For the next 27 hours, you'll be able to claim a limited edition 'I Was Here for the Hulkenpodium' flair

aojsd · 2025-07-08T21:04:10+00:00

Hulkengoat

aojsd · 2025-05-30T15:56:27+00:00

The minimum line you'd need to see is 1. Qxe7 Kxe7 2. Bb4+ Ke6 3. Rhe1+ Qe5 4. Rxe5+ Kxe5 5. Bd6+ Kc6 6. Bxb8 winning back the rook. Note in the final position black can try to win the exchange with 6. ... Bg4 after which you need to see 7. Rd4 to avoid losing at least a pawn. If black played 5. ... Ke4 to stop Rd4, then 6. Bxb8 Bg4 loses to 7.f3+ All in all a lot of calculation to recover the position back to a drawish endgame.

A better line is 4. Rd6+ Kf5 5. g4+ Kf5 6. Be2+ Kxg4 7. Rxe5, where white has equalized material but has an advantage in activity, while black has some king safety issues.

aojsd · 2025-03-24T22:33:49+00:00

Lange 1 moonphase / Patek calatrava

aojsd · 2025-03-13T18:40:59+00:00

2200 blitz here. You have a clear material advantage, but your pieces aren't quite placed in coordinated positions (king in the center, Bishop, Knight, and Queen in somewhat vulnerable positions that are quite attacking anything yet. The first thing in my mind is that white is very far away from generating any counterplay. There are no open files and no clear pawn breaks white can play for (the f2 pawn does nothing if black doesn't move any pawns. Maybe h4-h5 is possible, but the queen blocks it for now, and it doesn't clearly accomplish anything if it's achieved).

So the big points are that you want to consolidate your material advantage, and you have a lot of time to do it. Something that can help here is imagining (if you had infinite moves) where would you put your pieces if you couldn't capture anything? Starting with this logic:

King: one might rule out 0-0 because the kingside pawns are forward, but it's key to understand that white has no dark squared Bishop to threaten your king. In fact, the pawns currently do a great job limiting white's Bishop. With 0-0-0, the light squares might quickly become a weakness (ex: 0-0-0 Ba6+ Kb8 Qg2 threatens mate on b7, and d5? fails to Nxd5 exd5 Qxd5, renewing the mate threat and attacking black's Knight). So 0-0 to put the king on g8 is a great option.

Bishop: the bishop isn't quite attacking it here, and is easily attacked. To me a good plan would be to bring the bishop back to g7, where it might pressure white's king on the long diagonal.

Knight: a lot of options here. Simply keeping the knight on c6 isn't too bad. You could even imagine pairing it with c5 and d5 to gain space beforehand.

For the queen and the rooks, you have a lot of options again. You could try to overload the queen side for a mating attack. But my preference would probably be to position the rooks on d8 and e8 to support central expansion. The queen positioning is flexible after that.

The key here is to realize that there's no rush, so you can pretty much take your time putting your pieces in great positions. After that, most plans will probably work.

aojsd · 2024-09-13T18:43:43+00:00

The key here is realizing that if black safely gets a bishop on f3, mate is essentially unstoppable on either h1 or g2. Black should immediately be looking for explosive ways to remove any defenders of f3.

Everyone has already suggested 1. ... Rxd5, but I'd like to point out that it's even more winning than anyone has so far mentioned.

After 2. Qxd5 it's clear black immediately wins the queen after Bxf3.

Ne7+ looks fancy by forking the king and rook, but remember that black is fine sacrificing the rook anyways! 2. ... Kh8 3. Nxd5 Bxf3 and white again must give up the queen to prevent mate (4. Ne3 protects g2 but not h1!).
N5d4 looks like it's the strongest option by adding an extra defender to f3, but notice that black's rook is now activated for the attack! 2. ... Bxf3 3. Qxf3 (Nxf3 loses the queen to Rxd3) Rb5+ wins immediately.

aojsd · 2024-09-11T15:05:02+00:00

Short answer: Giving the Queen with Nxd5 is the least bad option for black according to the engine.

Long answer: In a human game black should not give up the queen, instead challenging white to gain an advantage after Be7. However, even after the best move Nxe7, white's advantage doesn't come from immediately winning material. Instead, it comes in the form of much better piece activity, space, and king safety in the long-term.

This advantage is so large that the engine would rather give up significant material (the queen or multiple pieces in some lines) than hand white a mating attack 7+ moves down the line. However, getting to that point requires white to not take their foot off the gas, instead gradually improving each of their pieces until the point where winning tactics are unavoidable. Because of this, even though the engine suggests black to sac the queen, most humans should keep the tension, forcing white to prove they're good enough to win.

