"It is a mistake to think that combination is solely a metter of talent, and that it cannot be acquired"-- RETI
[Concidentally this document was followed by a useful UseNet post by NM Dan Scoones.]
The way it works is this:
My mum and dad taught me how to play chess, and when I was about 9 I
went to the school chess club. I sat down to play a small boy, took
the Black pieces and was mated in four moves (Scholar's Mate). To the
best of my recollection I have never fallen for it since, and while I
can't ever remember perpetrating that particular sequence on anyone
else, I have delivered mate on f7 a number of times.
Learning and applying tactics is just that: you learn to recognise a pattern, you see it coming if someone tries it on you, and you can apply it in similar positions in your own games. In fact, once you know the patterns, a lot of the calculation comes pretty easily.
"Those chess lovers who ask me how many moves I usually calculate in advance, when making a combination, are always astonished when I reply, quite truthfully, 'as a rule not a single one' "-- Richard RETI.
It used to be thought - perhaps because of statements like this, and a little early psychological research - that there wasn't much difference in the abilities of strong and weak players at analysis: rather, it was all about judgement and experience. There might not be a lot of difference between GMs and IMs, but there is increasing evidence that among we club players, there are large and important differences [see Simon Webb's panel tests]. So, the patterns and judgements are important, but you must also train yourself to analyse. Sir Peter Medawar once remarked, rather testily:
"the spread of secondary and latterly of tertiary education has created a large population of people, often with well-developed literary and scholarly tastes, who have been educated far beyond their capacity to undertake analytic thought".[A sentiment to be found in his splendid demolition of Teilhard de Chardin's The Phenomenon of Man, first printed in Mind, then collected in The Art of the Soluble]
No less a tribute may be paid to the editors at Batsford and Cadogan and Chess Digest: there is a population of chessplayers who know about mysterious Rook moves, Super-Quart Grips, the Inverse Phalanx, and the latest wrinkles in the Sicilian, but who cannot reliably spot three-move tactics or win a Rook Ending. This piece is dedicated to the first of these failings.
Here's a nice example, which I think is not out of most players'
reach: have a go at solving it (White to move and win) before reading
on.
Becker - Jung, Eberstadt - Bensheim, 1948
(wKh1,Qc3,Ne2,e3,Bd3,Ra1,f2,Pa2,b2,c4,e5,f4,g3,h2;
bKf7,Qd7,Nc6,g6,Bh3,Ra8,h8,Pa7,b7,c7,d6,f6,g7,h5)
The different combinational themes are often called motifs.
The theme or motif of this combination is the fork. There is almost no way you can find the combination in this position if you have not seen this pattern before.
First, we examine the position for pointers. The Black pieces are not very well coordinated, and the Black King and Queen seem almost in reach - for example, if we had protection for e6, we could think about e5-e6+ winning the Queen. In fact, f4-f5 provides that protection, so 1. f5 (Knight moves) 2. e6+ looks excellent, except that Knight moves 1...Ng6xe5, but it starts to look as though we might be on for something here.
More details: we can, by Bxg6+, bring the Black King a little closer, and check it by f4-f5. In fact, we can check it immediately by e5-e6. Maybe some combination of these ideas might allow us to lure Black pieces to e6 and g6, and fork them by f4-f5.
So, this fork becomes the idea of our combination.
Next, the combination must now be calculated and the correct move order sorted out.
We might try 1. Bxg6+ Kxg6 2. e6 ... but Black might sidestep with 2...Qe7, or even take it 2...Qxe6, when 3. f5+ fails to 3...Qxe3...
Purdy coined the splendid term smite: you must learn to
examine smiting moves, checks and captures. These are the
most forcing and the key to starting most combinations. With this in
mind we can reconsider our combination:
the starting move 1. e6+ is perhaps surprising,
but once we consider the move at all we can see that is it very
forcing, and after 1...Kxe6 or
1...Bxe6 we can play 2. f5(+)
winning a piece.
So, Black seems obliged to play 1. e6+ Qxe6. Now
again, 2. f5 fails to 2...Qxe3.
Humph.
