When did you start being able to see several moves ahead?

I've been playing chess for a bit now and so far I seem to be stuck at 1050~ in tactics. The ones they give seem to be wanting to be able to see several 4-5 moves ahead for a checkmate or just taking a piece and I am having some trouble with that. I've been doing a bit better lately, but I was wondering if there was a point when you could just know that some pattern for checkmate would be available just by looking at the board as I've seen some people say about tactics - that they can just know that a winning tactic is on the board. So my question is, when were you able to look at the board and see where the pieces will be clearly enough in your mind to complete a long move tactic?

practice make perfect, kid!   Also, take your time, forget the damn timer.

Pattern recognition will become child's play eventually, my friend

If you need lessons, just message me.  Free.

 Baby steps! Worry about one move ahead first. But calculating moves is not hard if they are forced - to answer check, stop a mate threat, or recapture material. Most of the Tactics examples will involve forcing moves - that gives you a clue what to look for.

Don't try to think too far ahead in games if the moves aren't forced, though. There's an old saying: "Long variation, wrong variation!"

If it ever happens, I'll get back to you.

Try the stepping stone technique to help you at calculating and make your calculation longer. For example if there are series of exchange in a 6 move mate problems, remove in your mind's visual the pieces that are gone and try to visualize the current position. 

http://www.braillechess.com/rreid.html

http://roezen.blogspot.com/2009/01/visualization.html

http://www.qualitychess.co.uk/blog/2254

Tactical pattern recognition do help you at deciding what moves to calculate and look at. But there are situations that you need to really calculate long variations. Try calculating as hard as you can.

I just had a look at your Tactics and found you tried #91140. When I see a position like that I check to see if there is any back rank checkmate possibilities since the back row seems defended by the rook and king for now. Since the king is on f8 if you try a back rank checkmate it will be unlikely it will work with a king on f8 (queen on d8 would be checkmate assuming the defending rook is gone), I look for ways to push the king to g8 which is a very common back rank pattern (king in the middle of 3 pawns that haven't moved) So I begin looking at Qe7+ which will push the king to g8 then I realise that I can do Qe8+ after Kg8 since the rook on e1 will be able to come to e8 and checkmate. I hope this helps you understand how you could have solved #91140. If you click on your Tactics tab on the right side of your profile and then click stats on a computer it will show you your previously attempted Tactics. I think this also works on mobile as well.

Pattern recognition as so called is pretty useless without calculation. The most it gives you is an idea. And it might be the wrong idea too as the correct continuation is hidden in the position. Doing a lot of tactical puzzles will improve your ability to calculate but only very slowly unless you develop a method or learn one from somewhere. It has to be systematic and one that you can manage. You need to develop the ability to not only move the pieces in your head but also sense what every move is doing (such as leaving a piece hanging). Without developing that ability, you will never get there for calculating concrete positions. Positions that are not concrete require a different skill.

It took me perhaps hundreds or thousands of tactics before I can finally recognise useful patterns. Knowing checkmating patterns and common tactical motives like removing the defender of a piece or the pinning of a piece is a good start to build up tactical foundation. Solving tactical puzzles is a mix of these ideas, together with a bunch of calculations needed. And of course, move order matters. Thus, you need to know which ideas work in a given puzzle; sometimes a wrong idea used can even bring a winning position to a losing position.

Yea, I actually knew most of that - I fell into a tendency of mine to get so distracted trying to decide how to do one thing that I forget to check for better ones.

I beg to differ a bit; pattern recognition is important to some degree. If a pattern is about to come up immediately without further calculation, then of course pattern recognition becomes very important. Even the very basic checkmates such as king and queen (or rook) versus king endgame utilise patterns largely,

eric, I had the highest TT rating on this website when I stopped. I then moved to lichess where my TT rating is currently 2609. I don't know if that makes it the highest there but it seems pretty high. My TT rating outstrips my playing strength although I was once supposed to be a talented player, whatever that means. I struggled with TT until I ignored the pattern recognition advice and found a method to calculate. I also listened very carefully to grandmaster commentary when analysing tactical positions in games. Some grandmasters are obviously better than others at analysing tactics. The worst ones analysed randomly on seeing an idea which is what a person does unless they have a method.

