sicilian Black generally plays on the Center & Q-side .
Generally in Sicilian the Black Queen's favourite Square is c7 . You may see this move in Kan/Taimanov/Najdorf etc . When Black Plays a6 then it covers the b5 Square which prevents White's Knight to come to b5 and attack the c7 Queen which costs a Tempo to Black .


Can White win this knight endgame? [Title "Black to move"]
[StartFlipped "0"]
[fen "8/p2N1pk1/1pn1p1p1/2p1P2p/5P1P/2P3P1/PP6/6K1 b - - 0 1"]

I thought that I had advantage as White since I was able to temporarily cutt off Black king. I have underestimated Black's counterplay on the queenside with ...Na5, misplayed it and drew.

The more and more I analyze on my own, the more and more I start to wonder: Did I have any winning advantage at all, or was my position just "prettier" ?

You definitely had an advantage, but it's a bit of a challenge to turn that into victory. If you don't use all of your advantages and his disadvantages, it can quickly turn into a draw.

In this position, your main advantage is your Knight - it can jump very easily between very useful squares d7-f6-e4-d6.
Your King can be activated very easily in the next few moves, while black King is quite passive and has limited movement due to your Knight and Pawns (both yours and his) blocking him.
Moreover, your Knight can't be threatened at d7, so it's your decision when to move it (and give his King some breath).

His ...Na5 is a logical choice from his side, but you have nothing to fear, your aim is to get your King closer to the center (Kf2-Ke3) and also put Pawn on b3 (not if he pulls back with his Knight, of course) to disable any chances of his Knight getting through (preferably he plays Nc4 before you play b3, so you play that move with gaining a tempo).

However, the problem you have is that you can't go too far away with your King. Ideally you would come to the Queen side and take his Pawns, while his King watches helpessly; but you can't do that as he threatens Ne7-Nf5, which leaves your g3 Pawn at his mercy if your King isn't there to defend it. Now, you can try to exchange your g3 Pawn (Kf3 or Nf6 followed by g4), but that leaves you with weak h-Pawn which he can attack easily with his King (Kh6-Kh5) or/and his Knight (Nf5).

The best thing to try (after b3 and after your King is a bit activated on e3-d3) is to get your Knight back to e4 (Nf6-Ne4) to defend g3-Pawn so you can proceed with your King to the Queen side:

[StartFlipped "0"]
[FEN "8/p2N1pk1/1pn1p1p1/2p1P2p/5P1P/2P3P1/PP6/6K1 b - - 0 1"]

1...Na5 2. Kf2 Nc4 3. b3 Na5 4. Ke3 Nc6 5. Kd3 Ne7 6. Nf6 Nf5 (6...Nd5 7. Ne8+ Kf8 8. Nd6 Ne7 {Otherwise, you win a Pawn with Nc8} 9. a4 a6 {Black is lost otherwise, he either lets your Knight to c8 or your King inside} 10. a5 bxa5 11. Ne4 Nd5 12. Nxc5 Nc7 13. c4 Ke7 14. Nb7 {And you are a Pawn ahead}) (6...Nc6 7. Kc4 a6 8. Nd7 Ne7 9. Nxb6 Nf5 10. a4 Nxg3 11. Kxc5 f6 12. Nd7 {And now you don't have any trouble promoting on the Queen side on time}) 7. Ne4 Ne7 8. Kc4 a6  9. Nd6 Nc6 10. Nc8 Na5+ 11. Kd3 b5 12. Nb6 Nb7 13. Nd7 a5 14. a3 {Now black has no good moves} Kg8 15. a4 c4+ 16. bxc4 bxa4 17. c5 Nd8 18. Kc2 {You can pick up his a-Pawns and push c-Pawns afterwards} 1-0

But note that I didn't perhaps show the best black defense here. Although, to be honest, with his King that limited, he didn't have many options. If he tries to get his Knight to f5 before he provoked your b3, you can play a4-a5 and his defense on the Queen side is ruined. He can only perhaps try to push his Queen side Pawns and pray that he can somehow block you in time, although it's a very hard fight for him:

[StartFlipped "0"]
[FEN "8/p2N1pk1/1pn1p1p1/2p1P2p/5P1P/2P3P1/PP6/6K1 b - - 0 1"]

1...Na5 2. Kf2 Nc4 3. b3 Na5 4. Ke3 c4 5. b4 Nc6 6. Nf6 Kf8 7. Ne4 b5 8. Nd6 a6 9. Ne4 Ke7 10. Nc5 a5 11. bxa5 Nxa5 12. Ne4 Nc6 13. a3 Kd7 14. Nd6 f6 15. Nxb5 fxe5 16. fxe5 Nxe5 17. Kd4 {And now you win a Pawn and have an easy way to victory} 1-0

All in all, your advantage was a bit more substantial than just "prettier" position, at least in my opinion.

I analyzed the endgame for more than half an hour with Houdini 6.02 d = 42 /91 and then a analyzed again starting with few moves before the end of the line at d =38/74. IT ends in a seven piece endgame (knight and two pawns vs knight and a pawn) that tablebases evaluated as won for White (Mate in 39). It seems winning, even though I didn't take notes.


What is the reason for 5...Bb4+ in this line of the Bishop's Opening? After the opening moves
[fen ""]

1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 Nf6 3.d3 c6 4.Nf3 d5 5.Bb3

one of Black's fashionable answers is

5...Bb4+

What is the aim of this seemingly useless check?

5...Bb4+ looks like a weird move because you wouldn't play a move like that often, but it makes perfect sense because the white bishop in on b3.
White would definitely want to develop his knight with Nc3 on the next move and put pressure on Black's pawn center. By playing 5...Bb4+ you prevent 6.Nc3 (it'd lose a piece). If White goes for 6.c3, then Black can put his bishop on d6 without his position in the center being at jeopardy.
That's why the most successful move here is 6.Bd2!. Now 6...Bd6 is met with 7.Nc3!, so Black usually prefers to trade bishops.

To prevent castling later on in the game. It limits White's defensive options


Carlsen-Anand, Game 2. Could Black hold if not for 34...h5? At Black's 34th move in Game 2 of the Carlsen-Anand match, Anand blundered with 34...h5??. What were his chances for salvaging the draw if he had defended actively via, say, 34...Qd2 or 34...Qd4, counterattacking the f2 pawn?

[fen "5rk1/4R1pp/3q1p2/p1p2P2/P3Q2P/5p2/2P2PPK/8 w - - 0 1"]
[Event "WCC"]
[Site "Sochi"]
[Date "2014.11.09"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Magnus Carlsen"]
[Black "Viswanathan Anand"]
[Result "1-0"]

1.g3 h5??
    ( 1...Qd2 )
        ( 1...Qd4 )
2.Qb7 1-0

I'm looking for explanations of how White should then push for victory, and how Black should best respond, backed up with concrete analysis. Please note that I'm not at all interested in pure engine evaluations, but rather verbal, human annotations of the possibilities (though engine-checked analysis is certainly encouraged).

