Author: Otello Gnaramori
Date: 14:21:58 07/24/01
The following text is grabbed from Reuben Fine's "Chess Marches On" and is what Fine said about, Strategy and Tactics: "Thirty years ago (this was written in 1942), Teichmann said that chess is 99% tactics. And despite the enormous strides of chess theory since then, his percentage can only be reduced a few points. Many amateurs think that master games are usually decided by some deeply-laid plan covering all possibilities for at least ten moves.... That is what they conceive the grand strategy of tournaments to be. Actually, however, strategical considerations, while quite important, do not cover a range or depth at all comparable to the popular notion. Very often, in fact, sound strategy can dispense with seeing ahead at all, except in a negative or trivial sense. And it is still true that most games, even between the greatest of the great, are decided by tactics or combinations which have little or nothing to do with the fundamental structure of the game. To take one striking example, look at the games of the Euwe-Alekhine matches. Euwe is a player who analyzes openings ad infinitum, i.e., one who wants to settle everything strategically. Alekhine is likewise adept at the art of building up an overwhelming position. And yet in almost all cases the outcome depended not on the inherent structure of the play, but on some chance combination which one side saw and the other side did not. Tactics is still more than 90% of chess. In the following game (which we will not give) we have a good illustration of the interplay of strategy and tactics in the practice of two outstanding contemporary masters. The opening results in a position which is dynamically in Botwinnik's favor; yet because he is, for purely tactical reasons, unwilling to adopt the maneuver which best answers the needs of the position, he drifts into a situation where Lilienthal has the initiative. Lilienthal tries his hardest to increase his advantage, and succeeds to a certain extent. Then he makes a slight error, which gives his opponent adequate chances. Finally Botwinnik, faced by a difficult choice, picks the wrong alternative. And thereby both again demonstrate the wisdom of Tartakover's adage that a winner in a game of chess is the man who made the next to the last blunder." Regards, Otello p.s. Strategy is a nothing but crutch we need to cover for our inability to read positions deep enough. p.p.s Peter Frey, in his book "Chess Skill in Man and Machine," says that some people think that a chess program with sophisticated search algorithms and little chess knowledge might approach master level.
This page took 0.01 seconds to execute
Last modified: Thu, 15 Apr 21 08:11:13 -0700
Current Computer Chess Club Forums at Talkchess. This site by Sean Mintz.