What Playing Level is Respectable?

The chess club in my town lists members' ratings on its website. It has 272 members; the top player is rated 2194, the lowest 100. The average rating is 1200 and the median is 1193. All ratings were within three standard deviations of the mean. The 75th percentile of this sample is 1446.

Since our "metro area" has a combined population of around 150,000 and only 272 are in the chess club, I think you could say we are probably lower than average when it comes to chess playing. I'm going to add 150 points (purely subjectively) and round it to 1600 for my estimation of "respectible" among the general population. Among chess players, I'd say it's more like 1900-2000. I don't think one should have to be a "master" to be "respectible" so I'm keeping it under 2100.

Blunder festival.  I think you got to the heart of what I was thinking.  

I think once you get to 1800 elo not online, you really know what you're talking about. If they were 1400 in annotations they would make dogmatic comments like "I'm better because I have better pawn structure" or "I had a lead in development". That doesn't demonstrate much understanding but I respect those who can think for themselves in positions and not in rules with good intuition also knowing if the tactics are alright and when to try a sacrifice. they don't just play natural moves and they can explain the ideas of the openings they play pretty well. i would love just to get to 2000 elo, because it's not quite master level but it's very respectable among most chess players.

Read Silman's "Amateur's Mind", you will see that many players who are even rated 2000 OTB will make simplistic comments like "im better here, cause I have a bishop", or dumb stuff like that. 

I really think the sophisticated thinking and UNDERSTANDING begins around 2100, but I respect anyone over 1900 because their tactics are usually quite sharp, and you cant make any basic mistake against these players.

I'm bitter : ^ )

About what?

Why? What is it you think they understand that the 2300s don't.  I've played a few very talented people who eventually achieved (or will acheive) IM or GM someday, I've listened to GMs analyze, and to me the speed clarity and depth of the 'talented' chess mind just blows me away -- but not the "understanding"  --  I don't get the impression that the GMs are looking at the game very differently from poor old patzer me. They just see it immediately, and clearly... I need it explained to me... slowly.

Well maybe that's why the majority of people you know are 1900 or whatever, maybe because their tactics are very good. I'm a much more positional player, so I would probably get to that level because of that, sicne my tactics are rather mediocre. So I was thinking of someone who really understood chess which I think is better than complicated tactics. Sometimes I play people who have blitz or quick ratings of like 1700-1800 but when I play through it I see how much less they understand the game than me! But they are much better at tactics, but they actually made strategic decisions that I would critisize. If you don't understand positional play, you don't truly understand chess.

I feel it depends on what ur level is to what u think is respectable. 1600+ level in tournament chess is considered average level but to a 1200-1500 player is good indeed. 1800-2000 is top level amitures and then of course u have the masters who are in a league of there own who wont think 2000-2100 is so big a deal. Then Grandmasters who are again far better and then u have the world champions who would think nothing much of 2600+ GM player. So u see its all a matter of perspective. On this site i suppose most would say 1800-2000+ player is respectable and anything higher is truly amazing.

hi everyone,

here are a few thoughts related to this topic:

- most people will be able to see their own mistakes. therefore they will not usually consider their play to be respectable, and the question will be whether they think respectable starts 50, 100, or 300 points above them. many people have given variations on this answer, and i agree with them.

- someone called a game with players below 1800 a blunderfest. yes, i agree. most games below that level will be decided on a single move (or several iterations of such single moves) which tactically loses a minor piece or more. however, i've talked with grandmasters before, and after a game you will hear: "well, i threw that entire game away with one incredible blunder!" and what they are refering to is one move where they chose to avoid a queen trade, because in some variation they calculated 7 moves ahead, there was one move they missed, incomprehensibly (as usually they would see that move; or like to imagine they would). so the point here is that the word "blunderfest" is relative as well. as you get better, the bar for what you consider to be a blunder changes.

- some people have made the distinction between strategic understanding and either tactical acumen or practical skills (eg: i outplay this guy all game in blitz, but he hangs around, and i make some mistakes eventually; thus he is higher rated than i, but i understand chess better than he). but, now we have to define what chess is: is strategy the true understanding of chess? and tactics are merely some random little calculation exercise that gets in your way sometimes? in my opinion, strategy and tactics are intricately related, and in more than one way: your strategy can be supported by tactics, or your strategy can be to play for tactics. and practical skills such as patience, psychological stability, self-confidence, fighting spirit, self-awareness... are all part of "chess." therefore, your proficiency in any of these departments should be considered part of your understanding of chess.