Anand could have chosen

[fen "5rk1/4R1pp/3q1p2/p1p2P2/P3Q2P/5p2/2P2PPK/8 w - - 0 1"]
[Event "WCC"]
[Site "Sochi"]
[Date "2014.11.09"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Magnus Carlsen"]
[Black "Viswanathan Anand"]
[Result "1-0"]

1.g3 Qd2 2.Qxf3 Qxc2 3.Kg2

After which we reach a Queen+Rook middlegame. In such middlegames, the following factors are critical:

King safety
Piece harmony (coordination and collaboration between the Queen and Rook)

My evaluation of the position above is as follows. Black's King is less safe, since the f-pawn is on f6, exposing the seventh rank for the white Re7 and making it possible for white to attack the g7-square. Further, the white Re7 is better placed than the black Rf8. The white Qf3 is controlling the h1-a8 diagonal, safe guarding the white Kg2 as well as threatening Qf3-g4, Qf3-d5 and Qf3-b7.

White can have the following strategy: use the better King safety and harmony to attack the enemy King and checkmate and/or win material along the way.

Black can have the following strategy: keep the pieces active, try to make them collaborate better, seek a counter attack on the enemy King, try to exchange queens.

I think the position is better for white yet black can still fight. For example

[fen "5rk1/4R1pp/3q1p2/p1p2P2/P3Q2P/5p2/2P2PPK/8 w - - 0 1"]
[Event "WCC"]
[Site "Sochi"]
[Date "2014.11.09"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Magnus Carlsen"]
[Black "Viswanathan Anand"]
[Result "1-0"]

1.g3 Qd2 2.Qxf3 (2.Qe6+ Kh8 3.Qf7 Qxf2+ 4.Kh3 Qf1+ 5.Kg4 h5+ 6.Qxh5+ Kg8=) Qxc2 3.Kg2 Kh8 4.Qg4 (4.Qb7 Qxf5 5.Rxg7 Rd8) Rg8

Conclusion from the position after 1...Qd2:

[fen "5rk1/4R1pp/3q1p2/p1p2P2/P3Q2P/5p2/2P2PPK/8 w - - 0 1"]
[Event "WCC"]
[Site "Sochi"]
[Date "2014.11.09"]
[Round "2"]
[White "Magnus Carlsen"]
[Black "Viswanathan Anand"]
[Result "1-0"]

1.g3 Qd2

Black should play Kg8-h8, Rf8-g8 and h7-h6 to secure the kingside.
Black should trade all the pawns on the queenside and play 3 against 4 on the kingside.
White should try to prevent this from happening.

I'll make the answer clearer later, but for now, yes Anand had perfect drawing chances, for several reasons:

Rook and Queen endgames tend to be harsh and fighting, they are like semi-endgames semi-middlegames, but still drawish. Constant checks and the long range pieces make it easy to cover all bases, sometimes even 2 pawns down.
If a piece was exchanged, the situation would be even more drawish than it was before.
Usually in endgames, engines can't see a draw, because they have to search really deep. That's why we have tablebases. While the engine gave carlsen a plus, it was a fake advantage. With correct play from both sides, draw would probably ensue.
The game was a technical one. After the time trouble, Anand would probably find the draw. It is a technical endgame, so I'd have no fear on it.

I'll add some examples, and engine analysis.


Which engine is better at Chess960-Stockfish or Leela? It seems that TCEC has seen Stockfish and Leela go back and forth. It is probable that these days Stockfish is a little bit better than Leela. I was wondering, since it is different in Chess960, which one of two is better at it? Does anyone have any insights?

Currently, it's Stockfish: in the latest FRC exhibition (November 2020) Stockfish beat Leela +8 -0 =42.

Leela or AlphaZero is the best computer since they have beaten Stockfish in standard chess and Leela is said to be better at positional chess than Stockfish. Stockfish is better at tactical chess and since Chess960 is more positional than standard chess, Leela (or AlphaZero) is better at Chess960.


Why is this the solution to this puzzle? [FEN "2r3k1/5pp1/1q1bpn1p/pB1pN3/P2P4/5R2/1P3PPP/3Q2K1 w - - 0 1"]

1. Rxf6 Qc7 2. Rf3

This is a puzzle (and its solution) I found on lichess.

But I simply do not see the expected logic of this puzzle. The Qc7 move doesn't do much from my POV, and refraining from following up with gxf6 also doesn't make sense as that move wins a rook, and while it does open the king up to check, that check doesn't force any other captures, nor does it lead to mate. In fact, when I analyse the game with an engine, it even prefers gxf6 over Qc7.

There is a lot more to this, and this is really not a great tactics problem as much as it is a continuing the attack problem. The difference is that with a tactic problem, you can see the result all the way to the end. Other positions, you have just a feel for it, and you know that you are probably winning, but you have to play what you can calculate, you get there, and then you calculate more of the attack. Often, you do this while calculating places you could take a forced draw if it is not working out.

A great example of that is the game Dubov-Svane (here with copyrighted annotations), which I will give below. It was one of the best games of the year.

The move Qc7 is an example of why I am not a fan of online puzzles that have been computer checked, but no strong player has evaluated. After Rf6, if you do not take, you simply lose, and thus, Qc7 is not even an option to consider. The only lines that are important are the ones that include gf, but more importantly, the ones that include Bxe5, which comes closer to defending for a human than any other move.

 [FEN "2r3k1/5pp1/1q1bpn1p/pB1pN3/P2P4/5R2/1P3PPP/3Q2K1 w - - 0 1"]

 1. Rxf6 Bxe5 {This may be the most testing try in practice.} (1... gxf6 2. Qg4+ Kh7 (2... Kh8 3. Nxf7+ Kh7 4. g3 {The threat is Qe6.} Bb8 5. Qh4 Kg7 6. Qxh6+ Kxf7 7. Qh7+ Kf8 8. Qh8+ Kf7 9. Qxc8 $18) (2... Kf8 $2 3. Nd7+ Ke7 4. Nxb6 Rc1+ 5. Bf1 $18 {This is obviously important to see.}) 3. Bd3+ f5 4. Bxf5+ exf5 5. Qxf5+ Kh8 6. Qf6+ Kh7 7. Qxf7+ Kh8 8. Ng6#) 2. dxe5 gxf6 3. exf6 Kf8 (3... Kh8 4. Qd2 Kh7 5. Bd3+ Kg8 6. Qxh6 $18) (3... Kh7 4. Qd3+ Kh8 5. Qd2 Kh7 6. Bd3+ Kg8 7. Qxh6 $18) 4. Qd2 Rc6 5. Qxh6+ Ke8 6. g3 d4 {It is clear that that is heading to a queend ending, so maybe d4 would give some counter-chances under slightly more favorable circumstances.} 7. Qh7 d3 8. Qg8+ Kd7 9. Qxf7+ Kc8 10. Qg8+ Kb7 (10... Kc7 11. Qg7+ Kb8 (11... Kd6 12. Qe7+ Ke5 13. Bxc6 Qxc6 14. f7 d2 15. Qg5+ Ke4 16. Qe3+ Kd5 17. Qxd2+ $18) 12. Bxc6 Qxc6 13. f7 $18) 11. Bxc6+ Qxc6 12. Qh7+ Kb6 13. Qxd3 {There are other lines in here, but this line represents a moves that try to fight back until it is finally over totally.}

