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Hi all,how i can translate the vidio beacause i am having trouble understandingEnglish

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Try playing the videos at a slower speed.

Yes, the videos are in English as it is this website. We are very sorry that you cannot understand English well enough but at the moment it is not economically possible to translate this site and videos to other languages.

Thank you for your understanding.

Actually, providing subtitles is one of the things that we already checked, the site that Adam provided, we had already checked it, along with many other providers but the quality is very low always, only the timing is good. Chess moves are not properly understood by the IA yet and further tests will be needed but it is something that we will do on the long run. I am particularly interested in it but it is not yet feasible, I understand David's idea, we also thought about it but proper subtitles must be done by a professional, and it is a lot of hours and it is not always appreciated. Most of the times for a 1 min video it can take half an hour depending on the circumstances, correcting timings, etc… It is not an easy task, still we will come back to this later on… 

Blackmood - the missing bit

Hi I'm starting t o learn the blackmood openings. When I play however I'm at a loss as to how to respond to 1. Nf3 or 1. c4 1.b3 etc. Any idea when we will have some guidance on this.? In the meantime is there any advice available?

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Meeting Flank Openings are often closely linked to how one defends against 1.d4, so based on that idea give it a bit of a think and post your thoughts. Chess is a game of infinite possibilities and you will have to become comfortable making decisions when out of book using reasoning and logic. Magnus played 1.h4! the other day against Wei Yei, and I don't think we will see a ChessMood course covering this move anytime soon, so how would you respond and why? Looking forward to some interesting discussion.

Avetik is working on the section on how to attack against other 1st moves like 1.c4, 1.Nf3 and others. It will be uploaded in the near future.?

I find the English Opening course to be helpful and not hard at all to follow. I'd suggest just going through that course if you don't find it difficult.

French Attack "Dream Variation" Example Games?

Hello Chessmood family, Ive been working on studying the middlegame plans/ideas associated with the "dream variation" after reaching this position. I know the general idea after playing the reinforcing c6 move is to play moves like Nd7 - Nb6 (Stopping white queenside counter-play on f4 and h4) and then begin a kingside attack via a6, b6, Ne7 - Nb6, Kd7, etc. Avetik mentions that this variation has been used with success by GM Christian Bauer. Unfortunately I have not been able to find any of his games that use this variation (or any GM games for that matter) Does anyone have any example games that utilize middle-game plans suggested for this variation?

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As far as I could tell, in rated games GM Christian Bauer's opponents have not ventured Bxb5 against him. However, below are a couple of games played by other GM's in the structure you requested:

The 5 main mistakes that stop the growth

Champions, as you know a few days ago I had a 12-hour-marathon of 1-1 calls with our students, where I was listening to their problems and challenges, and was offering solutions.

Many of the pain points and questions were common. And not surprisingly, the mistakes in the growth plan were common too. 

So I decided to write this post and share the main ones. 
So, even if you missed those 1-1 calls, you can correct mistakes that you might make too. 


1 Correct Balance between playing and studying 
 

Some are playing too much, some too little. 
Both are wrong. There should be a good balance. 
And by playing I don’t mean just OTB tournaments. 
Training blitz/rapid games or online sessions count too. 

What’s the correct ratio between playing and studying?  
It very much depends on a few things. 
But here is how you should approach it. 

When we eat something, then automatically starts the digestion process. 
But in chess, it’s not automatic. 
When you study, you gain lots of knowledge - you eat. How to digest? - By playing! 

Think this way. If you teach me 10 new words in your language, I might easily remember them. But if I don’t use them in the next few days, I’ll forget all of them. 
While, the next day if I try to use those words in our conversations, they’ll become mine. 

The same is in chess. 
If, for example, you study a new opening and you don’t practice, you’ll forget… 

So playing and digesting the knowledge is essential. 
And here is how to find a good ratio. 

