Should I feel discouraged being at 850 ELO?

Hello everyone! Kinda asking this question for a little pick me up I think... I feel like I know the answer but I am just feeling really discouraged right now.

I played chess when I was younger and remember being in some small tournaments. I really liked the game but just stopped playing. I am getting back into it now and I am really enjoying it. I am doing challenges, studying openings, and watching youtube videos of Hikaru and Levy explaining theory. I feel like I understand things outside the game, but when it gets into the game I get completely lost.

I only really started getting back into Chess a week or two ago, so I know I have lots more to learn. However, it is really disheartening to see my rating drop. (Which is also why I never really play ranked anything).

I guess I am just looking for some encouragement that it is in fact possible to get better. I don't have anyone to play chess against in my personal life so I guess some personal stories of how you started out and got better would be much appreciated!

Im sorry this is kind of a self-serving post. But hopefully, other beginners might feel encouraged as well!

Thanks all!

First of all, welcome, hopefully you'll have a great time here. I 've written an article with the exact topic you've asked:

https://www.chess.com/blog/nklristic/the-beginners-tale-first-steps-to-chess-improvement

That is my story, but more important, there you can find how I got to where I am right now... still not that good, but it's perfectly fine progress for less than a year.

It's perfectly possible to get better, but it has to come from within and it takes a bit of effort. I have just looked briefly at your last 2 losses in your game list:

The first one was a write off where you lost a piece and resigned after only 7 or 8 moves. That is something you need to cut out if you want to improve. No amount of tactic puzzles, videos, advice can help you here - the board is in front of your eyes, you know how the pieces move, but you still leave a piece to be captured. It's inattention, lack of concentration or whatever you want to call it.

The second was a long struggle which you lost on time. This game showed you know how to play and you were indeed winning at one point. You didn't have time to convert though and it seemed like you got a bit panicky as your time was running out. Play longer games - everyone says this but it's true if you want to get better. Give yourself the time to think carefully.

A general thing about your play - your openings in both games allowed your opponent to gain space in the centre. This is inadvisable for a beginner level player because you have to play quite accurately in order to not just be squashed. Try to control the centre, develop all your pieces, castle your king, this basic stuff will help you beat all the players who don't do it. Major thing though, first and foremost before everything else you must get to a point where you can play a full game without hanging any pieces. Only then can you build on this solid foundation and take your game up a level. 

I wish there was a good way to like these comments. These have already been so helpful!... I mean I do feel a little called out with previous games.

Thank you!

You're welcome.

Hi there. Give it time. I looked at three of your rapid games and they were all 10 minute games. Fast is fun but you should also play slower games to improve. At least 30 minutes. Consider Daily if you cant fit in a 30 minute game and spend 10 minutes on each move, with tea and biscuits. It will give you more time to think and learn how to think. I mainly study from books. Two good books for beginners are Chess Tactics for Students by Bains, and Logical Chess by Chernev (try and get an algebraic edition). These will help you learn tactics, calculation, and basic positional chess.

Recommend John Bartholomew Chess Fundamentals series on you tube. There are 5 videos. Start with the one on Undefended Pieces 😉

Sorry 😁 analysing your games and pinpointing where you have made mistakes is a key part of improving and trying to eradicate these mistakes from your game. Try to do it for yourself, why you played certain moves, what your idea was etc. This is much more useful than just running it through the engine. If you post games here in the forums with your thoughts and ask for advice there will be plenty of people willing to offer it 👍

If it makes you feel better I dropped into the 400 and I'm slowly making my way back up. It sucks but I have a lot against me, most of which is age. I'm determined to get to 1000, then Ill set 1500 as my goal, ect. Your rating dropping is something that will happen when your new. Keep persisting at it and you will improve.

no

but you shouldnt be content with it either or feel sorry for yourself

chess is hard

and this site has a lot of strong players even at 800- in the sense that each bracket feels like it has a “mini boss battle” archetype you need to be able to handle before you “move on”

and dont listen to those “prodigies” who say they show up and after a month are now class A players

it takes a long time unless you are one of those “800” 6 year olds who wipes you out in an otb tournament game and after the dust settles a month later the 6 year old is now rated 1550 uscf and after a year is 1800+

All youre playing is speed chess.  What were you expecting to happen?

sorry- two post

it is also hard to do forums posts on iphone with sausage fingers

but the point is you need to put in work

you have to study- tactics, analyze/annotate your games, endgames

i would recommend a structured tactics training that goes by motif- not just the random puzzles you get on tactics trainer

analyze/annotate all your games- if this feels like too much play less games

go over fundamental endgame study especially: promoting a pawn, using opposition technique to execute promotion, king and rook vs king checkmate

dont get down on yourself; chess is hard; you will lose a lot- but you will learn most from losses is you work hard at it and properly

but also dont go easy on yourself

You haven't been playing  long. Give it time. Play daily games and finally, don't obsess about your rating at this stage. Enjoy!

