Questions tagged [analysis]
Questions relating to the objective assessment of a position. The assessment may entail which side has the advantage, or what the best move might be.
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Why is Nf6 a blunder here?
With Nf6, I'm trying to bring my Knight out. If the Bishop takes it, I can take the Bishop with by g7 pawn. Why is this a blunder?
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Why is Nh6 a mistake here? Why is Nf6 the best move?
I'm analyzing this game between me and Stockfish Level 1 on lichess.org: https://lichess.org/0SvUBEu0/black#4
With Nh6 I was trying to counter a possible Bxf7+. Without Nh6, the King would have to ...
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Why is Qe7 a blunder here?
I'm a chess beginner. I played this game against Stockfish and according to Lichess' analysis, Qe7 was a blunder here, and the best move actually was c6. I can't understand why?
[Title "Why is ...
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Chess Tree Visualization Tool (no engine or database needed)
Looking for a Good Visualization Tool
I am looking for a good tool to use for visualization of the game tree and for exploration of variations during correspondence games.
The tool would need to ...
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Rooks obstructed by pawns; how to give chessmate?
I played Black in 5 minute game, and reached this position with one minute left.
White moved its bishop close to my knight. I played knight takes knight, the white pawn took my knight. However, due ...
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I found, and now cannot find, an awesome chess website
I need help finding a lost chess website that was totally awesome! It was a wiki style website where you can enter in a FEN string into the search bar, then all the computer calculations would show (...
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How many unique checkmates are there from this starting position?
I can only see 5 lines on lichess from a game I've played and have tried several different moves. Mate in 4 is the fasted but I've seen up to 12. There must be at least 15 different mates, not all of ...
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Tools to study positions with partial information?
TL;DR Is there a chess engine or other tools to study a "position" where the exact location of certain pieces is not known?
From the following chess position, a plan could be to win the a2 ...
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Why is this the best move?
I was just reviewing my game and was wondering why the AI would think this is the best move. All I see is giving white a free knight.
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What are some good endgame books?
I know some people have asked about general good books or middle game books. But i read someone said that the best way to start learning chess is by studying endgames, so I ask: What are some good ...
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Best Repetoire Building Tools
I want to build an opening repertoire manually.
what are the computer tools to do that?
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Why did I lose -> I thought I can swap king and castle to avoid checkmate? [duplicate]
[FEN "6nN/Bp1k2pp/2n5/p7/Q4R1P/5pP1/P3qN2/4K2R w K - 0 1"]
As you can see my king got checkmated through the enemy's queen and pawn.
My question is, why is this a checkmate? I haven't moved ...
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What is the status for EIGHT piece endgame tablebases?
An earlier question here asked in 2012 about the status of 7-piece tablebases. Today complete 7-piece tables are widely available.
So today, what is the status of 8-piece endgame tablebases?
How ...
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What's the fastest way to detect blunders with an engine?
My main goal is to detect blunders in chess games.
I wrote a python program that loads a large pgn database and then analyses the games. I did it by letting Stockfish go through every game and every ...
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Is 2. c3 the best response against the Caro-Kann?
On chess.com, I was playing as White and my opponent played the Caro-Kann. I personally like the accelerated Panov Attack, 2. c4, but my mouse slipped and I played 2. c3. I was very mad when I did ...
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Why does GM Larry claim that this sacrifice is brilliant?
On this webpage GM Larry Kaufman claimed (at least up to 2012) that the following move was brilliant:
[Title "Kasparov vs Shirov (Horgen 1994)"]
[FEN "rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/...
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Where does the queen go in the Ponziani with 5 ..?
Consider this line
[Title "Ponziani"]
[fen ""]
[Startply "14"]
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. c3 Nf6 4. d4 Nxe4 5. d5 Bc5 6. dxc6 Bxf2 7. Ke2 Bb6 8. Qd5 (8. Qc2) Nf2 9. Rg1 ...