Don’t play when there is nothing to digest. In other words, if you didn’t study anything particular, if you don’t have new ideas in your head, don’t play. And in the opposite, if you studied a lot recently, play more. 

In some cases, it can be 50%- 50%, in some 80%-20%, and in some 20%-80%. 
Just always ask yourself. Did I eat and is it time to digest? 

 

2 Fear of playing  

I’m very well aware of this issue. 
At some point, during my career, probably I had this issue too. And I worked with many students, who fear of playing. They love chess, they love training. But they don’t want to play. Or find different reasons to avoid it. 
If this sounds familiar, here is the reason and the solution. 

Reason 
It’s ego… What if we train very hard, but play badly in the next tournament? 
Our ego will be attacked. Did we do something wrong? All the time we spent on training was in vain? 
We’ll let our ego down…
 

That’s why many avoid competition. Because if we’re not detached from our ego (something very hard to do), by playing we risk “the happiness of our ego”. 

Solution 
 

1. “Ego is the Enemy” by Ryan Holiday, is a fantastic book. 
I wish I had read it earlier… 
It’s one of the most important personal development books you’ll ever read. 

2. Detach yourself from the results. 
Don’t pay attention to rating, you win or lose. 
When you play, just try to do your best. 

In one of the articles that I’ll publish soon on our blog, I’ll share with you a story that will change your perception and help with detaching from results. 

But meanwhile, think about an artist, that paints and thinks about how much $ they’ll make… Not surprisingly, all the masterpieces in the art are created by people, who didn’t care at all about the price. They just made art. 

So when you play, don’t think about the result. 
Just try to perform your 100%. 

3 When to play 

To my surprise, I found that many of our students either didn’t read these 2 articles or didn’t follow the rules. 

https://chessmood.com/blog/golden-method-to-increase-rating-in-chess 

https://chessmood.com/blog/raise-your-chess-rating-by-cutting-your-losses 

Many don’t follow the “9 games” rule, which you can find in the 1st link. 
And the 2nd big issue is playing when tired or in bad mood. 

If you also do this, you’ll not only play bad sessions and lose rating, but also it’ll harm your confidence. And consequently the results of your next sessions. 

If you haven’t read those articles - please do! 
As the Chinese proverb says: “The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.”

 

4 Too Harsh
 

Many chess players are too harsh on themselves… 
And they lose themselves, when they blunder, they play a bad game or a bad tournament. 
 

Take it easy. 

Even the top 10 players in the world, make blunders. They have bad games and very bad tournaments. 

Everyone has.  

The issue comes from here. 
You often see their best games. You read when they played a fantastic tournament. But you don’t see their worst games and don’t read when they lost -20 points in one single tournament… 

Please, please. Don’t be harsh on yourself. Just smile, acknowledge the mistake, try to find a solution for not repeating it again and move on. 

A great book I want to recommend is “Chop wood, carry water” by Joshua Medcalf. 
GM Noel Studer has recommended it to me, and I’m very grateful for that. 
It’s a great book, for learning to enjoy the journey. 
You’ll love it. 

5 Bullet games 

Here, I’ll be short. 
No Bullet games… At all. 
It’s not just useless, but it’s harmful. 

It can only be acceptable if you’re a GM and you play a few games in a month. Or you’re a streamer, and you want to have some fun with your audience. 

Later I’ll write a separate article, and explain scientifically why it’s harmful. 
For now, if you’re playing bullet, just absolutely remove it from your schedule. 

Rating boost 

Most of our students who seriously invested time in studying the ChessMood material, significantly raised their ratings. It’s not an advertisement. You see the results on the website and in different forum discussions. 

And the main barrier, for those, who also have done a good job studying our ChessMood material but didn’t raise the rating, in 99% of time, is they did wrongly at least one of the mentioned 5 points. 
 

Some trained a lot but almost didn’t play. So if you don’t play, how you’ll raise your rating? :)
Many had a very bad study/training balance. 

Playing when tired and in bad mood, additionally not following the 9-game rule - is the most common reason I saw, that stopped some from raising their rating. 

