Hey guys, I was thinking, how do I become a mad tactical attacking genius? What I mean by that is, I have an average to good positional understanding (not fantastic or superb) however, I have an extreme eye for sacrifices and combinations.
How do I become like that? How do I become like Mikhail Tal? I don't want to play sound positional crap, instead I want my chess to be full of gambits and situations which lead to complex variations and full of combinations! I don't want to study openings forever and know which endgames or positions would be a won game, instead I want to sacrifice my queen out of nowhere and checkmate the person in an artistic way!
So currently my plan for that is:
1) Do 10-15 tactic puzzles everyday. This will help my tactics stay sharp.
2) Read Art of Attack in Chess by Vladimir Vukovic. This classic should be essential to any attacking enthusiast.
3) Read Life and Games of Mikhail Tal. Understanding the Mad Genius of attacking chess and ultimately become like him.
Any others to add?
The tactical geniuses of chess were no slouches when it came to that "positional crap." it is only with a solid positional understanding that one can create the necessary pressure to make a position ripe for brilliant tactics.
In chess, you cannot simply pick one area to focus on and expect great results. Chess is a mesh of tactics, strategy and so much more. You need a complete understanding of all of these factors to truly be successful.
Of course, once you have a solid grasp of strategy, you can create positions favorable to tactics or vice versa. However, do not sacrifice one type of understanding for the other. Just some advice...
Anyway, I think the King's Gambit would really suit your style. Try it out. It starts 1. e4 e5 2. f4.
I know. Its not like I am going to neglect all positional studies. As I said, my positional understanding will be good, but nothing fantastic. Its like how there was an era of chess where positional players dominated with their silent play and chess was boring, then some combination tactical players like Tal sparked up chess again.
So to sum it up, I want exciting chess rather than boring chess.
Yes, I understand that. My point is that to get exciting chess, you need to create a position conducive to tactics. To do this, you need to have fundamental positional understanding and maneuver strategically until you achieve the desired position. But, I'm glad that you already have a solid positional foundation. It is often the most difficult aspect of chess.
Yeah, you can't just separate tactics and strategy. If you want to focus more on tactics, do so.. but like already mentioned, it is the positional understanding which leads to the possibilities of tactics such as sacrifices etc. I also think it's a bad idea to think that some types of positions are more "boring", it's just going to make you weaker. A good chess player can play all positions and I think it's bad to have any such prejudices. My advice is, play according to the position at your best ability, not according to your preferences.
Originally posted by stanlohProblem is there are many six year old kids doing hundreds of one maters (pattern recognition drills), tens of 2-4 mates/material-positional gain/ and more puzzles than you plan to do a day.
[b]
So currently my plan for that is:
1) Do 10-15 tactic puzzles everyday. /b]
By the way, to understand why tactical geniuses like Morphy, Steinitz (yes, he was), Alekhine etc succeed in pulling out wonderful combinations is that they get into favorable positions before looking for combinations. Players who are strong tacticians understand these things as they've been in the eperience of being frustrated of not being able to find much on the board. They mature and discover that they need to understand, guess what... "positional crap".
Originally posted by stanlohwell, besides everything else said, I would focus heavily on tactics. not just 10-15 problems a day. I used to do 2-5h a day. but the problem is it's hard to keep that up. so I think you should keep the amount small enough to stay hungry for more. too much, and you'll burnout. but the more, the better.
Any others to add?
and I'm not that good anyway, so... a grain of salt.
Okay, fine, sorry, I din't mean to give out the impression that I want to leave out positional aspects altogether. I know that I have to play sound positional moves to get into situations where tactics are favourable for me.
Its just as I said, I want to be a player with a style unmatched in brilliant combinations and attacks instead of a boa like position squeeze till the end. In other words, I want a reputation like Mikhail Tal's in which he favoured wild tactical positions which contained a ton of complex variations instead of silent ones.
Makes any sense now?
play a gambit opening such as the blackmar-diemar gambit or kings gambit and learn how to use a lead in development to create attacking chances.
do a ton of endgame puzzles which force you to visualise simple positions in your head.
Read:
Art of the checkmate
attacks on the castled king (gillam)
how to beat your dad at chess (chandler)
practice blindfold chess using tools such as chesseye.
do as many tactics on chess tactics server as you can stomach.
In order to to become a "mad tactical genius" like Tal, I think you need to go whole hog and quit your day job so that you can devote all your energies to chess, drinking and smoking. Indeed, it wouldn't hurt if you let your appearance become disheveled and have some liver operations, then you might also look and feel like Tal.
thing is, to become a good tactician you should to be able to recognize and remember similar patterns and positions. and fast; you should be able to "see" (or "know"...) pretty much instantly whether some variation or sacrifice is sound or unsound. GMs have memorized tens of thousands basic patterns and plans...
and yes, very good tacticians are always good positional players too...
Play the position and let the rest follow naturally. Sometimes there is no great sacrifices, deal with it. Work on your whole game and once you get to expert level, it will come to you easily.
Do tactics. Art of Attack is a great book to read but unless you are around 1600 it won't do much for you. I read it several months ago and I was around 1720 by then. Some of the stuff didn't make sense to me, it was beyond me.