You only do a prophylactic move in certain scenarios.
Scenario 1: Neither have a clear plan of attack nor weaknesses or, you need to make a waiting move expecting x opponent move which will result in a weakness on his position.
You are about to launch an attack/plan, but your opponent has an intermezzo that will give him a crucial extra tempo to stop it.
Both are in a race, but he will make a treat that you can ignore, giving him an extra tempo on said race.
Obviously, there are more scenarios, but those are the main ones. So, unless those general settings are not present, you dont need to waste a move.
there is no miracle method, prophylaxis depends both on psychological concept but also on thinking about the opponent's plan. I like to say that when you look at the position, examine what your targets are (opponent castling, queenside, pawn chain) and once you have found your targets, tell yourself what your opponent finds as a target on your side, and think about which moves are good enough to disrupt your opponent, but nevertheless with this method, be careful not to panic and imagine that your position is hopeless because guessing your opponent's plan is very difficult
@njswift said in #4:
> material on this topic for intermediate players
Your 5 points provide useful approaches.
This is trying to focus on resources more related to intermediate players.
1) I also did the Kramnik freebie teaser Thinking In Chess Chessable course and found it helpful but maybe too difficult.
2) One suggested thing is to play casual Rapid / Blitz games and over-focus on anticipating and preventing (or reducing the effect of a move) moves.
I even tried to play some games where I was a mini-Petrosian!
3) Hellsten in Mastering Chess Strategy talks about Prophylaxis, Restriction and Provocation (hold your position with something like a null move and see what the opponent does). Contains 50 Prophylaxis type exercises to solve plus solutions. Resource available Forward Chess, Chessable and as book.
4) chessfactor.com is a free resource (donations accepted) that provides selectable lessons that you can complete in Elementary, Beginner, Improver, Intermediate and Advanced Paths.
The Intermediate has a prophylaxis course with 6 videos using weak squares (2 videos) as an approach to 4 prophylaxis lessons. (90 minutes of video plus additional course tasks/ tests and lessons). You can access the videos and other content within the chessfactor site.
If you just want the videos:
Search on YouTube for this playlist with 6 videos by IM Alex Astaneh.
In the YouTube search area, Type:
chess weak squares playlist chessfactor
https://XXX.youtube.com/watch?v=2wVVrS5DXKY
I put XXX in place of www in previous link so the video does not display in this message
5) You can also search for 'prophylaxis' in youtube and in the Collections area of chessgames.com.
Cheers
after someone slams you with a crushing, unanticipated move, start analysis at that point and work backwards, to the move where you should have seen it coming, and could still do something about it. there will be no shortage of training positions.
A few more Prophylaxis Resources
The Giants of Strategy book by Neil McDonald
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1018894
Grandmaster Chess Strategy Book
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1045320
F. Prophylaxis and Restriction
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1013319
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chesscollection?cid=1020114
Improve your Chess with Prophylaxis | Prophylactic Thinking | IM Andrey Ostrovskiy (a series of videos)
https://VVV.youtube.com/watch?v=2wVVrS5DXKY
I put VVV in place of www so video title page will not display
Search YouTube for: #Chess #Chessfactor #Prophylaxis #ProphylacticThinking #4K
Grand Master RB Ramesh - Learn Chess the right way! - Prophylactic thinking and Prophylaxis (approx 2h)
https://VVV.youtube.com/watch?v=a7vF_SvUxmE
Search YouTube for
#prophylacticthinking
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