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Rob Zacny

Episode 359: Chess in 2016

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Three Moves Ahead 359:

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Chess in 2016

The inmates are running the asylum as Three Moves Ahead producer Michael Hermes takes over the show to talk about the state of chess in 2016. Joining Michael is chess professional and Youtuber John Bartholomew, an FIDE International Master and all-around chess guru. There are many reasons to be excited about chess right now, such as the boom in Youtube and streaming and the dynamic state of the professional scene. John and Michael go over some of the tools available to modern players, the sites they get excited about, and how St. Louis has become the chess capital of the US.

Chess

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This was an awesome show. Stop hiding Michael, he's one of the more articulate members of the crew. He should be on more often!

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This was an awesome show. Stop hiding Michael, he's one of the more articulate members of the crew. He should be on more often!

 

+1

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This was much more interesting than I've expected.

 

I remembered Chess from the time I had any idea of strategic thinking. To me it looked like a game about attention, kinda like all those RTS games, but without speed requirement. Instead, I thought, you have to remember all those openings and counter-openings, predict which one your enemy uses and executing it noticing any necessary corretiongs. I never had enough concentration to be focused on not seeing direct consequences of my moves and you can't think about strategy when you don't have basics like this. This podcast made me try it again, with all those fancy chess.com analyze tools.

 

My mind was blown. Analyze tool made me understand what's perhaps obvious to any third-grader who actually tried to play the game. It's a game with 2 winning conditions. Or, well, with 1 winning condition of Checkmate but with other being removing your enemy's ability to Checkmate, i.e. killing his units. The interplay between ability to check, defend your king from being checked, take enemy figures and save your ones opened to me.

 

Thank you for this episode. I'm now going to watch all those chess videos. I probably won't play it on any serious level, I never can get persistent enough to become good at multiplayer, but I'm chess believer now.

 

And yes, John's video are amazing. He's also good at constantly asking you to think about a situation through guiding questions. It's kind of surprising this behavior is not endorsed by your usual Video game letsplayers, it would work with most TBS, at least when you're working with replays or single player games.

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This was an awesome show. Stop hiding Michael, he's one of the more articulate members of the crew. He should be on more often!

 

Agreed!

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the problem with chess is that it basically requires time pressure to function as a game, so it ends up being more like a real-time game rather than a turn-based one

 

modern strategy gaming really has evolved to the point where you'd make the same move no matter whether you had 1 minute or 1 hour to think about it, and chess feels like it hasn't figured out how to adapt.

 

maybe if it was computer-assisted so that normal people could filter out bad lines without spending minutes brute-forcing all the possibilities, it could work. i'm not sure how that can be done without devolving to computers playing instead of the human players though

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Don't agree with that assessment. There are less options, predictability or complexity in strategy games so you will usually only have a handful of real options at any time.

Chess features thousands of tangible calculations because of the predictable nature of the move sets of the pieces - that means a good player could spend hours thinking through various scenarios before every single move. That's just not viable or fun, so of course a time limit is necessary.

The reason I have never been able to really get into chess is because it feels to me like a memory game (learning lines and correct play) rather than an artistic pursuit. I'm probably wrong about that but the fact that a computer is the best player on Earth does lend some credence to my theory.

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Thanks for the kind words, everyone. I admit I was worried how this would go over but the response has been very positive. 

 

The vast array of time controls result in very different games. Bullet and blitz chess is a completely different game from long time controls. "Standard" tournament play is 90 minutes for the first 40 moves and then 30 minutes thereafter. That's a looong time to be sitting there evaluating a position. At that point the time control is almost invisible but is mostly there because people eventually have to go home.

 


The reason I have never been able to really get into chess is because it feels to me like a memory game (learning lines and correct play) rather than an artistic pursuit. I'm probably wrong about that but the fact that a computer is the best player on Earth does lend some credence to my theory.

 

It really depends on the level of play. Serious players, at some point, have to learn deep lines of opening theory. There's no two ways about it. But you'd be surprised how far you can get following the basic four tenants of a good opening position:

  • Establish control of the center
  • Develop your bishops and knights
  • Maintain a defensible pawn structure
  • Castle

If you can maintain those four principles at low to mid level play, it doesn't matter if your opponent is playing the Ruy Lopez or the Italian Game. Now, someone might throw a novelty at you that you might not recognize (Wayward Queen is a common noob trap), but then you learn and move on.

 

I think the memorization aspect of the is a bit overstated in general. Practicing chess tactics (puzzles) lets you recognize patterns that you see in games, but memorization of anything isn't too critical at the casual level.

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Yes, that 4 pronged strategy is basically where I got to with the game and it did improve my play. I just don't think I have any natural aptitude for it though however. I don't seem to be able to make a move without leaving something hanging or forking myself. I'll check John's channel out though for sure.