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Is there a list of chess openings online without names
I have been searching for a list of eco (Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings) chess openings online by moves rather than by name so that I don't have to sort through thousands of names but I can not find ...
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"Unclear" becoming outdated?
It was the Chess Informant who gave us "∞ - position unclear" (as we all know, a position can only be won, lost or drawn ;-). Now that we have super-strong computers, I expect that ∞ will ...
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Black to play and win but why was the move played a blunder?
In the position below Minic just had to play one move to reach the time control and, in those days, the adjournment which would have given his team a chance to find the win. Unfortunately he blundered ...
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Two different "accuracies"...why?
Ok, I know it's probably not impressive to most, but I'm on my way to a 1000 rating on chess.com. I'm guessing it's because of different engine strengths or something.
I recently played the following ...
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Why did white sacrifice knight in this Nimzowitsch's 1905 game?
Saw this image in a WhatsApp group. Initially it looks attractive with a possibility of a "smothered mate", but I am unable to find out if white can really survive for several variations.
[...
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How to run lichess stockfish analysis locally?
I am working on a research project where we need to run stockfish on hundreds of thousands of pgns we have collected. We need to extract all information generated from stockfish like centipawns, ...
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Why is this a “Brilliant Move”?
I don’t understand why chess.com says this is a “Brilliant Move”? Can someone explain please?
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What is the reasoning behind the suggested move?
In this game, my actual move was Qg6, leaving the knight on f3.
Why does chess.com suggest Ne1+ ?
I figure it would just be taken by the rook, but the engine suggested white would have played Kf1.
The ...
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Why was this castling move so "brilliant"?
[FEN ""]
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. Ng5 Nh6 5. O-O
Why did chess.com mark this move as a brilliant move? It was quite surprising to see a simple king-side castle getting a (!!) ...
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What are the cases in which is good to take Qb3 in "London System'sSH" setups and why
I know that the main idea against London System is to play Qb6 to attack the b2 pawn which is unprotected due to the early Bf4 white plays (generally) at move 2. Normally white reacts to the threat ...
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Winning position after move one?
Question: There are 400 possible two-ply openings; that is, positions that can arise after each player has made one move. Which of these positions, if any, are winning (either for white or for black)...
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Panov-Botvinnik Attack: position analysis
I am a beginner in chess (1313 lichess, 1177 chess.com rapid) and am in the process of learning the basics of the Panov attack from the Hanging Pawns Youtube channel. In this video, at 15:00,
[FEN &...
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Why is Qf3 losing in this position?
[FEN ""]
[startply "16"]
[StartFlipped "1"]
1. e4 d6 2. Bc4 Nf6 3. Nc3 g6 4. d3 Bg7 5. Nf3 Nc6 6. O-O e5 7. Ng5 O-O 8. Bxf7+ Rxf7 9. Qf3
Why does the engine go from -1....
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How to improve at chess by analyzing one's own games?
Analyzing one's own games can be a useful tool for improving at chess, as it allows players to identify their mistakes and learn from them. However, it can be challenging to accurately assess one's ...
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Why is this position -6.2 without a big material difference?
In one of my recent games, I got to the following position, Black to play:
[FEN "2rr2k1/1q2bppp/p3pn2/np1p4/4PQ2/P1N2P1P/BP1R2P1/2R1B1K1 b - - 1 21"]
While playing the game, I analyzed d4 ...
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Why is the chess.com analysis of this position -5?
I'm looking at the analysis of a recent daily game I played on chess.com, and have come to this position with black to play. Chess.com suggests white's last move (Nc5) was a blunder, and the analysis ...
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Is it the case that in practice making moves only decreases your positional score according to computers?
It occurred to me that presumably every chess engine's score is based on the best available continuation move, and thus every other move must be worse (or at least no better).
i.e. if there were a ...
