stunning

Originally posted by Jusuh
why not?

I`m saying practising them fast is much more helpful than practising them slowly...

Just my opinion, but when you are doing them fast, you don't truly understand the whole position. You might find the first 2 moves for each side in a mate in 6 problem and you would get credit for solving that puzzle but find the first 2 moves is not the same as finding the total six moves.

I've seen sites which give you a mate in 6 problem and if you find the first 2 moves they "think" you know the solution and give you the point for it. I tried a few puzzles on CTS and found the first X moves and then went over the solution slowly and the puzzle was 5 moves deep but they gave me credit for solving it after only the first 2 moves.

I don't think that's right. Plus in actual OTB you have enought time to spend 5 min or so calculating a tactic.

I did that La Maza tactic thing and the most I spent on 1 puzzles solving it was 5 min but after round 6 I was solving most of the easy one in 15 seconds and mate in 3 in 30 seconds. This is reasonable to me and I don't consider that fast. What I consider fast 15 seconds and under to solve puzzles.

Originally posted by Ragnorak
I try to push myself to spot them as fast as I can. If I can't spot the solution, I'll take as long as I need. Being able to solve them faster must always be better than always needing ten minutes of brute force searching.

My rating is currently 1453, with a high of 1484, and a success rate of 80.6%, which has gone down from a very steady 81.2%, since ...[text shortened]... o considering I normally go on there when I feel too tired/drunk/hungover to play on RHP.

D

81.2% accuracy. I think if you do them slowly that might increase a lot. I would rather spend 5 minutes and get the puzzle right then rush throught them. I collected 1000 puzzles and did that 7 round thing and now I'm starting a different thing with 1001 but I can solve most of them. Even online puzzles which I find I get most of them as long as they are reasonable, mate in 6 at the most.

I don't know I guess it's a matter of opinion. I would rather spend several minutes and get my puzzles right 90+% accuracy rather then rush through them and be less accurate.

It's like typing. You can type fast with lot of mistakes, or type at a reasonable rate with very few mistakes 🙂

Originally posted by RahimK
It's like typing. You can type fast with lot of mistakes, or type at a reasonable rate with very few mistakes 🙂

Or you can train them to type accurately quickly.

Did you ever hear the saying that you learn more from your losses? I learn a hell of a lot more when I try to quickly do a puzzle and get it wrong because I got "greedy" and went for the hanging knight, instead of just delivering mate, than if I spot the solution, check it. Check it again, go to the toilet so I can think about it some more, another deliberate check, etc, etc...

[EDIT] As you say though, it is a matter of opinion.

D

Originally posted by RahimK
81.2% accuracy. I think if you do them slowly that might increase a lot. I would rather spend 5 minutes and get the puzzle right then rush throught them.

You're probably right, but I rarely get caught out by tactics when I take my time in correspondence/OTB chess. That means I am already quite strong at slow tactics. I have identified a weakness in my game (which is thinking quicker), and I am trying to fix the problem.

If you really want to be a chess teacher, you realise that you can't use the exact same teaching strategy for everybody. Your job will be identifying weaknesses in your individual students and then devising programs to help them fix the weakness.

D

Originally posted by Ragnorak
You're probably right, but I rarely get caught out by tactics when I take my time in correspondence/OTB chess. That means I am already quite strong at slow tactics. I have identified a weakness in my game (which is thinking quicker), and I am trying to fix the problem.

If you really want to be a chess teacher, you realise that you can't use the exact s ...[text shortened]... ses in your individual students and then devising programs to help them fix the weakness.

D

Well we both got decent arguements. Personal preference 🙂

Originally posted by RahimK
What kinds of ratings do people from here or OTB player you know have on chess tactics server?

I think the ratings are to hard on there. I remember you telling me some peoples ratings on Rhp/OTB and the tactic server and they were way off.

Yea, can't really say how it would've gone if I'd done slow tactics instead of fast. but one thing I know, is that there are people doing CTS with 90+ success rate, and not making practically any progress there. where as I've been doing 80-85% which means about double the failures, but have gained several hundred points there.

I think there is significant progress to be made concentrating on quantity instead of quality, but it also has its drawbacks. mainly becoming trigger happy, which doesn't happen with slow tactics. I feel that I gain on CTS the potential to spot complex tactics and ability to pull them off, but suffer on the success rate. which of course is often fatal, but not that much of a problem in CC.

it of course depends also a lot on your dicipline, ie. you can do CTS very inefficiently if you don't pay attention to what you're doing. I always work out failed problems afterwards.


here's CTS/RHP ratings of some people (I'm not completely sure of everybody, but as far as I know the identities are right):

1457 CTS / 1698 RHP wormwood
1453 CTS / 1844 RHP ragnorak
1452 CTS / 1871 RHP ark13 (under 200 problems done)
1511 CTS / 1830 FICS bahus
1882 CTS / 2300+ FIDE nabla
1715 CTS / 1981 SELO jusuh
1591 CTS / 2156 FIDE Xparoni

generally CTS ratings seem to be 200-500 pts lower than OTB, although there are some even higher on CTS than here. but most are 200-500pts lower.

