17 Chess Principles You Must Learn

Timestamps:
0:00 - Principle 1 - Usually don’t trade your bishops for knights without a good reason
0:34 - Principle 2 - Don’t trade pieces when you’re opponent is cramped
1:19 - Principle 3 - Always pay attention to pieces on the same diagonals and files
1:56 - Principle 4 - Against early queen attacks, gain time by attacking the queen with your pieces
3:23 - Principle 5 - When following opening principles, you'll be ready for surprise moves!
3:50 - Principle 6 - Remember that isolated pawns are good targets!
4:18 - Principle 7 - Here’s a trick to trap bishops!
5:39 - Principle 8 - Don’t play h3/h6 or a3/a6 too early without a good reason
6:51 - Principle 9 - Time management tip
7:31 - Principle 10 - When in a bad spot, look for “out of the box” solutions to save the game!
8:52 - Principle 11 - When playing f5, Lee an eye on the diagonal to your king!
10:23 - Principle 12 - Here’s a special pin idea to take 2 pieces out of the game at the same time!
11:30 - Principle 13 - Sometimes not taking an attacking pawn can protect your own king
11:57 - Principle 14 - One straight square away from a knight and it can Not check you the next move.
12:40 - Principle 15 - When defending, look for ways to force trades and simplify the position.
13:41 - Principle 16 - Sometimes, Discovered Checks are better than regular checks
15:05 - Principle 17 - In time trouble, find an easy, forcing trade if possible

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[MrBabadis]

By watching your videos and listening to your thoughts on ideas, strategies etc. I’ve improved so much that I’m now almost at 1900 elo, from ~1200 on rapid 6 months ago. You’re a really good teacher and I wanna thank you on that that. For any ”beginners” to under 1800 elo, my advice is to always take your time when you’re not sure what to do and also when you blunder, never give up. Ps and learn the halloween gambit I’m still winning with it at 1800😂👍

[milesgreenwood]

LOVE THE NO INTRO, straight into the content

[asdfghyter]

12:38 in addition to no knight checks from one square away, you’re also safe two diagonal squares away. in general you can only be checked by knights on the same color square as your king

[Truffle_Pup]

These concise lesson recaps are great Nelson 👍

[HarleyMaebry]

12:32 "Orthogonal" is the adjective that you're looking for. "One orthogonal square away." Orthogonal is the counterpart to Diagonal.

[Righteousjules]

Thanks for that tip about lining up the king straight in front of the knight in time trouble to avoid next move checks. I think it’s super useful.

[kevinb.]

Hello,

could you maybe do a video on the polish defense? I saw you play it it in your last video and there's no good videos on it because it's so unknown. I find your explanations to be the easiest to understand so I would appreciate it.

Thank you for your videos, I enjoy them!

[zenfire]

Another informative video. Very humble too. I learn on your channel. Thank you for your help.

[MindsetByDave]

I was today years old when I learned the “one straight square away from the Knight” rule! Thank you so much. 🙌

[ThinkerT]

A good expansion of Principle 14 would be that you can never be checked by a knight in 1 move if your king is on the opposite color square of the knight, since a knight must always move to an opposite color square. So if the knight is on white and the king is on green, any move by the knight must be to a green square, which then could only be attacking white squares.

[Thatguyjo]

That keep your opponent cramped principle will really help my game. Thanks Nelson

[dahoop]

Brilliant lesson idea, unusual but effective.

[DroCaMk]

Incredibly helpful stuff, thanks a lot!

[zzzaphod]

Usually I skip watching videos with "You Must" in the title but I made an exception here--helpful content, thanks

[Chris-xylu]

I agree on trading for no reason but 2 knights is a lot of squares to calculate. I’ll usually get rid of 1 at some point. Depending on the game(color bishop)

[vermeirenniels]

How you only have 500k subscribers is beyond me. Your content is so much more interesting than Levy's

[ArxxWyvnClaw]

13:44 'Sometimes, Discovered Checks are better than regular checks'

i was under the impression that Discovered Checks are ALWAYS better than regular checks

[palpsextreme]

If these are good, just imagine how good it'll be for more videos with Bobby Fisherman and friends

[NJDJ]

Principle 14 - yes, always remind to stand one square next to the Knight, not diagonally or you'll get checked!

[sonic_boom]

Please post a video on the chess adventures