Ah yes, the "shut up I'm better than you" defence. I thought they refuted that...

I'm not sure whether to laugh or shake my head at this thread

Yes but my favorite, "lets not get into a flame war and ruin a good thread" variation never gets played, oh well

by the way how is the Kings Gambit unsound?

just cause I sac a pawn for rapid development, tempo gain and getting a lot of preasure on that semi open f file, I think it is great,

if you are criticle of any line just simply tell me what move you would play and when

Only once have I played Nf3, other than that one OTB game (which Btws I won playing the double muzio) , I always play Bc4, its a better line

Neither do I. I've been meaning to answer it for a while but tried to refrain from doing to avoid making it worse, but I really can't get worse...

To put it bluntly, you guys rated around 1300, be it online or blitz. In what universe does that make you good players ? You all agree that beginners should first work on tactics before learning opening or imbalances. The issue is that you guys seem to not consider yourselves as beginners. Your ratings show that you are beginners, and you will be for a long time, even with a significant rating jump.

I'm higher rated than you guys, and consider myself a beginner. I see you guys talking about you know your lines, but without memorizing them, playing instead thematically, understanding the underlying ideas and strategies. Well, mindlessely exchanging dark square bishops because it's thematic to hang a piece or miss a game losing tactic three moves later does not qualify as "understanding an opening ideas".

The worst thing is how you guys actually chose to play highly theoretical and complex openings, talking about how you mastered the closed ruy loez or some sicilian lines... Become a GM after having playing those openings for years in hunderds of games, then you'll be able to talk about how mastered them.

The other bad thing is your opinion about openings, showing how actually weak your knowledge is. Talking about how this or this line is better, or about the fact that the Caro wins by force for black (while it's widely used as a drawing weapon at high level), talking about Beating the open games as giving you the lines to stop worrying about the Italian or the Viena while it's a repertoire book focused on lines that, according to the author, give Black equality in the middlegame and not forced wins against well established openings...

Friendly advice: pick up one opening, play it as often as you can when your opponent gives you the opportunity to do so, focus on tactics, endgames and basic postional ideas for the next couple of years. Stop acting as if you were better than what your ratings show: you have played enough games to make it accurate.Admit that you're still beginners that shouldn't worry about openings, and that you'll still be at that stage after a 400 or 500 rating jump.

And stop this nonsense, please.

lol gavinator calling us dummies. The above post was referring to you too smart one.

@bguigz who said the caro is a forced win by black?

My bad, it wasn't you, it was the Silman quote you posted. Anyway, that wasn't really the point of my post...

I honestly didnt even read most of that post, I have so much on my plate right now.

I know that wasnt really your point. I agree with some of the stuff you said, compared to the titled players we are all just beginners lol. And I also agree with what you said about just playing ideas thematically, jet said that, which I disagree with. He just got two wins on me doing that, but I'm trying to get the feel for the dragon right now

BTW, the e5 thing is to force the knight to a passive position, trading Dark Squared Bishop ruins the integrity of the Fianccheto position around the King, exchange sac to disrup the pawns around the king(if that is not specific, it creates a hole in the kings guard to attack), and opening the h-file leads directly to the king, I understand the ideas of the dragon to a point, not completely, but with a general idea of how to

Here is a short analysis of the Nf6 line

simply put white gets his pieces out quickly and pointing towards the Black King, and he rules the center

A. I dont consider myself even close to an IM, that is actually my chess goal

B. Let's try to keep this friendly and not call each other dummies

C. I never put a special emphasis on openings. If you want to be truly good, you have to be good at every part of the game. tactics is more important for beginners yes, but if you truly want to expand you have to learn every part of the game.

yeah I think he meant later or earlier, I know I am not great, but I know that I can improve, and admiting that you are a beginer and have to treat yourself as one is highly demoralizing, to me you should first find the area you need to improve, me, position, tactically I can hold my own, sometimes I go overboard, but hey that is once in a long while. but treating yourself like a beginer can make a person give something up, so I just ask how to improve, simple practice play and get into debates

unless we have worked on tactics a lot already

@jet lets bring some positive advice into this forum. You need to work positionally, I recommened Silman's Reassess Your Chess.

My weak spot is endgames, I know about opposition and stuff, but I need to learn advanced techniques. Anyone know of a good endgame book?

what do you mean by hanging material? I hardly ever leave hang a piece and just leave it undefended, but sometimes I miss basic tactics from moving too fast or more advanced tactics

i often go overboard and use a 3 or 4 move tactic to win a pawn

yes I do practice. I work on all areas of my chess, not just one

well when rated 14xx at tactics, I would say I can see most stuff, I even see at the end of the puzzles that there are oprotunities for play(except in the find mate ones) like a discovered attack, or something.

also I sovle a lot of puzzles posted from GM games (in the articles) with non discript guidelines fairly quickly (<15 seconds) intuitively, aka no calculations. like that fischer tal draw in Serper's recent article on hating the new FIDE rules. I solved it all with in a minute, and I only knew the result would be a draw, not how.

so I need to improve position and endgame play as well as basic calculation. tactically I still need to practice, but the days when I hang the big one (mate or loss of huge material) are prettymuch over unless I play at night.

I talked to my chess coach, an IM, and he agreed with me that ratings are rough and oftens times dont depict their real strenth.

I am USCF rated, but Ive only played 5 rated games, so its way off measure

I don't have a rating as I don't know of any clubs near me, and between Track and Field and homework, I don't have time. plus I am very strict with where I spend my money

I believe that we should work on everything, but focus on one thing at a time. Like if you have 10 hours a week to study (not including playing) then I would focus on one subject, say imbalances, for 4 or 5 hours, but i will still have time to study endgames, tactics, openings, ect. As Ive been saying, to be good at chess you have to be good in all areas, not just tactics or openings or endgames