Online Play

This page is dedicated to helping players find instructional play (and practice) online

Main Chess Homepage - Lessons - Award-winning columns on Chess Improvement

  Slow Chess (not correspondence!):

      Slow Chess Leagues (Links updated Jan 2009):

  Team 45 45 - many of my students play here. It is regular individual chess, but your score counts toward a team match. Click on "Quick Guide" in the middle to sign up. Contact John Brady or Don Barrus if you want an individual contact or questions. A lot of my students like to play on the friendly "Long Live the King" teams with which they are involved; contact Al Pearson. Over 100 teams from 50+ countries!

  Chess 90_30 - Slow Play Tournaments at 90 30 for ICC members

  Slow Time Control Bunch website (ICC Ch 90 is for slow play) - Back Active! - Now with a slow time control sign-up board for ICC

  ICC Slowplay - Slow Play Tournaments at 60 0 run by the ICC; three games in one day

  LeChess Club runs slow time control tournaments and is consumed by the concept of improving one's play - currently dormant

  SlowTimers - plays casual slow games on the ICC for friendly competition - dormant

  Online slow Chess (60 15) League (OCL) - dormant

 

How to find slow games on the ICC - important advice!

     Slow Chess Organizations:

  On the ICC  Here is a link for ICC help and another link for ICC unofficial help.

  Join the US Chess Federation and play Over-the-board!

 

See the Links page for more online links

A list of ICC players who are willing to play slow (30 5 or slower, preferably!) games against any challenger if they have the time - you can play nonrated if you don't wish the game to be rated. Please respond to all inquiries (one way or another) and give me the courtesy of letting me know when you change your handle or decide to leave the ICC, or if you find someone below who is no longer an ICC member so I can update the list (last updated 02/11/2012 ). Thanks! For a BIG list of ICC slow players, click "Ratings" on the right at the Team 45 45 website.

helioaraujo, mattvd, lee-d, yush96, ray3, WeRallPawns, sapientdust, mrtoduvet, milesotoole, petros-son, alastorx, notyetagm, goirish, mississippian, softpawn, tryin, gojira,  zyme, alpearson, houseofcook, grenadier, receipt, megaskins, wheels, carolinaknight,  bookseller, matthewc, sra66, skylab, zepled37, astrochesspilot, fiercehermit, masterntraining, giltar, w4ip, chrimsom, oldbookseller

How to use this list (use a command line in Blitzin or Dasher):

    1)   You can add all/any with to your notify list with "+notify name" (Use cut and paste with "+notify " to speed this up), or

2)   You can check each with "fi name" to see if they are close in rating to you and only "+notify name" the ones you want.

3)   Once they are on your notify list, you can type “z” to see who is online.

4)   To challenge someone, “fi name” to see if they are busy. If they are not,“tell name xxx” where xxx is your request for a game.

5)   If they agree, you can use the pull-down menu GAME|Match to challenge them.

Internet Chess Club 2 5 Player List (11 Feb 2012 )

The following players are willing to play "2 5" on the ICC (e.g. to practice time management & openings). Please give me the courtesy of letting me know when you change your handle or decide to leave the ICC, or if you find someone below who is no longer an ICC member so I can update the list. Thanks!

cadfael, bmw2002, jlowe, alpearson, zyme, chiefslopgut, grenadier, receipt, megaskins, wheels, softpawn, bookseller, chessman123, keaaw, brerrabbit, legal, astrochesspilot, masterntraining, wmc, bourgeau, lee-d (5 5 preferred), sapientdust .

Note: "2 5" means two minutes for the game with a five second increment. This is helpful practice since US OTB games are usually played with a five second time delay. Suggestions to help augment your learning from these games:

1. Make non-critical moves almost immediately, based on general principles
2. Make critical moves with as much time as reasonable with no danger of losing on time
3. If not sure, assume a move might be critical
4. Never lose on time – much better to make terrible moves and get checkmated
5. Look up game later to see what you could learn from the opening

e-mail from John Brady to someone looking for online slow games:

"Perhaps I can help you find good slow games with people that enjoy the post-game banter and analysis which some of us find very beneficial.

Team 4545 League runs 4 - 6 tournaments per year. Each tournament is 6 rounds of regulation play and then 2 - 4 rounds of playoffs. Play is divided into sections of 200-point team average rating differences from Under 1200 - Under 2200. As the name implies these games are at time control of 45 45 so they are considered long for most ICCers that play blitz (but not long enough for people who prefer 40/2 SD 60 OTB games). The website is http://team4545league.org. There are handbooks there that describe how to register for the next tournament and find a team to play on.

There is also a site http://www.chess9030.com which is all about quads for players interested in, you guessed it, games at a time control of 90 30. It uses a similar bulletin board negotiation and results posting as at 9030. The site is much less engineered than 4545 but it is run very competently and diligently by Harmonicus on ICC. The instructions for signup at the site.

There is also the Slow Time Control bunch. They have individual long running tournaments http://stcbunch.net . I think their tournaments were at 60 0 game last time and I'm pretty useless without an increment.

LeChess is an improving players organization at http://www.lechess.com . I'm not sure they run tournaments per se but they do have various activities including an online game review/tutor program. They feild several teams in Team 45 45 League.

Some of these organizations have dedicated chat channels on ICC:

team4545 channel 365
lechess channel 340
stcbunch channel 90

Some of them operate across web servers:

Internet Chess Club (ICC) - http://www.chessclub.com
Free Chess Internet Server (FICS) - http://www.freechess.org
World Chess Live (WCL) - http://www.worldchesslive.com

Regards,
John Brady
bmw2002@icc"

Dan's 10 Rules for Internet Newsgroup Postings:

1. Few issues are black and white - sometimes correct answers are grey
2. Everyone is entitled to suggest where the grey lies.  An opinion can be based
on bad facts, or misguided, but it is just an opinion, and everyone is entitled
to one.
3. If you disagree with someone, that does not necessarily mean they are
"wrong", unless they have stated a clearly disprovable "fact", such as
misquoting the number of people in Detroit in the 1990 US Census
4. Problems often have many solutions.  Some solutions are better than others,
but sometimes it is hard to tell in advance which solutions may be best.  And
often good solutions have bad, or unforeseen side effects.
5. If something isn't broke, it does not mean it cannot be improved.
6. Sometimes things that are good for the entire (chess) community may be bad
for a subset of that community - you want to minimize doing these things, but
often they cannot be avoided for the good of the community.  A solution equally
as effective that is not bad for anyone is rare but preferable.
7. Open communication is good - a civil exchange of ideas.
8. Consensus ideas can be good, but are sometimes watered down.  Often those in
charge need to consider the consensus and come up with a clear position based
upon, but not necessarily identical with, the consensus.
9. If you end up in the minority or something is ruled against you, you can
still continue to support your point, but you should also simultaneously go
along with the ruling, so long as it is not malicious or harmful.
10. A community's long and short term goals change.  So to have a good position,
it is necessary to re-examine and change your position over time in order to
serve the best interests of that community.