Okay, I know puzzles obviously have a wide range of difficulty. But when I scroll through reddit, or try the chess dot com daily puzzle, I can only solve about a third of them. It discourages me from playing because I feel like I'll never get good. I don't really know what my rating is—I was 900-1000 ish on chess dot com rapid a few years and ago and am now thinking about getting back into it. I understand my question is a little vague because it really depends on difficulty of each puzzle but just looking for any feedback or to see if people were in similar boat but still able to climb elo.
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Most puzzles should be approached like this:
Am I a move away from being checkmated?
If yes: explore ALL ways to put their king in check, first.
If not at risk of instant loss, still look for checkmates, if you don’t get a feel it’s a checkmate puzzle, start looking at trades where you are up a major piece at the end.
I like this advice.
this is the best advice. i got to like, 700 in puzzles just by spamming queen & rook checks & mates.
Do puzzle and you will get better at doing puzzle. At the end it is more pattern recognition than anything for most puzzle. How many can people do doesn't make much sense.
Chess.com daily puzzles get harder through the week with Mondays easiest. I’d say you need to be fairly strong to get them correct through the weekend but not sure what rating that be.
Chess.com regular puzzles are suited to your puzzle score. For example, I’m currently around 1700-1800 puzzle score and am served puzzles around 1500-1650 rating. The puzzle rating doesn’t have anything to do with your Elo. But like Elo, goes up as you improve. You can set difficulty level for puzzles higher or lower though.
I would say do check in two puzzles on Lichess. Just google check in 2. You can set the difficulty for those too. They’ve really helped me start to understand and track where enemy king can move.
An aside, I’ve heard 80% is a good rate for learning information— winning enough to keep you motivated , losing enough to keep you on your toes. If you’re only getting 1/3 of your puzzles, seek out easier puzzles and gain confidence doing those.
We can make puzzles which basically aren't humanly solvable.
All puzzles will be difficult to somebody. People post positions / puzzles which are difficult for them, hoping others might enjoy the challenge. If those puzzles are too hard for you, that's okay! There are some really strong people out there. If you're under 2000 elo, it's a little unfair on yourself to even compare yourself to them - obviously you won't measure up to hardworking players with years and years of dedicated training and experience.
Of course, absolutely have a go at more difficult puzzles! We don't improve if we never push ourselves, but try not to compare yourself too much to others.
Don't do the daily puzzles, do the "solve puzzles" puzzles. You can only do three a day though, unless you're paying for the service, which I highly recommend
What rating is Hikaru?
Are you playing puzzles to get a higher puzzle rating or are you using puzzles as a training method to get better at chess? I only do puzzles to get better at chess, I have a high puzzle rating 2400 on Lichess but I don't care a jot about it I am just trying to get better at tactics to be better in games.
No rating.
It’s always relative. The better you get, the harder your puzzles become, and you essentially maintain the same solve rate.
Similar to ordinary ratings in games. “At what rating do you stop losing games”.
If you face the same puzzle or opponent rating, then probably 400+ points will give you a near undefeated solve or win rate, but if both opponent and puzzle ratings increase to match your new found skill level, your win and solve rates will remain similarly challenging.
That being said, a 30% solve rate is low by most metrics. I’d say aiming for at least 50% is reasonable. 60%+ is fantastic.
You probably need a checklist system “checks captures threats and then prophylaxis (ie. Doing the same in reverse for your opponent if you don’t see an aggressive move yourself) and slowing down to solve them properly and NEVER guess the first move to see if it’s right and then guess the second move etc. try to solve the puzzle entirely before making the first move.