The first thing you should work on is your mentality. If you tell yourself you are terrible with the black pieces, it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I was guilty of this myself when I was younger, and it got to the point where I just accepted that if I was black I would lose, before the first move was even played.
Also, looking at your rapid stats, your win rate with black isn't much worse than your white win rate.
The first thing you should work on is your mentality. If you tell yourself you are terrible with the black pieces, it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I was guilty of this myself when I was younger, and it got to the point where I just accepted that if I was black I would lose, before the first move was even played.
Also, looking at your rapid stats, your win rate with black isn't much worse than your white win rate.
Yes very true, I often do that with a lot of things in my life, I forget how much mentality plays a part in performance.
@1
"my white opening (English opening) is exponentially better than my black (Pirc/KID)"
++ White is easier. If white is careless and loses a tempo, then white just becomes black.
"I just need a new opening repertoire for black"
++ Each time you switch openings you lose more, not less.
It takes time and many losses to accumulate experience.
Do not blame your losses on the opening.
You do not lose because of the opening but because of tactical mistakes.
Analyse your lost games and see how you could have played better.
"a opening I really connect with quite like the English opening"
++ Most like the English opening is the Sicilian Defense.
The first thing you should work on is your mentality. If you tell yourself you are terrible with the black pieces, it will become a self-fulfilling prophecy. I was guilty of this myself when I was younger, and it got to the point where I just accepted that if I was black I would lose, before the first move was even played.
Also, looking at your rapid stats, your win rate with black isn't much worse than your white win rate.
Yes very true, I often do that with a lot of things in my life, I forget how much mentality plays a part in performance.
A rating is about your chess skill + your psychology strength.
With the black pieces, aim for a draw, get it in your mind that white has the advantage of playing the first move so your aim should be to neutralize what ever plan of attack white is undertaking
I'm not the best person to comment but I enjoy playing black. My mindset is assess threats, establish adequate defence per threat, cut down lines of attack...and be aware of tempo. White inherently has tempo. But if you can force loss of tempo, you can gain the upper hand as black.
I'm happy to be corrected.
The short answer is that your self-assessment is wrong (don't take that the wrong way - most people are terrible at assessing their own strengths and weaknesses). You need to work on opening principles and tactics. In general, the opening is not the source of your major problems, but you are trying to play openings that require better understanding than you are currently displaying in your games.
I'd say that openings is probably the least bad part of Poiseful's chess.
Take a look at this game:
On move 12 everything is fine, then comes blundering a pawn, blundering a piece and then blundering mate. All those moves banged out at lightning speed, without thinking at all.
You need to improve with BOTH colors. After reviewing some of your games, your opening principles understanding is poor, regardless of colour. You just think that you play better with white, which is not true.
Thank you for that, can you elaborate more on my poor understanding of opening principles so I can start to work on them.
I love the pterodactyl defense. Have done so from the start. The positions aren't overly clinch, cagey, or complicated, yet still complex and dynamic enough to prevent white from capitalizing on its inherent advantage.
Also the accelerated dragon is a great option.
Against e4 in general, you're always solid with the sicilian.
If someone could please review some of my black games compared to my white (specifically rapid) that would be really appreciated! The only thing I really know is my white opening (English opening) is exponentially better than my black (Pirc/KID), I think for one I just need a new opening repertoire for black but I simply cant find a opening I really connect with quite like the English opening, so any suggestions would be great and any other flaws you see in my black games compared to my white games please point them out to me, Thank You!