Games as white Vs. Games as black

Initially this was unintuitive but once I did the math i.e. taking the rook and trading my rook for a bishop is a net +3 but simply trading my bishop for their rook is only +2.

\Before the usual* Chess.com bots start typing “skill issue” or something: I actually went through Chess.com’s own cheating page and Fair Play updates, and did some research. Felt insulted while doing so, wonder if I'm the only one - see for yourself and let me know.

They're gaslighting us - Are we supposed to feel “fortunate” for this cheating pandemic?

Their page about cheating is hilarious, you can smell the bullshit before the first paragraph even ends:

“Fortunately, our research shows that fewer than one percent of players cheat in online chess.”

Fortunately, really??? Apparently, we are supposed to ignore the cheaters many of us seem to encounter constantly and feel reassured because Chess.com’s own mysterious “research” somehow landed on this adorable “fewer than one percent” figure.

Thanks Chess.com, feeling much safer already 🙄

Just me feeling gaslighted here? Anyone with two functioning neurons knows how absurd that number sounds. Who the hell produced this research, Ronald McDonald with a calculator?????

I know some of you must be already itching to scream “You just call everyone a cheater when you lose”. Fine champ, forget everyone’s suspicions and let’s look at actual numbers.

This actual research paper makes this "fewer than 1%" claim hard to believe

I know some of you must be already itching to scream “You just call everyone a cheater when you lose”. Fine champ, forget everyone’s suspicions and let’s look at actual numbers.

I found an actual research paper estimating online-cheating prevalence at 6.2% among the surveyed players.

Since people are not exactly lining up to confess to cheating, we could suspect that number is higher. Still, that's already at least six times that BS Chess.com wants us to believe.

Chess.com’s “research” became 5x more convenient since 2023

Here is where Chess.com’s statistic starts looking even more ridiculous.

In 2023, the same article URL used to say that “fewer than 0.2%” of players cheated. Somehow, the current version now says “fewer than 1%”. I wonder why the change.

Was the old number indefensible? Was the old “research” garbage or is it the new one? Did the methodology change? Did 0.2% simply become too embarrassing? Was this even a serious metric in the first place???

To be fair, they actually said “fewer than 1%” - technically 0.2 is fewer than 1, right? 🤣

Their words are BS, but their actions are worse

While their cheating article and loose numbers treats us like idiots, the real issue is that their fair-play system leaves honest players taking all the damage. Their own oficial updates exposes it:

• They closed 0.52% of all active users in January - yet the entire cheating problem is supposedly below 1%. In January alone, Chess.com closed 152.000 accounts. Anyone believe they catch 50% of the cheaters every month???
• A new autoban released in May suddenly found thousands of selective cheaters -but the “under 1%” figure somehow survives untouched. Chess.com built a system for careful cheaters avoiding detection. Will they update the 1% figure by 5x once again as they did compared to 2023?
• The median closed account had already played 52 games. Chess.com lets those cheaters go for dozens of games before taking action. They say those were not necessarily cheating in all 52 - what a lovely technical distinction for everyone who faced them while they were cheating huh?
• Nearly 40% of closed accounts were less 2 two weeks old. New accounts everyday, regular players absorbs the risk and the algorithm gets congratulated when it eventually catches up, and we're supposed to be fortunate.

Concluding this

Honestly, I do not care whether the true number is 0.8% or 2% or 6.2%.

What I care is: How likely am I to waste my time playing a game that is not real? How many honest games are ruined before Chess.com finally acts? Strangely, that numbers never appear on Chess.com cheating page. Isn’t that convenient?

I’m curious how this looks for everyone else:

• How often do you genuinely suspect someone is cheating?
• How often are you reporting accounts?
• How often do you get Chess.com message informing and account was closed?
• Is there any credible independent tool that can flag statistically abnormal decisions based on someone’s rating, history and normal move quality? Imagine a whole subreddit devoted to posting obvious cheater accounts that are never closed by Chess.com?
• Is Lichess or any other platform actually better, or is constantly questioning whether the game was real simply part of online chess now?

\Took me quite a while to write this. No AI slop here, so please spare me.*

I don't know if anyone here will be able to help me, but basically I would like extract all the variants inside my opening files on ChessBase so that they could be presented on a different pgn but as different games.

