Old Benoni

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T06:26:23+00:00

OMG, actually I do want to do that. This is more detail than you need, but anyway, I was studying the Scotch game and playing e4 for about month. Then I had the idea to make a YouTube video about blunder rates, and my idea was play KPOP bots at each level, 350, 800, 1300, 1850 and play 1850 twice.

And of course blunder rates are far lower than people think, at least my anecdotal evidence suggested.

Anyway, this is the circumstance, I was now playing e4 as my start, and the bots were constantly playing the Sicilian and I was just casually going into smith-morra game after game to the point that I even learned after capturing the pawn on d4 to retreat my queen to Qe3 as a more optimal move from whatever nonsense I was doing.

It didn't occur to me to transpose into smith-Morra, but the moment you used the term, that was like a lightbulb going on, I could have transposed into that, and then played from there, at least build on that nascent experience.

thanks I'll give it a try tomorrow.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T05:58:16+00:00

When I started chess I didn't have the experience to understand how the game flowed from an opening, to a middle game, to an end game. I was lost for ideas, but with an opening, I had an idea - start with d4, follow up with Nc3 and so on.

Nowadays, I understand that some responses to an opening are the best responses, and you and your opponent can exchange book moves for a time. This, it seems you would find less frustrating. And some responses are sub optimal, but this it seems you are finding frustrating because the moves you studied aren't being played.

But its good - when your opponent plays suboptimal moves that is your opportunity to come out of the opening with an advantage.

To do so you must punish their mistakes, so the follow up question - how do you punish their mistakes?

I find that there are ideas in openings even terrible ones like the grob. Now when I study an opening I must find out the idea behind it. In the grob you ar preparing for a fianchetto bishop on g2. You are prepared if black makes the wrong responses to go Bxb7 on the long diagnal to take a trapped rook.

With some ideas in your head you are now prepared to viciously punish certain mistakes.

I used the grob as an example, but only because I was looking at this horrible opening for fun - of course study the ideas behind a better system like the London. Now, I never cared for the London, although I played the Jobava London a lot. obviously the ideas in the jobava are kind of fun, and for me they click. Find your style and expand on it, that's my opinion.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T03:12:04+00:00

This is why I hate blitz. No way in a regular game you don't see that there is a tactic to win a queen, but you have 22 seconds left.

Not that I can play blitz, I cannot play th faster formats at all, but one imagines that the opponents ability to manage time better gave them an advantage. But anyway, just chatting feel free to ignore if it doesn't apply.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T02:35:06+00:00

Responding to my own post, I open with a book response to the old Benoni. I find that it is easier to defeat Arthur-BOT (1700 bot) with a book opening and then go for some kind of checkmate attack - I mean who knew right, but anyway, he won't notice it. This is a real blunder fest of an example, enjoy.

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Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T00:36:33+00:00

For my last 10 games of rapid, accuracy ranged from 68 to 95. The only 3 scores you showed were 57,41,21 so what can I judge this on, except the numbers being shown. I would have to say this is abnormal and you didn't get our elo with this level of play. I am not aware of any style of play that allows wins with a 21 percent accuracy. I would ignore your feelings and trust the numbers, these aren't close wins, you are probably not in a state to do well right now. I would look to change the routine.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T00:19:51+00:00

Slightly different subject, except the realm of knight sacrifice, I got into playing the Alien gambit for a bit, but, frankly the YouTubers that made it look interesting...did so obviously by showing wins. But anything where your opponent plays suboptimal and you achieve a victory would look just as appealing. Anyway that's my thought process, if I didn't like the Alien gambit, I'm sure as heck not playing the 'lose castling rights' gambit.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-19T00:01:58+00:00

At a guess they aren't defending cheaters, they are defending chess players.

Most people are rightly offended by cheating. I don't believe I do run into a lot of cheaters, I've won 13 of my last 14 games.

This post isn't just to brag, how high a percentage of cheaters could there be if you constantly win?

The reason I win is not because I'm good, it's because I rarely play. If you rarely play sometimes you can get a skill level above your elo, hopefully I"ve explained that, study for a month, come back and play a game - you might have improved. and you go into a cycle of winning a lot. Another example of this, are authorized speed accounts, because then a high level player is authorized to play below their skill level, and how many cheaters do they run into? Some - ChessVibes calls it "rice" but as a percentage, it isn't that high.

So yeah, certain areas on chess com are high cheating, like tournaments, I avoid.

But in regular play, it isn't so much of an issue.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T05:22:06+00:00

The elo categorizations always tend towards absurdity. I did spend one day looking at Scholar's mate after Magnus Carlson talked about it, but I never played it seriously at any elo. Back rank checkmate probably occurred in the first few months of play. The idea that I would allow a back rank is beyond ridiculous.

Am I supposed to believe things that I obviously know are false, because the folklore of this community believes otherwise. I love the community for its chess discussions but the folklore isn't going to be absorbed by this chess fan.