Here is that fantastic attack my Danil Dubov, which illustrates my point. Dubov most likely did not see everything from move 22 through to move 39, but rather, he saw chunks at a time, and there were probably places he could have bailed out with a draw. This type of attack, while containing tactics, is not one big tactic. I would describe the problem above in the same way, assuming that black played the best practical defense with 1...Bxe5 trying to keep equal material while trading off the key Ne5 attacker.

 [Event "EU-chT 22nd"]
 [Site "Batumi"]
 [Date "2019.10.31"]
 [Round "7.4"]
 [White "Dubov, Daniil"]
 [Black "Svane, Rasmus"]
 [Result "1-0"]
 [ECO "D37"]
 [WhiteElo "2699"]
 [BlackElo "2592"]
 [PlyCount "77"]
 [EventDate "2019.10.24"]
 [EventType "team-swiss"]
 [EventRounds "9"]
 [EventCountry "GEO"]
 [WhiteTeam "Russia"]
 [BlackTeam "Germany"]
 [WhiteTeamCountry "RUS"]
 [BlackTeamCountry "GER"]
 [FEN ""]

 1. c4 e6 2. Nc3 d5 3. d4 Nf6 4. Nf3 Be7 5. Bf4 O-O 6. e3 b6 7. Qc2 Ba6 8. O-O-O dxc4 9. Ng5 Nc6 10. a3 g6 11. h4 Bd6 12. g3 Qe7 13. h5 e5 14. hxg6 hxg6 15. Bg2 exf4 16. Bxc6 fxg3 17. Kb1 Rad8 18. f4 Bc8 19. Rde1 Kg7 20. Nd5 Nxd5 21. Rh7+ Kg8 22. Rxf7 Rxf7 23. Qxg6+ Kf8 24. Qh6+ Rg7 25. Bxd5 Ke8 26. Qh5+ Kd7 27. Qh3+ Ke8 28. Qh5+ Kd7 29. Be6+ Kc6 30. Qf3+ Kb5 31. Bxc4+ Ka5 32. Qd5+ Bc5 33. b4+ Ka4 34. Qg2 Bxb4 35. Qc6+ Kxa3 36. Bb3 Bd7 37. Qc1+ Kxb3 38. Qc2+ Ka3 39. Qa2# 1-0

P.S. The only "logic" to it is that someone, who was not that strong fed it to a computer, and posted only the computer's best moves, but not the ones that would challenge a human the most.

It wins a piece.   If you take the rook black gets mated in two more moves else he wins the queen too if you try to avoid the mate.


How can I know my rating in chess I play chess sometimes.
I don't know any chess strategy. I just know the direction of each piece.
How can I know my rating?

If you do not play in tournaments, then you do not have a rating. You are unrated.

If you play online, then you will have a rating. However, this is unofficial and cannot be used anywhere else.

your rating is 100 but only because they dont go lower

start reading some books to improve

play over grandmaster games to get a feel for what good moves look like in an opening

work through tactical problem collections to learn to recognise patterns of winning moves

to get a provisional rating play in rated events

to get an established rating play in lots of events


What material handicap would be required to compensate for a single double-move? Consider the following chess variant:

Black can, once per game, make two moves in a row (the second move may not capture the King)
To compensate for this advantage, Black gets a material handicap
Otherwise, the standard rules of chess apply

The question is, approximately what material handicap would be needed for the game to become roughly balanced? It is clear that making two consecutive moves, even only once per game, is a tremendous advantage. My guess is that at least a Queen handicap is necessary, since it is trivially easy to capture White's Queen with two consecutive moves once the pieces are out.

Has this chess variant been studied before?

The question can never be answered in a general fashion. Every move has its own perks and advantages. The major variables are these:

Is the same piece allowed to move twice or can black move two pieces once?

Are captures allowed? With just one move of the king's pawn already made, it is possible for any party to capture the opponent's queen within two moves. (Or put them in a position where it cannot escape capture in the next few moves). Here the price for two moves is AT LEAST a queen (since the two moves party would not only have captured the queen, but also invaded inside the enemy ranks).

Starting from midgame, two moves can easily put the opponent in a mate-in-x position where they cannot avoid mate. For example, if one has several mating combinations available, there can be no possible compensation to that!

All in all, I think the option of two moves can/should be made available only in the opening and the price is the queen. It is disastrous and potentially game-losing to allow the opponent double moves in the middlegame or endgame and there can be no compensation to that.

In most opening gambits, a pawn is worth two tempi(Two moves). So I guess that a pawn would be fine. To be more precise, the f pawn. I think that is the most logical way.

But yet there remains a problem. I can mate you like this:

  [Title "White to move"]
  [fen "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 1"]

  1.e4 e5 2.Bc4 Bc5 I use the move now 3.Qf3 h6 4.Qxf7#

I used h6 as a waiting move to show that a double move is made.

In a similar way, a player can trap or take a big piece, such as a queen.

So the rules so far:

White(Or black) lacks his f pawn.
The person with the right to double move cannot mate. If a mate is inevitable, he cannot use the double move.
The person with the right to double move cannot take a piece. If taking a piece is inevitable, he cannot use the double move.

About check now. I do personally think that if you are checked, the double move doesn't count, so:

The person with the right to double move cannot check. If a check is inevitable, he cannot use the double move.

 [Title "White to move"]
 [fen "rnbq1rk1/pppp1p1p/5BpQ/4p3/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RN2KBNR w KQ - 0 1"]

But there are also positions like this. So this idea comes up:

Right after the double move, the non-double move player can exchange one of his pieces for a piece of equal value. You can exchange a bishop for a knight. You cannot exchange say, two rooks for a queen and pawn.

So I think that this is the best way to answer your question.

Hope it helps.


What's with the Petrov? The Petrov or Russian opening is seldom seen these days:

[fen ""]

1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6

Why? Is it fully refuted? Or merely uncomfortable for Black?

