Middle game strategy

Hi, I've been playing a lot of daily games lately and it's helped me significantly reduce the number of obvious blunders I make.  My opening is generally good but I struggle with mid-game strategy.  My games usually get to a point where I don't see a clear strong move I can make.  Are there any guides, books or videos for high beginners I could watch/read to help me with mid-game strategy?

Opening Principles:

1. Control the center squares – d4-e4-d5-e5.
2. Develop your minor pieces toward the center – piece activity is the key. Centralized piece control more squares.
3. (King Safety)
4. Connect your rooks. There should be no pieces between your Rooks.

The objective of development is about improving the value of your pieces by increasing the importance of their roles (Piece Activity).  Well-developed pieces have more fire-power than undeveloped pieces and they do more in helping you gain control.

Now we will look at 5 practical things you can do to help you achieve your development objective.

They are:

1. Give priority to your least active pieces.

• Which piece needs to be developed (which piece is the least active)?
• Where should it go (where can its role be maximized)?

1. Exchange your least active pieces for your opponent’s active pieces.
2. Restrict the development of your opponent’s pieces.
3. Neutralize your opponent’s best piece.
4. Secure strong squares for your pieces.

Don’t help your opponent develop.

There are 2 common mistakes whereby you will simply be helping your opponent to develop:

1. Making a weak threat that can easily be blocked
2. Making an exchange that helps your opponent to develop a piece

Pre Move Checklist:

1. Make sure all your pieces are safe.
2. Look for forcing move: Checks, captures, threats. You want to look at ALL forcing moves (even the bad ones) this will force you look at, and see the entire board.
3. If there are no forcing moves, you then want to remove any of your opponent’s pieces from your side of the board.
4. If your opponent doesn’t have any of his pieces on your side of the board, then you want to improve the position of your least active piece.
5. After each move by your opponent, ask yourself: "What is my opponent trying to do?"

General Ideas.

1. Stop playing blitz, and bullet.  Play longer time controls of at least G45, or longer.  
2. Follow Opening Principles:

• Control the center.
• Develop minor pieces toward the center.
• Castle.
• Connect your rooks.

1. Study tactics...tactics...tactics.  One of my favorite quotes is this: "Until you reach Master, your first name is tactics, your middle name is tactics, and your last name is tactics”.
2. Double Check your moves.  Before making a move, ask yourself: "Are my pieces safe?"
3. After your opponent moves, ask yourself: "What is my opponent trying to do?"
4. Analyze your games WITHOUT a chess engine, then have someone stronger go over the games, or post them online for review.
5. DO NOT memorize openings. Learn and understand the pawn structure, and piece placement for the opening you wish to learn.
6. Learn Basics Mates:

• K vs. KQ
• K vs. KR
• K vs. KRR

1. Learn Basic King and Pawn endings.

• KP vs. K
• Opposition

1. Have Fun!

Here is a video I recently made that is a guide for those who understand the opening to an okay degree, but struggle to find the best moves in the middle-game.

Chess Strategy to Find the Best Moves in the Middle Game

If you have any questions after that, I will be happy to answer!

Pawn Power in Chess by Kmoch.

Might not be the "best" method, but it's a foundational start, it's free, and you can start now:

https://chessfox.com/free-chess-course-chessfox-com/

Read all the articles in the intermediate course (begginner if you need to). Take notes, start a book.

Then try the "10 day challenge";

https://chessfox.com/

A book? Silman's HTRYC. You'll find the process is a little different (there's several ways to go about it). I actually combined the one from chessfox, Silman, and some customization. But the order I started was pretty much what I gave you.

Most openings have basic strategies attached to them by the pawn structures presented.

You might find this helpful:

https://simplifychess.com/homepage/strategy.html

Chessdotcom has the videos mentioned (not sure which membership is required though).

Kmoch's book is great (imo). There are other books, but this should get you pointed in the right direction.

I good source for videos on YouTube:

https://www.youtube.com/c/HangingPawns

Playlist named "Chess Middlegame Ideas"...right up your alley.

Talk to you in a month or so

Good Positional Chess, Planning & Strategy Books for Beginners and Beyond...

https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell/introduction-to-positional-chess-planning-strategy

@7

"I am almost 2000 and i still struggle to make midgame and endgame plans."
Yes, around 2000 you need to study endgames.

Hallo

First of all, try to develop your style of play (tactial or positional). You could read a book or hire a coach to shape up your game skills. Analyze games of grandmaster that is most suitable for you.

Chess.com offers various lessons and courses that cover mid-game strategies.

Practicing tactics has helped me improve a lot.

Thank you for the advice.

Dear DDwildin,

I'm a certified, full-time chess coach, so I hope I can help you. Everybody is different, so that's why there isn't only one given way to learn and improve.

First of all, you have to discover your biggest weaknesses in the game and start working on them. The most effective way for that is analyzing your own games. There is a built-in engine on chess.com which can show you if a move is good or bad but the only problem is that it can't explain to you the plans, ideas behind the moves, so you won't know why it is so good or bad.

In my opinion, chess has 4 main territories (openings, strategies, tactics/combinations and endgames) and if you want to improve efficiently, you should improve all of these skills almost at the same time. That's what my training program is based on. My students really like it because the lessons are not boring (because we talk about more than one areas within one lesson) and they feel the improvement on the longer run. Of course, there are always ups and downs but this is completely normal in everyone's career.

If you would like to learn more about chess, you can take private lessons from me (you find the details on my profile) or you can visit my Patreon channel (www.patreon.com/Bgabor91), where you can learn about every kind of topics (openings, strategies, tactics, endgames, game analysis). I'm planning to upload at least 4 new videos per week, so you can get 4-8 hours of educational contents every month. I also upload daily puzzles in 4 levels every day which are available with a FREE subscription.

I hope this is helpful for you. Good luck with your games!

Wow Gabor! This also will help me. Thanks!

You're welcome.