Summary  

Just training, watching courses, and reading chess books, isn’t enough. 
You need to play. And you need to play smartly. With the right ratio between studying and playing. With Right Mood and with the right schedule. 

If you do everything correctly, you’ll join hundreds of our success stories we have. 
https://chessmood.com/feedback 

P.S
Hopefully, this helps. 
Hopefully, if any of the mentioned points resonate with you, you’ll fix them ASAP. 
And hopefully, I’ll hear from you soon, sharing your success story. 

Best wishes,
Avetik 

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Thank you, coach Avetik! Game changer tips ? Will try to play more according to advice in the articles. Now my training starts with playing instead! ? I'm confident to reach 2400 on chess_com in 500 games, almost 2300 atm just after couple of days (10 3+2 games per day session with analysis), next challenge will be on lichess.

Fear of playing is fascinating. Other things than ego could be factors. Sticking with your artist analogy - sometimes a blank canvas can be overwhelming. The fear is putting time and effort into something that might turn out to be garbage.

One of the obvious problems has been Covid. I've only played one tournament in the last couple of years (a few club league and national matches) and the rest online. Club matches are rarely against anyone stronger. I also found my rating increase leveled off in the early 2000s when I moved as there were not so many tournaments nearby as well as being in a county that is less serious about chess (most of the young smart minds leave for one of the bigger cities where there is decent money and career progression but horrendous living costs or commuting, but there again with working from home being more the norm that is changing). But yes fear of play is one I have, but more an inertia than a real fear. I think this one stems from exams, and the perhaps recurring nightmares you get about having some exam the next day and you've not studied. And then you think about your opening prep and all the lines you're not yet happy with and I guess it brings back the same anxiety. You want to be bullet proof prepped in everything which of course never happens no matter what you know. Chess is difficult as it's a mix of knowledge and intuition (i.e. absorbed by other means) and while it's inadvisable to go into an exam unprepared, chess isn't so simple and prep is only a part of the story. Sometimes actually playing and looking at the results can help point areas for study (the so called getting the biggest bang for your buck in terms of limited study time).

Thank coach Avetik! For everything, your advice are very useful! (I spoke for many..this is the piece of puzzle that they missed it)

Thank you Avetik, very good points (as always). Will stop the bullet play completely and focus more on rapid, maybe blitz. I'll also check out "Chop Wood , Carry Water" and "Ego is the Enemy".

Avetik, Some really good stuff here, thank you for taking the time to put this together for everyone!

Look Chessmood community. Fischer played and studied the same. He even learnt russian to accesos top notch chess knowledge published in soviet magazines. In the Sousse Candidates (1967) he forfaited although he was leading the table. Then in 1968 he only played and won two medium tournaments in Europe and in 1969 there is only 1 game recorded vs. A Saidy. What was he doing in the 68-69 period? Going to the beach? Watching TV? No. He was studying chess. In 1967 he realized that he needed an extra push to defeat the colluting soviet machinery. So he came black in 1970 with a chess strength never seen previously. The rest of the story we know: demolition in Vancouver, demolition in Denver, demolition in Buenos Aires and demolition in Rejkiavik. So the best path is to study first and only later try to put your knowledge into practice

once again...thank you! precious advices, it's only up to us to follow them properly

In reality all these are perfect pieces of advice but I do not tottaly follow thw Bullet rule. Ok I am an advanced player and in my 3 years of chessmood I gained 800 rating points, being over 2000 on lichess, close to 2100 and over 1900 on chess.com. Also my puzzle ratings are above 2200, have hit a 2400 barrier on chess.com. Sometimes, once or twice a month I play some bullet games but they have indifferent impact on my progress.

Thank you so much for this Avetik sir. Many of the points above I also did wrong and I will fix them immediately

My plan

Hi all, where I can find my plan?

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You probably need to organize a 1-1 call first.

