Sunday, January 16, 2005

The Emperor wears no clothes.

I'm still trying to decide my next course of action, should I stay or should I go on with the program.
Now the exercises have me combining lyrics from The Clash and A Tribe Called Quest. Go figure.

J'adoube is finding out how much the software sucks, it has kind of been treated as a given, and both Don and myself have tried to overlook it. I have even gone as far as trimming the Level 70 and above exercises out of the Circles, to alleviate a bunch of the messier problems.
J'adoube however is really grilling each problem with deeper analysis under the ever watchful and ever defensively resourceful Fritz.
His assessment has further confirmed my leanings towards changing software packages, and going with forced lines.
It may be time to call to order the first meeting of the Knights Errant, and give some serious thought as to what next.
Like I said one approach doesn't fit all, and it would probably be impossible to agree on what material to study, given the variety of playing strengths. But maybe we can layout our guidelines on how we will approach our individual training at least. Then continue to use the blogs to compare notes, definitely strength in numbers. Plus the moral support is really nice.






4 comments:

Calvin said...

I definitely agree about the idea of a meeting. I think that I have found a training regimen that would definitely work for me. However, as I live in California, I might have to make my comments online on one of you sites or on my own. Good idea.
Thanx,
generalkaia

Pale Morning Dun - Errant Knight de la Maza said...

Sancho,
While I am still in level 30, I have found several exceptions to the lines given by the program. However, as long as I play against Crafty and my line is confirmed, I don't feel that bad about it. I have to imagine that in the upper levels, there is so much room for interpretation that it's just not possible to do an effective study of a ten or twelve move combination. Truly, how often in chess have players come up with a forcing twelve move combo? I think the CT-Art program suffers because it's trying to do too much.

But then there is the general question of accuracy. So far I haven't found so many glaring errors to say that the program is actually "defective." Yes there are errors, but have you ever seen a Pandolfini book? Good god, you'd think he got a hold of some your mescalin before editing those things. His End Game Course is down right felonious to the tradition of double checking your work.

As I said in Don's blog, I think it's the right idea to truncate the course to focus on the first four to five levels, but no more. Master those combinations and then perhaps try something else.

Interestingly, none of us have really tested our knowledge to date (or at least talked about it). I've played some games with varying success, but I think it would probably boost everyone's morale to get it on with someone over the 64. I bet you'd be impressed with your vision and ability. I mean ultimately that's what this whole thing is for, chess improvement. In a sense, who cares if the software is somewhat faulty, if you are clearly dispatching opponents with new vigor and energy, I wouldn't throw in the towel on CT-Art....just yet.

Unknown said...

A meeting of the Round Table?

We could always use AOL IM or some other chat room device, I suppose. . .

Calvin said...

hi sancho
I was just wanting to let you know that Pawn Sensei and I are planning on meeting at pogo's chess intermediate chess room: greenspan. We were going to meet at 5 pm western time-zone. if you can make it that would be great.

thanks
generalkaia