There is nothing wrong with the Petroff and it is still used regularly at the highest levels. If it is less popular than it used to be (and I'd have to check the data before claiming that), then that would likely be because it is usually played when Black is trying to make a draw, and these days the Berlin variation of the Ruy Lopez is the most popular way to try to achieve a draw against 1.e4.

I wouldn't call any of those moves wrong, but I would say it is a bad idea for Black to move 2. ... Nf6.

If you are an optimistic player who thinks that White and Black are even at first glance, my Houdini counters by saying White is already one point ahead.
In one classical game, it goes like this: C42 Russian Game: Classical

[FEN ""]
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 d6 4. Nf3 Nxe4 5. d4 Be7 6. Bd3 f5


What is the percentage of players who are women in the sections where both men and women can play in? I am NOT asking for the percentage of chess players that are women.

I am asking for the percentage of players who are women in the sections where both men and women can play in.
That percentage is obviously lower than the percentage of chess players that are women because many women prefer to play in women-only sections.

In other words the question could be rephrased as: if I'm a man and tomorrow I'll play a game in a tournament, what's the probability that my opponent is a woman?

You can answer for either USCF or FIDE, it doesn't matter which one.

In France, there are women only team championships but not all women chess players supports them.

Here is the point of view of Mathilde Choisy (WFM, FIDE 2181), in French http://echecsetmixte.fr/?p=665

The main points are :

If you want to make progress, don't think about women competitions, think bigger and aim for results in "general" competitions. A top 20 in French mixed youngster championship is a better result than a top 3 in European Girl championship.
France has only a few active women players rated 2000+ so they always play against each other in these competitions
If you stay too long in girl competitions, you won't realize the gap in level with the boys until it's too late
Women championships promotes "amateur chess" but are no use for professionnal competitions.

It's clearly not an answer to the question but I think it's worth sharing.

Btw I met my wife in an French mixed open, so there are some chances that you'll played against some. I checked the data for this open and here are the rates :

Open A , Elo >1700 : 5-10% women
Open B, Elo <1800 : 12-15% women

It depends. Also it differs.
You can do it by

Find the open tournament you want to analyze. You can use chess results website

Find out the list of players.

Filter out the women players and make two list.

Now you have A - All players, B - Men players and C - Women players.

Now use the following calculation:

% women (%C)  = (C/A ) * 100
% men (%B) = (B/A)*100

If you are a techy person, write a script and do it for all the tournaments of a particular country and create beautiful graphs for the world to admire.

Hope this helps :)


Facing irregular or uncommon openings How do you deal with this? I'm a bit of a chess perfectionist, and I always want to play the best move, so when I go up against an irregular opening, I don't do badly, but it's hard be 100% sure you made the best move in the opening, and that really bothers me psychologically.

My current method for dealing with these types of situations is to just follow the basic opening principles, but at my level I feel like this is not detailed enough or too vague, since I always try to strive for a certain level of understanding in every position. What can I do to be more flexible in this area of chess? Are there more detailed guides for playing against uncommon openings?

Even though I don't necessarily play badly, I really want to learn to be "comfortable" in all positions. How would I achieve this? Is the answer to play beginners since they tend to play strange openings all the time? I've already done this, but I still don't seem "comfortable" enough. Maybe its all in my head?

What you describe is the best advice to meeting an unusual opening: play by the principles.

In terms of resources, there are 2 I can think of:

Beating Unusual Chess Openings by IM Richard Palliser. By 'unusual', Palliser really means anything other than 1. e4 or 1. d4, so he covers from Black's point of view:

  The respectable (English Opening, Reti and King s Indian Attack) through to the offbeat (Nimzo-Larsen Attack, Bird s Opening) and the totally bizarre (Orang-utan, Grob)

Chess.SE. We are always happy to see questions such as What are the ideas behind the Blackmar-Diemer gambit?

Many openings are rare, so I'll just talk about Bird's and Larsen's. For the Larsen's, just e5, the Bird's, d5, the From's gambit is not so good, according to Stockfish.


What is it like to be a Twitch chess streamer? I want to make a Twitch stream channel with my friend, and I want to know what the experience is like. Can explain it better to me or share their knowledge and experience?

First, it would be interesting to know what your goals with the channel will be. If it is to have enough revenue that it can become your job, you will need to offer something that others are not already offering, or do what they are doing a lot better. You need some kind of "angle".

For most chess channels, the angle is that they are Grandmasters, and since I looked you up on FIDE.com for another question previously, I know that you are far from that (I am not trying to be mean there). The other channels that are very popular by weak players also have something in common: Cute girls with good personalities. Alexandra Botez and Gold Dust Tori come to mind. Frankly, Tori is so weak, I could not imagine watching her although I have seen her for a few minutes here or there when a chess.com broadcast I was watching ended, and my channel was "raided" (users that are automatically transferred to another channel). Be prepared to change your approach after some time if you not getting any followers.

I am not saying that you cannot do it, but you will need to find something that makes you very unique. One idea for someone else might be: If you had been about half your age, like 6, it could have been to follow the little boy from novice through to Grandmaster, and grow with him. You are considering trying to stream with a partner. Partners seem to do well here (and on radio and television). A partner allow for more conversation, and for you to bounce things off each other.

Once you have your idea, then there is patience, and promotion. Assuming that you want to make money (if just for fun to have a channel, then all bets are off...just have fun), you would need to understand that it would be a job. You will need to spend many hours streaming for little, or no, money in the beginning until you have a following. Unlike YouTube, Twitch is more about live playing against various opponents, and you discussing what it going on for the audience.

Did I mention that it is a job? (Yes, I know I did.) You would need to take it seriously, and be consistent about your streaming, and that means probably every day, 7 days a week in the beginning. Famous streamers, like Hikaru Nakamura, can take stream as they like since people will show up when they show up (Naka puts his schedule on Twitter, for example).

Promotion. You will need to learn how to promote your channel via social media so people can find you among the multitude of channels. You will need to read books and websites from experts on how to do that. I do not know much about this, but you would need to find out how the system for "raids" works. That might be about building personal relationships, aka partnerships, so established channels are willing to let you take their audience when they are done.

It is a numbers game: You will need follower first, and then maybe they can turn into subscribers. Not all subscriptions cost money since Amazon owns Twitch, and they allow Prime members one free subscription per month. I usually back chess.com or Naka, personally with my Prime membership.

I wish you good luck if you try to do this.

"Tips for becoming a Twitch video game streamer"

For too many it feels like spewing streams into the void with nobody watching.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=17541600

Just how many people are out there watching at all?
How many streamers are there?

So how does it feel to stream stuff into the great bit bucket of the cosmos?  That strictly depends on you and your psychological problems.

Personally I would feel stupid wasting my time doing it.

Twitch.tv is a video-game broadcasting and viewing platform where viewers can "donate" to their favorite players. ... Video game players broadcast themselves playing the game, usually with an audio commentary.

