What's my problem? stuck under rating 500

Can someone take a look at my games and give me advice on what I need to learn. I've played a while and feel like I should have a better grasp on this game than my score reflects. I hear people say that at 500 rating or less you aren't understanding some basics. Understandable but I really don't know what it is that I'm missing yet. Sometimes I feel like I'm pretty good then I manage to muck up too many games and can't get my score back above 500. If someone can tell me what concepts I'm missing and need to study I would appreciate it. Wish I could afford to hire a coach or something lol.

Idk if this is the right forum branch. Saw a similar post here at first but now I'm thinking this should be on beginner players branch. My bad or not idk, let me know and I'll move it, thanks

You play very good. The thing is that you just don't play some moves carefully. I looked at your archive and it looks like you play rapid games. You have so much time. Think about 15 seconds for every move. First, think what's the immediate threat

Then after analysing the attack of the opponent, think what you can do. First thing, king safety. Then, look for forks. This should help you.

@1
A rating of 500 is a sign of frequent blunders.

Always check your intended move is no blunder before you play it.

That little mental discipline is enough to get to 1500.

tactics tactics tactics. also find a coach of fiverr or something, they are often decent.

It is true that you hang pieces frequently. You should make sure to see if your intended move is safe before playing it. 

Another problem is that you don't follow opening principles. 1.c4 2.b3 is not controlling the center, those are 2 pawn moves that doesn't help you develop for instance. Along with that you play moves like e3, f3 then f4... You make too many pawn moves in the opening, wasting time. 

"That little mental discipline is enough to get to 1500." Not even close, but yeah, otherwise good advice.

Always better than me.
I reached a score of 1399 (only 1 point before 1400), and I always traced around 1300 points.
Now I can barely keep around 1100 points.
And I have no idea why. Even players with less than 1000 points seem extraordinarily difficult to beat.

Actually the c4 b3 moves is a line that my coach is now teaching me that first F-Pawn move was actually a misclick. Once it was in the way of my knight I decided to move it again but normally that pawn wouldn't have moved there in the opening

tygxc is correct.

If you can stop making one- or two-move blunders, and can spot your opponent's blunders, there are no major hurdles between 500 and 1500 (or even somewhat higher).

hi

I don't know who your coach is and I wouldn't want to challenge his authority or something, but as a 500 level rapid player it would probably be good for you to learn opening principles first before just playing 1.c4 2.b3 against everything. You really shouldn't be learning concrete lines right now. I will tell you why.

For instance in this game you play 1.c4 and the opponent plays 1. ...g5. That is a very unusual move, and even if you've learned some specific line with 1.c4 2.b3, it goes through the window immediately after his second move.

If you knew opening principles, you would probably play 2. ...d4 (transposing to 1.d4 2.c4 openings where the opponent wasted time playing illogical 1.g5) or even 2. ...e4 taking the center because your opponent failed to do so. Engine says something +1.5 or even more after move 2 (if you tried a principal move like 2. d4) which is amazing for 2 moves played. It means almost nothing on sub 1000 level, and it is not of a great importance to someone on a weaker side like myself, but it is still a good practice that will serve you well when you are able to keep your blunders to some minimum. 

Perhaps 1.c4 2.b3 has some specific use, I don't really play English opening, but it is certainly not a cure against everything. Against 4 most popular responses to the English 2.b3 is certainly not losing, you can have a normal game, and maybe your coach has something specific in mind, some funky sideline, but I am not sure that is the best way to learn chess on novice level.  1.c4 2.b3 against usual responses to English pretty much give away the initiative to black, so it doesn't really look that great either. 

My point is before you play something like 1.c4 2.b3 you should understand why you are doing it. And to understand it, you should know more basic stuff. But of course, you are free to decide for yourself.

It is not really like that. Tactically 1 500 player will be a lot more aware than 500 rated one (on average, that is true), and he will know more about chess, weaknesses, controlling squares, about basic endgames etc. Blunders on 500 and let's say 1 300 level are generally a bit different. On 500 level it will be more hanging pieces, on 1 300 there will still be that but many games will be decided by weaker calculation, a little more refined tactics, and even some endgame knowledge.

In short, to get to 1 500 level, and more, one will have to have a much better understanding of chess than on 500 level player. Someone who is 2 000 rated perhaps do not see it, but it really is like that. 1 500 rated players don't know much compared to them, but their general knowledge is much better than the knowledge of sub 1 000 player. It is not just 1 or 2 move tactical sequences between them.

