When I looked that the board, my first thought was to fianchetto the bishop, which you did. Great diagonal and mounting pressure on his f3 pawn. Good catch.
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I would have considered a queen-side pawn thrust with his king so wide open.
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Played a very complicated game today against a “raid boss”… someone rated 100 points above me to cancel my 4 game winning-streak, rofl. I lost this game as expected, but I’m pretty proud of my play in being able to hold out in a complicated position like that. A week ago, I wouldn’t even make it that far in a game like this.
Big takeaways:
This is the highlight of my game. I immediately saw Qg4 which threatens their pawns on g7 and e6. For some reason I miscalculated and thought that their knight on c6 was defending the pawn on e6. I confused e6 with e5… and I’m attributing this to processing (I’m processing a lot right now, lol). I strongly feel like this was my biggest mistake of the game, personally and intuitively. I went Ne2 instead, which in retrospect doesn’t really look good because I’m blocking my queen. I feel like in my overall play, I’m underestimating pawn pressure and pushing pawns in general. That’s something I need to get better at. After Ne2, they went g5 to threaten my knight on h4, forcing me to retreat. If I had gone Qg4, he wouldn’t have been able to pressure me off like that. I feel like the game would looked much different had I gone Qg4, with me potentially winning. That’s just how I feel though, lol.
Same style of mistake in this position, where I was winning after a good sequence of pawn moves:
I went c5, thinking that I trapped his bishop on d6. No the fuck I did not, roflmao. I completely missed f4, and I remember when he went f4… I thought to myself “oh shit”.
That’s the second highlight of my game, and interestingly… it’s the same style of mistake. I’m calculating but I’m not thorough. I need to calculate cleaner and with greater precision. I need to double-check, if not triple-check. If I had seen that, I likely wouldn’t have made that move… which means I’d find something else, leading to potentially a different game and a different outcome.
After that, I made a move that gave no respect to his pawn pressure, lol. This is really the position where I lost the game:
Bc2 is a mistake because he can just go d3. He missed that too, and went e4. This ends up being a really complicated position for me, probably one of the most complicated that I’ve analyzed. These types of positions are complicated to me right now, and I need to give more respect to them. I end up losing an exchange and now they’re up a piece. Then they proceed to walk me down. The best move is actually Ne4… so that after he takes my knight on f3, I can fork him with Ne6. To be able to see that, requires a deeper and more precise calculation than I’m used to. If I’m going to go up in rating, I’m going to have to be comfortable, precise, and deep with these types of positions. This game exposed me to the things that are expected of me to learn and get better at if I’m to breakthrough into a new echelon of rating against stronger players. This game taught me a boatload. I also notice that stronger players have a better understanding than me of pawn power. I tend to be very reserved with my pawns. A lot to unpack, reflect on, and process. New and more advanced dynamics of the game being revealed to me. The goal-post is moving.
Overall, I’m just happy that I didn’t make any glaring blunders. My tendency to make those has been decreasing more and more. These games are powerful because if I go into my next game, I’m going to be really motivated, triple-checking everything, being more cognizant of pawns, going deeper into calculation, being more cognizant of potential knight forks in relation to trades, trying to see 2-3 moves ahead, etc. These losses make me way stronger, and I wouldn’t grow without them.
This was not a good game, lol. I won, but I was hardly paying attention. I need to analyze this game later because I missed mate in 2. We both played very sloppily, as indicated by the estimated ratings in game review.
No blunders today, which is good. I think I have a 0 blunder streak going, but I need to check that out later also. It might be a viable form of measurement.
This is definitely the most funny chess game I’ve played so far.
All I can see is d7, roflmao. I wasn’t even thinking about checkmate. Before this move, I was thinking “please let me fork, please let me fork, please let me fork”. After he went f5, I had the biggest smile on my face. It felt so good, lol. That was the most satisfying move I’ve ever played in chess. I felt a tingle in my body.
I’ve reached my highest rating today, 1106.
I don’t understand the matchmaking of chess.com. My last opponent aka the “raid boss”, was a whopping 1187. This opponent today was 1066. Oh well, a win is a win.