I followed in the footstpes of rlian3 and took a look at another puzzle you recently attempted, namely tactic #0502318. I can see that the puzzle is much more difficult than what its rating suggests (of course you would not know its rating until you were marked correct or incorrect for the puzzle).

Before Black's move Qf5, can you spot the winning move? Yes there is! Qf7#, a common checkmating pattern employed by a queen and a rook. Then, Black chooses to defend this by Qf5. Of course, taking the hanging rook Qb8? is not as good as the main continuation, since the White knight can get captured, and surprisingly the potential checkmating squares on f7 and g7 are well guarded by the queen and bishop respectively. Remember that there is also the a4 passed pawn to worry about. This suggests that there may be better options available.

The winning move Rh8+ is extremely hard to spot because players would not just commit to that sacrifice and may be well thinking 'Why must I give away my rook? I love my rook so much!', but upon closer inspection, we see that after the necessary Kxh8, Qh7# is checkmate. It is not easy to see this, but you must not be afraid to list these sacrifices (or 'give-away-piece' moves) as a possibility. The main idea behind this is that Qh7# would have been checkmate earlier had the h7 rook not been present. Rh8+ forces Black to make a move (and Kxh8 is the only move), while simultaneously clearing up the h7 square for the queen's path to victory.

I employed a very similar clearance idea my one of my recent tournament games where I played Rh8+ (from g8) to free up the g8 square for my next move Qg8# (I had a queen-rook battery along the g-file and the g8 square was not guarded by Black's pieces) after the forced Kxh8.

Well of course there are many more things to solving puzzles than simply pattern recognition. Many variations must well be thought out and calculated in advance (but there should be some form of patterns in at least a few of the puzzles). There can be many paths, for example, but only one path is trap-less. Or one seemingly good line ends up with the opponent initiating a perpetual check as a defensive resort. Then, calculation becomes more important. However, when we started out with chess at the very basic level, I am very sure that knowing patterns is the basis and foundation of our tactical knowledge and checkmating skills.

Having said that, maybe I should accept the words from the player with a tactics rating on Chess.com of over 3600 - I cannot even cross 2500...

The problem with patterns is that there are too many of them in any given position and the vast majority are there or thereabouts but not quite. What you need is a method to simplify the task, to cut down the number of possibilities or lines to look at.

Good point. But I am sure that the other players in this post also attempt to eliminate redundant possibities and work on the more interesting lines. Even the 1250 rated puzzle in post #14 above requires some elimination work, but in that puzzle recognition of checkmate patterns are very important (we cannot end a game, except on time, if the opponent refuses to resign and we do not know how to land a checkmate).

Or perhaps for you, these patterns are so basic that it is automatically included as part of your calculation.

What I saying is that I am not excluding pattern recognition. What I am saying is that it in itself is not the answer. There must be a technique for calculating. Random calculation is good for supercomputers. We need something more efficient.

I kind of rely on pattern recognition because that's just how my brain works. I've always excelled at tasks that require things like muscle memory, subconscious thought, or instinct,  but never have excelled at tasks that require deep focus. I'm the farthest thing possible from a natural at this game. Seeing familiarities during gameplay and exploiting them is the only way I know how to play. Pattern recognition might not be the best advice to get to the top, but I think it's a good start to improving for someone with a 1050 tactics rating and can't break the barrier.  

Slow_pawn, most combinations are a result of a loose piece. There is not much pattern recognition there.  However, it may require calculation to get the combination to the point where you pounce on the bounty. Chess is a game of moves and not ideas as Tomashevsky once famously said, although I don't think it was an original saying. He was bemoaning the fact that he relied on "pattern recognition" rather than calculating. It cost him the game.