I am an avarage player and looking to improve my strategic skills, I finished the Josh Waitzkin Academy in the game, and I currently play sequentially through all tutorials, am at Art of Learning. What is the propper way to finish them?
Also ... any ideea of how to use the database? The manual is flimsy at best ... and I have no ideea what the database is even used for!

It's best to finish the tutorials sequentially.

Granted, the manual isn't as nearly detailed as I'd like; but pages 48 - 49 will tell you the main features of the database screen... from there, you'll just have to experiment with it (at least that's how I learned how to use it).

One of the great things about the database is that you're not limited to the database provided by Chessmaster; you can create your own databases as well.

For instance, I created a small database of games by Garry Kasparov. I can then search the database by date, event, opening etc., and once I've found the game I want, move it to the training area and analyze it.

If you dont mind asking, what rating do you have? I started to really play seriously for several weeks, and my rating is around 700? What's the avarage rating for a John Doe picked right of the street, considering he already knows the basic rules of chess?

I must confess that I don't pay attention to ratings that much. Mostly, I play in Training Mode. I believe the last time I checked, it was about 1100 -- but I know others here have a higher rating.

For a beginner, Chessmaster starts you with a rating of 600... 900 for a person who's played chess before.

My own personal opinion is that many people worry about their rating too much. Ask yourself two questions:

Am I learning?

Am I enjoying the game?

If the answer to both of these questions is yes, then it doesn't matter what your rating is. If the answer to one of these questions is no, then obviously something is wrong, and futher examination is needed.

One use of the database is to discover if your opening moves have been played before by masters/grandmasters and how they proceeded into the middle game.
Let's say you played CM online. Go to the training mode and load one of your saved online games. Move through the game, say 4-5 moves and then go to the database. Select under edit, "copy position from training room" and then select, on the bottom right of the screen, "search this position" If your moves have been played in any games in the date base, the games will appear. Play though a couple and see how others proceeded from your position.

I like to play through my games until my position isn't found in the database. Then, either I've discovered a opening novelty (highly unlikely) or discovered where I've screwed up (very likely!). Enjoy.

A novelty is a novelty

It doesn't have to be a good one though

quote:

Originally posted by woodpusherghd:
One use of the database is to discover if your opening moves have been played before by masters/grandmasters and how they proceeded into the middle game.
Let's say you played CM online. Go to the training mode and load one of your saved online games. Move through the game, say 4-5 moves and then go to the database. Select under edit, "copy position from training room" and then select, on the bottom right of the screen, "search this position" If your moves have been played in any games in the date base, the games will appear. Play though a couple and see how others proceeded from your position.

I like to play through my games until my position isn't found in the database. Then, either I've discovered a opening novelty (highly unlikely) or discovered where I've screwed up (very likely!). Enjoy.

Found a very interesting opening position which I used quite succesfully in human games. Could not find it in the database at all following your instructions, kind of strange.
I did not finished the game though, I just played my move, searched for it, and that's about it.

quote:

Originally posted by tegramon:

quote:

Originally posted by woodpusherghd:
One use of the database is to discover if your opening moves have been played before by masters/grandmasters and how they proceeded into the middle game.
Let's say you played CM online. Go to the training mode and load one of your saved online games. Move through the game, say 4-5 moves and then go to the database. Select under edit, "copy position from training room" and then select, on the bottom right of the screen, "search this position" If your moves have been played in any games in the date base, the games will appear. Play though a couple and see how others proceeded from your position.

I like to play through my games until my position isn't found in the database. Then, either I've discovered a opening novelty (highly unlikely) or discovered where I've screwed up (very likely!). Enjoy.

Found a very interesting opening position which I used quite succesfully in human games. Could not find it in the database at all following your instructions, kind of strange.
I did not finished the game though, I just played my move, searched for it, and that's about it.

Please post the position. Since the database has mostly games by titled players, you may not find every frequently occurring amateur position, for example, well known traps, fools mate, etc., but then again, I've seen some really bad blunders in master games, so who knows? Did CM deliberately cull out master/gm blunders?

Basicly, im exploring this position, as to why would I use it, why would I not, pro's and con's, all the tactical information I can get on it. However, Chessmaster's analysis does not tell me anything worthwhile. I searched the database, no sequence is found. Probably beacause it really is a blunder! Here is the position. White plays first, black plays along, but white is the position.

1 - c4 d6
2 - Nc3 Nf6
3 - b3 Be6
4 - Bb2 Ng4
5 - Qc2 Kd7

This is certainly not standard and no titled player would play like this. Thats why you won't find it in any database.

After 3.b3 there are only 4 games in the MegaBase that has over 4 milion games. In none of those games 3...Be6 was played.

Obviously no titled player would play like this. Well ... at least it looks good ... can't believe I said that!

It depends on which side you are


Black violated three basic rules.
1.) In opening he unnecessarry moved the same piece twice (the knight)
2.) He blocked his central e pawn with his bishop.
3.) He unnecessarry exposed his king and forfeited his right to castle.


White didn't do anything wrong, but he could play a little more activelly.

The black was an AI, Kendra I think.

As for your comments ... if only chessmaster could comment like that, evaluate strategies and the like ...

I dont think even Fritz does that or?

No program can give comments like that.


As for learning to play better, go through all Chessmaster's tutorials and try to soak it all in (replay the tutorials 100 times if you have too). You can learn something every time.

Fritz has a window that you can open during the game where it lists the main choices of moves it thinks you have, in order of how good it thinks they are, with little comments.

e.g.

Be3 Development
Nf3 Development
Nb5 Moves a piece twice in the opening
exd5 Weakens pawn structure
Nxd5 Loses material
...

It's one of the few features I actually like about Fritz.
But the comments are no more detailed than these. In the above example you'd have no reason to choose Be3 over Nf3 other than Fritz preferring the former.

Well, I prefer Chessmaster over Fritz at this point. Analyzing a game with ChessMaster produces much more fluent analysis for me. And it gives an alternative to another move. What I dont like about ChessMaster analysis tool is that it's to materialistic, it will think in terms of "a rook and a bishop is better than a knight and a bishop" without caring much for the strategical concepts.

Anyone has the list of the basic principles of tactics and strategy in chess? I am going through Waitzkin's Course and I forgot to note them, and going through it all over again just to find those, it's a pain. I remember two of them :

- When you have a material advantage always trade down
- Bring the adevrsary king to the middle of the board for the execution
- A rook on the 7'th rank is called a pig beacause it can gulp down almost anything.
- Central squares are always important.
- Principle of two weaknesses (this I forgot what it is)
- Threat is much better than execution.

I think there are more of them though. But I dont wanna go through the entire course one by one just to fish them off.
Anyone has the whole list?

Another basic concept is to look for the space left behind each time your opponent moves.
Also, look for ideal outposts for knights (often the fifth rank)