This game was full on derp, it was just a matter of who derped less. Roflmao.
Okay. I now see why I was led to analyzing with Stockfish 17.
As I’m analyzing the game on chess.com:
The evaluation bar is +0.7 for white, which is great. I go Nc3.
The evaluation bar drops to +0.1 for white. What the hell happened?
According to this game review, Ne3 is a book move.
Now I go to Stockfish 17.
Stockfish 17 doesn’t like Nc3, and says it’s a Dubious move.
According to AI:
In chess, a dubious move (annotated as ?!) refers to a move that is not outright bad or a blunder, but one that leads to a noticeable disadvantage or loss in position. Specifically, in the context of this explanation:
- A move is marked as dubious if it results in a 5-10% drop in the player’s winning probability (Win% Loss).
- This loss is measured using a chess engine’s evaluation, which calculates the likelihood of winning for a given position.
Key Characteristics of a Dubious Move:
- The move is suboptimal but not catastrophic. It might indicate poor strategy or missed opportunities.
- It’s often a move that appears playable but gives the opponent a significant advantage or fails to maintain a prior advantage.
- Unlike a blunder (which results in a 20%+ drop in Win%), a dubious move is less severe but still a step in the wrong direction.
Example:
If you’re in a position where you have a 70% chance of winning (Win% = 70), and after your move, the engine evaluates the position as having only a 63-65% chance (Win% = 60-65), your move might be marked as dubious.
In essence, a dubious move suggests that while you haven’t lost the game outright, you’ve taken a step that reduces your chances of success unnecessarily.
I need to be aware of making dubious moves, and avoid them since they worsen my probability of winning. Chess.com game review doesn’t tell me this, it just labels it as a “book move”. I would have never known that this was a suboptimal move if I were mainly going by chess.com analysis. According to Stockfish 17, the best move is actually e5 which threatens his knight on f6. By studying the line, I’m supposed to understand the strategic/positional theory or logic behind it. Without going to deep into it because I’m not in the mood to, it appears that it forces him to move his knight, which I then threaten again by pushing a pawn… so his knight ends up way out of position on the side of the board. Very, very interesting.
I’m only using Stockfish 17 from now on, it’s just far superior for game analysis.
According to Stockfish 17, this is actually a really good game from me. 94.5% accuracy, and I made 0 blunders and mistakes. Holy shit, lol. I thought I played poorly, as I was half distracted while playing. Upon review, I’m actually making a lot of moves on the heat map. Wow, this is bizarre.
Here is my 2nd dubious move. I missed checkmate. Checkmate was Bh6, then he takes with the Rook and I go Qh6. Other than that, I didn’t really play any moves that Stockfish 17 didn’t like. This is basic enough analysis for now, and I reckon that as my rating increases… I’ll be more and more cognizant of different lines, and the best possible move to maximize the position and advantage.
I’m kind of stunned with this analysis. How in the world did I play that well, while not feeling in the mood to calculate. I was mostly playing instinctively. What in the world is in Limitless, roflmao.
The missed checkmate and this move Rf3, are what made me feel like I played sloppily. Rf3 was a straight up mistake from not paying attention. I allowed him to get my bishop for free. Stockfish 17 labels this as an interesting move rather than a mistake.
Interesting move, according to AI
In chess, an “interesting move” (annotated as !?) is one that:
- Represents a sacrifice or an unconventional idea.
- Is not necessarily the best move, but it has potential to create complications or put the opponent under pressure.
- May not be strictly sound (according to the chess engine evaluation), but it could lead to practical chances in a real game.
Key Characteristics of an Interesting Move:
- Sacrificial Nature:
- The move involves giving up material (such as a pawn or piece) for compensation in other areas, like activity, attacking chances, or positional advantages.
- The compensation might not be clear or guaranteed but is worth exploring.
- Not the Best Move:
- It’s not the top move recommended by the engine. However, it’s a creative or daring idea that could work in practice, especially against a human opponent.
- Unclear Outcome:
- The evaluation for the position after the move might slightly favor the opponent, but the resulting position introduces complexity or unexpected challenges.