I would feel more stupid wasting my money on it.

Do I have to pay for twitch?
Select Subscribe | $4.99 to choose the default monthly subscription fee of $4.99 USD. Or, pick All Paid Tiers to choose the $9.99 or $24.99 payment option and see a list of perks for each subscription tier.Jul 1, 2019


Is it possible to play vs bots on FICS? I was playing a 15 min game vs some 2300 guy. He doesn't take any time to think about his next move, not even a second, not even against a c4 opening. When i offered him to play, he accepted immediately, instantly.

He blunders or should I say, he plays slow moves, but he's strong, so no obvious blunders.

Is it possible that bots play on FICS servers? Like you run a bot client, connect it to the server and that's it? since there's no CAPTCHA or anything to make sure that you're a human? And since you can connect to FICS in so many ways?

To answer your question: There are computer accounts in FICS, with handles ending in (C). Also guests may be computers. There might be computers also behind other players, but that's against the rules of FICS. Engines can be connected to FICS using icsDrone, XBoard/WinBoard with Zippy, or similar tools.

There are some computer accounts that are on the site, so if you see one ending in (C), abort the game or resign. Another website is chess.com, which is really good.


Sicilian defense answer to Bc4 and Qf3 I am a very beginning player and something I see a lot in response to the Sicilian defense is Bc4, with white intending to play Qf3 next turn. I found that e6 is a good answer but I feel where I take it after that is pretty poor and I want to know a better answer. The following is how the game typically goes

[fen ""]
1. e4 c5 2. Bc4 e6 3. Qf3 a6 4. d3 b5 5. Bb3 d5 6. a3 c4 7. dxc4 dxc4 *

In your posted game you have done a decent job of harrassing and eventually marginalizing the White King bishop.  Yet, do you realize that each of your first seven moves is a pawn move?  Besides neglecting piece develpment, you leave your center rather unprotected, which partly defeats the purpose of using the Sicilian, and you expose yourself to the inconvenient discovered attack of e5.  For the moment, the Queen/Bishop attack is sufficiently neutralized by your 2...e6 and that is the time to begin development of your pieces.

Would highly recommend 3...Nf6. You have strong spots on both d4 and e5 to anchor your knight, the former targeting the Queen and weak c-pawn, and the latter targeting both the Queen and Bishop. 3...Nf6 also opens up Nc6, without having to worry about the pawn push to e5. Feel free to follow up with further questions


Were my sacrifices sound in this game? [FEN ""]

1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nf3 b6 { I wasnt familiar with theory here, but I vaguely remembered seeing a kingside fianchetto somewhere and it seemed reasonable. } 4.g3 Bb7 5.Bg2 c5 6.O-O Be7 7.Nc3 cxd4 8.Nxd4 Bxg2 9.Kxg2 { Maybe not ideal, but I think white is better due to my lead in development, my strong c-pawn and in particular the weakness on d6. } 9...O-O 10.e4 Qc7 11.b3 Nc6 12.Ndb5 { The point is to take control of d6. The attack on the queen allows me to do it with tempo. } 12...Qb7 13.Nd6 Bxd6 14.Qxd6 { I might lose time if black finds a way to attack the queen. As long as I prevent d7-d5 and can coordinate in reasonable time I think I have a clear edge. Tell me if I'm wrong. } 14...h6 { ? I think this move warrants a ? because it does nothing to fight for d6 or counter attack. } 15.Rd1 { I wasnt sure if the bishop was going to f5 or a3 so I moved the rook first. } 15...e5 { Whether this move is good or not depends on whether my sacrifice is sound or not, which is beyond my skill to say anything definite about. } 16.Bxh6 Nd4 { I expected Ne8, but here I am not sure of anything. } 17.Rxd4 { Is this sound? My knight will be beautiful on d5, blacks rooks will both remain very passive. I intuitively felt like this gave a clear advantage. } 17...exd4 18.Qxd4 gxh6 19.Qxf6 Kh7 20.Rd1 Rae8 21.Rd6 Re6 22.Qf5 Kg8 23.Qg4 Kh8 24.Rd5 Rg8 25.Qh4 Kh7 26.Rf5 d6 27.Nd5 Kh8 { I couldnt find a way to proceed with the attack, though maybe I should have kept looking. Instead I decided to simplify a bit and hope that my extra pawns and strong knight will be enough. Intuitively I was sure that it was, but objectively I might have been wrong. } 28.Rf6 Rxf6 29.Qxf6 Kh7 30.Qxd6 Rg6 31.Qc7 Qxc7 32.Nxc7 Rd6 33.Nd5 Kg6 34.f4 Kh5 35.Kf3 f6 36.f5 Rc6 { ? This allows mate. Was white winning here if black had avoided the mate? I see no counterplay and white will soon create several protected passed pawns. } 37.Nf4 Kg5 38.h4

I did analyze the game and it's just time consuming to annotate the whole game about all the inaccuracies and blunders made by black or white as there are many of them. Instead i wanna be more straight forward and answer your actual question about whether your sacrifices were good enough.
So the main sacrifices which i assume you are talking about are 16.Bxh6 and 17.Rxd4.
After 16.Bxh6 with perfect play, white can only achieve a draw, obviously your opponent made a blunder by playing 16...Nd4 (this loses him right away, I'll tell which is the best continuation after this move in my next explanation about 17.Rxd4)
Why 16.Bxh6 is not the best?, because of
16...Ne8 (gets away from the queen attack of Qxf6 if after gxh6, also attacks your queen and threatens gxh6) 17.Qd2 (getting away from the knights attack and defending the h6 square, so now you are sacrificing your bishop for g and h pawn) 17...gxh6 18.Qxh6 (after this you are a piece down for 2 kingside pawns, which usually is good when you can complete the attack on kingside to gain an advantage, but here there is no other piece supporting the queen to attack the King to threaten a mate or gain any material or positional advantage, infact after this white has to settle for a draw with perpetual checking which is...) 18...d6 19.Qg5+ Kh7 20. Qh4+ kg8 21.Qg5+
1/2-1/2. (If white wants to continue playing the position instead of perpetual, Black will have a slight advantage of around -0.4 and you can still play on with) 18...d6 19.Nb5( attacking pawn on d6) 19...f6 20.Nxd6 Nxd6 21.Rxd6 ( and the game goes on, though you have 3 pawns for his knight, after the exchange of queens and the other pieces at the right time, black with an extra knight will fight for the win, and white should play for a draw and achieving it shouldn't be hard. So instead of Bxh6, you could have just continued to play the position with 16.Be3 or 16.f3, white will have a good positional advantage)
16...Nd4?? (I don't know why your opponent played this, it just weakens his e5 pawn and does nothing else to defend white's Bxh6., black has totally worsen his position after this)
17.Rxd4 ( this is not a bad sacrifice, white still has the advantage of space, open king, isolated black pawns, 2 extra pawns for the exchange down, after this the way you carried on to play is fine because the endgame results you in a win, yes even if black hadn't given you the opportunity to mate him as you are 3 pawns up for the exchange, you can create passed pawns and black can do nothing to prevent the loss. But the best continuation than 17.Rxd4 which helps you to see the win right away was...) 17.Bxg7 (Completely opening the kingside, also gets back the sacrificing bishop which you will see in couple of moves) 17...Kxg7 (the best black can do, but still hopeless) 18.Qxe5 ( attacking the d4 knight and also threatening Qg5+. White gains the sacrifice back with a huge advantage even if black plays 18...Nc6 by playing 19.Qg5+ and then 20.Qxf6) 18...Qxc6 ( has to give up the d4 knight to defend the f6 knight which is the only defender around his king) 19.Qg5+ Kh8 20.Rxd4 ( White has huge advantage of two extra pawns, open black king, active rooks, space advantage, and can go on to achieve the win easily)

