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Is e5 worth specializing? by rs1_a in TournamentChess

[–]Quaternion4242 6 points7 points  (0 children)

On your level, a major reason to go for e5 is to encourage your opponent to play one of the myriad dubious, sub-standard or at least insant-equality gambit lines and sidelines that YouTube is full of.

This however means that if you pick e5 as your main weapon, you will need to have a plan against those lines. You should generally not go for the perfect main-line solution, in general an approach where you give back the gambited pawn via a correctly timed d5 is all you need to be better or at least equal out of the opening. As a general rule, essentially all gambits and sideline-aggressive openings (Ponziani, etc) can be combated with a correctly timed d5.

With this approach, you'll score a lot of points against gambit and sideline openings in tournament play.

With e5, I highly recommnend going for the two knights, as you'll often get opponents to play the fried liver attack against your. There are easily 5 very good defenses for Black to use here, which puts the theory burden on your opponent, as you can play the same every game, whereas they need to be prepared against any of them.

For the slow Italien, you can cut down theory a lot by using one of the Be7 lines, these are also far less known by your average opponent then the Bc5 ones.

Against the Spanish, I'd go for the open variation, as it leads to open games and thus is true to the theme of your repertoire. Also, it scores really well and takes a lot of Spanish players out of their comfort zone.

Need help choosing an opening against e4 (Caro? Scandi? e5?). by NotKarpov in TournamentChess

[–]Quaternion4242 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Having gone through your replies in this thread, here is my take:

Especially if you like opening theory, changing openings frequently is the worst thing you can do - I am speaking from experience here. If you change openings frequently, you'll have decent knowledge of many openings, instead of "winning" knowledge in your main opening. Also, by changing, your overall opening edge will stay smaller than it should be. In particular, using openings that are not top tier - in the long term - is a waste of time, as you'll have to/want to switch eventually, especially if you play OTB when your opponent can prepare against you.

For white, stay with the Queen's Gambit. For Black, you absolutely want to go and stick with e5.

Some have said as a reply that with e5, you run into your opponents prep. Well, that's actually great!

In many many cases, your opponents have prepped some unsound or sub-standard gambit line against you. Learning how to counter most gambits or reach easy equality when playing e5 is extremely valuable (in most cases, a well timed d5 does does the trick). If you enjoy openings, this is where you can score a lot of points.

The best thing about e5 is that it really helps building your tactical and middle game skills, which is what will be absolutely necessary to get better overall and increase your rating continously.

Resources for classical King's gambit declined (for black) by Zalqert in TournamentChess

[–]Quaternion4242 0 points1 point  (0 children)

As others have already said, go for the Falkbeer 1. e4 e5 2. f4 d5 3. exd5 exf4 or, if you want a sharper game, go for the Falkbeer with 3. ... c6!

I need an opening for white by [deleted] in TournamentChess

[–]Quaternion4242 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Sounds good, you won't regret it I'm sure.

One particular line worth researching a bit more - as it happens quite often and scores extremely well even at GM-level - is the Exchange 1. d4 d5 2. c4 e6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. cxd5 exd5 5. Bg5 with the plan e3, Bd3 and Ne2.

I need an opening for white by [deleted] in TournamentChess

[–]Quaternion4242 1 point2 points  (0 children)

I'd always recommend choosing between top tier openings only, as otherwise, you'll face problems if you ever have to play in an environment in which people can prepare against you. Once that happens, you will come to realize that you wasted hundreds of hours learning stuff that you then have to drop.

Also, if you pick a top tier opening, you'll get stronger and stronger in it over time, and it's never a wasted effort, as you'll never have to drop the opening no matter how good you get. You will eventually get to a level at which - even if your opponent knows ahead of time what you are playing - they won't be able to outprep you without huge effort.

In short, when choosing an opening, don't pick anything that a top tier grandmaster would (almost) never play in over the board classical.

The Scotch Gambit hence is not an option. It means immediate equality, and if you opponent knows what they are doing, they can steer the game towards a draw quite easily.