Example:
You’re in a balanced position, and instead of making a safe move, you sacrifice a pawn to open your opponent’s king-side. While the engine might not favor this move, it could lead to practical attacking chances or force your opponent to find precise responses.
In essence, interesting moves add a touch of creativity and risk to the game, often making them exciting to watch and analyze, even if they aren’t strictly “correct” by engine standards.
I’m mainly understanding this as introducing complexity and unpredictability into the game.
My main takeaways from this game are:
- Don’t miss checkmate, even if you have a free queen fork. Always look for potential to close the game in the fastest, most efficient manner possible
- Use Stockfish 17 to analyze key moves of the game
I’m tempted to flip the board and check out my opponents dubious moves. I might learn something from their perspective of play, after all we’re in the same ELO rating. I might truly be able to learn from my opponents mistakes. Might experiment a little with that later.
- Start exploring best lines, and develop a memory/pattern recognition for them. Also, start understanding the strategy/positional theory behind why they’re deemed as the best according to Stockfish 17
I would 100% take the queen over mate in 2 lol. Guaranteed queen vs. Maybe I mess up a mate and just lose?
Queen 100% of the time haha
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I played 2 games today. 2-0
I’m currently at my highest rating in Rapid: 1135
The games today were very interesting. I’m eager to analyze them.
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I’m 7-1 in my last 8 games. What the actual fuck, lol. It’s supposed to get harder the more my rating increases. Limitless is insane.
I analyzed my last 20 games in Stockfish 17.
This is the blunder count in order of recent games:
- 0
- 0
- 0
- 0
- 0
- 1
- 1
- 0
- 0
- 1
- 0
- 0
- 2
- 1
- 1
- 0
- 2
- 1
- 5
- 1
I have made 0 blunders in the last 5 games according to Stockfish 17. This is the longest I’ve gone without making a blunder. This is amazing, especially considering that I intended and wrote down in my journal that I want to make less blunders. Wow. I think this is a viable measurement of improvement that’s worth noting, however I’m not too invested into it.
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In the first game I played today, I was getting smoked. This game technically shouldn’t count as a win because the opponent randomly abandoned the match while clearly winning. I don’t think that I’ve encountered this yet on chess.com. Maybe he had an emergency or his internet disconnected, I don’t know. That being said… a win is a win, roflmao.
I made a lot of mistakes in this game. Very strange moves. This game deserves a very deep analysis, because I really don’t like my play in this game. This is the game that I feel like is going to teach me a lot of things, so I’ll revisit it later.
The way I won in the second game, is extremely fascinating because I readily applied the concept I had learned from yesterday’s game when I missed checkmate. This is actually crazy to me.
I get the fork on c7. Then he goes Ke2. Naturally, the first thing I would do is immediately take his rook. It’s a free rook, you just instinctively take it.
In yesterday’s game, I had a similar scenario. I got a fork on the opponents queen. It’s a free queen, you just instinctively take it. That caused me to miss mate in 2 because I was playing too instinctively, without understanding the bigger picture. I got too fascinated with winning material, which caused me to forget the objective of the game - which is to win, maximize positions, and ultimately checkmate the king. Lesson learned, need to be more cognizant.
So bringing it back to this fork on c7. For some reason, I ignore instinct and start thinking “yes, I can take the Rook but am I missing something else?” I begin to apply some form of wisdom. “Is there potentially a better move?” It’s not logical at first to think like this, and in some sense it might even be greedy. As in, “just take the free Rook, you’re doing too much.”
Once he goes Ke2, I relax and find Nd5.
Nd5 forks his queen. Why take a rook, when you can take a queen. Why take a queen, when you can checkmate? Same concept from yesterday, lol. After I took the opponents queen, they resigned.
This is really, really crazy… that a lesson I learned on a previous day… is immediately tested and applied on the next day. This learning manifestation by Limitless is wild.
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There’s a great meme from the Chessbrah channel.
“When you have mate in one, look for better.”
