Above and beyond anything else, the aspiring chess player has to gain a firm mastery of tactics. But how to go about it? Here are three recommendations:
Don’t strain too hard to play for “tactical positions” from the opening
A big mistake that many aspiring players make is to assume that if they are tactically deficient they must try to reach such positions at all costs. This is usually achieved by playing gambits and off-beat lines. I don’t recommend this approach. Tactics naturally arise in the course of a game as a result of superior strategy and plain old mistakes on either side. Even if you play an absolutely “dry” game of chess, you’re bound to run into many tactical moments and motifs, so there is no reason to strain for such positions – which has obvious downsides.
Review your games with a chess engine to find missed tactical opportunities
As much as you possibly can, never play a game (even an online blitz game) without taking a self-critical approach to it afterwards. Take a few minutes to boot up an engine, and a games database if you have one and find the key tactical mistakes. You’ll be astonished how many there are. You can even keep track of how many you average per a given a number of games (for instance, you may have 15 missed tactical opportunities in 10 games) and try to reduce it in the next 10 games you play. You’ll be surprised how measuring this and focusing on the results will help you to focus in a new way and quickly drop the number.
Solve tactics puzzles – smartly!
Of course the most direct solution is to solve plenty of tactical puzzles. No other method is as direct. But there are some guidelines to observe.
Make sure that you have foreseen everything and checked for alternatives before verifying your solution
This is absolute critical. It is easy to be lulled into the feeling that you’ve worked everything out merely because you see a sacrificial move and one or two moves ahead. But you need to evaluate every defensive (and counter-aggressive!) idea your opponent might have. You must also make sure your calculations are very accurate. Be very self-critical when checking solutions. Even if you had the right idea, did you overlook a key variation? Don’t give yourself any breathing room here. In a real contest with a real opponent, you have to be 100% certain before you take the plunge and sacrifice material.
Study the position for several seconds before looking at any sacrifices
It’s difficult to overestimate the importance of this point. During a chess game you have to rely on cues in the position to suggest combinations, or strategic operations for that matter. You must build the crucial habit of asking yourself “what are the key positions of this position?” every time you are confronted with such a position. Ask yourself what factors in the opponent’s position can be exploited. And what about your own position? Are there threats to it? What strengths do you have? Keep asking questions about the position for several seconds in order to really begin to grasp it. Then start looking for ideas. You’ll be surprised that almost immediately you can find many tactical ideas as well as strategic ideas.
Use the training principles of “overtraining” and “progression”
One surefire way to really get a handle on tactical patterns is to solve sets of puzzles more than once. One eccentric version of this is to try to solve a set of around 1,000 puzzles seven times. This is probably a bit more than necessary, but solving puzzles multiple times will etch the themes into your mind very strongly. You’ll find that on your second time around you’ll remember many solutions vaguely. This is good, because when those same themes happen in your serious games, you’ll also notice them and sense them.
The principle of progression states that you should try to increase the difficulty every step of the way. After becoming proficient at beginner puzzles, move onto intermediate and/or advanced puzzles. For a free version of KEBU Chess Tactics Software which allows you to do that click here. Best of luck!
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