The forcing sequence 2. Bxg6+ Kxg6 3. f5+ Bxf5
seems almost to fizzle out, but then (aha!) 4. Nf4+
forks King and Queen. Missed anything? No, all looks OK, so, Black
has to lose a piece, probably by 1...Bxe6 when a couple of
Pawns will be partial compensation.
So, the elements of a combination are motif, idea, and
calculation. You don't really change gear from one to the other
when trying to come up with a combination in practice, but you do need
to work on each separately if you are to improve.
How did your attempt match up to my account of the solution?
Missed the idea? Missed a defence? Muddled the move order?
Hopefully what I describe below can improve your performance in each
aspect. Even if that one seemed totally beyond you I'll at least show
you how such a standard can be approached.
"A thorough understanding of the typical mating combinations makes the most complicated sacrificial combinations leading up to them not only not difficult, but almost a matter of course."-- TARRASCH
You must know all these motifs:
Once you are aware of these motifs you can apply them in your own games. See also Combinational vision below.
"The technician, whose vocabulary has been doubled by Dr. Euwe, will find that White could have saved his soul by a desperado combination. Had this failure anything to do with the fact that Dr. Euwe's terminology was not yet existent at that time!?"--
You can get this far solving positions one move deep, two moves deep, three moves, four moves, five moves and six moves deep. They are all knight forks, if you want a hint, although other motifs may make an appearance.
This 'decoy' of the Queen onto a forking square is very common in combinations with a Knight Fork motif.
1. Nd5 is an obvious first move for a tactic, and forcing
because the Black Knight is loose; once considered, you should be able
to wrap it up:
1. Nd5 Qe6 2. Qxe4 Qxe4 3. Nf6+ 1-0
(wKg2,Qb3,Nd5,Pc7,f3,g3,h2; bKe8,Qc6,Ne6,Pa7,f6,g7,h6)
You've had your hint! It's a matter of nudging the Black pieces onto the
right squares, which White can do neatly:
1. Qb5 Qxb5 2. c8=Q+ Kf7 3. Qxe6+ Kxe6 4. Nc7+ Kd7 5. Nxb5 1-0
White actually resigned here, but...
1. Re8+ Kd7 2. Re3 Qg7 3. Rxd4+ Qxd4 4. Rd3 Qxd3 5. Ne5+ 1-0
Remember, this was a correspondence game, so time wasn't the issue - despair was.
[3.Nf2 Qxh2+ 4.Kf1 Nxe5 5.Qc5 Nxf3 6.gxf3 -+;
3.h3 Qe1+ 4.Rf1 Qxf1+ 5.Kxf1 Rxd1+ 6.Rxd1 Ne3+ -+
]
The other resource, besides these tactical problems, is simple chess studies: at their best they can make you pay close attention to the geometry of the board, like this one:
1. Ng5 is a very vigorous double-check, but the key is:
1. Ne5+
In an actual game, you just play this straight away as the best winning attempt because there are so many ways for Black to go wrong. But for practice, can you follow it to the finish? These open-field combinations can be hard to keep track of, because of the apparently great number of choices at each turn.
1... Ke3
2. Qe1+ Kf4 3. Qf2+ Kg5 4. Qg3+ Kf5 5. Qg4+ Kxe5 6. Qg3+ Kf5 7. Qxb8 1-0.
Experience: Once you have seen something, you might be able to implement an analogous idea in your own games. This is more than knowing the motifs; I mean you should continue to broaden your experience of combinations by examining new examples. An example from my own modest practice: I have known about knight forks for ages (ever since I kept finding them arriving on c7, checking and forking Ke8/Ra1). But once I had seen the famous finish of a Petrosian-Spassky game (see the entry for Petrosian in the Style section of Canon), I could see the same thing going on in my own game.
This rather reminds me of the old psychological tests based on embedded figures; finding combinations seems a bit like that.
Imagination: I used to think that the creative imagination was something mysterious and intangible, which could neither be described nor trained. While there may always be something elsuive about artistic creation, some thinking by people like Liam Hudson and Daniel Dennett gave me some cause to hope. Creativity is not a simple product of unfathomable inspiration, but a result of firstly, generating lots of (mostly junky) ideas, and then weeding them out to discover the ones that work. If this is true of the expressive arts, then it surely also applies to chess, where the ideas have such concrete prompts on the board, and the selection of the ideas that work can be put to the simple test of analysis.