They mean it as "end the game with a cooler checkmate. But it’s based off that principle - ALWAYS look for a better move in a position - whenever you have one tactic, there’s often times more, as positions that are tactical are sometimes filled with tactics.
Btw ur a freaking god. I didn’t see that knight sac to win the queen.
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I played 1 game today and won.
I’m now currently at my highest rating in Rapid: 1151
I just keep winning, what the hell is going on. This was a really weird game, I’m going to analyze it quickly. I didn’t feel like playing chess today but I did it anyways.
I’m like 8-1 in my last 9, lol.
I won against a 1210 today. Woah. Did I just beat the raid boss?
I’m like half-confused, half-shocked, half in recon, half just enjoying chess, and half not really caring. Processing is heavy today.
According to Stockfish 17, I made no blunders today. 89.7% accuracy. The zero blunder streak continues, it’s currently at 6 games in a row now. I made 0 mistakes as well… I might need to look at my mistake frequency as well in the past 20 games. That could be interesting, I might do that later.
5 dubious moves though, that’s not good. Stockfish 17 doesn’t like Nh5, but for some reason I really liked that spot. This wasn’t a good game in my opinion. I was sloppy, by missing his free Rook on g3. The opponent missed that not once but twice. This didn’t feel like a 1210 rated player, it felt like someone who was hardly paying attention. He went derp, then I went derp, then he went derp again and you just can’t do that. You just can’t sequentially derp like that, you’ll lose. After I took his free rook, he resigned. Today is weird.
The craziest thing about this game, is that I instinctively and intuitively really liked having my knight on h5.
I kept bringing my knight back to h5. In some bizarre manner, my knight on h5 is what won me this game. That’s kind of wild, but whatever. I let Limitless do its thing with the pattern recognition, intuitive play, and etc.
Upon reviewing the evaluation, this game was actually quite tight while I slowly created a lead with black until he made a big mistake twice.
Very interesting. For some reason, I’m not really too enthusiastic about reviewing, learning, and analyzing every dubious move I made. I don’t know why, but I’m not going to force it. I feel like I’ll save a good in-depth analysis for the next game I lose.
Was it just dubious because Ne6 wins the pawn on d4? (If Rg4, just h5)
White can’t defend the pawn but he can attack your pawn back with his rook, but you can take his bishop and fortify your d pawn with your e pawn while he recaptures.
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Yeah, I should journal about my learning process on here.
So Stockfish 17 will point out the dubious moves, but it won’t specifically tell me why it’s dubious. This is probably a stretch of the imagination, but maybe in the future they can make a Stockfish AI that you can actually discuss moves with, that can tell the exact logic/theory behind certain moves, etc. That would be wild.
Anyways, the way I’ve been doing it is… I look at the top 3 lines:
Asking myself:
“What does this lead to in terms of moves, material, position, etc?”
“How does that compare to the top engine line, etc?”
I actually made the move Nh5 a total of four times, lol. 2 times it was dubious. The first time as seen in the above photo:
I went Nh5 to threaten the bishop and stop his pawn push on h5. I felt like if he pushes his pawn then it’s going to break up my king side’s defenses. I also liked Nh5 because he can’t really move it from it’s place. It’s just stationed there, since he has no pawns on the f file. My entire logic for liking this move, was thinking that it’s a “strong station” and slows down all of his attacks. I felt like he was trying to push pressure onto my king side and this move seemed like a nice way to defuse everything.
The best move in this position is Nc6, probably because I’m completing my development. I’m probably overestimating the level of threat on the king’s side, leading to an unnecessary move and loss of tempo or something in the eyes of Stockfish 17. I don’t really know for sure though, lol.
The second time it was a dubious move:
It leaves my pawn on d5 hanging. Luckily my opponent missed that, lol. Players at higher ratings sure as hell won’t miss these things, so I have a long way to go and need to sharpen up.
This is the position I think you’re referring to:
Yeah, you’re right. Ne6 is the best move because it wins the pawn on d4. However, Nh5 is still the 3rd best line according to the engine. It’s still a viable move according to Stockfish 17, so it doesn’t label it as dubious.
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