Pivot point
I sorted out the 197 items that I found in the 50 positional problems I'm working on. I made a decision which items I must study first. I decided to focus on the pawn breaks. These are the most complicated and probably rewarding items to study first.
There are a lot of aspects that must be learned. Today I focus on the pivot points. The saying goes "if a pawn is well protected by pieces, it probably stands in the way". This means that when a pawn moves, a pivot point behind it becomes cleared.
There are two preconditions which might make you refraining from playing a pawn break:
- When your king is not safe
- When you are behind in development
When your king is not safe, opening the position might become disastrous.
When you are behind in development, your opponent might be the one who is going to profit from the opened lines of attack instead of you.
A single pawn move might have an effect on:
- 6 squares (knights)
- 4 diagonals (bishops)
- 3 files (rooks)
So it might have a big impact on the LoA landscape (lines of attack).
 |
| White to move |
r2q1rk1/pbpnnpbp/1p1pp1p1/8/3PPP2/2NBB3/PPPQN1PP/R4RK1 w - - 0 10
There are 3 potential pawns that can be used to break:
- d4 (3:1)
- e4 (2:1)
- f4 (4:0)
The values between parentheses indicate the amount of pieces from white that gets a bigger scope vs the amount of pieces of black that benefits from the same move.
1.f5 is a move that enhances the scope of 4 white pieces (B,N,R,Q) and of 0 black pieces. So it is a multi purpose move.
Development emerges as protecting a mobile center pawn by pieces. Activity is enhanced by clearing the pivot point by pushing the mobile pawn. Restriction is blocking the mobile pawn of the enemy, thus preventing it to clear the LoAs.
ReplyDeleteFurthermore there is something like undermining a center pawn. If black was to move in this position, he could undermine the e-pawn by d5.
It’s fascinating to see the opinion of two Super GMs regarding the best 10th move for Black after 10. f5: GM Komodo likes 10... e5 and GM Stockfish likes 10… c5. The “Black Death” (GM Blackburne, not a Super GM) preferred 10… exf5.
ReplyDeleteI found a couple of “hints” in Techniques of Positional Play: 45 Practical Methods to Gain the Upper Hand in Chess, by Valeri Bronznick and Anatoli Terekhin, © 2013, New in Chess.
Technique 12: Attacking the pawn triangle
In the position after 9… O-O, the pawn triangle to be attacked consists of the three Black pawns e6, f7 and g6. Advancing the f4-pawn “attacks” this part of the pawn structure, with possibly one or two intentions: (1) drive a wedge into the Black king’s position on f6, or (2) open the f-file for a king attack.
I think that Steinitz’ 10. f5 was intended to open the f-file for invasion of the Black kingside.
Technique 22: Botvinnik’s prescription: exchange those pieces which are protecting entry squares!
GM Stockfish suggested 10.f5 c5 11.Bh6 cxd4 12.Nb5 e5 13.Nxd6 Qc7 14.Nxb7 Qxb7 15.Rf3 Kh8 16.Bxg7+ Kxg7, apparently following the same logic as The Patriarch.
While looking at the position prior to asking for the opinions of the Super GMs, I noticed some “tell-tale” signs. Every White piece (except for the WRa1) is aimed at the Black kingside. Black has a distinct deficit of defenders in the immediate vicinity of the Black king, and difficulty in shifting pieces into defensive positions. If White achieves a breakthrough by “blowing up” the Black kingside pawn structure, then his pieces are going to be hunting the Black king in short order. Exchanging off the BBg7 is an integral part of preparing the battlefield by eliminating the defender of the black squares. After eliminating the BBg7, White will still have the White Queen, White Rook and at least one White knight aimed at the kingside, with the White Bishop providing moral support aimed toward h7.
Here’s the game score.
[Event "London m2"]
[Site "London"]
[Round "1"]
[Date "1862.??.??"]
