GM Grigoryan on the "Myth" of Solving Puzzles

Grandmaster Grigoryan has an interesting article about what he calls the "myth" of solving puzzles for chess improvement.

His main argument, simplified: many players recommend that others "do puzzles!" to improve at chess. But while solving puzzles can be fun, and while they will help improve your tactical vision, they won't directly help you learn how to properly play chess.

Furthermore: spending too much time on tactics, in lieu of other chess elements (positional learning, for example, which Grigoryan refers to as "strategy"), can be more harmful than helpful.

Here's the full article, for those interested:

https://chessmood.com/blog/the-myth-about-chess-tactics-and-solving-chess-puzzles

What do you think? Do you believe that chess puzzles are the end-all, be-all for chess improvement? Or do you agree more with GM Grigoryan's perspective?

I agree. I'm a beginner who spends far too much time solving puzzles and to be honest, it doesn't seem like it helps all that much, probably for a number of reasons. I'm still low 1000 in rapid and constantly getting wrecked by mid to high 1000s. I keep solving puzzles because it's entertaining and because everyone says that, to get good you should spend hours solving puzzles. As a result, I have a pretty high puzzle rating and I still suck at chess. Plus, many puzzles involve sacrificing a queen or rook for checkmate or material advantage. I've never actually had these tactics come up in a game, but I'm constantly looking for chances to sac my queen. 

Tactics flow from a superior position. If you don't know how to reach advantageous positions, you won't have the opportunity to play many tactical shots.

Yeah, many people say: "What do you ever gain with a small advantage? The game gets decided with a blunder in 90% of cases for people below 2 000." That is sort of true but there is more to it.

For me, in many cases, small advantages gained via better positional play often make the opponent suffer in a position. From such a position blunders are more likely to happen than just out of the blue. Along with that, in many cases positional mistake , that alone doesn't decide the game can lead to a big blunder because the position becomes much more difficult to handle.

Here is one example:

So for me, strategy and tactics go hand in hand. 

All of that being said, tactical play is my main weakness probably, so in my case puzzles will do some good.

Don't solve puzzles, don't study openings. I will have nothing left to do soon.

I think players under 1000 or so really should focus on tactics but once you get above that it is good to start learning more strategic ideas about things like pawn chains, outposts, controlling space, opposition and openings. Even then I think continuing to do some puzzles is good.

Hm

I agree with this GM's thoughts.... in your simplified version.

My puzzle rating is 2300... and rapid rating is 1600 only.

The way i see it is that puzzles are sort of trick bag, at least that's the case for me. That is, it's good to know tricks you can pull of when need (or opportunity) arises. Bit like an martial arts expert, who knows some potentially deadly tricks (s)he can pull of when needed. But the truth is, of all the "tricks" i have learned from puzzles i probably have used only about 5% or so.

And yes, my puzzle rating is over 2000 while my rapid rating is ~1200. But i think it's only natural, since puzzles are stoptime with only a few moves or so, whereas chess is more broader (and complex) than that.

Yea... in fact the question is how to get positional advantage?

This is the class  in Chess game.

chess is 100% tactics.  'strategy' is really just planning future tactical operations.

computers are far stronger than us & crush us tactically.  the more patterns you have memorized, the better you become at spotting opportunities, avoiding traps & zeroing in on the proper line of play in any particular position.

the clearer you can calculate lines, the further & more exactly you are able to visualize & assess future possibilities for yourself & for your opponent.  habitual analysis furthers your move horizon & sharpens your logical thought process.

my pb's:  3600 puzzles & 72 survival.  🙂

I took one look at the puzzles, did one of them and decided they would harm my chess. It may be that I'm a more tactical player than most, too.

Chess.com puzzle ratings are extremely off. Having +800 or even +1000 puzzle rating compared to your chess rating is normal, there's nothing exceptional about it.

Also, it is not impossible that there are a few (very few) low rated chess players whose weakness is not tactics. I doubt it, but it can happen. However, 99% of low rated players are bad because they suck at tactics and calculations. They hang pieces left and right... and they don't notice when their opponent hangs a piece.

Tactics are useful, but if someone only solves ‘play and win’ type tactics then there’s only so far you can go with that approach alone. Whereas most low rated players issue is simply blundering/board vision and you can’t fully address that purely by solving traditional puzzles. 

So yeah his basic premise that you should do tactics but not overdo it seems like basic common sense. Any facet of the game will provide diminishing returns if it is overdone in isolation. 

This ⬆️ is the answer.