Antisicilian line

1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 Nc6 3. f4 g6 4. Nc3 Bg7 5. Bc4 e6...... Most of my recent opponent played e6 here in the 5th move. What should be white game plan in this line ?

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This isn't the ChessMood line. Are you mixing up your lines here? Play 3. Bb5 and the course videos will explain the game plan in all the variations from here and you will do well out of the opening. Good luck!

I am attaching a couple of screenshots of positions arising from this, normally you play with the d3, Qe1 plan, the only difference is that depending on where the knight goes, we should play e5 or f5. Check out the screenshots and I hope that it will clear your doubts if you are playing with the 3 f4 move order. Otherwise, this is the course that you should check: https://chessmood.com/course/sicilian-defence-part-2

Happy hunting Shahinur!!!

Simplified blackmood course against the English?

Is there a section against the English yet? Maybe I missed it. Thanks for your response.

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Avetik is working on the section on how to attack against other 1st moves like 1.c4, 1.Nf3 and others. It will be uploaded in the near future.?

Blackmood openings take a quiz

There will be take a quiz for blackmood openings as well? Thanks

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Claudio, most probably next week.

Hi Everyone I am new here

I'm Frankie "Durian Defense" Kam. I signed up for the Pro Trial yesterday. Nice to meet you all. I'm a 54 year old IT Manager from Malaysia. 1986(!) Malaysia National Schoolboy individual event champion. Drew against the late, great Tony Miles in a 1985 simul in Kuala Lumpur. That was like 35 years ago. After that I went to university, got a job in education, got married, had (and still have) one loving wife and two kids. During 2022-2021, I got back into online chess with Lichess and chess dot com. Lichess: Bullet 2057, Blitz 2182, Rapid 2052. Chess dot com: Bullet 2033, Blitz 2059, Rapid 1701. I 'invented' my own 'Rubbish' opening named the Durian Defense. 1. ...Nh6 and 2. ...c5 gambit trash opening which only works in bullet and blitz. I wonder why, huh. I also got into Twitch dot tv chess streaming. Started streaming in October 2020. Made Twitch Affiliate in March 2021. My channel name is the same as my nickname. With Chessmood and its excellent videos, blog articles, and amazing Champions Community, I hope to improve my chess rating on Chess com and/or Lichess despite on my family commitments, church service, office work and Twitch dot tv streaming schedules. I think I'll binge watch the Chessmood Openings videos. And read the most excellent and eye-opening wonderful selection of Chessmood blog articles. After 6 more days of the Trial account, I hope to make a decision then. Cheers Frankie "Durian Defense" Kam

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Welcome to the family!!!?

Welcome to ChessMood family! 
If you take 1 year PRO, after your trial ends, reserve a 1-1 call with a GM, to get a personalized study plan and move forward faster! 

1 to 1 session with GM Avetik

Hello All, How can I register for 1-1 discussion with Avetik- I am sort of stucked at 17-1800 since last three years- and sort of disappointed with my progress. Want some solid recommendations!

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Please, you can get in touch with us at @chessmood.com">contact@chessmood.com and explain your case. Did you already have the 1-1 discussion with Avetik in the past? You should also explain this. 
Have a great day ❤️

Muizzuddin, yesterday was my contribution day of the month. And I had 1-1 calls with our students for no charge. 
We've sent emails, and written in forum and in closed group… Seems you missed it. 
Soon, we're going to give an option for people who wants to have additional 1-1 calls with 30 minutes duration, which will cost $50. 

I'm going to summarize the main advice I had during yesterday's call. Hopefully, there will be lots of useful stuff for you. 
 

French Attack - Advance

In the position after white's 3.e5 and following Avetik's recommendation of 3. ... Bd7 intending 4. .... a6 aiming for a light square bishop exchange after 5. ...Bb5. White played 4. Be3 a6 and then 5.Nc3 effectively preventing Bb5 and with the and 3.Be3 making c5 (normally played when the c3 N blocks the c pawn's support of d4) now problamatic. Pinning the N with 5. ... Bb4 resulted in 6. Qg4 causing difficulty to the g7 pawn. Any thoughts on how to best deal with this move order other than forgetting the light-squared Bishop exchange strategy and simply going for . ...c5 against the advanced french.