Put simply, this suggests that someone like Tal can come up with great ideas because they come up with loads of ideas, good, bad and indifferent, and then can select the great one. The problem with most of us is not that we are failing to come up with enough good ideas, but we are failing to come up with enough ideas, full stop. Our ability to spot combinations is limited by our tunnel vision, considering only a few moves of a stereotyped nature, and not having the habit of looking at every thing once, no matter how foolish at first sight. Developing imagination, then, is not a matter of learning how to do something terribly magical, but to some extent involves putting aside what you think you know (retreating pieces is bad, putting your Queen en prise is bad) and considering moves that only very good players - or very bad players! - look at.
13. Bxe6 fxe6 14. Qh5+ Kf8 15. Bh6+ Rg7 16. Ng5 Qe8 17. Nh7+ 1-0
Ah, if only it was all like that...
21. Qe8+??
...1-0.
Patzer sees a check... It didn't affect the outcome in the end but White had to start all over again to build up another combination.
There are lots of opening traps like that: White bites off more than he can chew.
A
Tactic appears for you: you see it but analyse it wrongly.
Regis, D
-Stooks, Charles (1993)
19. Nef4? ( yes, very good, but unfortunately
19... Nc6??
20. Nh3 Qg4 21. Ng5 1-0
26... Bd4 27. Bxd4 Rxe4 28. Qxe4 Ng3+ 29. Kg1 Nxe4 30. Rxe4 Re8 31. Rbe1
Rxe4 32. Rxe4 Qf7 33. Re6 Kh7 34. Rf6
34... Qe8 35. Re6 Qxa4 36. Re7+ Kg6 37. Rxc7 Qd1+ 0-1.
The tactic was obvious enough, what I failed to assess was how good White's pieces would be in the ending.
I thought I could wrap things up here: 28... Nxe4?!
was an obvious first choice, trying to win a Pawn. Does it win a
Pawn? Oh no, because of Nxc4. No, I was right, it does win a Pawn,
because I've always got both ...Bxh4 and ...Bxa4.
So...
28... Nxe4?!
29. Bxe4 Qxe4 30. Nxc4 Qd5
And of course I realised here I'd blown it:
This is very common: stopping analysis at the end of a sequence favourable to you. But after that, it's your opponent's move!
As we start to comment more deeply on these examples, we see two sources of error: mistakes or bad habits in analysis, on the one hand, but also misjudgements on the other - errors in the general assessment of the board or the opponent. It is just the first of these I am concerned with here; else we are raising another big issue about attitude.
Getting your mind rightCombinations do not usually come out of nowhere - they are based on a superiority in position, and you can tell when a combination is likely to be around:I don't know any exercises to improve your mental attitude, but awareness - particularly self-awareness - is important in eliminating all sources of error, not just tactical ones. I have written and collected material elsewhere about getting your mental attitude right: there are examples (good and bad) in the Psychology section of the Canon, there is some good advice on a Poster for Juniors, and in a compilation of Advice for the middlegame. However, in this document on tactics I'll mention the issue of attitude in this aside, and return to the matter at hand.
"No combination without a considerable plus, no considerable plus without a combination [...]-- LASKER.
In the beginning of the game ignore the search for combinations, abstain from violent moves, aim for small advantages, accumulate them, and only after having attained these ends search for the combination - and then with all the power and will of intellect, because the combination must exist, however deeply hidden."
I like this quote, but it has to be said that while there are 'just' and logical combinations where you (say) carry out a combination based on a campaign against the long-term weakness of a Pawn, there are also 'accidental' combinations which seem to be based on nothing but the chance arrangement of pieces, and there are also traps - so diligence in searching for tactics is required at almost every move.
"All candidate moves should be identified at once and listed in one's head. This job cannot be done piecemeal, by first examining one move and then look at another."-- ALEXANDER KOTOV
The idea is, to make sure you don't overlook some vital idea at the start of analysis.
