I'm U2000 and I Don't Think I'm Really Playing Chess

Chess has its peculiar charm. Most people just play it and have fun exactly the way it is. Just trying to make good moves.

My answer to "Is chess ...?" or "What is chess?": Man, if you have to ask, you will never know!

Maybe you should play longer time control. At fast time control tactics are dominant. Play through some annotated grandmaster games e.g. of the recent tournament in Norway. You will see some games are decided by tactics, but more games are about strategy and endgame technique. If you play through all games of a whole tournament you get a more complete picture, as otherwise tactical games get published more than positional games, that most readers often consider as dull.

I used to have the same problem as you when I was a weaker player. I never played interesting games, most of the time, games were simply won or lost due to tactics that seemed fairly straightforward. I got around this by playing longer games, correspondence even, and I got far more out of this.

Even at the highest level, chess is still all about tactics. Grandmasters spend a lot of time in a game calculating and checking for tactics, even if there are no tactics on the board, this is only because the players spent a long time making sure that they don't give their opponents tactical opportunities. At all levels you have to have the patience to calculate tactics.

It is true however that tactics are more likely in good positions. At the amateur level, piece activity is probably the most important positional consideration.

Take the following game where I was black. According to computer analysis my losing mistake was 13...Nc6. I should have played 13...Na6, because it defends c7 and c5, so white cannot put his bishop on c5. However, 13...Na6 is a very difficult move to find and in a practical sense, it was a mistake to get into a position where I had to defend so precisely. I is more useful to express my mistakes could be expressed strategically, I played d6 opening the game up when I was behind in development, and I did not castle soon enough. Often, even if a game looks like it was won tactically, there were strategic errors that led to a position where tactics were possible.

lichess.org/vk3AaGkh#25

The most important strategic considerations at your level are probably undefended pieces, piece activity and king safety. Other strategic considerations are less important, for example I often find it very difficult to make the most of a space advantage in a closed pawn structure. It is true that until you get good, a lot of chess strategy is irrelevant, even once you reach 2000. It doesn't mean chess is not interesting, although it is true that the better I have got, the more interesting chess has become.

The best thing to do to play more interesting games, is to play slower, and pay most attention to king safety, piece activity and undefended pieces. However, at all levels, you still have to put time into being vigilant about fairly straightforward tactics, even if what you consider to be a straightforward tactic changes. Even at the highest level games are lost due to mistakes that are fairly obvious to the players. If you don't like being vigilant to straightforward tactics then chess isn't the best game to play.