[White "Steinitz, Wilhelm"]
[Black "Blackburne, Joseph"]
[WhiteElo "2650"]
[BlackElo "2570"]
[Result "1-0"]
1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3.Bd3 e6 4.Nc3 g6 5.Be3 Bg7 6.Qd2 d6 7.Nge2 Nd7 8.O-O Ne7 9.f4 O-O 10.f5 exf5 11.exf5 Nf6 12.Bh6 Qd7 13.Ng3 Rae8 14.Qg5 Bxh6 15.Qxh6 Kh8 16.Nce2 Nfg8 17.Qh4 Qd8 18.Nf4 Nd5 19.Qxd8 Rxd8 20.Rae1 Nxf4 21.Rxf4 g5 22.Rf2 f6 23.Rfe2 Bd5 24.c4 Bf7 25.d5 Rfe8 26.Kf2 Re5 27.b3 h5 28.Rxe5 dxe5 29.Ne4 Kg7 30.Nc3 c6 31.Be4 cxd5 32.Nxd5 Bxd5 33.cxd5 Ne7 34.Rd1 Nc8 35.Rc1 Nd6 36.Rc7+ Kf8 37.Bd3 e4 38.Bc4 Nxf5 39.Rxa7 e3+ 40.Ke2 Re8 41.Rh7 Nd4+ 42.Kd3 Kg8 43.Re7 Rxe7 44.d6+ Rf7 45.Kxd4 Kf8 46.Kd5 Ke8 47.Kc6 Kd8 48.Kxb6 f5 49.a4 Rf6 50.Kc6 f4 51.a5 Kc8 52.a6 Kb8 53.b4 Rf8 54.d7 Rf6+ 55.Kd5 Kc7 56.d8=Q+ Kxd8 57.a7 1-0
An additional insight into Blogger not recognizing my Gmail account when trying to comment. It seems that also if there is a Security message of any kind that is unread, Blogger will not allow commenting using the Gmail account.
ReplyDeleteWhat a PITA!
Every few months the cookies of my browser seem to evaporate. That seems to coincide with login trouble. Blogger seems to miss something. But it is not clear at all.
DeleteThe art is to shift the focus from the moves to the plan behind the moves. The moves are only relevant in how well they serve the plan. The amount of possible plans is definitively finite. There are different ways to serve a plan. But the amount of scenarios that can serve a plan is limited too.
ReplyDeleteAfter inventorying the 197 points and categorizing them, the next step is to understand the plans behind them. This loosens the knowledge from the position, thus making the transfer of knowledge possible between different positions with the same plan. It is not easy to diddle the plans from GM Stockfish.
Temposchlucker wrote (in part):
ReplyDeleteIt is not easy to diddle the plans from GM Stockfish.
Rather, it is IMPOSSIBLE to diddle the plans from GM Stockfish for a simple reason: GM Stockfish does NOT "plan" at all, in the human sense. What appears to be a "plan" is an artifact of the consideration of millions of moves through a process of generating all possible moves, evaluating those moves according by a numerical evaluation (all factors considered to be applicable to each specific "new" position), arranging the list of moves in accordance with the evaluation from highest to lowest, and then regenerating a deeper set of moves by the same process, another ply deeper. It is quintessentially a "forward looking" process that is associated with the stereotypical "combination player": try the most forcing moves, and see what turns up as we follow the forcing moves to quiescence (no more forcing moves).
Planning by a computer is an illusion, similar by analogy to the aliasing seen in videos and movies regarding wheels spinning backwards as a vehicle moves forward. In the case of chess, the "aliasing" occurs NOT because the sample rate is too slow (surely the computer is sampling at a much higher rate than is needed for determining a plan) but because the sampling is all that is being done. There is literally NOTHING guiding the movement forward through the move tree but a mechanical evaluation made on the basis of each individual position sampled. Ultimately, it is a “King of the hill” strategy calculated at the speed of electrons.
Arthur C. Clarke's three "laws" of prediction (specifically #3) come into play:
(1) When a distinguished but elderly scientist states that something is possible, he is almost certainly right. When he states that something is impossible, he is very probably wrong.
(2) The only way of discovering the limits of the possible is to venture a little way past them into the impossible.
(3) Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic.
Computer chess IS “magical” because we have no way to replicate it inside the human mind, so we ASSUME that it works like our minds because the overall effect creates an impression of “planning.”
But, we know all that already. We’re just mesmerized by the sheer magnitude of the aliasing effect.
Repeating what the Poet Lariat Will Rogers opined, "It ain't so much the things that people don't know that makes trouble in this world, as it is the things that people know that ain't so."