This is more applicable to ‘Dailys’ (Online correspondence chess) then over the board chess…though it certainly can apply.
You all ever pour an obsessive amount of energy into a game…working out all the lines from a critical point in the game, only for your opponent to…just give you the game? Give you mate in two? Or some such.
I chased this guys king all over the board. Was down 3 pawns and a knight to nothing from all the sacs trying to corral him. He did what I thought was a brilliant move to block a mate in two, so i worked out all the permutations from there. Mate in four or five or at best for him he would lose his queen and an obscene amount of material
Then he just completely undid his brilliant move and handed me back the mate in two.
I’m not quite sure what point you’re trying to make.
I hope the following isn’t too critical!
It sounds like you played a good game with exciting sacrifices.
However you missed a ‘brilliant’ move of his? That’s why we calculate as much as we can - to see such defences in advance.
Also it’s impressive that you calculated four or five moves ahead (even when I reached 2390, I rarely saw three moves ahead in a middlegame.)
Given you were winning anyway, I don’t see it matters what your opponent does (and since his ‘brilliant’ move only delayed his demise, I wouldn’t call it that.)
Hi glee, on a semi related note I’m a struggling adult improver and you had offered in the distant past to help me. I was recently handed a crushing defeat from a winning start. Could I ask for some of your time in taking a look and telling me and all these fine people where I went wrong? I’d start a new thread, natch.
Well it was a ‘king chase’ and on Chess.com, not OTB so it was all a bit forced but it did take a good amount of time and mental energy to calculate.
Which is the point I was making. “Have you ever poured a great amount of time and energy into making a move…just for your opponent to blunder his next move?”
Edit: I mean…i can post the game, but now that I’ve ‘game reviewed it’…its embarrassing.
On a different note…i wouldn’t mind seeing a couple of yours (Glee) and anyone else on SD…the games you’re most proud of. Maybe with a couple of notes. You all can post here or in a different thread if you want.
Yes, all of the time. Although, more often, I’m the one blundering an even position. But I’m very much a “casual” player.
The positions that require the most calculations, for me, are either endgames (where you can actually calculate very far ahead) or tactical middle games. And tactics are generally where the “big” blunders are. So rather often I will calculate a few lines where there are clear blunders for my opponent, while assuming they won’t make them (to make sure the line is sound even with best play by my opponent). Then, once I’m confident the line is OK (which, to be honest, it isn’t always… like I said I’m not very good) my opponent plays the blunder that I was sure they would avoid.
Often. But, this is a good thing, right? I’m delighted when it happens.
If I’m able to put a ton of pressure and I’ve spent the time/energy to understand the position and tactical nuances, then that pays its dividends via my opponent playing a suboptimal or losing move.
My thought process then is usually, “Wait a sec, I’m pretty sure he can’t play that. Let me revisit that branch of the calculation…” And if I decide it is still a blunder, yippee! But sometimes that extra review – that giving to my opponent the benefit of the doubt – reveals to me a resource I missed in my own calculation.
Although in your game it sounds like the position was dead lost no matter what your opponent played.
Here I’ll just post the game. Ignore the low score the game is giving. I was chasing his king, and I don’t think my opponent deserved his score. I don’t know how many people will actually be able to see this:
I’m white. On move 15 he opened up his bishop to foil my mate. I blocked him and planned to pin that bishop to his queen when he captured my block. I spent forever calculating my next moves.
And then he undid all his work by capturing the blocking piece with a pawn instead of the bishop.
Regardless, its a messy game highly reflective of our ratings. I’ve seen YT channels run by 1500 rated players all the way up to Hikaru. I wish a 1200 player would start a channel. The games are highly entertaining…at least to my dumb ass.
The only way I can make sense of his choices is that he still didn’t see the mate and he wanted to play …Bb4 to “chase” your queen away. Evidence is strong that black didn’t really understand what was happening given 13…Ka5, apparently trying to run to safety via the unavailable b6 square. He was probably surprised when chess-dot-com didn’t let him play 14…Kb6. When he took back with the pawn on d6, my guess is that he figured his king guarded all its neighboring dark squares and that there wasn’t an immediate threat, not seeing the double-queen move tactic you played that forced his king away from the defense of the a3 square (17. Qb3+! Ka5 18 Qa3#). Nice find there, by the way. And he didn’t want to take back on d6 with the queen given RxQ, and he didn’t want to take with the bishop since (in my speculation) he wanted his bishop mobile for his rather shallow plan of poking at your queen / developing his bishop with tempo.
Fatigue can play its part. In any case, as many games are lost in sporting events because of bad mistakes as are won by great plays or a brilliant performance. As the old saying goes, to err is human.
Not just that, I’ve made the mistake of playing online correspondece chess (Dailys) while at work. AND a lot people apparently play six or more games at once.
Here’s another interesting phenom I think mostly applies to people in my skill range.
I’m in the middle of a daily game right now and have had an advantage but making dubious plays to seal the deal. My opponent has spotted them all and dealt with them in a timely fashion, but on my last move he didn’t play quickly like i thought he would and sure enough…i found his position is more complicated then I thought.
TLDR: My opponent not playing quickly led me to find he had good reason not to.
As I said it mostly applies to my skill range. Great players will see everything very quickly, and lower lower range players just play willy nilly
I was playing a tournament game against a Master (I think I was about 1600-1700 rated at the time) and we were early in the middle game. I had been pondering all sorts of moves and strategies (some of them over and over), looked at the clock, and I had been thinking for more than 40 minutes! I frantically looked the board over, grabbed my knight on c6 and moved it to a5 (I was black), because I recalled I had calculated it didn’t lose immediately.
We ended up drawing the game and afterwards a friend of mine told me that my opponent had exclaimed to someone outside the hall (later in the game), “He thought for 45 minutes on one move, but the move was soo good!”
That was an exciting game - here’s some comments.:
The opening transposed into a Blackmar-Diemar gambit.
4. f3 is best - then after 4. … exf3 5. Nxf3 White has good development for the pawn (and Black’s f5 move now looks very weak.
4. … h6??
6. Na4 is tempting (hoping for Nc5+), but wastes a move (Black should reply b6.) 6. f3 is still the best - after 6. … exf3 7. Nxf3 White threatens Ne5+ winning.)
10. d5+ is very tempting, but risks losing. Given Black plays weak moves, regualr chess will win.
14. … Ka4? loses (quickly after 15. a3 when 15. … Kxa3 16. Qa5 mate or 15. … a5 16. Qb3. 14. … b4 is better.
Thank you for the comments and yeah…after i after i did a game review, I saw I missed a mate in 3 around move 10. Which is why i said it was kind of an embarassing game. Exciting, but indicative of my around 1200 rating.
When he took back with the pawn on d6, my guess is that he figured his king guarded all its neighboring dark squares and that there wasn’t an immediate threat, not seeing the double-queen move tactic you played that forced his king away from the defense of the a3 square (17. Qb3+! Ka5 18 Qa3#). Nice find there, by the way. And he didn’t want to take back on d6 with the queen given RxQ, and he didn’t want to take with the bishop since (in my speculation) he wanted his bishop mobile for his rather shallow plan of poking at your queen / developing his bishop with tempo.