Chess - Waiting

I've continued to play chess online, and again after doing some of the training puzzles I took to another rated game... and this is where I find myself...

The chap has fallen into my trap with the knights and queens, he had the upper hand on the left, but then I had the two knights defence and he fell into this position.

All he can do is move the knight to block the my Queen (blue line) and then I move my Queen (red arrow) and we have check-mate.

However, he's not moving... I don't know if he's left, or quit, or just wants to let the time roll down, but I'll just keep giving him 15 seconds to stop him trying to time the game out.  So this is maybe another toxic player from the community.

Chess - Win

In my prior post I had posted that the en.lichess.org community was a little toxic, well, I'm happy to announce the registered community is actually quite nice... so far...

I decided after doing a bunch of the "openings" training (and being bad at it) I'd try a rated game...

I won, and not only did I win, but I had the opponent "Vecky" chat back to me, and it was a nice game, I enjoyed it.

As I said in the chat there, I celebrated with a nice coffee :)

More Chess - Toxic Players

I'm beginning to find the online Chess community a bit more feeble than I remember... I used to play on Yahoo Games Chess, years ago... I even met a lass through it once, seriously, chess got me laid... However, playing on en.lichess.org, I keep having my opponents leave the match!

In this case the chap had the upper hand, my opening went wrong, he moved his bishop aggressively into my centre, but then my knights rescued the situation and he left?!?!?!  Leaving me to just have to wait for his time to end or "claim victory".

Chess & Me

I've always been fascinated by board games, Chess was perhaps the first I obsessed over, and I wasn't bad at playing it... When I was around 10 we had a wooden chess set at home, and I'd spend hours looking at positions, but was  never encouraged that this was a worth while thing to do.

When I was in my early twenties, I came back to Chess and had a few books and bits and bobs for it, spent ages analysing positions once.  It's sort of part of me.

Anyway, I recently came across en.lichess.org, and signed up... I had played a few games and got totally thrashed whilst anonymous... But I did a bunch of their training puzzles (some of which I think I saw better options or at least equivalent options for) and then signed up... Ironically when you sign up their capta check is a chess puzzle, and I kept getting it wrong!

But soon sorted and I started my first game, no pressure, so I went for classic 20 minute (plenty of time) game style.  I have this speed chess, I'm not practised enough for it.

Here's my ending board, did I win... I think I did, but the opponent just left :(

(I'm playing white)

Thor, Smaug & Computer Chess - Films

Last night the good lady and myself went to see Thor 2... I'd have to agree with Jingles when he called it "Loki 3"... Thor being Loki 1, the Avengers Assemble being Loki 2 and this film being Loki 3.

As adventure fantasy this is a really nice flick, its got some good laughs, though I had to question the recasting of Fandral, and also the changing they've made to Dr Erik Selvig post Avengers Assemble...

I also love how they kept the damage to London to a minimum... It's like, lets tear New York apart, but they darn't do it to London... As it should be.

The next film I plan to go see is Desolation of Smaug... 

However, I've also spotted this potential geek gem on the grape vine...

Though you can, with careful searching, find this whole film listed on YouTube already, not that I've yet taken a look.