Yes and no.
On an absolute basis definitely not.
On a relative basis yes because you won.
What makes a sacrifice sound is whether it works or not. Not what some engine says is perfection, just what THAT game result is.
Obviously it may not be 'sound' but it only has to work once to be sound, which depends on you and your opponent at that time.
Many top players make an 'unsound' sacrifice once, but may never attempt it again.


Where to start with a child learning chess? From here:

What is the best age to learn chess?

it seems that consensus is that that kids can start learning chess at almost any age. From around 5 years old they are big enough to learn the names of the pieces and the rules for how each piece moves.

Here:

https://chess.stackexchange.com/a/6225

it is suggested to not push kids to learn chess, but to lead by example.

Here

Where can I start to learn?

there are tips for how adults can learn chess.

My question is: Assuming you have an interested child age 5 - 10, how do you practically suggest teaching chess? Does it make most sense to just start playing with setting up all the pieces, or are there smaller "games" that one can/should start with?

Does it make most sense to just start playing with setting up all the
  pieces, or are there smaller "games" that one can/should start with?

It doesn't really matter the age of the person learning to play, there is no point in starting with a full set. There is just far too much to take in and make sense of. The first thing to do is to teach them how to win!

So, first teach them how king, queen and rook move and then teach the basic mates -

KRR v K
KR v K
KQ v K

And I would do it in that order because it is the easiest and it is the way to introduce concepts like checkmate, king not allowed to move into check, two rooks working together, opposition, king and one rook working together, stalemate (to be avoided with KQ v K).

Next I would go on to KP v K, when you can win, when it is a draw and how to win.

Then I would go on to a game which many people start with (but there is no checkmate, so less fun IMHO) and that is 8 pawns v 8 pawns. Winner is the first to get a pawn to the other side or to "stalemate" the opponent - i.e. the opponent is the first to run out of moves.

After that I would reintroduce the kings and major pieces before finally going on to the full game.

You can see I'm working backwards here because that way the learner first learns where they should be aiming to get to and what to when they get there in stages starting from the destination.

I learnt Draughts/Checkers first. I can't say if it's optimal, but it certainly got me used to playing on square boards and diagonal takes/captures such as with pawns.


When checkmate is impossible in a position Edit This question is not a duplicate, as mentioned in my comment. The linked supposedly-duplicate question addresses neither my below question #1, nor question #3, nor question #2 except tangentially mentioned in an answer. The linked question is about sufficient mating material whereas my question is about cases where material may be sufficient but nevertheless checkmate is impossible.

The laws of chess say

1.5. If the position is such that neither player can possibly checkmate the opponent’s king, the game is drawn (see Article 5.2.2).
5.2.2. The game is drawn when a position has arisen in which neither player can checkmate the opponent’s king with any series of legal moves. The game is said to end in a ‘dead position’. This immediately ends the game, provided that the move producing the position was in accordance with Article 3 and Articles 4.2 – 4.7.

[Articles 3, 4.2-4.7 basically deal with making legal moves.]
This is interesting because it seems possibly non-obvious whether this condition applies (though presumably rare in actual games!). I think this must have been investigated before. I'm wondering:
(1) How computationally difficult is it to determine that no sequence of legal moves ends in checkmate? Is there a better algorithm than brute force?
(2) Do you know of interesting examples of positions where it is hard for a human to tell whether this condition applies?
(3) Are there any examples of historical games where this law was not followed due to players and officials not realizing the condition held? Especially interesting if the game did not end in a draw due to time expiring for one player.
Inspired by https://old.reddit.com/r/chess/comments/8ulfrt/using_fide_rules_if_white_runs_out_of_time_in/
(edit) See also this closely related question where the accepted answer has a couple more examples where there is sufficient material to mate, but it is impossible from that position.

What you're asking goes by the name of "Dead Reckoning" in the domain of problems and retro problems.

(1) There isn't an algorithm I know of except the one mentioned by zaifrun: brute force. The reason is because you can find pretty amazing positions...

(2) Check out many problems relying on Dead Reckoning at Andrew Buchanan's website.
Also there are problem databases (like this one) where you can run a search for 'DR' in the stipulation.

A concrete example I recall is this one, which I reproduce here. By Andrew Buchanan, in StrateGems 2002. White to move; what was the last move in this position? (The position is dead but the last move made must have been from a legal and live position - so it's uniquely determinable.)

Bb1k1b2/bKp1p1p1/1pP1P1P1/1P6/p5P1/P7/8/8 w - - 0 1

(3) Even grandmasters have technically made moves in a dead position! See François Labelle's page for examples.

Well, this is really 3 questions, not sure I am answering everything here.

But there is an 'algorithm' for this problem, but it is NP complete, that is basically brute force in essence although you can make some Optimizations. This is basically the table base generating algorithm. Of course with large number of pieces this becomes difficult to apply, even for a single position.

This Rule is basically there, so you can claim a draw in positions that are obviously drawn such as bishop and king vs lone king with no pawn and similar positions.


Promotion race between three non-confronting pawns Two evenly matched players have reached the endgame after exchanging off all their pieces except the King and 3 Pawns. Having castled on opposite sides, we have now reached the following interesting position.

8/pppk4/8/8/8/8/4KPPP/8 w - - 0 1

Quite clearly, this is now a race for pawn promotion. What should be the strategy in this position (for both players)? Should your King go after the enemy pawns, or lead your own pawns to promotion?

The two previous answers both suggested that this position is a draw, but I believe it's a win for White.

Stockfish 5 evaluates the position at more than +10 if left to run for long enough (e.g., to depth 40), which sounds pretty decisive, but of course Stockfish isn't infallible. I generated a FinalGen tablebase for the position, but unfortunately it wasn't able to solve the position fully, though it did show that the moves 1.Kf3 and 1.Kf1 lose. Stockfish evaluations for the positions after 1.Kf3 and 1.Kf1 eventually drop below -10, which suggests that Stockfish does understand what is going on here, and its evaluations (at depth 40 or more) should be taken seriously.

