Help identify my style of play

Hi All, I am a chess player with no formal training but have played over a bunch of OTB tournaments when I was young. But after a long break I am going to resume the tournament play. I have been continuously playing in the site seriously from the past month. But I have a hard time identifying my style of play. If an experienced player can look at couple of my games and provide some feedback, it would be really helpful. Also I have trouble crossing the 1300 barrier..as suddenly when I am winning, I start a losing streak again dragging me to the same level. Thanks for taking time and reading my post. Looking forward to your valuable feedback.

Is this game typical of your style?  Were you happy with the opening? After 10 moves, you were a pawn down.  

At any rate, it seems like your "style" is typical for a player with your rating. You dropped another pawn before long. It seems like you don't look further than the immediate threat. I would think that a lot of tactics trainer problems would help.

Was the move 38 ..Re2 a time pressure blunder? 

Your style is called "Queen Raid" as you get your queen out quickly and then moving it back and forth trying to find a checkmate, ignoring your other pieces and just helping black develop.

In this game the queen is best on d4 and when Nc6 then you retreat your queen to c3 to keep black from castling. Instead you move it to f4 which is the least attacking square. A few moves later you moved it to f5 which is equally bad. Black stopped your queen easily because the threat is very simple.

Focus on making sure your moves are safe.

Queen raid's not a bad style but you have to practice using the queen a lot better. I used to be terrible at that style but now I'm much more comfortable with it.

good to see if you know how to interpret it.

Yes it is!  More so if it is coupled with a lack of development and a weak pawn structure.

Study tactics. If you find yourself routinely making more than one queen move in the opening that amount to nothing (ie not winning) you may find some value in opening study.

TheReal(FAKE)GMBobFisch,

You're a 1000 in standard and I am roughly 1400 and you're trying to tell me that queen raiding is a bad style?!?

I shouldn't be so subtle.  Queen Raiding is a TERRIBLE style.  It is metaphorically equal to chopping off your legs in the hopes of playing in the NBA.

My three games in Standard are not indicative of my strength.  Two and a half months ago my Blitz ELO was 100 so you might say I am improving. If you don't believe me, unblock me and we'll play a match.

Do not bring your Queen out too early.  -  from Francisco Bernardina Calogno's poem 'On the Game of Chess' ('De ludo scachorum') circa 1500

In my climb through the lower ratings I will tell you, Queen raiding is the predominant opening style up to about ELO 1100 and virtually no other opening motive exists below 800.  The sub-style is playing the rest of the game a queen down.

Pick up the latest issue of New in Chess and play through the first 20 moves of every game and let me know how many of those games can be categorized as queen raiding.

No one who is even remotely good at chess regularly queen raids out of the opening except when their opponent makes terminal opening concessions. 

On one hand, you are correct - The OP needs to play his queen better.  Part of that better is is to not allow his opponent to gain tempo, tactics or simpy drive the queen out of play or trap it and win it.

It does not take a +1400 rating to develop all the pieces and the queen to good squares and maintain a solid pawn structure in the first 10 to 15 moves.  Getting out of the opening materially equal with good piece development is a worthwhile goal.

wrathss , vallme played d4, d5

Technically your style is called "losing".  There is no "style" until you are at least a B player.

Let me speak from personal experience.

I suggest investing in a diamond membership and go thru the videos and chess mentor lessons.  Challange players who are at least 1600 to online chess.  If you play only losers, you will stay a loser.  When I was at 1450 I played 1900+ players and it took about a year to get to 1800.

But for now, go over to chessfox.com and do their blunder alert trainer -- give them a $5 contribution.  Then take their free 10 day training program.

Good luck to you.

I love it!

I had not thought of it in that way.  Looking at my "style", I thought I had a positional style.  But then I realized it was actually a "passive,defensive" style.  A strong player, as you say, can formulate a plan based on the position.  I realized that I could not attack the opponent even if he begged me to.

So, I'm now working on how to do attacks, and THEN I can say I have a style when I can actually choose a plan, rather than being stuck in a rut.

Thanks for the insight.