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IMO after 5. Nc3, I would have reverted to the c5 plan... now white can't play c3. It might go something like: 5...c5 6. dxc5 Qc7 7. -- Bxc5 8. Bxc5 Qxc5 And now you have pretty good control over the center. I've not been able to play this line of the French too many times yet... I've gotten some interesting responses to 3...Bd7 and usually it forces me to revert to the c5 plan.

What are moodcoins now for?

I have about 100000 Moodcoins but can't seem to spend it on courses... Is this a bug or now are moodcoins devalued?

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Don't worry, there is a bug with buying courses with moodcoins, which we're fixing. Thanks for reporting it! 

So if you are a pro member is there any point to moodcoins as the courses are included in the membership?

If everything goes as per the plan, in 2 weeks you will all be able to spend all the moodcoins! ?

French Move-Order Mayhem

While thinking about GM Avetik's intended recommendation against 3.Nc3 in the Classical French it occurred to me that it could equally be used to avoid the mainlines of the Winawer variation. To illustrate: A. 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e5 Ng8!? B. 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.e5 Bf8!? and we have reached the identical position as above. A curious case of transpositions within the same opening, and the madness doesn't end there, because if White now goes 5.Nb1 we have suddenly been transported into the starting position of the Advanced French. The whole thing feels like a deleted scene from Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness. :D

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Very interesting point! I never played the French myself but everyone is telling me to do it… This is a very interesting transposition!

I want to serve you for 12 hours

Hey, Champions! 
One day this week (most probably May 20), I want to serve you. 
I’m going to have 1-1 calls for 12 hours. 
No charge, for free.  

For more information, please check out your email inbox. 
I’ve sent you details on how we’ll do that. 

For your growth, 
GM Avetik ❤️

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Hi, not seen any email yet, could you clarify? Is this for members who haven't had a 1-1 before, or for any member who might want to have their progress reviewed? Given the no-charge, is this also for users who don't have 1-1 entitlement? First come, first serve on the appointments i.e. book a slot in advance?

Hey champions! How are you doing?! ?

Seems like we had a technical issue yesterday, as a result of which some of you failed to get the email from us.
So, those of you who haven't received the email can get in touch with us at contact@chessmood.com or give us the email you use at chessmood.com. 
Have a great day ❤️

I am interested Avetik please conatct on messenger, I have left you a message

Email received, thanks

Hi Avetik. I also did not receive the email. My email address is sacrat59@gmail.com. Thanks!

life changed with one such call 3 years ago I guess . Thank you for that , and hope many others will get benefit from these calls .

It's our kind monster's day!

Happy birthday, GM Gabuzyan! 
Wishing you always to have that cool energy and excitement about life. 
Love you, my good friend and brother. 

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Happy birthday Gabuzyan. I've enjoyed watching you play blitz - very inspiring.

Happy birthday!

Happy birthday coach!

Happy birthday coach ! Your courses and streams helped me improve my chess. Keep being awesome.???

Why does our intuition fail us?

