i've only ever played chess on an irregular basis against the same old opponants ( brother mainly ). Now that i have stumbled acrross this site i realise that i know nothing about the game.......So can anybody please explain what a 1200 rated player is compared to a other ratings. what is en passant ( i know it means in passing but what does it have to do with chess)?
thanks for the patience
Originally posted by MungoWelcome to the site.
i've only ever played chess on an irregular basis against the same old opponants ( brother mainly ). Now that i have stumbled acrross this site i realise that i know nothing about the game.......So can anybody please explain what a 1200 rated player is compared to a other ratings. what is en passant ( i know it means in passing but what does it have to do with chess)?
thanks for the patience
I'm not sure I understand your question about ratings, but I can help you with the other: http://www.timeforchess.com/help/index.php?help=enpassant
The rule makes more sense if one knows that originally pawns were allowed to only move one square forward. When that was changed, en passant was required to avoid pawns skipping past each other unchallenged.
Edit: XanthosAUST, succinct as always.
Originally posted by MungoA 1200 rating pretty much means that you're not quite intermediate, but not really a beginner anymore, either. You know how everything can move, and can even spot simple combinations to win material, but the planning and strategic elements of the game are lost on you. However, everyone's rating starts out at 1200 no matter what level they actually are, but within a few games it will make its way toward the rightful number.
i've only ever played chess on an irregular basis against the same old opponants ( brother mainly ). Now that i have stumbled acrross this site i realise that i know nothing about the game.......So can anybody please explain what a 1200 rated player is compared to a other ratings. what is en passant ( i know it means in passing but what does it have to do with chess)?
thanks for the patience
En passant is actually pretty simple. If you have a pawn on the 5th rank, and your opponenet tries to advance a pawn from an adjacent file two squares forward (such that your pawn could have captured it had it moved only one square), on your very next move, you may capture his pawn as though it really had only moved one square, and your pawn moves to the square in which the capture would take place. If it isn't done on the next move, it can't be done anytime anytime after.
Welcome to the site, you picked a good one! I'll attempt to give an explaination of ratings.
When you start playing you have 20 games as a provisional rated player (that's what the 'p' next to your rating symbolises). For the first 20 games your rating doesn't mean anything, as you have completed too few games for it to be a useful representation of you 'chess strength'. 1200 is the starting point for your grade, as you win games it increases, when you loose it goes down (obviously). The amount your rating goes up when you win, depends on the grade of the person you are playing. If they have a lower grade than you, yours won't go up by much, but if theirs is higher, your grade will go up a lot. The maximum i believe you can gain from one game on this site is about 31 points (though i could quite possibly be wrong about this..).
Use the rating of your opponent as a guide when picking who you play. If you are new to chess, i'd reccomend you start off by playing people around 1000-1200. This is a beginners standard.
1300-1500 players are generally ok, you can expect a couple of mistakes duaring the game, but otherwise they generally play pretty well.
1500-1800 players are club standard. They generally make less errors and will have some studied knowledge of chess. As you get closer to 1800 you will find the over all technique of the player to be pretty solid.
1800-2100 players are Strong. They will hardly ever loose a piece through a silly mistake (maybe once in a hundred games or more), will have strong opening knowledge, middle game technique and a good knowledge of Endings.
2100+ is approaching Master strength and you will need to be seriously good to not get beaten.
Hope thats what you were asking 🙂
Originally posted by MungoLearn the rules first.
i've only ever played chess on an irregular basis against the same old opponants ( brother mainly ). Now that i have stumbled acrross this site i realise that i know nothing about the game.......So can anybody please explain what a 1200 rated player is compared to a other ratings. what is en passant ( i know it means in passing but what does it have to do with chess)?
thanks for the patience
That's the best advice, albeit the most obvious.
Originally posted by Natural ScienceIn essence, if your opponent moves a pawn two squares and it goes through a taking square of one of your pawns, you can choose to take it, or not.
A 1200 rating pretty much means that you're not quite intermediate, but not really a beginner anymore, either. You know how everything can move, and can even spot simple combinations to win material, but the planning and strategic elements of the game are lost on you. However, everyone's rating starts out at 1200 no matter what level they actuall ...[text shortened]... would take place. If it isn't done on the next move, it can't be done anytime anytime after.
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is it possible or pissable to get your rating to zero? of course there have to be more players who're losing most of the time. But if there would be 10.000 people who lose all of the time and then they start playing each other and the lower half loses and then the losers play each other. I bet it can be done to get your elo on 0.
For those first 20 games your rating can go up or down quite a lot, in fact I recently lost points from my provisional rating for winning because my opponent's rating was significantly lower than mine.
To answer a later thread I don't think its possible to ever hit zero points as you lose fewer and fewer points the lower your rating is in comparison to your opponent. I guess if a few people kept losing to everyone deliberately and then one lost to another in the group it might be possible(?)