Tactical Patterns Made Easy

IntroductionTactics are very important in Chess. How to spot winning material and other tactics?Using text and 850+ diagrams, FIDE Master Bill Jordan shows you how.

Chess has relatively easy rules but is potentially a game of great complexity. The complexity is achieved by the large number of ways the simple elements can be combined. The number of possibilities increases geometrically with the number of units on the board.

Pattern recognitionThere are many tactical pattern which happen again and again in games. Skilled players are familiar with many patterns and themes, through both play and study. This familiarity allows players to spot tactics much quicker than they would otherwise. There is a strong correlation between playing strength and how quickly a player can find tactics.The book starts with a fresh look at the simple elements of chess and how they can be put together. Elements include the chessboard itself and the basic functions of the units. Types of patterns are explained. The last section contains a large number of common tactical patterns.

Types of patterns include attack, checkmate, ways to draw and ways to win material. Drawing patterns include stalemate patterns and perpetual check patterns. Patterns involved in winning material include Forks, Pins, Skewers, Discoveries, Nets, Ties and Discoveries. Saves are also examined.

This book includes many positions that have been collected for coaching purposes over many years. The book is designed to help the reader to quickly become familiar with many tactical patterns. It may also help refresh familiarity with tactical patterns that have been previously seen, but partly forgotten.

PositionsThe positions have been invented. In many cases they have been simplified and have few units on the board which are not involved in tactic being presented. In many cases they are fragments of positions, one or more Kings may be missing. However they are are very similar to positions from actual play and are quite unlike composed positions.

DiagramsIn all positions White moves first and White is playing up the board. Moves are numbered from the current position, not from the start of the game.The book uses standard chess notation, which is short Algebraic notation. It is desirable to know this.

There are different ways you can read this book.

You can treat the positions as puzzles. You can choose the move you would play and move to the next diagram to check whether you are correct or not.You can simply enjoy playing through through the positions, becoming familiar with a wide range of tactical patterns as you do so. You can quickly flip forwards (or backwards) through the sequence of moves in each position.You can combine both approaches. For example, during a first reading you could play through the positions. On a second reading you could see how many you can solve from the starting position.See my authors page for information about my background and other books.