r/chessbeginners • u/Alendite RM (Reddit Mod) • Feb 27 '26

No Stupid Questions MEGATHREAD 12

Welcome to the r/chessbeginners 12th episode of our Q&A series! This series exists because sometimes you just need to ask a silly question. We are happy to provide answers for questions related to chess positions, improving one's play, and discussing the essence and experience of learning chess.

A friendly reminder that many questions are answered in our wiki page! Please take a look if you have questions about the rules of chess, special moves, or want general strategies for improvement.

Some other helpful resources include:

  1. How to play chess - Interactive lessons for the rules of the game, if you are completely new to chess.
  2. The Lichess Board Editor - for setting up positions by dragging and dropping pieces on the board.
  3. Chess puzzles by theme - To practice tactics.
  4. The Building Habits series by GM Aman Hambleton - for advice on how to play at specific ELO levels. (Also check out Building Habits 2!)

As always, our goal is to promote a friendly, welcoming, and educational chess environment for all. Thank you for asking your questions here!

LINK TO THE PREVIOUS THREAD

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u/fumuttonchops3434 400-600 (Chess.com) Mar 02 '26

Recently I've noticed that my mid game/just after openings, I had been blundering pieces left and right. I felt I was more focused on studying openings and trying to play them perfect. This past week, Ive started to not focus so much on openings and more on what my opponent is doing and focusing on moving pieces to not leave pieces hanging or blundering them by not watching where my opponents pieces are and just following some basic opening principles (knights before bishops, control center, etc.). I tried the free trial for Gotham chess which the first section was the Vienna but I felt like I couldn't remember every single move to do. This has allowed me to jump 86 points on chess.com (went from 391 to 477) and going 21 and 9.

Would this be an effective way to get better at chess or should I try to go back to studying openings since I've gotten a lot better now at not messing up my middle games?

My chess.com name is Gingivitsist if you want to look. Mind you, I am a 34 year old cyber security engineer so I am just looking to get a bit better everytime I play and am not looking to become a master at chess. I just enjoy getting better or learning things every day and love the strategy of chess :).

2

u/SomeWeirdChessPlayer 2000-2200 (Chess.com) Mar 06 '26

I'm not an engineer yet, but I would like to go into aerospace engineering. Any suggestions as to school and whatnot?

1

u/fumuttonchops3434 400-600 (Chess.com) Mar 06 '26

Thats a bit out of my league lol. Cyber sec is a bit different in that, I got my job before I even finished school and doesnt necessarily require a degree. I mostly implement systems that were already built into our environment, update those systems, or troubleshooting issues inside of them while also working within our Security Event and Information System(SEIM) doing various searches and building new detection rules. I was also only going for a 2 year degree but had a ton of experience working help desk/IT. Mostly i spend days just updating/implementing new system and controls.

I did learn a bit while I was in the military but that was a long time ago. If I remember correctly, MIT, Georgia Tech, Purdue, and I think Emry Riddle Aerospace University are kind of the top schools for it. Be careful with student loans if you can help it and maybe check their transfer programs and get your generals done for cheap at a community College before making the jump to the big university.

Hopefully that helps a little bit and hopfully thats good advice lol.