One great thing about chess (unlike a sport or the latest video game) is that you can play, enjoy and compete in it forever. There's aren't too many pursuits like that out there when you think about it.

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Is it left to me to be the Go guy? I am sure "Go is superior" Internet comments have dropped off since the Google-Sedol match, not that they were necessarily true anyway. ;)

 

A test of a strategy game's depth might be whether mastering it improves your chess game. Go certainly can make you a better chess player. I don't know if I could say the same for the euros on my shelf, though it sounds like enduring a full schedule at Gencon can prepare you for a serious chess tournament.

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Just wanted to check in (pun? maybe...anyway!) and say that this was a really great episode.  I think I have always been afraid of chess because I am awful at it.  But it is really refreshing to see all of these resources out there that can help folks along and learn and advance.  The history of the game is so intriguing in that it has been around for 1,000 years give or take.  That's wild!  Great job 3MA and it was wonderful to hear Michael out and about.

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Is it left to me to be the Go guy?

 

 

Not at all, I'm here with you (would you like a game on DGS or OGS?).

 

Great show, and I'd like to +1 about Michal being one of best panelists (guests?) on Three Moves Ahead. Please have him on more regularly!

 

 

If you are ever thinking about doing a show on "Go in 2016" (and there's a LOT to talk about just now given the huge AI developments), then I can suggest a couple of people who would make great guests (Dwyrin, who streams on twitch/youtube and also does Let's Play of Civ and TW games, so would dovetail with 3MA's core audience) and Haylee (a professional Korean who has her own youtube channel too). [Andrew Jackson and Nick Sibicky would also be great].

 

 

This episode did make me want to go play some chess. Sadly, I first need to get to 1dan with Go before I can consider learning another deep game, and that's taking a while!

 

More shows like this please!

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Can you or someone else recommend an iOS app for learning, training, competing? I'm one of those discussed on the pod that learned the basics as a kid but haven't played in ~20 years.

EDIT: I see lichess has an app. Downloading now.

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Not at all, I'm here with you (would you like a game on DGS or OGS?).

 

Great show, and I'd like to +1 about Michal being one of best panelists (guests?) on Three Moves Ahead. Please have him on more regularly!

 

 

If you are ever thinking about doing a show on "Go in 2016" (and there's a LOT to talk about just now given the huge AI developments), then I can suggest a couple of people who would make great guests (Dwyrin, who streams on twitch/youtube and also does Let's Play of Civ and TW games, so would dovetail with 3MA's core audience) and Haylee (a professional Korean who has her own youtube channel too). [Andrew Jackson and Nick Sibicky would also be great].

 

 

This episode did make me want to go play some chess. Sadly, I first need to get to 1dan with Go before I can consider learning another deep game, and that's taking a while!

 

More shows like this please!

Also a Go guy here. A Go show would be nice. Those suggestions for guests would probably be great :) Crazy stone was just released on Steam for those interested in playing against a good AI. Maybe not for a total beginner and the price is very high...

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I think a Go show would be interesting. The daunting part would be covering a game like that in such a manner that does justice to the depth and scope of the game, especially since I'm nowhere near as familiar with it as I am chess. I'll keep it in the potential topics list, though! It's encouraging to hear there is a client on Steam.

 

Regarding iOS apps, yes - Lichess is good. Having gone through almost everything on iOS, I would say that the Shredder is the best all-around app for playing the computer. The Shredder engine has the best options and most human-feeling playstyle that I've found, and the computer auto-adjusts the rating based on your performance between games. For tactics and multiplayer, Lichess all the way.

 

Thanks again for all the kind words!

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I think, rather than a standalone Go episode, it could be interesting to talk about Go in context of surrounding in other games, capturing in strategy games, etc. All you need to do is add a couple of links to Go trainers and resources and much of the chess episode covers what would be said in a standalone Go episode. :)

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A test of a strategy game's depth might be whether mastering it improves your chess game. Go certainly can make you a better chess player. I don't know if I could say the same for the euros on my shelf, though it sounds like enduring a full schedule at Gencon can prepare you for a serious chess tournament.

 

I've never seriusly engaged with Chess, but I know my Chess game felt a lot better after I had played a lot of Euros and other modern board games. It felt as though I was better at planning ahead and seeing the possibilities on the board.

 

On the topic of Chess variants, the only one I've played is COIN Chess and it's flipping great. It adapts the COIN wargaming system for Chess, so that each colour is split into Nobles and Peasants, with limitations on which pieces they can move and how they score points. I highly recommend giving it a shot if you can find three other interested players.

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I think, rather than a standalone Go episode, it could be interesting to talk about Go in context of surrounding in other games, capturing in strategy games, etc. All you need to do is add a couple of links to Go trainers and resources and much of the chess episode covers what would be said in a standalone Go episode. :)

 

 

If anybody is interested in Go, I think the best place for a complete beginner is still http://playgo.to/iwtg/

 

Michael - go chat to Batt! :)

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