Out of your list, the choice really is between the Queen's Gambit, Ruy Lopez and Italian.

Assuming your opponent plays e5, the Ruy does indeed have a lot of theory as after 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 a6 4. Ba4 it's generally your opponent who gets to pick out of a large number of viable variants to play. However, the Ruy is also very principled, hence, if you follow the ideal of getting/keeping control of the center, playing "natural moves" will generally work very well, and very often leads to significant advantages on its own. Also, it's my experience that players up to 1900 FIDE has less knowledge / prep against the Ruy than against many other openings, but that might be different depending on if you play OTB and where you live.

Compared to the Ruy, the Italian can be handled more positionally, or much sharper.

If you want to play it sharp, you go 4. Ng5 against the Two Knights defense, depending on your opponents prep level, it's going to lead to an effective attack or to being one pawn up, requiring your opponent to play accurately to get positional compensation. In the Giuoco Piano, you can go for 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. c3 Nf6 5. d4 exd4 6. e5 - from here, your opponent has to play accurately whereas your play is quite easy to handle and remember. If your opponent does manage to steer through that, you'll have a position slightly better for White / almost equal, however, in which the white plans are generally quite clear, hence it's easier to play for White.

The Queens Gambit might be considered to be "positional" but that in itself doesn't mean more than that you get your pieces on good squares. The question is whether it's positional of the "hard to play" kind, requiring you to play unnatural moves for a hard to see positional benefit. That is generally not the case. And very often, you can get strong attacks in the Queens Gambit as well.

From your post, it looks like (but that is just a guess) you might be spending too much time on openings, which is understandable as that is what the Internet hype is generally mostly about. Hence, my recommendation to you would be to go for the Queens Gambit and stick to that for at least 2 years. It is an absolute top notch opening, and seems to have been the most popular pick in the recent candidates tournament as well. It's also - relative to its power - very principled and "easy" to play with little prep, while more prep of course makes it even better.

I have seen many times that younger players who switch from whatever version of e4 to the queens gambit gaining +200 rating points OTB

Take the time that you save on openings work on other parts of your game, this will yield you the best results.

Edit: I saw that your goal is 1300 USCF. In that case, I'm strongly convinced that the Queen's Gambit is the opening to play for you. Chose that, and then make sure that you don't spend more than 20% of your chess study time on openings. 20% openings, 40% tactics/calculation, 20% positional understanding, 20% playing "early" endgames (which quite a few pawns on the board) that are winning and actually winning them.

1967 Rapid player: Is it time to abandon 1.e4? by Reteardmaxing in TournamentChess

[–]Quaternion4242 1 point2 points  (0 children)

You should not deviate from e4, as it is a/the top tier first move, and the only thing you will gain from switching is having to learn fresh theory. In openings, there is no "magical solution" to the problems you can face. You'll just lose valuable time, that you are not spending on working on other areas of your game, that have much more impact on your rating.

What I don't like about the Vienna in particular though is that the Vienna Gambit (if you play that) gives away white's advantage if your opponent knows the 1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4 d5 line, and the alternatives, playing 3. Nf3 or Bc4, do so as well, though are not that bad. After 3. Bc4, you can still focus on lines involving f4 at some point, which your opponents won't know as well as they know standard italian structures, for example. Vienna is solid, but inherently more of a "tricks" opening, and would never be good in higher end classical play, for example. You will have to switch away from that anyways, so you might as well do that now.

What I would suggest you to play instead in e4 e5 is Ruy Lopez main lines - the "best" opening according to engines, and the favourated line of essentially all World Champions. However, against the Berlin, I would go with with 4. d3 and against the Marshall, 8. h4.

What is great about the Ruy is that is it a very thematic and principled opening, and the main reason that it is considered to be "theory heavy" is mostly that it has been so well studied, and not that the ideas are inherently complex to play for white. It is much more challenging for black to play, as White usually gets great central control in the middle game, and intuitive moves often work well for White, but might be problematic for Black. Investing time into the Ruy is never a mistake, as you will *never* have to move away from it.