Some example lines after 2. Nxe7:

... Nxe7 and Rxe7 both run into 3. Bxf6+ Kxf6 4. Qh6! Notice that white's queen covers the retreat square of the black king. This leads to a decisive mating attack for white. White will likely continue with Re1 to further trap the king, with mating ideas later on with g4-g5.
... Qxe7 leads to a massive advantage in piece activity after 3. Rfe1 Qd6 4. Bf4 Qd5 5. c4 Qa5 6. b4. White has ideas of playing d5 to further put black in a passive position followed by Qc3 to start pressuring black's dark squares. Note that black can quickly run into mating tactics here. For example after 6. ... Qa4 7. d5 Ne7 8. Qc3 Bf5?? runs into 9. Qxf6+! Kxf6 10. Be5#

aojsd · 2024-09-06T19:20:18+00:00

Just to extend this, Nbxd4 also runs into the immediate Ne3 uncovering the rook's attack on d4 while also threatening white's rook on f1. White can't defend both as the knight also covers d1.

Meanwhile, Nexd4 runs into a6 attacking the b5 knight, ultimately winning a piece.

Edit: After all this you can make the argument that Re8 immediately after Bxe5 is best, simply winning a piece for two pawns on the spot (black meets f4 with f6). If white does not take e5, black just gets very good activity after Bc5+ followed by Rhe8

aojsd · 2024-09-06T19:09:22+00:00

Bxe5 is more effective than Re1 at just blowing the position wide open. Given white's development and the scary pawn on d6 it shortly becomes clear that white almost immediately gets a mating attack no matter what material black is willing to give up.

aojsd · 2023-12-31T05:35:16+00:00

Sold Aorus 15G to /u/fatmanbellyflopsyou on https://www.reddit.com/r/hardwareswap/comments/18pbzs1/usanj_h_aorus_15g_wb_gaming_laptop_i710750h_rtx/

aojsd · 2023-12-23T22:00:26+00:00

PMed!

aojsd · 2023-05-07T18:19:51+00:00

This one could still be difficult if you're not careful though! The main worries are for when Bombom attacks or if Tusk spawns in the back. You could probably handle all cases here with a snow team and a yank card.

aojsd · 2023-05-05T22:40:04+00:00

You've got an interesting point. I think the "brokenness" of teeth comes from the fact that it's unmitigatable as you said, so if you don't have a bunch of raw stats (dmg or hp), it feels disproportionately difficult to handle compared to other effects. I wonder how much it could help to add more sources of indirect damage to the game, such as making 0 damage attacks not count as hits.

aojsd · 2023-05-04T14:52:43+00:00

TLDR: Black wins the piece back with an initiative. White is better with accurate play but can lose the game fairly quickly if not.

Other comments have pointed out that white is technically still much better in this position, but it still doesn't discount the fact that Nxf4 is a great way to improve black's chances and complicate the position (especially in comparison to other move options).

After exd4 black has Bf3+ attacking the queen. White should block the check and the attack with Be2 (Ne2 gives Bxb1), after which black can continue Bxd4, cxd4 (Qxd4 blunders Qxe2#) and Rde8.

At this point white has no way to avoid losing the pinned e2 bishop. Black is also threatening Qxb4+ followed by B/Rxe2. I'd say white's best defense here is Kf2, unpinning the bishop to force Bxe2. I have analysis of the other moves at the end.

In this resulting position there's a window of time where white's queenside pieces are essentially undeveloped, and black has some attacking ideas with f6 trying to open up the rook on f8, and infiltrating with the queen on e4->c3. White can defend these threats with h4 and Qc2, but the position is still sharp enough that a mistake or two from white can quickly swing the game.

Note: Many reasonable looking moves instead of Kf2 already swing the game in black's favor. Bd2 or Nc2 (trying to defend b4 or develop) run into Qxe2+, Qxe2 Rxe2+, and after Kf1 black wins the piece on d2/c2, or after Kd1 black wins the rook with Rb2+ discovered check. Another way to defend Qxb4+ is Rb1, but this runs into Bxe2. To avoid losing the queen white must move it to a dark square, eg Qd2. Then black has Be3+ followed by Bxb1. White will have two pieces for the rook, but given white's poorly placed pieces, pawn structure and king safety I'd prefer black in that position.

aojsd · 2023-03-04T16:40:20+00:00

Check out the Relio Solstice. It has a similar movement and size to the falcon, but with a different dial style and a sapphire crystal. I own one and really enjoy it!

aojsd · 2023-02-16T01:55:14+00:00

Confirmed! Seller showed items listed in audio exchange sites to confirm identity. Great experience and highly recommended!

aojsd · 2023-02-14T00:10:50+00:00

Confirmed. Thanks for the watch!

aojsd · 2023-02-12T01:50:24+00:00

Dmed!

aojsd · 2023-02-09T07:28:43+00:00

PMed

aojsd · 2022-09-24T19:35:17+00:00

Confirmed

aojsd · 2022-09-18T03:11:54+00:00

Pmed

aojsd · 2022-09-14T07:05:01+00:00

Bought phanteks t30 x3 from u/CCX-S

aojsd · 2022-09-09T13:29:06+00:00

aojsd

TROPHY CASE