Hey kids,
thanks for a thread that was more interesting than I might have expected. I was pretty entertained by the different arguments posited... For every good postulation, it's actually kinda nice to see different points of view on the matter at hand.
My chess game is fossilised, I haven't played it for a few years, and now my friend is kicking my arse (as invited).
I actually have kinda an odd question. One of my major problems seems to be, uh, short term memory! (Can't think of any obvious reason that might account for that... heh...)
Recently I figured that part of my issue is kinda like needing to be able to scribble stuff down on paper. Although the grid reference points are useful, when I look at them (ie when a move is denoted), it doesn't really translate to the game in my head. Basically, I think chess is cool, but have had little to do with it to date, which is s/t I"m gonna start amending right now.
Anyhow, I had this epiphany that I would be sooo much better if I could have a way to basically do little sums on paper. I've noticed that there is an option to print the board.
Maybe approaching this is kinda like suggesting someone mix CDs rather than records, ie akin to blasphemy, but I'm wondering if anyone else finds they can play a whole lot beter if they can print the baoard out and scribble some stuff down.
I don't know if this is equivalent to being weak or cheating, insofar as that - for instance - I've known maths for ages, but I still find that I definitely need to write sums down most of the time; for some reason my memory doesn't seem to have the capacity to hold several things in mind at once.
I don't know if this makes me a better or worse chess player; ie I can anticipate a discourse that would imply that only an immature player would "have to" do such a thing.
I'm just not sure if it is to do with "immaturity" - I make no attempt to pretend my stage is anything else but juvenile - or whether it's simply a matter of approach, as one could deduce with maths.
It's not that my maths is necessarily better or worse than someone who can do sums easily in their head (heh, well I hope); it's just that I need to scribble things down as an aid to memory so that I don't stall interminably.
Ha, after saying all this, I don't have a printer though! (For printing out the chess board at different stages).
Um, something else... I haven't checked out all these chess resources yet... but does anyone know of an electronic interface which basically allows you to mess around with the eventual possibilities that are evoked by a given move?
Does that make sense? Ie, in this interface, one can only move one piece in the hypothetical sense before submitting. Being pretty lame, I need way more insight into how my opponent might move etc. I guess I could attempt to play this out on a real chess board (I have a very romantic Indian one in marble) but it seems like it would be quicker and easier to do this electronically.
I haven't finished even one game electronically! so please be gentle, people... 🙄