Stockfish or other engine to explain WHY a move was inaccurate/mistake/blunder

So I really love the game of chess, and I really want to improve my game. The problem is that I am finding no explanation for why my bad moves were bad moves. at my level, ~1200, stockfish can tell me that I have blundered without me or my opponent ever noticing. The suggested moves are great and all, but it doesn't say why my move was bad in the first place. Most cases I can sit there and analyse my own games, but going over every discrepancy gets out of hand, is there a way to get feedback as to why my move was bad? like have stockfish include the set of moves that would screw me over for having moved there?

A lot of us had no computers and no coaches to hold our hands while we were learning.
Had to walk to school, too.

Is this where I'm supposed to apologize for trying to improve? If you're gonna troll, do it better.

It just strikes me as funny having a computer immediately telling you what your mistakes were and suggesting improvements, and still wishing the computer would give you a whole "set of moves" and strategies so you can improve at triple speed.
I had no engine to help me while I was struggling along for years.
It's a shame that powerful engines exist at all.

 

Urk is telling you to THINK. Modern teachers and coaches speak too much.

"So I really love the game of chess, and I really want to improve my game."

Be creative, and come up with something! When I was just starting serious chess a few years ago, I didn't know about online chess, chess engines, and I had literally 3 random chess books to read. If you want to get good at chess, you need to want to put in the effort  including finding the appropriate online resources, which are all around you

Also, I have to say that your level is considerably below 1200 OTB. It's closer to 900 USCF. 

At that level, your chess development will get better if you simply read "Back to Basics: Tactics" by Dan Heisman, and forget you ever knew about engines.

Beginners often think engines are cool, without understanding even a fraction of how they work or what they do. 

There are two things I can suggest. 

The first is going over your completed games and learning how to analyse them. 

The second is reading books. When I was younger I read so many books that talked me through famous games (especially the early Masters) and how they were won and lost. I guess there is now stuff on the internet that can do that. 

In the end though, there is no short-cut for learning. It takes effort, time and commitment. 

 V2 used to give that info i.e. reason y a move  was ca-ca.

#1 You have to read between the lines with @urk when you get a one liner.

Try this: Ask stockfish to assess the position prior to the first move.
It is going to tell you, say, 1. e4 ( +0.2 ) or 1. Nf3 ( +0.25 ) or 1. d4 ( +0.3 )
Oh really.
The same thing happens on move 10. where you play say Nd4-b3 or Nd4-f3, there is a good chance it will subtract from your game value centipawn  evaluation but more with one move than the other. On the other hand you leave your knight on d4, a big mistake what with it being attacked by a pawn. Bang goes your knight and the evaluation goes over -3

If stockfish says your Be2 move turns your 0.5 position into a 0.2 position while recommending Bc4 which it says your position would be worth 0.6 ignore it, that is not a blunder but an eval.
You really do not need an engine to tell you, all things be equal Bc4 looks more active than Be2, for that you need chess judgement.
Personally if doing by numbers, and I don't, turning a 0.8 position into a 0.0 is round about the point you should even look at the "better" move.

On Wednesday I played a game and I was nearly convinced that white had Nxd5 e6xNd5 ; e6 and I was up a creek without a paddle. For about four moves being the clown that I am I spent a couple of minutes re-checking the sacrifice on each move.
I put the game through the engine. That is its wonder, at no point did it fancy Nxd5.

Engines do not teach, they calculate linear evaluations, books teach as they contain the "you should do this because" explanation. 

What GUI are you using? Assuming that you can get Stockfish to show you the strongest move in any position, make your move and see what it wants to play in reply - enter this move. Then make the move that you were planning in response. Keep making moves in this way until you see why you're losing as a result of your initial move.

This should help for the big blunders, though not the small inaccuracies

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if you blunder then put the position into an engine then see what the engine says your opponent should do.  

As a general rule at the beginner level, ignore computer advice that is +/- 0.7  of the move you played.  If the computer says Bc4 is 0.6 while Be2 is 0.3, don't worry about it.  If the difference is between 0.7 and 0.2, still don't worry about it.  If you have time you may look at these moves, but it's not vital at this stage..

Pay most attention, though, to moments where the evaluation jumps 1.5 pawns or more, even if neither you nor your opponent saw the continuation.  If you just wave your hands and say, "I could never see that," then you will never see it because you never improve.  Instead ask, "What would I need to do to see it?  What should I be looking for?"  Was there a loose piece, a weak back rank, a deadly pin, hanging pawns, an easy fork?  These are the signposts for tactics, and if you can start seeing them, or at least start knowing what they look like, then you can start using them in your own games.