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A complex eight pieces opposite color Bishop endgame
The position, derivated by a variation of the Alechkine Defense, Four Pawns Attack, is the following:
[FEN "3b4/8/1k2B3/6pK/P7/8/6PP/8 b - - 0 1"]
Black to move. Stockfish 14.1 NNUE gives ...
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Why does Stockfish evaluate this position as completely lost?
After thinking for a minute my copy of Stockfish evaluates the position below as +4.7 for white. Why does the computer hate black's position so much?
I know that all things being equal, black should ...
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Adding "summary" comments to an analysis
When I analyze my chess games for studying, I like to write a high level summary or action items.
For example, a summary of a game might include some positive feedback for myself, as well as ...
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Are these depth-41 Stockfish evals the result of a horizon effect?
I was using lichess's analysis board for Stockfish's analysis of this line in the French:
[Title "French Defence, Steinitz Variation"]
[StartFlipped "0"]
[fen ""]
1. e4 ...
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Why does Stockfish evaluates the trade of a B vs N that bad, while the trade has the King in the open and doubles pawns?
In this position (White to play)
(Picture credits to the chess compass extension that analyzes a chess.com game after it ended)
The current Stockfish evaluation (before White plays) is ~0.0.
But SF ...
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Detecting traps in chess
Are there any ways to detect if the opponent is setting a trap, without explicitly just "knowing" the position?
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What is the deepest Stockfish evaluation of the standard initial position that has ever been done?
Letting Stockfish (14+ NNUE) run for several minutes with lichess' analysis tool on the initial position of a standard chess board lets it reach depths beyond 30 moves, I suppose letting it run for ...
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Why is this position judged to be so balanced, and why is castling wrong?
For the position after 10...Kc4:
[Title "White to move; castling is considered a blunder"]
[FEN ""]
[Startply "20"]
1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. Nf3 Bb4 4. Bc4 ...
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How to analyse positions more accurately as a total beginner?
In this position I thought I was winning with white, like +2 or +2.5. But Lichess Analysis shows evaluation as -1.4.
[Title "Black to move after Ne5"]
[fen "rn3rk1/1p1b3p/p2n1qp1/3PNp2/...
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Can you make a lucky brilliant move?
Is it possible to make a brilliancy (a brilliant move) with luck? Or is it so rare that it can only be spotted by the best chess players?
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Is white winning in chess with the 1st and 8th ranks reversed?
Here is the position I am referring to:
[FEN "RNBQKBNR/pppppppp/8/8/8/8/PPPPPPPP/rnbqkbnr w - - 0 1"]
It seems that there are no forced checkmates for white, any f3-Qh4# plans are thwarted ...
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Why Bxa2 is bad according to Silman?
[FEN "2nr1r2/1pp1q1pk/2n1bp1p/p3p3/4P2N/2P1N1P1/PP2QPBP/3R1RK1 b - - 0 1"]
1... Bxa2 2. Bh3 Nb6 (2... Nd6 3. Rxd6 cxd6 4. Bf5+ Kg8 5. Ng6 Qf7 6. Nxf8 Qxf8)
I found the above position in ...
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When is it okay to break a pin using kingside pawns?
In the following position, Stockfish recommends h3 followed by g4. I can understand feeling okay to move your kingside pawns in a closed position or an endgame, but I don't know if this position would ...
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Game analysis app for Mac?
I am using a Mac and trying to find an app that can analyse the whole game and tell me where the mistakes/inaccuracies/blunders are, instead of just telling me what I should do for the next move.
The &...
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Why does Stockfish suggest this move (25. Qxa6?)
In this position, why does Stockfish suggest the move 1. Qxa6?
Also, after 25. ...bxa6, Stockfish also suggests 26. Rd7+, which is followed by 26. ...Bxd7 and 27. Rxd7+.
White would just have traded a ...
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What is the best Chess Engine to practice latter Middlegame and Early Endgame
I have taken a break from chess for while now, and I am hoping to make a comeback soon. I want to brush up on my latter Middlegame and Early Endgame.
I want to start by analyzing recent GM games. What ...
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