The question, of course, wasn't about the game-theoretic status of the position, but about the strategy. The basic strategy is to block the opponent's pawns and aim for zugzwang. White's first move appears to give him a decisive advantage in doing this, provided he starts by moving his king towards the queenside (1.Kd1, 1.Kd2 or 1.Kd3). Here's a sample line:

[FEN "8/pppk4/8/8/8/8/4KPPP/8 w - - 0 1"]

1.Kd3 Ke6 2.h4 Kf7 3.h5 Kg7
( 3...a5 4.Kc4 a4 5.Kb4 b5 6.f4 c5+ 7.Ka3 c4 8.Kb4 Kg7
( 8...Kf6 9.g4 Kg7 10.f5 )
9.f5 Kg8 10.g3 Kg7 11.g4 Kg8 12.h6 Kh7 13.g5 Kg8 14.g6 Kf8 15.f6 $18 )
4.g4 Kh6 5.Kc3 a5 6.f4 a4 7.f5 Kg5
{ The kingside is now mutual zugzwang: Black can't move there without allowing promotion, and White can't move there without losing a pawn. Play therefore switches to the queenside. }
( 7...b5 8.f6 $18 )
8.Kb4 b5 9.Ka3 c5 ( 9...c6 10.Kb4 c5+ 11.Ka3 c4 12.Kb4 $23 { Zugzwang. } )
10.Ka2 b4 11.Kb2 a3+ 12.Kb3 c4+ 13.Ka2 c3 14.Kb3
{ The queenside is now also mutual zugzwang, so Black to move loses. }
14...c2 15.Kxc2 a2 16.Kb2 b3 17.Ka1 Kf6 18.h6 Kf7 19.g5 Kg8 20.g6 Kf8 21.f6 1-0

Black could try to avoid zugzwang by mimicking White's moves, but he can't mimic checks, and this is in any case a recipe for losing a direct race to promote. Here's a sample line:

[FEN "8/pppk4/8/8/8/8/4KPPP/8 w - - 0 1"]

1.Kd3 Ke6 2.h4 a5 3.Kc4 Kf5 4.h5 a4 5.g4+ Kg5 6.Kb4 b5 7.f4+ Kh6 8.f5 c5+
9.Ka3 c4 10.f6 c3 11.g5+ Kxg5 12.f7 b4+ 13.Ka2 b3+ 14.Kb1 a3 15.f8=Q a2+
16.Ka1 c2 17.Qc5+ 1-0

Unless there is careless pay, I see this ending up in a draw, play might continue:

[FEN "8/pppk4/8/8/8/8/4KPPP/8 w - - 0 1"]

1. Kd3 Ke6 2. g4 a5 3. h4 a4 4. h5 Kf6 5. Kc3 b5 6. h6 Kg6 7. g5 a3 8. Kb3 b4 9. Ka2 Kh7
10. Kb3 Kg6 11. Ka2

Black can't do 11... c5, because then it is basically over with:

  [FEN "8/pppk4/8/8/8/8/4KPPP/8 w - - 0 1"]

 1. Kd3 Ke6 2. g4  a5  3. h4  a4  4. h5  Kf6  5. Kc3  b5
 6. h6  Kg6  7. g5  a3 8. Kb3  b4  9. Ka2  Kh7  10. Kb3  Kg6
 11. Ka2  c5  12. f3 c4  13. f4  c3  14. Kb3  a2  15. Kxa2  c2
 16. Kb2 b3 17. Kc1  Kh7 18. f5  Kg8  19. f6  b2+  20. Kxc2  Kf7
 21. h7  Kg6 22. h8=Q


When is it a good idea to capture the fianchettoed bishop? According to Simon Williams, from 25:10 and forwards of this stream, his opponents attempt at capturing his fianchettoed bishop with a bishop and queen battery is not a good idea "in these types of positions".

So, thus I ask: When is it a good idea? I usually go for it because I know that many players hate having to give up their fianchettoed bishop.

[FEN ""]
1. d4 c5 2. d5 g6 3. c4 Bg7 4. Nc3 d6 5. e4 Nf6 6. Bf4 O-O 7. Qd2 Re8 8. Be2 e6 9. Nf3 exd5 10. exd5 a6 11. O-O Bg4 12. h3 Bxf3 13. Bxf3 Qc7 14. a4 Nbd7 15. Rfe1 Bf8 16. Ne4 Nxe4 17. Rxe4 Rxe4 18. Bxe4 Re8 19. Re1 Bg7 20. b3 Be5 21. Bxe5 Rxe5 22. Bf3 Qd8 23. Rxe5 Nxe5 24. Bd1 Qf6 25. f4 Nd7 26. Qe3 Kf8 27. Bg4 Nb6 28. a5 Na8 29. Bc8 Qa1+ 30. Kh2 Qxa5 31. Bxb7 Nc7 32. Bc6 Qa1 33. Qf3 h5 34. f5 Qe5+ 35. Qg3 gxf5 36. Qxe5 dxe5 37. d6 Ne6 38. Kg3 e4 39. Kf2 Nd4 40. Ba4 f4 41. b4 cxb4 42. c5 b3 43. Bxb3 Nxb3 44. c6 Ke8 0-1

There are a few points here that make it a bad idea.

First and foremost, white's dark squared bishop in this pawn structure is his good bishop (and it's extremely active). While black's fianchetto'd bishop is also good, it isn't directly influencing the position until the knight on f6 moves (which you'll notice never happens in this game until his opponent mis-steps and trades knights).

Secondly, trading the kingside fianchetto'd bishop is usually good because it leaves black with dark squared weaknesses that white might be able to take advantage of and attack. Notice how Simon Williams calls Qd2 "an aggressive plan." He's already envisioning white trading bishops, and going for a kingside attack. However, in this position, white does not really have any pieces aimed towards the kingside that he can use to attack black's king. And the possible plan of h4-h5 to open up black's king falls flat in the Benoni when black is able to quickly open the center of the board with e6-exd5. If black had already played e5, then it would be entirely different.

Lastly, notice that when the pieces start to get traded off, BLACK offers to trade this bishop for white's (41:20ish). The reason here is that the position has transformed largely into an endgame, and Simon Williams discusses how he wants to get the classic good knight vs bad bishop endgame. All of white's pawns are stuck on light squares, impeding his minor piece's mobility. Whereas black has a few important dark squares his knight can jump to in the center of the board where it influences everything (e5 and d4 in particular, possibly c5 if white plays b4 cxb4).

Usually the fianchetto'd bishop is strong because the h8-a1 diagonal has a lot of juicy targets it can aim at from a distance. In this game, the diagonal never really meant anything.