Sometimes, yeah, the move is really friggin' tough to see.  Most of the time, though, especially at the novice level, it's usually a two move tactic taking advantage of a hanging piece.  If you focus on this, you'll get better at tactics and, more importantly, much better much faster than worrying about Bc4 vs Be2 when it's a 0.2 eval difference.

Stockfish tells me what it thinks of any position I put in.

 

      Eval term |    White    |    Black    |    Total

                |   MG    EG  |   MG    EG  |   MG    EG

----------------+-------------+-------------+-------------

       Material |   ---   --- |   ---   --- |  0.00  0.00

      Imbalance |   ---   --- |   ---   --- |  0.00  0.00

          Pawns |   ---   --- |   ---   --- |  0.00  0.00

        Knights |  0.12  0.00 |  0.12  0.00 |  0.00  0.00

         Bishop | -0.12 -0.37 | -0.12 -0.37 |  0.00  0.00

          Rooks | -0.27  0.00 | -0.27  0.00 |  0.00  0.00

         Queens |  0.00  0.00 |  0.00  0.00 |  0.00  0.00

       Mobility | -0.73 -0.84 | -0.73 -0.84 |  0.00  0.00

    King safety |  0.93 -0.06 |  0.93 -0.06 |  0.00  0.00

        Threats |  0.00  0.10 |  0.00  0.10 |  0.00  0.00

   Passed pawns |  0.00  0.00 |  0.00  0.00 |  0.00  0.00

          Space |  0.36  0.00 |  0.36  0.00 |  0.00  0.00

----------------+-------------+-------------+-------------

          Total |   ---   --- |   ---   --- |  0.00  0.00

 

Total Evaluation: 0.08 (white side)

USCFtigerprowl, the reason I don't post diagrams and examples is because I'm only here on the app on my cellphone and I can't do that. It won't let me. If I could I would but I don't even have a working computer at the moment.

As for the poster's question, you can help him better than me since your method of improving is to try to understand all the engine recommendations. So advise him based on your vast experience. You haven't done it yet.

Maybe it's a good way to learn in the 21st century, but I think I agree with Cherub that he'd be better off spending the time on a good book like Heisman's. It seems to me that he should only be using an engine to blunder check.

I would recommend you start with your biggest problems -- your blunders.  As SmithyQ points out, the computer advice that says you could gain a fraction of a pawn with a different move choice is likely to be incomprehensible at this point -- and your opponents are probably not capitalizing on those errors either.  Focus on problems that are dropping a piece or pawns or leading to immediate mate.

 

A great majority of blunders come because you either don't see a tactical opportunity your opponent gave you, or you don't realize you've provided one to your opponent.  Therefore, I highly recommend Tactical Trainer.  I would take every TT problem to the analysis page whether you solved it correctly or not and try out different move choices to see what consequences they bring.  Also take note of what the tags the problem has.  Sometimes tags can be bogus, but often they give solid clues to what you need to notice about the position.

I recommend you avoid just playing moves in Tactical Trainer.  Try and really see the advantage/danger in the position/move before you move, which means you need to go slow.  Move when you're certain you've got a real good reason for making a move -- then don't worry when that wasn't the best move.  Just about all tactics involve creating two or more threats with one move -- and his best response leaves one of the threats unanswered.  Look for those moves.  Get a good book on Tactics.  Study Pins, Forks, Double Attacks, Double Check, Skewers, Back Rank Mate, etc.  Be constantly aware of Forcing Moves you have on your opponent, and those he has on you.

I know exactly where you're at.  I've been there.  I've come a little ways now.  I've got a lot more work to do myself.  But know this, put some attention into it, give it time, and you'll notice you're improving.

And don't worry about trolls.

 

No. At that level, he should lightly browse Jeremy Silman, then make lots of YouTube instructional videos.

Uphill both ways.

The engine has no idea why moves are good or bad. The engine has no ideas at all. The engine is a calculator, its calculations based on parameters of evaluation developed by a programmer. I've analyzed several of my games after the fact, and I've found that the basic 1-second evaluation is usually wrong, sometimes badly so.

To properly analyze your games, you need to read along with books on opening, middlegame and endgame practice. Or hire a coach, but that's mostly for people who are looking to become masters, or to win class tournaments.

An engine can help, but as you improve, you might find (as I have) that a move I made ranked rather low in the evaluation, until I stepped into the move, then all of a sudden the engine thinks much better of the move. Part of the reason is that humans and machines will evaluate a position in very different ways, and a human will make a move on experience and intuition that would take an engine a lot of computational time to fall into. On the other hand, the engine won't make a gross tactical blunder (it won't fall to "chess blindness").

Engines are a mixed blessing. They are great for finding where the error in a game is, but they are nowhere near good enough to be able to explain why.