Varley - Hewson, WECU Jamboree, 1993 [B18] Black has a restricted position and is behind in 'development' (=getting his pieces out) but his pawn structure is very solid. Can Black get away with this, or can White show the flaw in Black's move order by the sacrifice Bxe6?
What do you think?
11. Bxe6
An enterprising sacrifice! White hopes to catch Black's King in the
centre.
11... O-O!
Unflappable Exeter player Brian Hewson calmly sidesteps the main line
of a sacrifice (11...fxe6) threatening a pin on the e-file.
12. O-O Bxf4 13. Bxf4 fxe6 14. Qxe6+ Kh8 ... and Black consolidated and won. [0-1]
It is often the case that players will analyse one line very deeply but fail to spot an early alternative - as mentioned above, Grandmaster Kotov advised many years ago to identify each candidate move at the outset before analysing any one move deeply. Had White done this he could not fail to notice the possibility of Black castling, and should then spot the classic pattern of Q and K lined up on the e-file which suggests a pin from a Black R on e8, and could not fail to realise that it refuted the sac.
There is another example or two illustrating the 'candidate move' idea from Simon Webb's panel tests, and the commentary on Nunn's games in the Analysis section of the Canon.
There are certain sorts of moves which are easy to spot (or train yourself to spot: like checks, captures, and so on. There are also certain classes of move which are difficult to make yourself consider - here are a few surprising/paradoxical moves. You should:
12.Qd1 1-0.
The error made by Karpov above is actually a common one - missing an undeveloping retreat.
Other errors of this sort - hard types of move to spot - include long moves, sideways moves by Queens, captures by Pawns away from the centre, and so on. Another example:
30. Rxf7 Rc1+ 31. Qf1!! h5 32. Qxc1 Qh4 33. Rxf8+ Kh7 34. h3 Qg3 35. hxg4 h4
36. Be6 1-0
How about that one: a Queen moving backwards into a position where it can be captured!
Fischer, R - Benko, P, ch-USA, 1963
Obviously, there is a mating attampt at h7 but
19. Rf6!
This is what I mean: a silent sacrifice of the Rook, which actually
leaves Black helpless. Chess may not be an art, but moves like this
have a strong aesthetic effect, at least for me - I like the apparent
subtlety of the sacrifice without a check or capture, and I like the
drama of giving Black an apparently free move for the defence - which
he cannot make use of.
19... Kg8
20. e5 h6 21. Ne2 1-0.
"Examine moves that smite!"
But have a look at this:
Spassky
- Korchnoi, Kiev, 1968
1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 d6 5. f3 O-O 6. Be3 Nc6 7. Nge2 a6 8.
Nc1 e5 9. d5 Nd4 10. Nb3 Nxb3 11. Qxb3 c5 12. dxc6 bxc6 13. O-O-O Be6 14. Qa3
Ne8 15. h4 f6 16. c5 Rf7 17. Qa4 Qc7 18. Bc4 Bxc4 19. Qxc4 Bf8 20. h5 dxc5 21.
hxg6 hxg6 22. Qe6 Rd8 23. Rxd8 Qxd8 24. Rd1 Qe7 25. Qxc6 Nc7
The situation in this Candidates' Match game is tense. Although White
undoubtedly holds the advantage, Moscow players analysing while the game was
going on could find no clear continuation, e.g.
26. Qb6
Surprising and elegant, this 'creeping move' impressed many, including
Kotov who has cited it more than once. The move prepares to answer ...Qe6 with
Bxc5 and leads to a swift win. To Kotov, this was a far more brilliant move
than the Queen sacrifice that ended the game.
26... Kg7 27. Nd5 Qe6 28. Bxc5 Bxc5 29. Qxc5 Nb5 30. Qe3 Qc6+ 31. Kb1 Nd4 32. Rc1 Qb5 33. Nc7 Qe2 34. Ne6+ Kh7 35. Qh6+ 1-0.
