why am i SO bad at chess?

Post Reply New Topic

today it took no more than 7 minutes to put me in checkmate.

why does that happen?

I’ve had embarrassing games like that: I can only win a game against opponents I’ve played at least twenty games with already.
I think it’s to do with theory of mind and predicting likely tactics to come...

thats what I tell myself anyway

I never played chess but I'm sure I'd be awful cuz I s#ck at just checkers.

^ I’m worse at chequers (or draughts as we call it) than I am at chess!

The disparity between my ability to solve puzzles and my ability to play strategic games is... it's just funny how huge it is.
The same with my dispairity between results of written and oral exams - I didn't have any hint of diagnosis back then so I just survived Uni with 99.75% on written exams and barely passing the oral ones, mostly thank to high results of written ones.

In my case, it's likely the human interaction part. I'm a classic example of the "female type", with social life going via frontal lobe. When there is at least one human interacting with me, they automatically takes the majority of my "processor" and there is very little remaining for the actual task.

This is why I rarely enjoy board games: social interaction and the game compete for the same resources and it makes me very uncomfortable.

Another thing, chess specifically: there are many predefined strategies and advanced players can use them to quickly win. My exbf was interested in the topic, a girl who won with him in just a few moves, later explained to him the "classic opening" and what he should have done seeing her making these moves.

Were you playing a machine / bot?

They are pretty good. I haven't played for years but my friend battles when playing bots.

My strengths lie elsewhere - challenging word games such as Scrabble and cryptic crosswords.

You probably do not have a knack for it. Not everyone is good at chess. Those who have a knack for it who are the ones who play it. So when you go up against one of them you will likely always lose.

You're not the only one. I've always sucked at playing chess.

no, i was playing a coworker during a break, he went to his locker and broke out a small chessboard. it was embarrassing how quickly i was cornered.

it's probably cause i play like...three times a year on average. you don't get better at things when you do them three times a year
but i want to change that. i don't bother looking up strategies, that may help. didn't know what the "classic opening was"

now that i think about it i don't think i've won ANY game of chess, EVER. i'm no good at scrabble either

it's like the smash melee of board games

I figure I would have to play chess daily for at least a year before I started really playing it right.

^ The only period when I’ve consistently won games of chess was when I was living in a shared house with a death metal band, and both me and the “singer” were unemployed: so we spent most afternoons for months in end playing chess in silence at the kitchen table.
I got to know his game by sheer weight of observation.

Do you normally lead with either the Ruy Lopez or the Bishop's Redemption play?

^ I tended to let him have first move because I’m better at reacting than acting
I’ve never learnt the names of the plays... checking whilst in mid post...
Yeah: I used either depending on what he was doing, with the object of dominating the centre of the board.
(I did to the quick checkmate with the bishop & queen in a handful of moves on him once well... if he was going to play the day after having done MDMA for the evening )

I'm not exactly the World's Greatest Chessplayer, but I do well enough that people stop wanting to play against me after a while. They will complain either that I am "good" (true) or that I "cheat" (false), or maybe even both .

But if I'm good, why would I need to cheat?

I'll stick to playing Dungeons & Dragons...

Ah, the old “confound the opponent you can’t overcome with self-contradictory twoddle” tactic.

Someone wanted to demonstrate Scrabble on his tablet in front of a bunch of people and I volunteered to play him. It only took me a few plays for me to find a bingo! Which is using all seven tiles for an extra 50 points.