Chess Strategy: Aggressive or Defensive?
There is no doubt that chess is a game of strategy. People spend entire lifetimes learning about chess and developing their game.
Your personal style of playing chess may differ greatly from a given opponent, and is based on many factors, including the style/s of any mentors you may have had, your learning style, and most importantly the way your brain works. Different people ‘see’ the chess board in their minds in different ways.
Reading your opponent’s style is an important part of chess strategy. Some people play with an aggressive strategy, while others can be said to be defensive. Both styles win chess games, of course – otherwise, only one style would have evolved.
An open strategy, for instance, simply means beginning the game with the inner few pawns, and is a fairly offensive, or aggressive, strategy. The game will progress quickly as the board is opened up and you are both forced to think quickly.
On the other hand, opening moves in a closed strategy are considered defensive, and your game will progress more slowly as your movements are limited. While you will have less, initially, of your more important pieces, this is a good way to learn chess in that it provides for a slower game, allowing you time to think through your moves.
Then again, an open strategy allows you to learn to think ‘on your feet’ quickly, and a closed strategy can be very cleverly used by chess masters.
You will learn to tell from the opening moves of your opponent what his or her style is, and by learning many different strategies yourself, you can be better prepared to deal with the varying thought processes of your oppoents – thus getting the winning edge!
