Catalog of All Chess Themes & Ideas

This is going to be a weird topic, but here goes. I'm trying to categorize all themes in chess so that one can understand any more or position in simple terms, etc. Here is what I have so far. There are major categories, sub-categories, and sub-sub-categories :) Feel free to disagree or tell me if I have missed anything!? I looked for a definitive resource out there on this stuff and couldn't find anything...

Rules and Basics
Piece Movement
Checkmate Rules
Draws
Notation


Opening
Opening Principles
Opening Theory

• 1.e4
• 1.d4
• 1.c4
• 1. Nf3
• Other openings

Gambits
Opening Traps


Endgame
Basic King and Pawn Endings
Advanced King and Pawn Endings
Queen Endings
Rook Endings
Minor Piece Endings
Opposition
Zugzwang
Triangulation
Endgame Tactics



Strategy
Weak and Strong Squares
Outpost Squares
Color Complex
Opening Lines
Open Files
Semi-open Files
Simplification
Positional Sacrifices
Initiative
The Closed Game
The Open Game
Undermining the Center
Using Knights
Using Bishops
Good and Bad Bishops
Using Rooks
Rooks on the 7th
Using the Queen
Overprotection
Planning
Evaluating Positions
Pawn Structures

• Pawn Wedges
• Passed Pawns
• Isolated Pawns
• Doubled Pawns
• Pawn Mobility
• Minority Attack
• Weak Pawns
• Blockading
• Hanging Pawns
• Backward Pawns
• Pawn Islands
• Central Pawn Majority
• Advanced Pawn

Tactics
Double attacks
Forks
Pins
Skewers
Basic Checkmates
Advanced Checkmates
Back Rank
Discovered Attacks
Overworked Defender
Zwischenzug / In-between Moves
Decoys and Deflection
Clearance Sacrifice
Interference
False Protection
Removing the Guard
Misplaced Piece
Basic Combinations
Advanced Combinations
Calculation


Attacks
Vulnerable King
King Hunt
Attacking 0-0
Attacking 0-0-0
Sacrificing on f7/f2
Queenside Attacks
Mating Nets
Defense

Also if this is some kind of index for educational purpose, I would put the very basics together in a separate section, things like skewers, forks, etc. plus the most basic mating patterns, very basic stragetical tips (piece value, don't give away material, etc) very basic opening principle (with the first two or three move of an e4 opening, as an example to follow), with, of course, fool's mate and scholar's matetraps.

Do you think that defense might deserve a catagory of its own like Attacks?

eg. Fortresses, prophylaxis, exchanging etc. ?

Endgame - This deserves a top-level section, like opening and middlegame. 

One challenge to sorting endgames is that one article or game often includes many endgames: Eg, R + P vs R + P becomes P vs P becomes Q vs P. So it's really important to be able to tag an endgame as belonging to multiple categories. Which categories to use?

Simple - Tag an endgame article with all the pieces it includes.

1. Pawns
2. Bishops
3. Knights
4. Rooks
5. Queen

Middle-of-the-Road  - Tag an endgame with the endgame categories it includes (Fine):

1. Elementary Mates
2. King and Pawn Endings
3. Knight and Pawn Endings
4. Bishop and Pawn Endings
5. Minor Piece Endings
6. Rook and Pawn Endings
7. Rooks and Minor Pieces
8. Queen Endings 

Complex - Tag an endgame article with all the endgames it includes (Fine):

1. K+P vs K
   
2. K+P vs K+P
3. K+2P vs K
4. K+2P vs K+P
5. K+3P vs K+2P
6. K+3P vs K+3P
7. ...
   

I use the simple tagging scheme, but chessgames using the complex 43-category one. You might also consider including "Not Quite Endgames" (per Flear) eg endgames with two pieces per side in your classification. Those are more practical than most true endgames and there are already several articles on them here.

Basic King and Pawn Endings
Advanced King and Pawn Endings

Hmm. What are "Basic" and "Advanced" trying to represent? Wouldn't this apply to every ending and not just pawn endings? I suppose we could label an endgame article based on who it's intended for: beginner-intermediate, or  intermediate-advanced. We could also do composed vs real-game, but I'm not sure that distinction would have much practical value if we're already classifying articles based on the intended skill-level of readers.

Opposition
Zugzwang
Triangulation

Zugzwang - A good tag.

Actually, opposition, mined squares, corresponding squares, and trebuchet are all sub-categories of zugzwang. Triangulation is how to put your opponent into zugzwang.

I hope this helps.

Make sure I get the first signed Edition.  LOL

theriverman

Opening

True Gambits v Temporary Gambits

Endgame

Checkmate with B+N

Q v R  (it happens often enough but few know how to)

Q+(P on seventh)

Strategy

Line Closing

Good Knight / Bad Bishop

Pawn Structure:- Types of centre (blocked, fluid, under tension)

Tactics

Destruction

Desparado

Nowotny (?) Interference (ok thats more for problems)

X-Ray

Square Attacks

Underpromotion

<mxdplay4> <Opening True Gambits v Temporary Gambits>

I haven't heard that one, is that the same as pure and pseudo gambits?

Attacks

-non-sacrificial attacks on the castled position.

-defensive measures.

-attacks from opposite castled positions.

Strategy

-calculating

-analyzing

-evaluating

What about allowing people to add articles to your catalog?

I would consider planning as a major element. So:

Planning:

• moving your pieces (only manoeuvres to increase control of some area like center or centralising your king, decreasing mobility of opponent's pieces, overprotection etc.),
• pawn actions (also pawn advancing like minority attack),
• exchanging (exchange of rival's best piece, defender, not to waste time)
• plans about free pawn: blocking it, creating and advancing,
• attacking weaknesses (weak king or restricted pieces)

Restricted pieces are understood by me as pieces having less movement freedom or even directly and totally blocked. There's no point in attacking other weaknesses (exception: king).

Withal, everyone's missed intuition, which is very important in all games.

What does "false protection" mean? Can anyone give me an example?

This topic is interesting.

Recently I have studied about the study of chess compared to the study of the formal disciplines of high school and higher education.

One of the main learning mechanism is repetition through exercises. But unlike math, it is possible to learn and train a limited part of the discipline, in chess we learn in a holistic way.

It is not very simple to put into practice the themes learned because they will not appear in the next games. The comparison with mathematics is interesting, because it would be like studying the four operations, but in the test have questions about Differential and Integral Calculus. What happens in chess in these scenarios is that the student will try to solve the questions using what he knows, so imagine the difficulty of someone trying to solve mathematical problems only with the basic knowledge?

If the student can train a limited portion of the chess he will learn faster. So let's just say he's studying "Weak and Strong Squares." He should play a fair amount of positions where that theme is present. We must remember that a math student needs to work out many exercises to master a subject and pass a competitive test.

So in summary the idea of ​​cataloging the themes is interesting, and more interesting is finding ways to train these themes. The books provide a very limited amount of examples.

Yusupov has a book that works this my perception about the study, but still has few exercises. To master some theme we must solve many, many exercises, until that theme is second nature.

House of Staunton has a catalog of chess books and equipment they sell.  Perusing it would give names for various chess themes.

Some can only be found in chess news,  like the:

Gormally knockout

Gypsy sendoff

Krush king slap

Tkachiev blackout

Nimzo table jump

Outflanking.

Tempo moves.

Building walls.

Entombed pieces.

Cutting off the king's escape squares.