The problem with puzzles

So I'm still pretty new to Chess and have been doing a good amount of puzzles, but from what I could tell, it seems to me like 99% of the puzzles are ultimately starting at the point where the other person had already made a mistake/blunder, so doing them seems like ultimately they'll improve your tactical ability to recognize when someone made mistakes, but they don't really improve your tactics if your opponent is making good moves... For example every puzzle is solved after you've capitalized on a mistake to gain a pretty big advantage, but there don't really seem to be any puzzles to just help gain a positional advantage that could lead to more mistakes for the other person...

Tactics are obviously a great way to improve.  But as you pointed out.  The tactics here do not show you how the tactic developed.  You would be better serves by doing tactics on a site that show you the entire game. 

Yeah also it seems like all of the puzzles mainly focus on offense, even when they specify defense as the category, they mainly seem to be defensive by being offensive. There doesn't really seem to be any puzzles where you're already caught in a pretty bad attack and the puzzle is "won" when you're still in a slightly losing position but at least you weathered their fierce attack... If there were more defense puzzles like that, then when you make a bad move, they should let the CPU make its next move after your move showing why your move was bad (for example they move their queen to checkmate you so you see why it was bad).

Or there are plenty of puzzles where you're about to be attacked but the goal is for you to checkmate in 1-3 moves making their attack meaningless. Since you're just thrown into random puzzle, and when they all happen to be offense oriented even for supposedly defense oriented puzzles, it seems like it makes it hard to learn proper defense and recognizing when an attack is coming because the puzzles teach you to always attack.

If youre interested where you can do tactics that show the entire game, send me a PM.

It depends on the puzzle rating. There are defensive puzzles but my experience they appear at higher ratings. Ultimately all tactics rely on a mistake by your opponent otherwise there wouldn't be tactic to solve. These become harder to find as the rating increases. Also at lower ratings they tend to start with a forced move such as a check or capture. At higher ratings the first move is sometimes a threat which is harder to find. Also at higher ratings there may be multiple tactics and if you move to win the piece but miss the mate in 4 you lose the puzzle (look for a move then look for a better one). For me, puzzles have really helped my visualisation and calculation skills improve. I calculate everything until I think I have the solution and only then do I make the move. Calculating three escape routes on a potential mating attack is hard work when you have to account for the puzzle defensive resources. Your chess will only improve if you are doing that regularly. If you guess the move and see if it is red or green you are not getting the full benefit.

Also I found that to keep improving at puzzles and push my rating up I had to evolve my technique which then transfers into my chess. At lower rated puzzles it's just a case of see and move. Higher rated puzzles are often combinations with multiple tactics and move order issues. I had to start CCT (checks captures threats) and explore and calculate candidate moves and variations to get the solution.

Your puzzle opponent has defensive resource which you have to account for so they do help you think about defense ( though bare in mind that the best defense is an attack or threat not passive) and anticipating your opponents moves. To get the most out of them aim to get them right first time and calculate dont guess the first move.

Here is a complete game from the site i was telling you about.  You can play through the entire game and get a chance to see how the tactic was set up.

Positional puzzles usually have multiple answers of equal merit. Or you may play a few waiting moves before executing the critical idea, without changing the outcome of the game. Such puzzles doesn't fit into Chess.com's single-answer puzzle system. You can find materials on positional advantages in the "lessons" function and, if you wish, in brick-and-mortar bookstores and on Amazon.

Hi Ronan. Just sharing some personal insight.

First of al Gary Kasparov himself said, computer does not have to be perfect or incredible. It just has to make fewer mistakes than the human. Same thing with human vs human. Whichever side makes fewer mistakes will win. Even top level GMs make mistakes or tactical oversights.

2nd, Yasser Seirawan in his brilliant books winning chess tactics and play winning chess teaches that tactics are the guard dogs of strategy. For instance, your strategy could be to dominate center control with pawns or pieces up to you, develop faster, amass force to one sector of the board where you overpower the enemy forces or like Seirawan also points out, identify weaknesses such as weakness in development, weakness in opponent cramped space or weakness in pawn structure (for instance you aim your pieces on an isolated or backwards pawn and win it)

Now in a perfect world strategy will win you the game, However, there is "weather" in this game. Or in other words like Seirawan says, tactics are the guard dogs of strategy. For instance you could have a perfect middle game strat of cramping the opponent by pushing pawns then attacking an isolated piece that his other pieces cant get to... but because of an oversight, tactics or a "storm" suddenly happens. And you lost the game because you were too far behind in material or got checkmated with a combination due to improper king safety. In a nutshell, if you don't know tactics you are in trouble because they exist in all 3 phases of the game and you wont be able to turn the tide around or you will fall victim when you are supposedly ahead. Tactical sight comprises two things, first recognizing your own tactical opportunities and preventing opponent tactical possibilities. You could be a positional genius but because your opponent has the right tactic at the right time it is all for naught.

So that's my first major point. Tactics are needed. I can't remember which intro in which tactics books maybe it was the woodpecker method that showed 40 percent of GM level games were decided by tactics. As the rating decreased it when up to as high as 80 percent of deciding the winner at lower levels.

So without tactics no strategy in the world will save you. Strategy is the car, elements on the board like force time space and pawn structure are the roads and tactics are the weather. When people mention "positional" what they mean, possible advantages that are not yet concrete but will materialize hopefully in a few moves.

It's all in Yasser Seirawan's winning chess series it really is so good at simplifying and teaching. You can sound smart but understanding is understanding no way around it.

Now here's my third point, So far I have finished play winning chess which shows all the aspects of the chess game, rules, elements, tactics, strategy, endgame knowledge, calculation methods and psychology of chess. A really good road map that will serve you well in deciding which area to improve. At the lower levels tactics is the highest "yield" because the power of a weather storm to eff up your plans so to speak. Now i'm reading winning chess tactics and I already feel I have improved a lot in terms of tactical understanding. I also found out another thing about tactics. In the real world when a GM pits him/her self against another GM, time pressure is real. You don't have infinite time. So doing random puzzles I feel was a waste of my time because I can't repeat the same puzzle later to increase pattern recognition by repetition (wish i didn't spend 10 hours on it so far) In the real world, a GM will reach for example 4 different candidate moves (based on what he/ she feels is a good move based on experience and principles, and calculate out moves ahead with the branches of different positions. He/ she can visualize the board in advance AND can do it quickly. This is why the woodpecker method is famous. The author of the book claimed he got to GM level by doing the same puzzles over and over again until he could spot tactics in seconds. Not minutes. In the real world, if you can't spot a tactic in less than 20 seconds will it be of any use to you? If a GM can spot 2 possible tactics, calculate it out, spot one combination, calculate it out, and two lines to avoid as it exposes him to enemy tactics in that same 20 seconds, then we know why that GM is a GM. So based on believing the authors in the advanced tactics books and the woodpecker method, I now will limit myself to excellent tactics books like winning chess tactics, tactics for the tournament player, 1000 checkmate combinations encyclopedia of tactics etc etc which are all organized by theme. And keep doing it until my pattern recognition is quick enough.

Here's the kicker theres a book called chess tactics from scratch that is quite advanced that teaches you the MECHANICS and grounds for tactics to occur, so it might also give some insight in how to CREATE tactics, by lining your pieces in a certain way and increase the STORM weather control you possess to your favor.

All these insights were possible with Tikkanen, Weteschnik, Seirawan and IM

Kostya who recommended and explained this well. Check them out! And that's the world of tactics, I will probably be so overwhelmed once I focus on openings, strategy, endgames, psychology,  specific prep against specific opponent, game analyses oh oh....