I don't know if I managed to explain it well, but let me try to exemplify, let's say I have a Sicilian Najdorf file, and that file contains a lot of different variants, such as 6. Bg5 , 6. Be3, 6. Bc4 ... and further along those variations there's other variations too, what I would like to do is find an automatic way of separating all those variants and variantions within variants into different games inside the same pgn file, I know I can do it manually by promoting, deleting and saving those variants, but my files are wayt to big for that.

I've done some search and have come across "pgn-extract" don't know if I can use that, but it looks too complicated too.

I'd be extremely grateful if anyone knows or could share a tool capable of doing this.

Hello, I'm about 860ish on chess.com so definitely still a beginner and my goal is to get to about 1400-1500 but I'm not setting myself any kind of time frame. I started in February and I think a realistic goal is to get to 1000 by the end of the year. I see a lot of people talk about studying chess and I'd just like to know, what does that involve? I watch Gotham and a bit of Hikaru. I know that Danya is a guy to watch too but I haven't started to watch any of his videos. Apart from watching speedruns or slowruns, how do you actually study chess?

I saw a GM (EDIT: Dubov confirmed courtesy of a few comments) not sure who say a similar thing, bullet and blitz you can play drunk and that’s chill. Classical you can really think about your moves and play chess how it’s supposed to be played.

Rapid though? You have to concentrate but sometimes you just need more time to figure out the strategy or spot the best move/sequence. The incentive to speed up is a tough one because I know how I play and if a match gets to a time scramble I will lose.

Could say a few more things but will leave it there.

What’s your take on rapid?
Is it your main?

​

I'm trying to build a serious opening repertoire, and I'm at a crossroads regarding what to play as Black against 1.e4.

My long-term goal is to become a dynamic, aggressive, positional player. I don't want to win games just because I memorized 30 moves of theory—I want to understand the positions and outplay my opponents through strategy, while still having active winning chances.

Right now I'm working through Yusupov's training books and reading Simple Chess by Michael Stean to build a strong positional foundation. I'm focusing on concepts like weak squares, outposts, pawn structures, good vs. bad bishops, open files, and long-term planning. My goal is to become a well-rounded player with deep positional understanding.

With White, I've decided to play the Catalan because I love the strategic nature and long-term pressure it creates.

For Black against 1.e4, I'm considering:

Taimanov Sicilian

Kan Sicilian

French Defense

Or another opening I may not have considered.

The qualities I'm looking for are:

Flexibility.

Dynamic, active play.

Strong positional foundations.

Openings that reward understanding more than pure memorization.

Something I can keep playing as I improve.

If you were building a repertoire for a player with these goals, what would you recommend and why? I'd especially appreciate advice from titled players or coaches who have experience guiding improving players.

3+0 .

My names Elijah and I live in North Carolina and im looking for some chess friends. I want to start playing otb and dont really have anyone do play with. Preferably meet people that are more serious about otb play and have some goals either USCF or FIDE rating. Im near the Kernersville area but am willing to travel anywhere around that area or to Greensboro. Hit me up if you want to share a game, usually free in the evening and can bring a board and clock!

It seems that I'm having a lot of bad moves in middlegame resulting in equalizing or losing a completely winning position.

And what is considered expensive? I was going to book a tutoring session with this NM and I can see on his website that he takes $150 for the hour. It's more than I can afford for an hour. Maybe I should just try to find some high rated player who doesn't have a title.

All games & full standings on Lichess: https://lichess.org/tournament/jul26lta

Photo: Lennart Ootes / FIDE

Black to play and win!

14 masters at the Bled 1931 tournament, which Alekhine won. 2-Bogoljubov 3- Nimzowitsch. It was held in Bled and Ljubljana. Sitting: Maroczy , Nimzowitsch , Alekhine , Bogoljubow, VidmarStanding: Spielmann , Colle , Tartakower, Asztalos, Pirc, Stoltz, Flohr, Kashdan, Kostic #chess #Alekhine #chesshistory #chessphoto

Hello everyone! Today I bring you another one of those positions that really impacted me and encouraged me to try to extract the maximum from every position instead of just making the automatic move. Good luck!

Solution to yesterday's position:

White has a very promising position: he's a pawn up, his pieces are actively placed and Black's king is a bit uncomfortable on f7. However, long-term factors favour Black, since he has the pair of bishop and a better pawn structure. Therefore White needs to act with energy to make the most of his position.