Following on to what I said about intuition playing a bigger part than I thought in chess. Classic theory suggests we learn via the levels of competence: . Unconscious incompetence - we don't know about what we don't know . Conscious incompetence - we are aware and start to do something about it (we train), but the results aren't good . Conscious competence - we get good results (our training is producing results), but it requires a lot of focus and effort . Unconscious competence - it now is taken care of automatically freeing up our concentration for other tasks Those of us who do well at very long time controls, but are awful at blitz are probably at the conscious competence level, and getting to unconscious competence I believe is the way to break the 2000 level. One of the things holding us back (me especially) I believe is to want conscious control of the thinking process (overthinking, not hearing/listening to intution etc), as well as studying too many things we never consolidate it. My 3 0 has improved a lot recently, so maybe I'm using more intuition now correctly. However, assuming the training is good (we learn openings, we study master games in the middle-game, endgame, those that are positional and attacking, watch our favourite GMs play, practice and analysis games...), we still make mistakes, sometimes hoodie level ones, experience tilt and so on. So my question is why does our intuition (auto suggested move) get it wrong? There are some patterns to mistakes: . Not having full sight of the board (i.e. focused in on a small area) which means we might have a great tactic, but overlook something out of our field of vision. . Not noticing the opponent's move (i.e. focused on the sequence of moves / plan we intended to make without gathering new observations). . Choice (of plan or tactical) - our neural nets work like a heat map or ripples and the strongest response wins and we become conscious of it. The input (what we noticed on the board) is applied and an answer comes out, though like the illusions duck or rabbit, a wire cube's orientation (and many others) once we're locked on we can't see alternatives easily even if they are obvious to someone else. We need to be aware in situations of choice (and notice them) to make sure all reasonable options are looked at. . Concrete lines (a move looks the right one but isn't or ignores another one due to some concrete line - i.e. the trick is hidden down the line of several moves which can't be seen at the start). . Insufficient training (novel positions or containing ideas we've not seen enough of) and biases (perhaps as a result of insufficient training). . Tiredness, fatigue, insufficient attention, distractions, interruptions from our conscious thought or the environment... Any others? The point is that if conditions in the above list start to come into play (we should look out for that), it is worth using some conscious thought process (calculation and other tricks) to prove our intuition right or wrong (depending on the clock and criticality), as well as consider blunder checks. It also means we can budget our time to these critical moments better, and not on moments where intuition is likely to be right or a calculated answer may not help us or be achievable. Thoughts?

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Interesting post. I think one you missed out is emotional state, AKA right mood. It's related to your last bullet point, but a little different. Obviously tilting can have a big effect, but there are more subtle things too. Like when the opponent plays a very surprising tactical or aggressive move, we might panic slightly or assume we're losing and get negative about things. If instead we react calmly we give ourselves a much better chance to react correctly. A big part of it is taking a moment to properly digest what has changed on the board, which gives our intuition a chance to throw up some decent ideas and candidate moves.

Interesting post. I think it's a bit of everything you mentioned. I know for me, I can get a bit of tunnel vision when I have a plan, and miss what the opponent is doing. I had this recent game, I was doing well overall and thought I had the necessary pieces in position to take the e5 square. Then the opponent played Qh5 and checkmated me on h7. I hadn't even thought of it, I was too focused on my plan. https://lichess.org/cnrcPzyb/black#25

The next upcoming course

Dear champions, 
After 3 months of research and preparations with our team, I’m about to start recording the next course, which will be a game-changer for you. 
The topic - How to dramatically reduce blunders! 

There will be around 15 detailed sections, with lots of examples and actionable advice. I’m finalizing the material next few days, and yeah we go! 

Meanwhile, would love to hear from you. 

1. What kind of blunders do you make most often? 
2. What do you think are the reasons behind your blunders? 

3. What do you do to reduce them? 

Feel free to comment, and share your suggestions. 
 

For your growth, 

GM Avetik 

P.S 

Would you like me to make a video behind the scenes? 

How do we prepare the material, record and etc…? 