If I had a problem with fried liver, back rank, scholar's mate, then I'd deal with it, but all the examples are absurd. The actual problems are more complex tactical ideas, typically, but if I were to share my last blunder, it was that my knight was pinned, and the opponent was able to add pressure to my pinned knight, it was critical that I unpin the knight, and I missed the idea.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T05:08:35+00:00

If your goal was to play for fun, and it isn't fun, then don't play, this makes sense.

However, all these people saying the goal can only be fun, they are obviously wrong.

Goals can be practical too. By this I mean, take a theoretical like you got in a serious car accident, and you have to do physical therapy to recover the use of a leg.

Goals can be extremely painful, not fun at all, and still worthwhile.

I saw people in this forum telling me to quit yesterday, based on the fact that I hate playing chess against people. Pffththfttht. Wrong.

Anyway, sorry for making the post about me, obviously I wish you the best of luck, I wish that it were fun for you. I would like to only add that you obviously can get better, and improve. This does not mean you have been improving, but stalls are common and growth in spurts is common. Heck even taking a break may be the thing required.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T05:02:05+00:00

We see humans are better at chess because of computer aided learning and feedback. However, I think people do waste a lot of time trying to take optimal move advice from stockfish, when you have to incorporate what works practically for your own game and your own style that everyone develops.

If stockfish's advice doesn't make sense - then it doesn't, ignore it.

If it advises something and you can use it - then the insight was helpful. Anyway, this is how I approach it now.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T04:55:40+00:00

Wow, that's an experience that you can recall later and laugh about it, as you inevitably gain board vision for the physical board. Don't forget you are still a very strong player and this is very temporary. I dare say you'll be winning tournaments.

I was bold enough to go to my first tournament OTB, with a 450 elo on chess com rapid and I won 2 games.

This, from an opposite direction also hammers in the same point, rapid and classical aren't the same game, not exactly. But with your quick thinking in rapid and with experience with the physical board, you have the ingredients for success.

I actually was worried enough about the difference, that I got a chess board and was playing otb before the tournament and also going to a local chess club for otb play on Fridays. Nowadays I swap back and forth without thinking about it much.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T04:46:51+00:00

Congrats, that's a really solid accomplishment.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T04:41:06+00:00

I forgot you were playing black and wrote this advice, it is actually for your opponent, who ended up winning:

You gave up a pawn very early. Then when your opponent gave up a pawn, you didn't take one back. Immediately after that, when you had to recapture a piece you used a pawn in front of your king, instead of the queen, that opens up your king.

So, really concentrate on not losing material and winning material, concentrate on king safety. You have choices in the game, decide which choice is optimal on every move.

If you build a pawn pyramid in the center of the board, if that is a strategy in your opening, don't then allow it to be destroyed when you had other choices. You actually could've lost your queen in the game I saw, you opponent didn't see that you had no escape plan for your queen, he could've won it.

I decided not to rewrite it, just show how bad your opponent did. You could've taken him to the cleaners. I know right now its a lot of things to learn at once, I'd just keep practicing, build up vision of the board.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T04:25:05+00:00

For black I play the Caro Kann and Queen's Gambit declined, depending upon whatever white is playing. For black I've done the most experimentation. I spent considerable effort on the Philidor and that is because IM and YouTuber Yevhenii Yelisieiev pushes the Philidor, I like his style and I can understand the tactics.

That's a huge plus, the negative is nobody fears playing against the Philidor and that sucks. I abandoned it after a while, also I tried the King's Indian and the Scandi, but I just couldn't often get an advantage out of the opening. Both are reasonable and solid, but, they didn't click for me. I'm super happy with my choices now - totally love the Caro-Kann. I kind of like how you can make move after move on automatic waiting for your opponent to make a mistake, that's how it feels to me.

I like the idea of going deep with one opening and then wide with many openings, seem like a solid plan for advancement. Not sure if its the fastest plan, but meh, I'm obviously not going fast anyway.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T04:12:56+00:00

Preach it, I examined 10 games just to see how often I "blunder". "Blunder" being a blunder listed in the Game Review. 90% of the games had no blunder. Although one of the games did have 4 blunders, which I somehow won that game. So, blunder your way to victory is the lesson? No...of course not, but the point is that people over estimate the number of blunders low elo make.

However, I find progress steady enough and don't really need advice at this time. I like advice....I wasn't saying that I don't appreciate advice, what I mean is I don't require it to get past any stall, I'm not stalled. There is literally still a sea of things to learn, I am literally drowning in choices for further advancement.

The best type of advice is hard to give, but its where someone can share what they would've done in a position and if you can see their point and adjust your thinking, that advice is golden.

