Complex Midgame Strategy - Brainstorming.

Hi everyone! :).

This is going to be crazy complicated.  But maybe we can all learn something from it. 

Alright so I'll get right to it:

Everyone knows control of the center is important.  And of course there are certain games where it's clear one side has an almost unchallengeable center... But what's next?  A strong center is known to limit the counterplay of your opponent, but it is only a means to an end.

Our brainstorming session:

I'd love if we could find games where one side DOES create significant control of the center (master or your own) with comments on how that was converted into a win. 

Yeah, complicated I know... but if you have any clue what I'm talking about we may all be able to develop a much more significant understanding of chess.

Looking forward to this!!!

-matt

take a look at any of booby fishers games where he plays his famous sicialian open with Bc4, and Bxf6.  The purpose is to post the c3 knight on d5, dominate the center, and win games, which he has done countless times. 

If you study any of Silman's work, you will certainly find an example

Actually, I used to wonder about this exact same question, until I started studying Morphy's games.  Not that I'm a big Morphy fan (actually, I'm something of a hater compared to many here), but studying games from that old classical era will be your best guide.

The shorter, and less illuminating, version of the response is that your center gives you a spatial advantage that restricts your opponents' pieces.  If your advantage in the center is unassailable, you can manuever in other sectors to create other weaknesses, and it will be difficult for your opponent to match an adequate response because he has less room to both prevent a further breakthrough in the center, while still setting up his pieces properly to respond to your other threats.  When people talk about Silman's examples, they're talking about the parts where he discusses just that -- how to use your Space advantage.

The problem I've been running into is that my advantage in the center is unassailable, until I 'leave' the center to create another weakness! 

I'm sure it's more a matter of calculation in an individual position but I'm a big fan of positional principles :P.

Here's a game that shows exactly what I'm talking about.  Surely I had an advantage, my center was beautiful.  My whole game focused around building a big center and the result was that there were small weaknesses available for my exploitation simply because I had created the nice center and wasn't restricted to defending.  However I wasn't able to find a breakthrough!  I did miss a tactical pawn push that would have likely won (my computer found it afterwards) but surely there was a more positional way (despite this miss) to win the game.

I'd love to hear some opinions... and again, this thread was made for more of these games to be published. 

Attacking without controlling the center?  That's a loss.  Notice the player that started the pawn storm a few moves later is trading off his queen.  So much for pawn storms weakening the opponents king.

Great thread Ih8sens! A meaty chess topic for us to sink our teeth into, and discuss. I've got to go get some excercise but I'll take you up on some examples after the sun goes down. (2hrs)

My short note is: You had a modest central space advantage in that game you just posted... but you had a N with no outposts.  The side with the better, more active, pieces has the advantage. An advantage in the center generally means you have the better piece activity -- but if you don't have that... your supposed advantage isn't actually worth very much. That is the case IMO with the game in #7... of course now some NM is going to come by and point out where you had a win using your center space advantage but missed it, making me look like an idiot... but I'm used to it. ;)

A great example elo-a-day ... goes to show that a premature attack on the wing (with tension remaining in the center) is to be refuted WITH play in the center. 

In your game, post #7, I think you should double the rooks on c8 and c7 instead of c8 and c4. This will keep white from trading rooks. Then white is tied down to the defense of the c3 pawn and you can advance your f-pawn, gaining space on the kingside and/or creating weaknesses there. Your rooks will be flexible enough to move to that side of the board when necessary while your opponent will not be so flexible.

Here is a game where I had control of the center and this allowed me to advance my kingside pawns without my king being in danger of an attack.

Loomis you're certainly on to something... with central control (the 'soul' of the game if you will) under control... one's focus should change to attacking the most tangible weakness... in this case allowing the rook exchange (and simplification with it) made it impossible to achieve the required two 'tangible weaknesses'.   Excellent post and thanks for posting that game.  Very educational!

In your first game, 16...e4 looks like the mistake, a premature break in the center.  You have to be prepared for your decisive breakthrough *before* you advance your pawns, or you've lost a lot of their dynamic power, and just left weak squares in their wake.

That's easy to say in retrospect, but it's a very common theme.  I recall it coming up time and again in the study of the Ruy Lopez -- White manuevers to create threats based on *potential* advances in the center.  Once you finally make that advance, if you haven't prepared properly, you lose a lot of your advantage.  As your guy Nimzowitsch would say, the threat is stronger than the execution.

More specifically in that position, b6 followed by Na5 would seem to be a good plan.  You don't have to hurry to take advantage of your strong center -- because of it, White doesn't have a lot of good plans he can follow, and has to react to your threats.

Obviously, you're a strong player as it is, so I don't presume to be giving you lessons, that's just my take on the topic.

Are you supposed to advance your flank pawns and maintain the e4 d4 center, or advance the center pawns themselves? I never knew when was the right time for each.

I think the right plan depends on the position.  In the Ruy Lopez, White usually manuevers his pieces (knights in particular) over to good squares attacking the kingside, though the frequent a4 advance is obviously a flank pawn.  In other positions, advancing the flank pawns can work.  The point, I think, is to maintain the e4/d4 center, controlling all of the c5/d5/e5/f5 squares, and threaten breaks based on advancing that center, until it becomes opportune to actually do so.

Again, though, I am by no means an authority on the topic.  The better approach is to study GM play in classical openings (as you can tell, I learned a lot in the Ruy Lopez), and pay attention to how they use their pawn centers.

I know it's an old thread, but the following 15 minute game was the epitome of central control covnerted into a win:

I haven't added comments because while I found it entertaining, I know I didn't play my best. If anyone has questions, I can explain my reasoning.

I have a better played example here, with annotations. I'm very pleased with my play in that game.

Anyway, this is a good topic and I hope people continue discussing it. It's important to be able to convert all forms of advantage, not just material. Although, I'm sometimes not successful even in converting material advantage. :D