- to add some numbers to my post: my rating is in the 2400s uscf/fide. if i ask myself if my understanding is respectable: i would tell myself i'm so-so. if i were trying not to hurt other people's feelings i might say something else.

- i think that what answers we give to this question say more about ourselves than about the objective truth of chess.

- also, a final thought: how can anyone evaluate what is a respectable understanding of chess, unless they themselves understand chess? unless you are on top of the mount, looking down, it's hard to say how far up is "a considerable way." so, probably this implies none of us can give a definitive answer to the starting question; we can only share our "feelings," and speculations.

That whole philosphy got shot WAY over MY HEAD and RATING!!

Its very simple he is saying that at every level people have trouble with the issue of what is respectable and that it is all opinion more then anything else based on the individual persons point of views at the time. He believe that our attitude to chess makes the real big difference in being respectable in chess overall and not so much the rating class. I think that's about what he was trying to say.

ONLY RATINGS OF OVER 3000 ARE ACCEPTABLE, IF YOU DO NOT HAVE SUCH A RATING PLEASE LEAVE THIS SITE!!!!!

This is one of the best forums ive ever seen on the internet.  Everyone is offering their true opinion, and reading some of the master players thoughts is a little lesson in itself. 

Nobody is making fun of each other, nobody points out how 'buddy' doesn't respect himself because he doesn't double check his spelling etc...

The only reason i decided to type "play live chess into google" was so i could beat a few of my relatives but mainly one guy, who rubbed it in when he beat me twice in a row.  All i knew at the time was:develop knights 1st and put them in the center,  bishops good in the corner and worth slightly more than knights(this is what i "thought" remember), queen good anywhere, castle early and try and advance as much as possible.  Buddy on the other hand knew to take control of the center immediately, stack your rooks, stack your bishops, pin pieces and use your king in the end game.....im not saying that buddy's priorly mentioned "stratagies" is the key to sucess by any means.  It was more than enough to beat me though.

Well, after playing about 50 live chess games on this site, opening ppls profiles and seeing how they would open, develop pieces and all sorts of little things improved me quite a bit.  Studying different book openings and learning their names going through chess mentor, and READING everything that was written(not just try and solve the puzzle) improved me even more.

After two or so months, i could beat everybody i know EASILY, and as for buddy.....well lets just say that while i was going for my 5th win in a row: he smashed the chess board and the pieces went flying. (right after he saw that his king was 4 birghtly coloured squares behind his queen which was being attacked by my bishop, and nothing could block it.)  Poor sod, after 5 games over two consecutive sunday afternoons, he couldn't even make it to an end game without being down at LEAST 5 points. The closest he came was he had just his king and i had a rook and my king........he insisted it was a draw.......lol *sigh* aaah it was glorious!!

But as a few shrewd ppl have said, its a blunder fest.  The difinition of the word blunder changes of course, but unless somebody somwhere along the line makes a mistake, no matter how small, it will be a draw.

Ive been logging on to chess.com once a day for about 3 months now, and i must say it competes with(if not beats) TV and video games.  I really appreciate all the help everybody so generously and readily hands out and i must say that ppl who enjoy, study and discuss chess are far more respectable and stable ppl than your average chump. 

*Side note* Do you ever scroll down and read a coupla pages of comments on youtube???? GEEEEZE all those ppl take themselves WAAAAAY too seriously!!!  To actually take time out of your day and get your hate on for some RANDOM person who in all likelyhood will never even see your coment simply boggles the mind! Now on the other hand, i find it great that somebody as gifted as an IM would take an hour out of his day to give his opinion to us.

Oh and i think ppl who are 1500 plus on live chess know what they are doing, im a mid 1300 player playing 10 | 10 time limits.  (I should really improve my blitz rating, its been a while...) i only just started playing online chess and im actually at 1500 so i think that online chess ratings are inflated.  I would LOVE to play an otb tournament, anybody in Vancouver know a good place to start???:):):)

why don't you look it up in the google ? 'Vancouver chess club' does this one suit you ?

In my humble opinon,1900 ELO + is enough to get my respect.Those are strong and solid players with often good repertoire,that are already very efficient over a chess board.

I respect any honest chess player, whatever the rating.

I respect your saying that!

anything above 1600 in live chess is a respectable rating according to me, and as long as the understanding of the game goes i have seen many people without an y proper theoretical knowledge of openings and end games playing really well too..

As of writing this, my rating is exactly 1337... fellow nerds, need I say more?