If your rating makes you feel discouraged, ignore it. It's just a mechanism to match you with roughly equal players. It auto adjusts. There's really nothing you need to do about it, think about it, decide about it, or worry about it. Weave some Allan Watts into your youtube chess diet, that'll help you let go.

On joining Chess.com  I would like to see an automatic intro rating of 4000......then I can constructively work backwards!

Assuming no one said this (I didn't read through all of the posts) studying openings as a beginner is a waste of time. E4 and D4 are the best openings, everything else is also good but complex and requires a lot of theory. Studying tactics and puzzles and the basic endgames and just playing and analyzing games especially is very helpful. Sorry if you know this, but it is handy knowledge, just thought I'd share

Anyway to answer your main question: No. Everyone has to start somewhere. If you aren't just starting, don't be discouraged. I had a huge slump and went to around 1050 points when I was 1250 before. In fact I was better 9 months ago than I was then. Eventually I learned to take more time and blunder less, and I got better. Everyone has slumps and chess is very frustrating, and you can take comfort in knowing you are probably better at chess than (at the VERY LEAST) 6 billion other people in the world. Hope this helps.

I wouldn't worry about it. You'll reach your goals of 1000 and 1500. I would look for the ways the game is really interesting to you, so there's less focus on the ways the game is intimidating. And there's lots of us who feel that way. I'm somewhere around 800 on puzzles, but more around 600 with a real player. It's easy to get flustered. Another reason to play longer games, such as 30 min.

After a long break, I resumed chess during the plague. I recommend 30 m games to give you more time & working through chess.com lessons. One of the best books is “Chess - beginners & intermediate - opening, strategies & endgames” written by Hugh Patterson. Good luck!

I'd suggest to stop looking at ELO, cause I can tell you, no matter how much you improve, there's always someone who knows more, plays better and the feeling that you don't really know anything about the game will never go away. 

I am quite amazed at how many people suggest analyzing your own game to be a good start. I would think that this would be incredibly frustrating. Sure, this works great when you're 1800 or so, but at 800 it might just be hard to see what you did wrong. And then you might turn to the computer for help, but that computer is infinitely stronger than any human. I see so many lines where a computer suggests a winning idea, where I'm just sure that I won't find that over the board. I know when to discard a computer suggestion as unattainable, with 800 rating you don't have that filter. Moreover, the computer will tell you what works, not what in general is a good or a bad move. I think you'd benefit more from knowing what in general is right than to be taught the exceptions by the computer in positions you might never play again. 

So my tip would be different. Stop learning openings. You should become better more easily if you play openings according to general principles. White wants to get pawns to d4 and e4, black should prevent that. You should develop all of your pieces and castle. Make sure to put your pieces to active position, make all of them as happy as you can, and focus in the opening on playing with each piece only once before you've finished your development. 

For the rest: tactics. Learn about tactics (how to see them, what tactics there are) and study tactics. That is the single most important thing to do to improve. If you would analyse your games, just only focus on the moment where one of you dropped a piece to tactics and see if you could have prevented it. 

My firm believe is that no one can start soon enough on getting to know how to make their pieces happy. While tactics always trump strategic ideas (winning a queen makes the rest not so important anymore), knowing basic ideas helps you play quicker and see 'normal moves' faster. For this, Reassess your Chess by Silman is great. Especially if you first focus on the 'static' aspects of a position, like strong squares, open files, weak pawns. Leave the initiative and other dynamic aspects for now, return to that when you're a lot stronger. 

Tactics and general ideas, that's how I would study. And studying and improving should be the only goal. Don't look at ELO, don't worry about ELO either. It has happened to everyone that they would be stuck at a level, even lose a few points and then suddenly break through a barrier and never looking back when improving. And most of all, just enjoy the game!

@RAU4ever That is some amazing advice and just what I needed to help out my game. Thanks for sharing!