- Chess basic rules I know, but I didn’t know about the strategies. There are three games in chess- opening game, middle game and end game. There are strategies for all the three games. There are millions of possibilities for the coins to be moved, but not all are winnable. There are different types of chess – rapid, blitz, chess960 and normal. With the hope that basic rules of the game can be known by people (where pieces are to be kept in the opening except for chess960, and how pieces are to be moved), which I learned from my father at an early age, I thought I could play well and win games with ease, as once I defeated my father in the game at an early age. But things are not that simple, as I lost plenty of games later without any professional training and still thought my game was good. It is a wrong belief. Later after many user interface defeats in chess.com in recent times, ( I liked zapak.com user interface previously and lost chess games in different user interfaces later over the years like jungle animals, knights etc. apart from chess game with controller and cassette), with different difficulty levels(high mostly) but I never won. I underestimated the skill level of grandmasters and had the impression it is an easy task which could be done in a few years time. It takes dedication and perseverance for mastering the skill, even though it’s an indoor game. (Not underestimating indoor games, but toiling in the sun looks comparatively hard on paper at least ). Later got to know about ’Some basic strategies’ free book(I will try to add the book name and author soon). The book has some good sound strategies from India’s pre-independence era. (At least to me, who had nothing). Here are some things I got to know – control the center of the board, have pawns in chains, (known as pawn chains)-avoid doubled pawns, there are good gambits but they are played at the club level, avoid conquering opponent’s piece unnecessarily,-if it doesn’t result in controlling more squares in center don’t take the opponent’s piece, (but later hypermodern defence for black has evolved which can counterattack the white from flanks), there are some opening rules- avoid bringing out queen early, beyond the enemy lines squares should be controlled, the passed pawn(pawn which advances towards the enemy’s top square) power increases towards the end of the game, to study- it is imperative to study how to end the game with certain piece combinations like rook and the king, 2 bishops(the power of two bishops is greater than two knights as they can control many squares, knight and a bishop), bishop and a knight etc , the game can’t be ended with a king and a knight or a bishop and a king. I wasn’t taught all this by my father, who might not have been aware himself. Happened to learn this in recent times. Many grandmasters study the openings as there are plenty of variations but also middle game and the end game tactics are equally important. By knowing this rules along with some discipline and experience, I was able to improve my game by more than 50 %. Have to learn plenty of strategies and play in club, tournaments possibly. My drawback is however hard I try I am unable to remember certain moves . There is queen trap, poisoned pawn. Whoever is interested please explore communities and make use of tools to improve the game just like many sportsters. (Ex: Kohli in oakley meta ad). Computers may be able to tell about combinatorial game theory but it is limited. Many people can claim many different openings just like stock market tips. (Avoid those , go with reputed openings, and book authors )