It's hardest of all to spot a 'creeping' move in the middle of a combinational exchange. Here is a simple example:
Wahltuch
- Palmer, Manchester, 1912
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 Nf6 4. O-O Nxe4 5. d4 Nd6 (BERLIN DEFENCE,
RIO DE JANIERO Variation)
6. dxe5
6... Nxb5 7. a4
This is a gorgeously messy line
7... Nd6
8. Bg5 f6 9. Re1 fxg5 10. exd6+ Ne7 11. Ne5 cxd6 12. Qh5+ g6 13. Nxg6 Qa5 14. Nxh8+ Kd8
Have a look at the next diagram and see what you think.
15. Nc3
It is tempting to try a forcing move, but none work.
"A quiet move in the midst of an attack is the sign of the master" - Du Mont
15... Qf5 (else Qf7) 16. Nb5 Ng6 17. Qxg5+ 1-0.
Kotov gives some example of positions where the analysis gets
progressively more detailed:
The
'Tree of Analysis'
Also, I think also the "coppice" type of position is not out of most
players' reach. What is required here is organisation - to list the
moves required at the outset, and to work through them methodically.
What is most challenging is the type of position which is genuinely
complex, like the "bush", when it is difficult for most of us to
analyse everything relevant. Are they any hints or tips for making
best use of the time we have, while our analytical skills are still
developing? Yes indeed: we have advice from de Groot, from
Nunn/Griffiths, and from Nimzovitch.
The chess master and psychologist De Groot, in commenting on
transcriptions of players' verbal reflections, used to talk about
'progressive deepening'. If this strategy is to be adoted in must not
resemble the feckless meandering described so amusingly by Kotov in
his book Think Like
a GM, switching dissatisfied from one move to another until you
run out of time. However it has often seemed to me that rather than
work six moves deep down line "A", then six moves each down line "B",
it might be better to look (say) two moves deep in each of lines A-G,
then go back to "A" and go four moves deep this time, and so on. It
may be that you find the key to the position earlier than you would
have done by a strictly sequential approach, and in any event, ideas
which may be obvious from one line of analysis may come in handy when
analysing other lines, where the same idea is not so obvious. There
is an example illustrating the idea of 'progressive deepening' from
Simon Webb's panel tests.
Given a list of candidate moves, which lines do you start with? Purdy again: start with the most forcing moves. But if none look any better than the others?
Nunn and Griffiths advise: "Just plunge in"; take a look at
this one, where "Black has a decisive attack" but there is no forced
mate.
..."and straightaway you have learned a
lot about the position".
Sometime you can divert the task of analysis: play a good positional
move relatively quickly.
Nimzovitch - Tartakower (Karlsbad) 1929 [E81]
15. Bxf6!
However, sometimes there is no such resource, and you must simply work
your way through the variations as best you can.
So much for theory. How do you put this into practice? Well, you
practice! We must cultivate good habits in our analysis.
"(1) by careful examination of the different types and by a clear
understanding of their motives and their premises
Since Euwe wrote, some other methods have become more available.
If you are determined to get better, try the Russian chess
training programme contained in three books by Livshits: Test your
chess IQ, Vol.1 (for players up to 160), Test your chess IQ,
Vol.2 (for 160-200) and Test your chess IQ, Vol.3 -
Grandmaster Challenge (for 200+ grades).
They both suffer from the drawback, in my view, of containing
only combinations that work - there are no false but tempting
opportunities offered to you, which is so often the case during a
game. In fact, I believe that mass practice of tactical tests like
this can lead to a false sense of optimism when presented with a
promising tactical opportunity. Unless these tests have hidden points
in the variations you are required to spot, or include 'false'
opportunities, they must be supplemented by other activities.
Some support for this is found in
Gene Thompson's article for
Chess Scene.
More testing (literally) is the Chess Monthly
magazine feature, How Good is your Chess? which takes you
through a real game and gives you points (There is a book of these
under the same name by Danny King; BCM have a similar feature called
Test Your Chess.) Here's an easy example of such a test from the B.C.F., with answers.
Another important book for theory is Nunn and Griffiths, Secrets
of Grandmaster Play. It is a deliberately educative book,
showing, firstly, what a complete analysis of a game looks like, but
also giving lots of practical tips and observations, and trying to
show how much players really see at the board.
