Why You Keep Losing | 15 Chess Principles You MUST KNOW

Welcome to Episode 1 of this "Book Club" series where we are currently going through the book: Logical Chess - Move by Move by Irving Chernev

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[waltervondervogelweide]

1. Knights before bishops.
2. You should try to defend and develop at the same time.
3. The principles are guidelines, but there are exceptions.
4. The best attacking piece is the king's bishop.
5. Place each piece on the best possible square as quickly as possible.
6. Don't move your pieces more than one time in the opening.
7. Castle early (better on king's side).
8. Two pieces are worth more than a rook and a pawn.
9. Develop all pieces before attacking.
10. Deal with threats first before continuing development.
11. Each pawn you move in front of your castled king weakens your position. Try to keep all 3 as long as possible.
12. Developing a piece that ALSO attacks is a good move.
13. Open lines are to the advantage of the player with more development.
14. The best defender of white's king side is the knight on f3.
15. Whoever controls the center has better chances of attacking.

[pakasokoste]

That principle with the three pawns and the f3 knight, and how moving them gives chances to the opponent, that was new and very valuable information to me. Thank you Nelson!

[Rammbock]

Nelson, you are the best chess channel and ACTUALLY teach very efficiently, rather than make a big show. Bravo!

[tiagobordin]

Principle number zero: don't play Chess when you are exausted.

[JustAnotherCommenter]

That last part there really shows that the best defense is a good offense, a.k.a. counterattacking.

[latimil]

As an intermediate player I can say that you can do A LOT if you just focus in not blundering. Especially in quicker games, if you don't screw things up, chances are that your opponent will do that eventually

[OrlandoBillyBob]

This is going to be a great series for the channel. Every two weeks to start is probably fine but I will definitely be looking forward to the next one. Great job!

[bosspoke]

One thing that you didn't mentioned about weakening the king side through moving pawns forward is that it can potentially for lower elo players be a weakness to keep the 3 pawns unmoved. I haven't been back-rank checkmated myself much, but I've done it multiple times in the elo range of 1300 - 1900. People in this elo tend to forget the crucial danger of getting checkmated on the back row so they continue what they do, thinking they have an advantage but suddenly they get checkmated or forced to sacrifice pieces to avoid the back-rank mate.

It's probably obvious to higher elo players how to avoid the back-rank checkmate, even if you didn't move a pawn, but to lower players they are either unaware of the danger or forget it. I'm not particulary good at seeing these kind of lines where you abuse the weakness, so it often prevents me from doing stuff like sacrificing bishop to create attack. And it rarely happens to me as well when I weaken the king pawns.

It is great advice, though just to keep in mind the potential of back-rank mate that people like me and lower elo players tend to ignore.

[davidatkinson]

Thank you Nelson, we're moving up the ranking slowly, from beginner to (almost) advanced. I'm holding my own against 1000 ELO Bots. I find your videos most informative.

[JackPine]

Nelson is a natural-born teacher. Many thanks for clear, concise, easy-to-follow lesson. I'm never overwhelmed with too much, too fast information as with many other Youtube presenters.

[AcesulfameGaming]

Finally got over my anxiety to play real games after doing 2k puzzles, from review it seems the middle game is my weak point, when there's a lot of options to choose from. Thanks for all of your videos you explain things very well

[Ray-kusj]

You did a good job on this video, Nelson. Logical Chess-Move by Move by Irving Chernev was the very first chess book I bought, way back in the early 70's, I still have it, and enjoy going through the moves, one at a time. My other favorite chess book is entitled: "Chess World Championship 1972 Fischer vs Spassky by Larry Evans and Ken Smith. The unique thing about this book, is that it takes you through the '72 World Championship, one game at a time, with a diagram for every move, and an explanation for each move. I feel these types of chess books are really valuable for the average chess player, and answer many of our questions on why certain moves were played. Keep up the good work. Ray

[VTPSTTU]

Thanks for the video. A couple of questions stand out to me.

First, you advocate the queenside castle to get to the point that is shown at 19:07. At that point, the position is vulnerable but not terrible for white. If white moves Bf4, the bishop is now defending the h2 square. That temporarily means that two pieces are preventing the black queen from moving to h2 for a checkmate. That also prevents the black queen from checking g3 again. Black pawn moves to h6 and g5 can deny g4 to white's bishop, but in the time needed to make those moves, white's bishop could take the pawn on h7 and be in a position to check on e5 before trading bishop for knight. I imagine something like

.... 0-0-0
Bf4, h6
Bxf7, g5
Bh2, Rdf8
Be5+, Kb8
Bxg4, Qxg4+
Kh1, Rxf3

That's still a bad position for white, but maybe I've missed a move that white could have made to save the position and maintain a piece advantage. Maybe the sequence for white would be

..., 0-0-0
Bf4, h6
Nh2

At this point, the white bishop is still protecting h2, so black can't just hit h2 to force checkmate. Now, the knight at h2 and the white queen are threatening the black knight on g4. The black knight can go to e5, but that seems to mean losing the initiative with white still a piece ahead.

I wonder whether the bishop should capture the f2 pawn at the 17:38 mark. If black captures with the knight, then white has to respond to the fork. That sequence might look something like the following.

...., Nxf2+
Rxf2, Bxf2

White has now lost a pawn and a rook in exchange for a knight. I understand that the white bishop sacrifice can lead to perpetual check. Maybe black counters by refusing to take the bishop.

Bxf7+, Kd8
Bg5+, Kc8
Be6+, Kb8

White now has both bishops, a knight, a queen, a rook, and four pawns in not so great structure. Black has a queen, a bishop, two rooks, and six pawns, but one of these rooks is trapped behind the king. I don't know whether this position is decisively better for either side.

[stekikun]

Thanks Nelson, this series is a great idea! So I had read the 1st game in the book, and as I did I thought that black's attack, although very strong, was a bit premature because black's king was still in the center.. I had an eye for moves like Bxf7+ or Qa4+! Even without seeing the perpetual in full, I would not have resigned with white after Bxf2.. nothing to lose at going for a few checks to see where they lead to 🙂

[sheltersteve]

This is so cool. Years ago when I got back into chess and needed to learn better this was one of the books I picked up at my local bookstore. I really like the idea of telling the "why" behind the moves. Looking forward to the rest of the series.

[boomshanker]

What a fabulous idea for a series. I have just blown the dust of the book, which I have in the old descriptive notation. Your video lessons will compliment the ideas of the book and bring it more up to date. Great work Nelson, very much looking forward to game 2 - thanks

[aliteralperson]

Love the new series Nelson! You present the chapter in a really instructive way.

[sirenbrian]

This is a really nice distillation of chess wisdom, thank you! I've played many games where I'm on the receiving end of these attacks and I didn't really know what I'd done wrong. This is a very helpful collection of simple ideas.

[vassiliosavlonitis]

Dear Nelsi, I just wanted to congratulate you for truly educational content for real chess lovers. Well done for NOT going down the path of offering entertainment for thousands of internet trolls, attracting them through clickbaits and other cheap means. Keep it that way! You will still make a living and maintain your reputation and earn the respect of good people.

[istariknight]

I definitely missed the perpetual counterattack when going through the book, I'm glad you pointed it out! Don't resign unless it's forced mate!