Chess tactics vs strategy
For example you might play an anti-positional move because it is part of a long-term strategy. Strategy on the other hand means long-term planning. mostly pawn structure and piece placement. Positional thinking consists of static short-term considerations concerning the health of your position.
There is a lot of confusion concerning the terms "tactical", "positional" and "strategic".įirst of all, "strategic" and "positional" are not the same! You might carry out a tactical combination in order to gain a positional advantage. There is even some blurring between the two. Capturing all that material was tactical advantage but the positional considerations were such that the winner was still able to force a win in the end. Here the winning player had sacrificed a bishop, both rooks, and his queen. One really good example of this is the famous game know as the " Immortal game". The other direction is harder to find but ignoring positional play when making a tactical move is the kind where you gain material but make positional compromises that hurt you. I once played and game that my opponent analyzed for me afterward, one of his comments for a particular move was "Amazing this move is as good strategically as it is bad tactically" and I had hung the piece simply giving it away. If you make a positional move while ignoring the strategic considerations it is a worthless move. Good positional play puts you in a position to find strategic play. You increase king safety, or strengthen your hold on the center, or something similar. There are no tactical variations that you can use at the moment and so your play must be of the type to create abstract strengths. Strategic or positional play was described as being what you do when you don't have anything to do. Many lines in game analysis are of this type usually ending with something like "winning a pawn" or any other concrete goal. The play can be calculated and the outcome determined. Tactical play was described as being what you do when you can force the issue.
I have seen an informal distinction between tactical and positional, or put another way between tactical and strategic play. Petrosian was a master on the other side, playing sober games, choosing super-positional and kinda-drawish systems so that he'd never lose, and win when opponents tried with no hope to break the wall he built. Mikhail Tal was a master at this: his style was so complicated and filled with tactics that when he managed to catch an opponent in his net he had no escape. The key is that if you know that you're facing an opponent with a playing style that's the opposite of yours, you should try to involve him/her in positions he/she doesn't feel comfortable with, while you are. The key is not the advantage that tactical play has over positional play (or positional over tactical). He'll try to go for an aggressive play, but he will face a tactical opponent who feels more comfortable in complicated situations, and eventually the positional player will make a blunder and get punished by the opponent.
#CHESS TACTICS VS STRATEGY FULL#
The same is true also when who needs a full victory is the positional player. Then the solid player will only have to defend (supposing he's good at this), and take the full point himself after the opponent's suicide. The tactical player will probably try to force combinations even if the position on the board wouldn't allow such tactics. In a tournament, for example, if a positional player knows that he's facing a tactical opponent that for some reason needs the full point, may choose a solid system with very few victory chance but no weak points.
Tactical playing style has no advantage on positional playing style, and vice-versa.Īlthough, a single player may have a psychological edge on another player with opposite playing style, in specific situations.