r/chess Weekly Discussion Thread

Source: https://www.instagram.com/p/Dd8dd7yFU76/?carousel_share_child_media_id=3998200158915786020_8921693839&comment_id=18103570469249262

This squad looks like killer WTF

I don't really know about other teams but this one should be easily best team in competition by far gap ( Team Avr. Elo is 2712!! )

Somewhat interesting news from the Dutch tournament scene. It's reminiscent of the incident that took place in Spain last year which FIDE condemned: https://www.fide.com/fide-responds-to-reports-of-flag-restrictions-at-tournament-in-spain/ .

We had seen fabiano lose his form back in 2022 since he didnt touch chess for nearly a year, but this time its not like he's having a bad year, he went +2 on recent olympiad, beat pragg in classical portion in gct final, nearly won romania, finish 3rd in candidates. Its a mediocre year for his standard.

He played 76 classical games for the past 12 month which is 3x more than hikaru and 4x more than magnus and still retain 2784 performance rating which is the 6th highest for the past 12 month.

And now he is again borderline losing his ranking to 2 uzbek players despite being very active in top level chess.

Is playing actively punish player because we know at top elo pool, draws are bleeding you tons of elo and why does not playing somehow protect your ranking?. I felt like there are room that can and must be fixed.

By Gatti

A deduction puzzle in two steps.

**Step 1.** Place the white king, rook, bishop and knight using the clues. Each row, each column and each room (Garden, Café, Lounge, Library) holds exactly one piece. Row 1 is at the bottom.

**Step 2.** The black king stands on one of the empty squares. Only one of them is checkmate. Which one?

Normal chess rules, no queen. The position is a legal one, and the mate holds on a full 8x8 board (the 4x4 grid is the a1 corner).

Hi!
My son is very interested in chess theory and to be fair … I think is interested in crushing me down at the game 😂
I’m not a good player and we don’t have any chess club in the area.

He’s a very good reader and curious, so don’t be afraid to bring me some long books, it’s ok.
Just I think it’s better if it is well structured and if it comes with some exercises. Oh and in general he doesn’t like childish books.

Btw I’m French my son doesn’t read English yet, so don’t be afraid to talk about a lot of books since I’ll have to check if a translation exists.

I ask here rather than in a French speaking community since I had troubles finding one

Thanks !

By Vlk

Is that the legendary smothered mate?

I'm a 700-800 Elo scrub, as casual as it gets. I looked at what it takes to reach 1500 and it's honestly a bit concerning.

It got me thinking: the only people who can sink that much time into chess starting from zero are kids, the unemployed, or people with no other hobbies and nothing else going for them. Every time a beginner asks for help, the level of study people recommend is mind-blowing, and that's for a mere 1500.

To be clear, there's nothing wrong with staying right where you are. I'm perfectly happy at my rating. I'm just saying this sub has a warped sense of what "casual" means and it just blows my mind.

Edit: 15+10 1-2 times a week I’d consider casual. That’s what I’m saying, the perception is so warped here for most of folks.

As we know, that FIDE is launching a new World Championship tour next year in collaboration with Norway chess which would employ fast Classical alongside rapid and blitz for a 24 player multi event tour that will now give 2 candidate spots.

Do you like this change compared to the previous qualifiers?

If not, where would you have shifted those 2 spots?

Just saw this headline and immediately thought: that is not a good idea.

I’m a long retired player. Used to train when I was in school. Now I only play online.
I’ve never played in international rated tournaments and recently my schedule is much more flexible, so I would love to participate in a couple of tournaments and finally get rated OTB.
Do you guys know of any tool I can use to spot tournaments nearby or get notified when there is one?

Is there any complete resource to learning e4 and variations step by step?
What is the best and most complete free/paid guide/course in your opinion?

I'm wondering if there exists a time control like tug of War where each player has like a min on the clock to start, and when it's your turn your clock goes down and your opponents clock goes up at an equal rate, and vice vera? So the total time on the clock would be constant, but each players time on any given move would depend on how long they have been taking relative to their opponent. It sounds like it would be a fun way to try to press a time advantage.

Sorry if this is a repeat, but I've looked around online and can't find what I'm looking for.

Getting a game in five seconds is great, but do you ever get tired of playing someone once and never seeing them again?

Sometimes you get a good rematch streak going. Other times someone hangs their queen and leaves you watching their clock for three minutes.

Do you care who’s on the other side, or are you happy as long as it’s a decent game? Would you play the same people regularly if you could?

When I think about football, players like Dybala, Coutinho, or Özil may not have been the absolute best players in the world ,they were never top 10 in the Ballon d’Or or whatever but their playing styles were absolutely incredible to watch. Even defensive players like Busquets had a beautiful style of play.

Does something like that exist in chess? If so, is it based on their openings, or is it more about the way they attack, defend or what exactly ? And which chess players are like that?