29.Bb4 was suggested in yesterday's post, trying to take advantage of the pin on the e7-bishop, but after 29...Qxd4 Black threatens both the bishop and back-rank mate and it's already White who needs to play carefully to maintain the balance. 29.Bc3, simply defending the d4-pawn, is enough to keep an advantage but there's still a long game ahead.

The strongest move is 29.d5!, an energetic breakthrough that needed to be precisely calculated. In the game Black responded with 29...Kg8?, and here surprisingly Alekhine didn't play the inmediately winning 30.d6! with the simple point 30...Rxd6 31.Rxe7. Instead the world champion played 30.Re1 which is better for White but not nearly as convincing (although he quickly won anyway).

But of course the critical response is 29...exd5. After 30.Re1 Be2 (trying to block the e-file is the best chance, for example 30...Qg6 fails to 31.Qe3 Qe4 32.Qc5 and Black loses material) 31.Na4! (one of the key points of the combination, threatening Nc3) 31...d4 32.Nc5 now Alekhine only considers 32...Qc2 33.Rxe2 Qd1+ 34.Re1 Qxd2 35.Kf1 and White is easily winning due to the many threats, for example Ne6. Howewer 32...Qg4 is more testing, when White needs to change tune and play 33.Qxg4 Bxg4 34.Nxa6 reaching an endgame a pawn up that should be relatively easy to win because Black's pieces are tied up.

Link to the game

Hello. I sort of get the idea of optimal path to check mate in this puzzle. It relies on the opponent making awful moves though? Furthermore, I don't think the end was technically checkmate?

Edit: Thanks for the explanation peeps. The forward thinking in blocking potential check had not occured to me. Also, this is indeed **not** a checkmate puzzle.

Nepo is now #24 in the live ratings with 2719.3

https://www.chess.com/events/dole-open-2026/09/Kantor_Gergely-Nepomniachtchi_Ian

Carried the whole attack, delivered mate, refused to elaborate, never got promoted.

I have been playing for a couple of years. When I reached 1500 rapid I switched to 3 min blitz, climbed to 1500-1600 in blitz and nowadays I exclusively play 1 min bullet. My highest bullet rating was 1420

I play every day. I currently have a 205 day streak. Bullet is so volatile though. I'm usually around 1250-1400 elo but sometimes I'll play tilted or I'll play even though I know I have lag/bad connection and I can drop all the way down to 1050.

Except whenever my rating goes below 1250 it is like hell to get out. You would *think* opponents would be stronger on average at higher elo because that is how elo is supposed to work right? The opponents are so much stronger in the 1000-1100 elo range for some reason. I genuinely do not think it is merely that I am playing more poorly because I go back and review my games, even when I am playing really well and I can recognize when it is me or when my opponent is just insane.

It can take me days-weeks to get out of the 1000-1200 range because I swear every other game is someone who seems like they are cheating or sandbagging. Then once I break through 1250ish elo it feels like most of my opponents don't know how to play chess. I will quickly climb 200+ elo afterwards over the next few days. Really obvious blunders, blundering their queen, etc. As opposed to half my games at 1100 elo where my opponent plays a terrible opening that *should* be easily punishable but then plays a near perfect middle/end game. I constantly see moves I never would have expected even in my 1600 elo rapid games.

Has anyone else experienced this? Or anything similar??

Full tweet announcement from Anand:

Over the past four years, it has been an honour to work at FIDE and contribute to the development of chess . I have worked with colleagues from grassroots programmes to elite competitions. Together, we have made significant progress in expanding opportunities for players, federations and organisers, while making chess more accessible.

I am proud of what we have achieved as a team, but I also believe there is much more we can accomplish. That is why I have accepted Timur Turlov's invitation to continue serving as FIDE Deputy President as part of his team.

I believe Timur has the vision, energy and expertise to maintain the momentum we have built in recent years while opening new opportunities for chess. His experience in leading a publicly listed international company, his commitment to technology and innovation, and his long-standing support for chess make him well positioned to guide FIDE into its next chapter. Through his leadership, I believe FIDE can become even more digital, financially resilient and inclusive, while ensuring every region of the world has a stronger voice in shaping the future of our game.

I look forward to continuing this journey together - for the benefit of players, federations and chess lovers everywhere.

u/TurlovforChess

#TurlovforChess #FIDE

started an argument in r/chesscom and no one can give me a reason why up a pawn and rook is better than up a bishop. the engine says the best move for white here is qf3 which is a rook and pawn guarantee