I have ALWAYS been very bad at chess, and not much better at other strategy games like go. Even within the small sample of the 20-some kids I went to elementary school with, when I played at school I was regularly defeated by other kids. On lichess, my ELO sits well below average, nearly on the border of falling to 3 digits!
I have some intuition for mathematics as it relates to graph theory, to the point that I am able to do well in these subjects at a decent US university. I have done well on standardized tests, especially as it relates to mathematics. So it's not that I'm a total brainlet when it comes to thinking about these types of things.
I've been trying to understand why it is that I'm bad at chess. My best guess is that when you do mathematics in a school setting, you are looking mostly for generalizations more than anything; you're really building from the bottom up. But when you play chess, it requires you to keep a lot of possibilities in your head, and it's more of a top-down view where you have to have intuition for those bottom-up possibilities, and to apply them.
That is something I just cannot do. I have ADHD and aspergers, and that disability on my working memory probably plays a big role in it.
So Veeky Forums, are you good at chess? Pic is of the geography corresponding to 50 million games played on lichess, and where players are from.
it's definitely applied mathematics to some extent...
Andrew Stewart
I was ok at it until my gramma died. Then I got much worse - just sorta lost interest I guess. Weird.
Aiden Green
same as you OP, I'm really good at stuff that my classmates struggle with but stuff like chess that people tend to be good at just baffle me
I think it's because I'm panicking about not winning immediately
it also took me three tries to pass my learner's exam to drive lol
Thomas Jenkins
tits or gtfo
Zachary Diaz
sorry about your grandmother. What do you think made you a good player in the past? What do you think makes you a worse player now?
Benjamin Ortiz
I was country champion as a kid and have 80% winrate on chess.com I play it when on shitter, it's better than scrolling twatter or some shit
Eli Anderson
Do you do well at mathematics in an academic sense? Do you think the skills are related?
Within the demographics of those who are able to do high-level mathematics, do you think people are more likely, less likely, or equally likely as the general population when it comes to being good at chess?
Tyler Kelly
I'm genuinely confused at how you could determine my gender from my post
David Johnson
Yes, raised with chess as a family board game. I have no known health dealies. white male hetero blonde blue athletic genius
What I noticed when I toyed with a chess club that met at a park building was... Concentration - "seriousness" pay attention play to win, instead of socializing LOL
You can see that after so much practice, hours and hours per day, the masters just walk by the board and move the piece, several seconds delay at most... This requires long daily periods, like olympic training
If you aren't "into chess" ... forget it
Robert James
I'm really terrible at math, but I'm pretty good with logic. I don't think math itself has anything to do with chess. You are not calculating moves in a sense that you calculate equation, it's rather using logic to come up with solutions
Leo Morris
>I'm genuinely confused
tits or gtfo
Isaiah Anderson
Did he guess right?
Jordan Lee
It is IQ related, so psychology or neuroscience checks out
Julian Smith
I was atrocious at chess as a kid too, I've gotten a little better but not much Some of it is probably IQ, you have to hold moves in your head and such. But I think the greater part is practice. In other words, there are a lot of "good" chess players who don't have any unusual natural talent. And naive natural talent will lose to an untalented player with a good repertoire. Practice comes from motivation. People who are good at chess have a very strong competitive instinct, in other words, they need to prove that they're better than somebody else to feel good. I don't care much so I don't get a "kick" out of chess, so I don't go home and read hundreds of chess books and memorize opening lines when I lose. I don't care as much about whether I win, so I don't focus that hard when playing. In other words the people who rise to the top in chess are the "Spikes" in Richard Garfield's system of players. Playing chess is not the fastest way to get good at chess. Memorizing patterns is much faster. A large part of the superiority of a tournament player is the opening theory they have memorized, which often they may not even understand that well.
Logan Sullivan
I'm ok at chess Raymond Smullyan and some other logic authors have neat chess problem books that might help you get better with reasoning, but I've found it's mostly about just reading the board. My dad used to make me play chess with him (my parents are filthy Russki jews) and it's usually just about forcing moves on your opponent while keeping your own losses to a minimum most of the time. My advice would be to just read the whole board and consider where every piece can move, then consider your options and see which places would keep you "immune" from being captured while also opening up more opportunities for movement.
Benjamin Sanchez
I was really good at chess growing up, but the opportunity to take it seriously was kinda taken away from me by chance. Some GM was supposed to come and play 50 games at once. He decided not to at last minute. Ended up playing some old dude and just mind gamed a victory. (Blew my first two skips out the gate and opened rook pawn)
Good at math.
Juan Clark
this is the other reason spikes tend to dominate: the best chess strategy is "boring" unless you can see much further into the game than your opponent. it's actually not as fun to play chess well as it is to play poorly.
Eli Thomas
It's obvious, roastie
Jonathan Richardson
No. Im good at dota though
Chase Robinson
A dude in Canada proved that anyone can be good at chess by sucking balls and just continuously playing rated matches anyway and eventually he was a Grandmaster and won the Canadian championship.
If two people are just learning to play chess, you could probably say that it's IQ related, but if one person has played 10,000 games and the other has played five, it's probably not.
Jose Cruz
Very low self confidence with no natural urge to compete that would overcome any panick about not winning. Very few males lack both qualities...
Blake Davis
What's your username? I'll add you on lichess to play some casual games.
Asher Howard
>I have ADHD That is probably part of the explanation, to play chess you need to concentrate for extended periods of time.
>So Veeky Forums, are you good at chess? I am absolute garbage. The only times I play are with my brother.
>it also took me three tries 6 here.
But that also requires mechanical skill, you need to have good reflexes and hand eye coordination.