Up to 1 000 roughly (it is not written in stone), it is mostly about 1 or 2 move blunders and opening principles (because people there will in many cases be lost because of a lack of development). Beyond, people will have some other knowledge as well, and in many cases will have to be encouraged more to make blunders. 

On the other hand, we could look at it this way: "Avoid blunders and you'll get to GM level" is technically correct as well, but on that level it certainly doesn't tell the entire story, and it is not that helpful.

solving puzzles will help

And analyze your lost games.

Not with the engine. With your own brain.

That's completely false. Are pieces being hung left, right, and centre at the 1500 level? Yes. Will a 1500 beat a 500 even if the 500 can take back any move which blunders a piece/checkmate in 1 or 2 moves? Also yes. 1500s are aware of, and more or less consistently follow/take into account, all the opening principles, many strategical concepts such as weak pawns, king safety, attacking potential, etc, and most/all of the fundamental tactical motifs such as pins, skewers, discovery, removing the defender, trapped piece, etc. A 500 is either aware of none of these or is aware of some of them but doesn't apply them in real games. Blundering is a relatively minor hurdle on the way between 500 and 1500 that most people overcome relatively quickly just through practice (and by "overcome" I mean reducing their rate of blunders to that of a typical 1500 ─ which, again, is still high). However, many struggle with most of the other hurdles, which is why you see people playing and studying for years and never being able to approach 1500.

I assume you're making the claims that you are because you have little to no recollection of being at that level yourself, and are mostly going off your current perception of 1500s through the lens of a much higher rating. That's understandable, as from up above, it really does appear that the predominant deciding factor in most 1500-level games is frequency of blunders (as blunders stand out the most); however, as someone who was 1500 only a year ago and who currently coaches 1500-level players, I can guarantee you that this perception is false. Not only is it false, but it can also be both discouraging and misleading to hear if you are at that level or lower. So, while I completely understand where you are coming from, I'd recommend intermediate players not to pay attention to people who express this sentiment.

Thank you! I'm a 2000+ player but I can see it. However, part of that is due to coaching experience; I think coaches who have first-hand experience of trying to identify the biggest weaknesses in a 1400-1500's play and seeing that just blundering pieces is most of the time not even close to one of them (there are usually at least 10-15 strategical and tactical concepts that need prioritising before the simple "check for one- and two-move combinations) can see it more clearly. To a 2000+ without coaching experience, I can definitely understand why blueemu's conclusion would seem intuitive ─ after all, one- or two-move blunders occur almost every game at this level, often numbering in several per game; but the trick here is that most of them would be much more easily avoided not with better prudence or pattern recognition but with the knowledge of strategical and tactical rules, themes, and concepts.

Yeah, of course some people will notice it, those who have recollection of being that level, or playing chess against players with various rating or through coaching. 

Blueemu has a draw against Mikhail Tal, so he probably breezed through 1 500 rating quite some time ago and I am not sure how strong would be 1 500 at that time compared to this time. 

Someone mentioned Peter Svidler at some forum topic. How he had a stream and he got a question from a viewer on how to get better from 1 700 rating. He politely said: "I am not the right person to answer this question, because I don't remember the time I was that low."

I can accept that even someone let's say 800 rated has slightly more knowledge than someone rated 500 (but it is probably hidden by frequently blundering). The difference between 1 500 and 500 is more pronounced. And on top of that, not all 1 500 rated people are the same. Some are better tactically, some rely more on other stuff. 

Wow! A draw against the Magician from Riga is extremely impressive. So it seems like my suspicion was spot on. I see this sentiment being expressed by a higher-rated players so much that it's almost turned into a stereotype. Again, a harmful one at that, because it both discourages and, more importantly, misleads intermediate improvers. They will focus on trying to be more alert, to grind tactics, and to engage in exhaustive thought processes but will get absolutely nowhere, and very often will even lose rating as they will have replaced useful information/intuition with, frankly, useless garbage. So I actually respect Svidler for not perpetuating this stereotype and being honest about the extent of his knowledge.

Actually, there is a massive difference in knowledge and understanding even between a 500 and a 800. A 800 will, more often than not, demonstrate a decent understanding of the opening principles and also apply basic tactical patterns. A 500, generally, will significantly stray from the opening principles and will also miss most of the basic tactics.

In fact, I did some Eloguesser, and it turns out I can tell a 800 from a 500 with a very high accuracy ─ I can do so even with the 800s blunder more than a 500 would and, conversely, when the 500 makes fewer blunders than the average 800. Non-coaches (and even, unfortunately, many coaches) vastly underestimate the importance of transferable knowledge and teachable intuition at the lower levels.