I have seen players write down a losing move while nodding and
smirking, look over the board again still nodding, and then play the
move. Useless - just going through the motions. I guess they were
just revising their latest thoughts on the position. You must jump!
snap! start! your thinking again, to see if you have overlooked
anything at the start of your thinking. You are not
checking conclusions - you are checking
assumptions. [If they had genuinely re-started their
thinking there would have been a change in body language - not a
smooth progression from choosing to writing to blundering, nodding all
the while.]
Online exercises from John Coffey and David
Hayes.
Alexander, The Penguin Book of Chess Positions
Avni, Danger in Chess
British Chess Magazine, Find the Winning Continuation
Chernev and Reinfeld, Winning Chess
Chess magazine, Winning Combinative Play
Chess magazine, How Good is your Chess? (Book of same
name by Danny King)
Dvoretsky, Secrets of chess tactics
Kotov, Think like a Grandmaster )_candidate moves, tree of analysis,
analysis of master games
Kotov, Plan like a Grandmaster )
Livshits, Test your chess IQ, Vol.1
Livshits, Test your chess IQ, Vol.2
Livshits, Test your chess IQ, Vol.3 - Grandmaster Challenge
Nunn and Griffiths, Secrets of Grandmaster Play
This document (practact.html) was last modified on 20 Jan 97
by
bare trunk bare trunk with coppice bush
side-branch
Through practice, I would have thought anyone could master the art of
analysing "bare trunks" and "trunk-with-branch" - what is required
here is the ability to visualise the board several moves ahead.
Corden - Nunn, Birmingham, 1975 [Variation]
The first move to look at must be 15. Ba4 Nd2+ 16. Kc3 Qe3+
17. Kb4 a5#
That is, you can regain at least
one piece whenever you wish, still keeping the K exposed. After this
you can work your way methodically through the other lines, with the
conclusions from your quick first assessment already in mind.
[15. Bxf6 Bxf6 (Nimzo analysed briefly:) 16. Qh6 Bg7 17. Qxh5 h6
18. g5 f5 "now it is necessary to analyse several variations which are
roughly equally good:" e.g. 19. gxf6 [or 19. gxh6]
19... Rxf6 20. Bh3]
"all of this is extremely complicated and therefore I played
after no more than five minutes' thought"...
15... Bxf6 16. Rxh5
Bg7 17. Nh1 There followed:
17... f6 18. Qh2 h6 19. Ng3 Kh7 20. Be2 Rg8 21. Kf2 Rh8 22. Rh4 Qe8
23. Rg1 Bf8 24. Kg2 Nb7 25. Nh5
"with a strong solid game and chances of attack" - NIMZO [...1-0]
Good practice"Let us repeat once more the methods by which we can
increase our combinative skill:
-- Euwe, Strategy and Tactics in Chess.
"(2) By memorising a number of outstanding as well as of common examples and
solutions
"(3) Frequent repetition (in thought, if possible) of important combinations,
so as to develop the imagination.
Blumenfeld's rule:
"It often happens that a player carries out a deep and
complicated calculation, but fails to spot something elementary
right at the first move. In order to avoid such gross blunders,
the Soviet master B. Blumenfeld made this recommendation:-
-- KOTOV
When you have finished your calculations, write down the move you
have decided upon on the score sheet. Then examine the position for a
short time 'through the eyes of a patzer'. Ask whether you have left
a mate in one on, or left a piece or a pawn to be taken.
Only when you have convinced yourself that there is no immediate
catastrophe for you should you make the planned move."
You've all seen people do this. I've also seen people do it
badly. The idea is to snap youself out of the trance of analysis and
take a fresh look.
Net reading:
Worked example from Gabriel Schwartzmann
Kotov's classic Think Like
a GM, the first chapter of which has been very influential.
A nice piece of self-reflection from an amateur,
Gene Thompson, first published in Chess Scene.
Bibliography
"The pleasure of a chess comination lies in the
feeling that a human mind is behind the game, dominating the inanimate
pieces with which the game is carried on, and giving them the breath
of life."
-- RETI
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