Checkers to chess. Help please!

Sort:
Oldest
ChocolateShwarma

My friend is desperately wanting to become a chess master, however, he has played checkers his whole life. What are some tips to help him transfer his talent over to chess?

Strangemover

I'm not sure there's really that many transferable skills. Apart from being played on the same board it's a completely different game. 

Sakhibhava

No offense, but checkers is practically a kids game compared to chess. He will have to work hard & develop completely new skill sets.

Vibhansh_Alok
ChocolateShwarma wrote:

My friend is desperately wanting to become a chess master, however, he has played checkers his whole life. What are some tips to help him transfer his talent over to chess?

Transfer talent? Here we go... Ctrl+C  Ctrl+V and yeah you’re done!!

JackRoach

First of all, if he'd never/rarely played chess then his window to being a chess master is gone.

Second, chess isn't even close to checkers.

snoozyman

Just imagine a person who plays Tic Tac Toe and wants to learn and be really good at checkers, but chess is whole different monster.... Like another person said, both games use the same board in a turned based game, however, the differences are vast. In checkers, each player starts out with 12 pieces, in chess each start with 16 pieces. In checkers all the pieces are the same until they become kinged. In chess, there are 6 different kind of pieces each with their own special moves. In checkers you use 1 square color, in chess you use all squares. Checkers, much like Connect 4, has been solved by a computer but chess has never been solved and probably never will because the number of chess games exceed the number of atoms in the observable universe! Tips to help him transfer over chess? Just like any strategy game he already has the skills to think ahead, which is important because chess requires you to think at least 2-3 steps ahead after every move, sometimes even more if you've been playing long enough.

 

Not only do you have to think several steps ahead, there are different "lines" or order of moves to consider. For example, the very first move for white has 20 different moves, which can be multiplied if you think several steps ahead after each move, and that's just the very first move. After both players move, there already 400 different board setups to exist and then almost 200 thousand after the second move, and then 121 million different moves after the third set of moves. Average games last about 40 moves while highly skilled players can go up to 60 moves or more, so chess can get very very complicated. With that being said, as long as you know the fundamentals, chess tactics, and have a decent strategy, anyone can become a "decent" chess player.

 

My advice would be to learn all the basic moves such as how to develop pieces, castling, how to enpassant, how to use openings, end games, and how to checkmate the opponent's king. Also, play chess puzzles and watching YouTube videos of classic games from grandmasters in the past such as Paul Morphy and Bobby Fischer games.  Now to be a really "good" player require years and years even decades of practice and studying. The current world chess champion and the highest rated player ever, Magnus Carlsen, says he can remember about 10,000 games in his head, that's like over half a million moves in sequential order, which is super human.... 

aayuchampion
Vibhansh_Alok wrote:
ChocolateShwarma wrote:

My friend is desperately wanting to become a chess master, however, he has played checkers his whole life. What are some tips to help him transfer his talent over to chess?

Transfer talent? Here we go... Ctrl+C  Ctrl+V and yeah you’re done!!

lol

Woollysock
I know what the OP is talking about, cos I was a devoted tiddlywinks player , and decided to step over too chess . The first few months were so difficult for me , I thought I’d never get the hang of chess . I’m now set on making it to GM status by the end of this year .
Forums
Forum Legend
Following
New Comments
Locked Topic
Pinned Topic