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By Stephen Kullas accessible:
Chess Combinations for Club Players, by Convekta, PC-CD, $31.95
(ChessCafe Price: $26.95)

Chess Combinations for Club Players is a digital chess course that teaches the
tactical principles that are important and useful to the club-level player. This
Book Peshka Training course is designed for those in the 1400-1800 rating range,
and it is invaluable to its target audience. The training course encompasses
Reviews common tactical motifs that arise in club-level games. The program installs
easily, runs well, and seems to have no kinks or bugs; in general just a solid
[Find us on Facebook.] program. The course includes more than 2,000 exercises on the following
topics:
Translate this page Attack on the King I
● Annihilation of the Defense of a Piece by Convekta
● Annihilation of the an Important Square Defense
● Decoy of a King to a Mating Net
● Decoy to a Knight Fork
● Intercepting a Piece Defending Another Piece
● Distracting a Piece Defending Another Piece

The annihilation of the defense of a piece is by far the most relevant to the the
up-and-coming club player. This concept is more commonly referred to as
"removing the defender" or "removing the guard." This is a tactical theme that
any club player would be remiss not to master. The software offers you a
series of tactical positions to be solved that slowly ascend in difficulty and
complexity of the board position.
Attack on the King II
Here is an example of a removal of the guard tactic: by Convekta
Play through and download
the games from Black to Play
ChessCafe.com in the
DGT Game Viewer.

CT Art 4.0
by Convekta

[FEN "rn3rk1/pp2ppbp/2pp1np1/q5B1/
2PPP1b1/2N2N2/PP2BPPP/R2Q1RK1"]

Your score is based on on how quickly and accurately you solve the puzzles.
The correct solution is 1...Bxf3!. This removes the defender, or "annihilates
the defense," of the g5-bishop and allows for 2...Qxg5, winning a piece.

Another motif that is a worthwhile area of study is what the training course
calls "Decoy of a King to a Mating Net." These are positions in which the
king can be forced, often by some form of material sacrifice, into a mating
net. This is something that will come about less often in normal play, but the
study of these patterns will be beneficial to any club player.

White to Play
 [FEN "1r1kr3/Nbppn1pp/1b6/8/
6Q1/3B1P2/Pq3P1P/3RR1K1"]

Here we see that White can force the black king into a mating net with 1.Qxd7
+. Black is forced to play 1...Kxd7, at which point White plays 2.Bb5#. While
this type of exciting queen sacrifice does not occur often, being able to lure
the enemy king into a mating net is is still immensely useful. Chess
Combinations for Club Players challenges you to find these patterns time and
time again, slowly but surely increasing your tactical abilities.

At any point during your training you can click on the "Elo Rating" tool and
see the rating that the software has assigned. However, this rating is likely to
be inflated. For instance, the program put my rating at 2002, while my general
level of play is hundreds of points lower. Still, the charts that graph your
progress offer extremely useful feedback to pinpoint what needs work. You
can revisit your history of solutions, which are then plotted on a graph by your
increasing ELO rating as you solve more tactical puzzles with greater
accuracy.

The only other complaint is that the range of difficulty of the puzzles is
insufficient. For the most part, the problems are easy. I seldom had to study
the position for more than a minute to find the solution. Yet, the course covers
motifs that are extremely relevant and occur frequently, and the number of
tactical puzzles allows the player to quickly improve if they work through all
of them.

Chess Combinations for Club Players will improve your tactical vision and
your ability to quickly spot combinational motifs. The program is simple to
use and is accessible for the beginner looking to learn, the veteran looking to
stay sharp, or the chess coach looking for training material. The program is
worth the time that you invest in it and your improved results will be a just
reward.

Order Chess Combinations for Club Players

by Convekta

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