Chess Mentor Course Suggestion

After trying the computer workout "development" a few times I have found that I am completely unable to turn a lead in development into anything meaningful. The computer closes up the position and with an almost complete absense of space manages to undermine my pawns and make it's position better. What I would like to see is a course on attacking purely defensive setup's, as the genre of "attacking" tends to fall under either grandprix attacking or going against a setup with fixed weakpoints.

In my case when I set up an attack against the computer opponent it removes the sting from my attack with a pawn move or two and suddenly all I've accomplished is an easily underminable pawn chain weakening my position with no solid attacking chances. I suppose a big part of my question is what are the inherent weaknesses of a structure that isn't changing from the starting position? Obviously this wouldn't occur in a real game, but clearly my ability to determine what a weakpoint is isn't that sharp.

So what exactly do I do? The computer is obviously not going to give me an advantage by playing aggressively when there is not a good way to immediately. Surely a lead in development means something though -- the question is how to approach making something out of it.

side note, the position from the "development" workout is a bit ridiculous just on the grounds that with black moving Nf6-g8-f6 or what have you leaves white with only arbitrary ways to develop anyhow.

double side note, I don't like watching a line of best moves only to be shown

"You did not play accurately. You slipped from a better position to an equal one."

because that is just silly.

    You do pose some very critical questions here.

   First , you must know that learning to attack(or anything else) is not something that it can be learned from one day to another.It needs serious study and effort.

    One thing that certainly helps is to take well analysed instructive games (obviously you need good books) and replay the position from which the advantage begins , trying to win against your opponent(your opponent must be a much better player).You can start from a point where the advantage is winning.Of course It would be pointless to start from a point in which the winning side has forced mate in 3.You have to choose a position from which the advantage , no matter how big it is , needs some kind of technique to be exploited.If you don't win(your opponent won't follow the book , he will play what he likes) , the analysis can show you the mistakes and you can try again.If you win, you can also try again , this time from an earlier point where the advantage of the winning side is big but not winning.The same game can be played from 3 or 4 different points which will make you understand all the phases of the advantage, from the correct positioning of the pieces to the final exploitation.Knowing what you have to do from the analysis , comparing with what you did and determining of what you should do, will help you understand better certain type of positions.

    I don't know if that  helps  but we saw impressive results in my chess-club with that method.

I haven't seen the workout position but most textbook positions where they show you how to exploit a lead in development usually involves opening lines in some way. A pawn break/sac or an exchange/ minor piece sacrifice does the job of clearing the way to feed your pieces into the attack.

@Michael-G

That sounds like a very good method actually. Unfortunately, (Average a player as I am) I am the best person I know personally. I have seen a chess club a few times on my way to school, I could try stopping in there. Is it worth it?

but also, the hope really would be that I could get some significant learning out of a chess meanter course that would focus on teaching that, or a computer workout. There might be a computer workout course for this, but comments on why moves aren't so good is nice.

That's a good point too Vease. I tried doing that and somehow failed though, three times. Not exactly a good feeling, especially because its in the "beginner" section. :\

I can help you with that if you like, I can provide you the games and I can be the punching bag.Untill you find someone better.

 And yes it's worth to stop in the chess club that is on your way to school.

That would be fantastic. When do you want to do that?

The computer workout tool here is very bad in my experience.

There are several theoretically winning positions where clicking "best move" only leads to a draw, you have to find the win yourself.

There is a KP vs K position where the aim is to draw (where you have the K) but the computer opponents gives up the pawn immediately, because as far as its concerned all moves lead to a draw..

There is even a position where the intended aim is to draw, but due to the poor computer opponent it's possible to win!

In short there are plenty of premium tools far better than computer workout (like TT and CM) so it would be better just to focus on those.

I use TT quite a lot actually. Also I would say despite its many shortcomings the computer workout is significantly better than a lot of chess mentor courses. Personal opinion I suppose, but I would rather run into a refutation for a bad move 100% of the time. On mentor a lot of bad moves get generic responses of "find a better move" etc. If all the courses were instructive instead of "solve this position for: strategy" I can see how it could be a great tool. Simply too few helpful comments and hints.

I do agree the computer has its problems, though.