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GM Avetik, This course sounds fantastic and is definitely much needed! As far as kinds of blunders I make I think I make them all ?. However, the number one problem I feel I have is that I am not spending the time to figure out what my opponent is doing and play to restrict his plans. This of course results in hanging a piece or not calculating correctly. As far as a reason I assume I am not following a correct thought process or if I am I am not doing it consistently. To reduce my blunders I just try to really pay attention. This is perhaps one of the great challenges of chess, paying attention throughout the entire game. Either the time control is too tight, as in blitz, or the game is too long and fatigue sets in. Either way something will slip and a blunder occurs. I think a behind the scenes video would be a huge hit and a lot of fun. It would foster a feeling of closeness and inclusion among your subscribers/members. You may also consider doing a brief, 3-4 minute video, of the ChessMood Tournament later on in the year. You could also use it as a marketing tool to raise awareness and participation of your future events as well as something prospective students could see when they are first visiting the ChessMood website. Thanks for putting together so much awesome material and for facilitating a great community! Leslie

1. My most consistent blunder is blundering a piece by not seeing a Bishop in the last rank attacking it from the behind the pawns 2. Reason: I'm not seeing the whole board 3. What I think I need is a concise checklist I train myself to go through religiously before each move. Haven't come up with a satisfactory one yet that works well under the time constraints of online chess.

I have found, as I continue to take a deep dive into improving my chess game, that my blunders ALWAYS come from a lack of calculation. There are several root causes for this lack of calculation, from time trouble (this is an addiction of mine, though not quite to the Grischuk level hehe), missing a tricky move from an opponent, simply forgetting a piece was moved to a new square, or the worst problem of all, my laziness in my calculations. I am sure if I suffer from these issues in calculation causing blunders, then others are as well, and I look forward to learning how to overcome these missteps, as well as methods to overcome other problems leading to blunders that I may not yet even realize I am doing! Thanks for your continued hard work, you are an example to us all! Jay Oh, and a behind the scenes look is a great idea!

I put together a list of reasons our intuition fails us and leads to blunders which applies to faster time controls and time trouble in this post: https://chessmood.com/forum/pro-channel/why-does-our-intuition-fail-us Choice, complexity, being stuck on a plan, not seeing the whole board, not knowing what to do / inexperience with similar positions, being under pressure (time and/or aggression) all these things and others lead to blunders. Take this example from a league match a few years ago which probably represents my worst blunder in a serious game in recent times: [Event "?"] [Site "?"] [Date "2018.10.24"] [Round "?"] [White "Graham, N."] [Black "Flynn, D."] [Result "1-0"] [ECO "D00"] 1. d4 Nf6 2. f3 d5 3. e4 dxe4 4. Nc3 exf3 5. Nxf3 Bf5 6. Ne5 e6 7. Bc4 Nbd7 8. Qf3 c6 (8... Nxe5 9. dxe5 Nd7 10. Bf4 Bxc2) 9. Nxf7 Bg4 10. Nxd8 Bxf3 11. Nxe6 Bxg2 12. Rg1 Nb6 13. Be2 Ke7 14. Nxf8 Bh3 15. Nxh7 Nxh7 16. Rxg7+ 1-0 White (~1800) plays nothing but the Blackmar-Diemer gambit so is well versed with the tricks. All Black's moves when taken in isolation are fine and normal moves, but c6 was a result of being focused on the attack to the b7 pawn and is a normal move in other lines, thus not seeing the pin that White has just set up. This is the reason such openings survive and score is that there is constant pressure and multiple threats and it can be tough to see them all and navigate the different move orders. If they were all just simple attacks then there would be no point to the opening as Black would simple defend against each and be a pawn up for nothing.

It would be good to clarify what is meant by "blunder". It seems like an overused term these days. To me blunder means: - turning a winning or even position into a losing position - overlooking a fairly obvious/shallow move or threat If you're in an otherwise level position and you miss a tactical shot that would win you the game, is that a blunder? I would say no, but maybe I'm in the minority? The Chess.com review feature obviously doesn't agree with my definition of blunder.

