Questions from a player stuck at 800-900 for over 4 years

This is my latest game. And I think it's where I actually played the best I can so far.

1. Take your time, you get no extra points for the time left on your clock at the end of the game.
2. Take even more time when your pieces or pawns are very near your opponent's king. The goal of chess is to checkmate the king, not to chase random pawns.
3. Take your time to actually give a goal to your moves. What's the point of move 34...Bb6 threatening the Queen if you don't capture her next and choose to capture a pawn instead ?

In short : take your time.
(Maybe play a longer time control ? And/Or with increment ?)

• Is hanging pieces something to still look out for?

Yes.
Hanging pieces and making obvious blunders is relevant at least up to 1500-1600( the frequency declines in line with rating) . At your level you can expect on average more than one obviously hanging piece in every game. Taking them when they are blundered will gain you 100 rating and not blundering whole pieces will also gain you 100 rating.

@AtalanteChess said in #2:

Opening does matter a lot, though not theory. Acquaint yourself with opening principles and try to follow them in your games. After each game analyze if you indeed followed through with principled play in the opening or not. London system is principled, but fosters the bad habit of not thinking at all in the opening which hinders your progress as a player.
Don't hang pieces, take hanging pieces: of course, this will be relevant to eternity. Though don't expect opponents to blunder them at every move. Just do tactics daily and you will see improvement.
What openings to stick to? My opinion: drop the London. Stick with Italian or Ruy Lopez, whatever you enjoy more. Black is fine.
To reiterate: Really learn (again if necessary) about opening principles and make an attempt to apply them every single game. Afterwards analyze if you did so. Cheers.
actually dont drop london like you are 1000 so your opponent are gonna blunder very soon(probably) so try to use some tactics like pin or skewer and if you need help do the lichess basics it helped me a lot 2 years ago(i did lichess practice 2 years ago)
but you should do basics then practice it will help you more but... jump onto practice once you have gotten 3 stars in every level of basics if you cant get 3 stars then message me on lichess i will tell the answer and explain it

@Curieuil said in #12:

1. Take your time, you get no extra points for the time left on your clock at the end of the game.
2. Take even more time when your pieces or pawns are very near your opponent's king. The goal of chess is to checkmate the king, not to chase random pawns.
3. Take your time to actually give a goal to your moves. What's the point of move 34...Bb6 threatening the Queen if you don't capture her next and choose to capture a pawn instead ?

In short : take your time.
(Maybe play a longer time control ? And/Or with increment ?)

Thanks! .. yeah.. I don't know what I was doing. After the attack on my king started happening after my OOO I became more lost and lost how to actually defend it. When analyzing the game I see it, in game.. i sometimes miss it.

For example, the step back of the bishop instead of taking the pawn (move 10), "need to defend bishop, move back".

I really like your "you dont get extra points for time left".

• People seem to say the opening does not matter. However, versus the lines I play (Often London System, Ruy Lopez, Italian game) there seem to be some moves .. where I just end up losing a piece in the first 10 moves

tactics issue

opening preferences don't matter, but opening principles do (and not blundering pins or forks is one of them)

• Is hanging pieces something to still look out for?

Obviously so, and this includes elementary tactics

also what #5 and #12 said

Looking at this game I have absolutely no idea why you ask if you should still look for hanging pieces...

As you see, each player made around 10 heavy blunders in this game. And most of them are probably changing the result in one way or another.

Talking "I play this or that opening" makes hardly any sense on this level. Even if you could play the correct moves, your opponent will not, rendering your "preparation" useless. You seem to play some moves that you saw somewhere, but it is obvious that you have no clue why they are played.

Frequent observations are undeveloping your own pieces, not taking opponents free pieces, hanging your own pieces, neglecting your own development...

I mean, it is no big surprise - if you wouldn't commit these crimes, you'd be playing 400 Elo higher. But ti improve, you need to tackle these problems. Either by thoroughly studying material for beginners (good but easy tactics compilations), and/or go with someone stronger over your games. You don't need to hire a coach for lifetime, but it may be worth it to have someone talk you through the games. Knowing tactics is one thing, but making it a habit to actually look for them quite another.

@Cedur216 said in #16:

tactics issue

opening preferences don't matter, but opening principles do (and not blundering pins or forks is one of them)

Obviously so, and this includes elementary tactics

also what #5 and #12 said

That hits on something I have been thinking about. When you ask experienced chess players "Do openings matter" they rightfully say "no" but I think it might be miscommunication. Because what I notice in my games as a 800-900 player is that the first mistakes (and sometimes even big ones) happens right away .. where I can pretty much resign right away because I am already 3-6 points behind. But what you say is "openings don't matter, but opening principles do". I think us newbies, actually mean that when we ask for "do openings matter".

Long story short: Are there any good youtube videos that explain opening principles well? Or would a youtube search for "chess opening principles" be enough? I don't want to do a youtube search and find a video that explains the wrong principles.

@nadjarostowa said in #17:

Looking at this game I have absolutely no idea why you ask if you should still look for hanging pieces...

As you see, each player made around 10 heavy blunders in this game. And most of them are probably changing the result in one way or another.

Talking "I play this or that opening" makes hardly any sense on this level. Even if you could play the correct moves, your opponent will not, rendering your "preparation" useless. You seem to play some moves that you saw somewhere, but it is obvious that you have no clue why they are played.

Frequent observations are undeveloping your own pieces, not taking opponents free pieces, hanging your own pieces, neglecting your own development...

I mean, it is no big surprise - if you wouldn't commit these crimes, you'd be playing 400 Elo higher. But ti improve, you need to tackle these problems. Either by thoroughly studying material for beginners (good but easy tactics compilations), and/or go with someone stronger over your games. You don't need to hire a coach for lifetime, but it may be worth it to have someone talk you through the games. Knowing tactics is one thing, but making it a habit to actually look for them quite another.

Thanks!

I have been around 800-900 for some time but I used the chess app more as something to do like you would social media. Just some past time. Always 3 daily chess games. But then I went over to 1 daily games and dropped 70 points in no time. It felt a lot tougher. Since then I want to play more and better and I also pretty surprised I stood my ground for so long at the 800-900 level. So hey, awesome feedback!

@nizzledizzleshizzle said in #1:

What openings should I stick to at my level?

Any of them will work, when people say "opening does not matter" it's just you don't need to learn the 14 first moves of every possible variation (I'm exaggerating, but not so much), obviously you have to be careful in the opening phase and follow some general principles. Follow the advice by @nadjarostowa and get some book/course/videos teaching those principles (rather than a concrete opening).

Also, you should memorize some usual moves to avoid mistakes without having to calculate everything, everytime. For instance, you play Ruy López with 4.Bxc6, which is totally fine, and then face 4..dxc6 5. O-O Bg4 6. h3 h5... you could be tempted to take (7.hxg4), a bad idea. But you better know why it is a bad idea to take that Bishop so you could figure it out in different positions. So you should both memorize and understand it.

@nizzledizzleshizzle said in #1:

Is hanging pieces something to still look out for?

Look for it, it happens sometimes and doesn't hurt. But, above all, look for your pieces not hanging!