Originally posted by wormwood
Yea, can't really say how it would've gone if I'd done slow tactics instead of fast. but one thing I know, is that there are people doing CTS with 90+ success rate, and not making practically any progress there. where as I've been doing 80-85% which means about double the failures, but have gained several hundred points there.

I think there is significan ...[text shortened]... B, although there are some even higher on CTS than here. but most are 200-500pts lower.

Interesting numbers.

I read an article yesterday on Strategy or Tactics by a WGM who trains expert people to get over the master level. From the results she posted she was 3/3. She has this rigid program from here students using CT-art 3.0 and they all got over 2200 easily.

She talked about calculation and Combinative vision.

Here's the link

http://www.chesscentral.com/articles_chess/chess-training-ct-art.htm

I think by doing lots of puzzles fast you are working on your combinative vision but not you calculation that much. Doing them slowly you are working on your calculation ability. That's what I think the difference is between a book and say CTS.

check out...

http://www.chesscafe.com/archives/archives.htm

and there Dan Heisman's article "A Different Approach to Studying Tactics" , May 2001.

quotes from the article:

"Just because you can solve a tactical problem does not
necessarily mean that you will spot this tactic in a game. While this is
obvious, the reasons for this, and the remedy are not quite so clear. In
a problem, you know (1) it is a problem; (2) there is a specific
solution; and (3) you are just looking for a tactic to solve it. However,
during a real game, you have to do much more than look for a tactic -in
fact, you may not know that the tactic even exists, so you may not
spend much energy looking for it (this leads a future article on
Recognizing the Seeds of Tactical Destruction, but that is another
story!)
Therefore, you have relatively little time available to spot a tactic. If
you cannot find it quickly, you might not find it at all. So it is not just
the ability to find the tactic that is important, it is also important to be
able to do it quickly and efficiently, or else quickly conclude “there is
no tactic.
So I told my student, "Go back and do the problems again until you can get most of the simple problems within a few seconds. It may be a little boring, but if you can recognize most of the basic tactical motifs:
removal of the guard, double attack, effects of pins, etc. much faster,
then you will start seeing a much higher percentage of them in your
games."

and...

"I would go so far as to conjecture that more basic the tactical problem, the more beneficial it is to do it multiple times until you can do it
quickly, while the more difficult the problem, the relatively less
benefit it is to do it over and over. The reason is that more complex
combinations usually consist of many basic tactical motifs, but not
vice versa. And secondly, you see the basic tactics in many
combinations throughout most games, while difficult ideas are
more complex, and so each one is more unique, and occurs more
rarely - in fact, you may never have seen one just like it before -only
somewhat similar. Therefore, the capability to figure out these
complex problems is more important than their rote recognition.
And players who know very well basic tactics can figure out more
difficult tactics, the requirement being a accurate and quick eye for
basic tactical motifs."

Originally posted by RahimK
I think by doing lots of puzzles fast you are working on your combinative vision but not you calculation that much. Doing them slowly you are working on your calculation ability. That's what I think the difference is between a book and say CTS.

that sounds pretty much like what I've been experiencing. I think I'm going to give ct-art a try now.

interesting article. and very interesting to notice that even 2200's gain a lot by concentrating on tactics. I would've thought that they had their tactical skills pretty much perfected, but I guess it just never is enough.

Originally posted by wormwood
that sounds pretty much like what I've been experiencing. I think I'm going to give ct-art a try now.

interesting article. and very interesting to notice that even 2200's gain a lot by concentrating on tactics. I would've thought that they had their tactical skills pretty much perfected, but I guess it just never is enough.

That's what I thought also. I figured it would be rare for master to study tactics. Doing a puzzle here and there is fine but for them to seriously study tactics i thought would be rare since they must be pretty good at it already.

Guess I was wrong assuming that.

Originally posted by Jusuh
check out...

http://www.chesscafe.com/archives/archives.htm

and there Dan Heisman's article "A Different Approach to Studying Tactics" , May 2001.

quotes from the article:

"Just because you can solve a tactical problem does not
necessarily mean that you will spot this tactic in a game. While this is
obvious, the reasons for this, and the remedy ...[text shortened]... ult tactics, the requirement being a accurate and quick eye for
basic tactical motifs."

Very nice. I read that article years ago. Good point.