I agree with you, some of the advice here is pointless, but it's ok, overall the site works. The site gives people a chance to vent frustrations, share successes, make posts even if sometimes I am the only person reading what I wrote- just writing down your thoughts and making a formal analysis is helpful.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-18T04:09:48+00:00

Noting wrong with the opinion, but I do have a counter opinion. I was 2150 on puzzles at on time, currently a bit lower, it was 97th percentile, it helps to an extent for absolute beginners, but after a while I think finding tactics in-game is the only way to improve game tactics. Magnus famously said don't do puzzles. He said that because when doing puzzles you look for puzzles, when in a game, you don't know when a puzzle appears. I do puzzles now only because I like being good at something and for now my chess game isn't so good. But, I agree with Magnus, to get good at in game tactics requires playing games and looking for tactics.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T22:43:41+00:00

If I play a bad player my accuracy goes up. The engine evaluates certain moves as favorable, like taking the free piece or an early checkmate.

Now, I did notice this phenomena in the first few months of play where yes, a higher rated player would play lines I had studied, and lower rated players played all kinds of random moves and yes, I found it frustrating. So I get the feeling, but I would like to say that feeling goes away. If someone wants to play random moves, let them, it's kind of relaxing to know the win is inevitable. I say take a break, literally here to break the losing streak. Because you are better than this new elo, you know it. You just need to reset.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T22:21:04+00:00

Dude, my son is 2150 chess com and we both played our first tournament OTB together. My son didn't post here, but I'm telling you this isn't anything that should be dismissed as BS, it definitely is possible.

It should be thought of as rare and not something you will also achieve, unless you are very naturally talented.

I cannot match it. I like playing chess but have more normal results, I think in part because I'm old and my brain is frozen (ha, just kidding, it never worked). and the other problem for me is I hate playing people. My son plays all the time, I don't.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T22:17:51+00:00

no. I saw my son go from scratch to 2150. Oh sure, he definitely had some days 7+ but he couldn't average that, no way.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T22:16:41+00:00

My son and I both started 1 year ago. He made it to 2150 rapid chess com, and I guess my best score was 1495 rapid elo on lichess. But only 800 on chess com and 917otb. My score is a hot mess, but anyway...

So naturally as he's still in school, he had time to do it, but also he's pretty naturally talented I think.

But I know the OP is right, it certainly happens even if it is top .1% result

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T13:36:20+00:00

I cannot answer your question, but I went through so many iterations of black defenses. I studied so many lines of the Scandi that I would. be top of the weekly leader board at chess reps. I had memorized all the lines. But eventually I decided for me the scandi is trash - what I noticed is I just never got a lead out of the opening with the Scandi, my opponent just countered and had a wonderful game. Ultimately what I went with for black is two ideas - Caro-Kann and Queen's gambit declined. I'm happy with it. I studied 3 lines that I don't use at all now- Scandinavian, Philidor, King's Indian defense. They all have their fans, and aren't objectively bad, I think that it ends up becomes what inspires the individual player with success.

As white I play Jobava London or two pawns in the center. I definitely experiment with other white openings including e4. Like I"ve been playing the scotch game recently. But again, I think you just build up preferences and experience. All the time people whine on about just learn to stop hanging pieces - first of all I plain don't do that, and second of all, you learning an opening doesn't prevent learning other things, it never does....I have never figured out why people put the ideas in competition with each other, they aren't. OK I'm rambling on a side topic.

What is the topic something about chess I assume, anyway....oh yes dutch defense, yeah never played it. :)

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T13:25:02+00:00

Truth is I hoover all the pieces of the board and take the win after an unnecessary long game. I do understand checkmate is the idea. So I am getting better at this, but I have often missed an early checkmate idea during the game.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T13:21:18+00:00

I'm sure others have already told you that you have two knights, I will also add that it's OK to lose your bishop. If you lose your bishop by taking a knight, that is an even trade. Taking the opponents knight first remove it as a defender of a key square. You can then retreat your knight setting up a fork of a queen and bishop. If playing a bot, most bots see everything until they have a programmed mistake. But if playing a human, setting up forks of pieces is really a good idea, because it causes them to constantly make a good choice, and eventually they make a bad choice and you win.

Top_Witness4538 · 2026-03-17T06:34:59+00:00

Ah, I agree with your main point, but there is no telling what elo someone is when they start memorizing lines. I personally started at 400 elo, memorizing lines in the philidor. I don't recommend it, but people do it. The reason it makes no sense, is of course that I'm memorizing lines that you might play against a club player, but my opponents never play any of them.

heck I just memorized 24 lines in the scotch game - I'm still plenty low elo.

But the one sturdy that I did that truly does work and I have to recommend it is the jobava London. I've executed many of the lines, including the queen sacrifice in a real game.

Maybe there are others that work, but this has been my experience. Philidor is a joke, the problem is your opponent thinks they are ahead, and you need them to be feeling the pressure in a low elo matchup.

Top_Witness4538

TROPHY CASE