Careful!  He never said it was a bad idea.  He said it usually doesn't work in these types of positions.   Note how me chooses to play Re8 so he can keep his Bishop with Bh8.  This is why it doesn't work; White is unable to get the trade.


Is there an online PGN editor for Blank Chess? Blank Chess is a variant where the board starts empty and the first two moves are placing the Kings on your side of the board. You can then either place a piece or move a piece in subsequent turns.

I recorded a game I played with my son in the same notation one would use for CrazyHouse, and would like to record it in a PGN (or BPGN) format to show it to friends.

Does anyone know where I can find such an editor online, or failing that, one that I can download to my Mac?

Caissa's PGN Editor claims to be what you want.

I think you are looking for something like this:

http://www.apronus.com/chess/wbeditor.php?w=8&h=8

You can create your own position, load/export PGN/FEN formats.


What is the highest value of pieces on this particular 6x6 board, without any of them attacking each other? I got a question in school in which I have to get the highest score possible by adding pieces on a 6x6 board like this:

The rules are that they are the same color and may never attack each other, and that pieces on my board must also be on yours in the same position.

Here are the point values:

Queen(D)15 points

Rook(R)15 points

Kings(K)10 points

Bishop(B)=9 points

Knight(H)=5 points

Pawn=0 points

My highest value was 97 by placing 8 bishops.

This was the correct answer with 100 points!

The max is 90 +Q + K  =  105 + K as  I understand the problem.  You can place six rooks at 15 each.

Then if you replace any of the rooks with a Q you lose two rooks by being attacked by that new queen.

I get 115 max as I can put six rooks on the board with the K and Q.
And no piece is attacking any others.

Final answer:  115

4k3
7r
r7
2r5
5r2
6r1
1r6
3q4


two or three initial moves = win? you have to play a game with the following rule : white can initially play two moves, then one move each side as usual, and a draw counts as a victory for black. Which side do you choose ? (say differently, do you think this variant favors white or black ?)

Same question with three initial moves for white. Maybe this is already solved?

Since I'm a 1.d4 player, my first two moves as White would be 1.d4 and 2.c4. After that position, Stockfish gives an evaluation of +0.59 if Black plays ...e6. I would definitely enjoy playing this as White since the threat of playing e4 at any time prevents the Nimzo and Dutch. Black best option is to settle for a QGD one tempo down by playing ...d5 on the next move, but this would be very comfortable for me. So I'd probably choose White, but it's not an easy decision.

That being said, it's not close to winning for White. An extra move just guarantees a pleasant edge.

With three initial moves, I would go for 1.e4, 2.d4, 3.Nf3. Stockfish gives a +0.99 evaluation, and it would be very tough for a human to defend as Black in a practical OTB game. This seems on the verge of winning for White, but still not a definite win.

2 extra moves for white is not even close enough for white to be winning, I would take black with draw odds any day.
Advantage of white is already only around 30 points elo difference. 2 more moves might make it 100 but thats very little chances of a draw is so high.

We have had 3-4 move odds with humans + engines vs engines and it quickly becomes apparently by playing certain openings as black that the advantage quickly disappears, the best the human player can still get is a draw in a worse position.

How many moves white would need to win is an open problem, I think the best lowest proven bound is like 12?


Does chess improve our intelligence? This is my first question in Chess, so I hope my question is simple.

I know about chess but I am not a regular player. But my friend told me that everyday play chess is good for your mind and also for improving memory power. Is this correct?

And also I don't know some of the move rules. So, please give me some suggestion to improve my chess knowledge.

So far, studies I‘ve seen mentioned in newspapers making a claim either for or against a correlation between chess and intelligence strike me as highly dubious in their methodology. That‘s not surprising, since the concept of a “general intelligence” is itself dubious. (And it’s not even entirely clear in every context what “intelligence” actually means.)

Chess is basically a duel that two people fight with their minds. One would expect that as a pastime it’s more attractive to people who enjoy exercising their minds in various areas in general. Therefore, it wouldn’t be surprising to find that among good chess players there would also be more people than average that are good at mathematics, spatial visualisation, music and arts, programming etc.

(Speaking metaphorically: A rooster makes cock-a-doodle-doo, because the sun goes up. It's not the other way around: The sun doesn't rise because of the rooster.)

Developing, for instance, a good memory for chess games and long variations doesn’t automatically grant a good memory for reciting poetry or repeating the dance steps in a choreography or the memory necessary to keep one’s focus through deciphering a particularly difficult classical Greek text. Nor does it make you good at drawing portraits (which is for a very substantial part about having a good short term visual memory).

There might be some soft form of synenergy in that playing chess increases brain activity, brain metabolism etc. which conceivably might have a positive effect on other mental activities. That, though, would also go the other way around.

Chess does not have that much of a direct correlation to IQ.  There should be no formula.

Expert Chess Players Are Smart?


After a blunder, is it better to resign or keep playing? I often wonder if it is better to resign or keep playing at a disadvantage after making an obvious blunder (for instance, leaving a piece hanging, only to realize too late that you made the mistake).

Let me be clear: I am referring only to casual games (not tournament), and my main goals are 1) to have fun and 2) to improve.

It can be frustrating to keep playing at a disadvantage, but does that additional challenge help make you stronger, or is it better to just resign and start a new game?

An example would be the game below, where I blundered (black) on move 13 and left my bishop hanging... should I keep playing or resign?

 [FEN ""]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 Na5 6.Bb5+ Bd7 7.Bxd7+ Qxd7 8.Nc3 Nxd5 9.d3 Nc6 10.O-O Nxc3 11.bxc3 O-O-O 12.f4 f6 13.Ne4 Bc5+

First, I would try and keep a very straight face, and maybe your opponent will "trust" you, and overlook the blunder. It has happened before even with very strong players.

That said, if the opponent takes it, you should probably decide based on your level of skill and your perceived level of skill of the opponent, and if the position is messy.

For example, if you are playing a master, and the position is just a clear piece down, you should probably resign. If you are playing an 800-player, then it is very possible that you can play on despite your error.

What I mean by "messy" is if the position is a tactical mess even without the piece, it is more likely that your opponent can still make an error, but if it is just a clear piece down with no tricks, as in the position you gave, then you may as well resign if your opponent is a reasonably decent player.

Lastly, is it a blitz game, or an over-the-board tournament game? (I know in this case, you said it was casual.) If it is blitz, it really does not matter as much either way since it will be over soon; but if it is OTB, it matters more, but your opponent also has that much more time to figure things out.

In the end, there is no right or wrong answer, and you have to evaluate the circumstances, and do what you think is best at that moment.

Do keep in mind that if it were a tournament game, that playing it out may also tire you for the next game.

I would not resign this. With opposite side castling and queens still on the board, anything can happen.