Also I found the concepts in this resource helped (as long as you don't try to follow it like a computer). The idea of hazards is useful (not just loose pieces drop off be keeping an eye on equal attacks and defended for example) http://www.neoneuro.com/downloads/chuzhakinssystem.pdf (referenced by author on chess.com forum so a legitimate download)

Hi Avetik, I think it basically comes down to not paying enough attention to the opponent's resources and not putting as much effort into finding his ideas as much as our own. But why some moves harder to spot than others is a very interesting topic and being aware of several different types could lead to a new set of patterns like Mating and Tactical patterns. That would be awesome! I'm really looking forward to the course! Just working slightly less hard to find opponents moves means we miss many types of moves for him that can catch us out. I've got to work harder on looking for the opponent. For me the most common types are: 1. Backward moves - especially with Knights or Bishops are harder to spot. 2. Forward moves in defence are hard to spot. For some reason, I always think my opponent should be going backwards when he's defending and I'm going forward so I can miss these forward defensive moves that change the result. 3. Quiet moves - I think more effort is needed to find these so if we often don't consider them it leads to blunders as the opponent can make a quiet move that changes everything. 4. Intermediate moves in the combination for the opponent 5. Unexpected exchanges or sudden changes in the pawn structure 6. Blindness of when an opponent can put a piece on a square because the piece I have covering it is pinned. I hope you can cover some of these. Cheers. ps. a behind the scenes video would be cool too to see how you prepare the material.

Hi Avetik! My most common blunder is calculating a sequence, then putting it on the board complete without stopping each move to see if I missed something stronger or missed a resource by my opponent. In one game I made a correct sacrifice of a Rook for two pawns, but didnt slow down enough to find the clear win part way through the sequence. My opponent ended up having a resource that allowed him to draw.

Greeting Avetik! Greatly interested in a behind the scenes video. My blunders are not seeing the board clearly in my mind when calculating a variation. Also, not seeing the whole board, I sometimes will just focus on one part of the board and forget about a distant piece. Bret

A course for reducing blunders sounds interesting, but I'm wondering how much value such a course will have unless it is in the context of a well understood framework for thinking (or "decision making" to use the trendy term) in chess? I guess I'm wondering if a general "how to think in chess" type course might be more useful before a course specifically on reducing blunders. Or maybe that is going to be covered in the reducing blunders course, in which case I think you are underselling the course! Yes I'd like to reduce my blunders, but how is that going to fit into the rest of my thinking process? Is it worth trying to tweak my thinking process to reduce blunders, or should I instead be trying to make big changes to the way I choose a move? For example, I think getting into time trouble is a big source of blunders. Yes, we should move faster to avoid this. But why do we move slowly? What is wrong with our thinking process that causes us to move too slowly? I think it would be useful to have an idea of the "ideal thinking process" so that we can compare ourselves to that, and figure out how to make improvements so that we can move faster and avoid time trouble. I'm not sure if that makes sense. I could write more but it would probably just be babble :-)

Hi ChessMood GM

I was wondering if I could get a study plan ? I was supposed to have a chat with a GM before the price change but was not able to due to work circumstances. I work shift as a nurse and it was difficult to schedule a time. The reason I am asking for help is that I have studied the Scotch and French extensively and I am not seeing the results I hope for. Especially with the Scotch. I promise that I will subscribe in the near future but as of right now I can't afford it. I would really appreciate it if I could get advise/ help to improve my game. thank you! Kamel

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Hi Kamel! 
Please contact our support team, they'll assist you. 
https://chessmood.com/contact 

Course not visible

Where has the course "100 Commented Classical Games" disappeared?

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I can't see it either. I know it was there yesterday!

Caro Kann and d4 sidelines also missing at least.

??Already informed the technical team. I do not understand what is happening here, but  solving this issue of the courses disappearing is our first priority. Thanks for reporting it. ?

personal view from course

Just watch the course. Tactic ninja is one of the best content in the chess mood. I just realize in this position, black can try to keep his rook to stand a chance to play rook endgame, it has a chance to secure a draw. No, offend hear ya, just share out my personal point of view on the position. Peace.

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? Thanks for your feedback! We are very happy to know that you enjoyed the course!!!

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By the way can you tell us the idea that you have in mind in order to draw this position? It will help everyone for sure… Thanks in advance!!!?