I don't understand why this opening is popular for 1200's to 1300's I have played against it as white four times today alone. I know the first two moves are the scandinavian. Does anyone know why there seems to be no advantage for black here at all. Granted I did not respond well after move 5 or so, but still picked up the win, and missed a royal fork in the process.

EchosMyron> Does anyone know why there seems to be no advantage for black here at all.

Black never starts with an advantage--his opening goal is equality, or sometimes a slightly worse position that he knows better than his opponent.

EchosMyron> I don't understand why this opening is popular for 1200's to 1300's I have played against it as white four times today alone

No idea. 3...Qa5, 3...Qd6, and 3...Qd8 are all more respectable. And if their goal was to find a Scandinavian surprise, even 3...Qe5+ accomplishes that and is better. My favorite game in the 3...Qe6+ line is Kasparov-Letterman, Late Night Show 1989:

As you can see, 5.Nf3 and 6.d4! works much better than 5.Nf3 and 6.O-O?.

If you want to castle kingside and are uncomfortable about gambiting your g-pawn, another try is 5.Bf3, planning d4, Nge2, and O-O. White's space advantage should give him an edge, although not so much as in the gambit line.

Cat and mouse

It is popular at the club level because it is trappy and tricky and if White has no familiarity with it he is liable to make a major mistake.  Then, being a piece up, using that advantage.  That is Black's plan, hope for a White mistake before a Black one.

his queenside castle was a blunder, castling queenside can be ricky, due to the A pawn

normally Qa5 is played.

Hey, you're lucky - each day I go onto Live Chess and play Black, three out of four people try the Scholar's Mate setup on me. It's really condescending. This is at least a bit more interesting of an opening (albeit still not a good one at all).

I know that feeling really well, I have people try the scholar and fools mate all the time, it is very condescending.

Some reasons:

1) Surprise, some don't prepare much for it

2) Gives black control of the opening instead of having to defend all the white e4 openings after e5

3) Gives an open game for black usually

4) I like 2...Nf6 better

5) Nice change up when you are bored or for blitz chess.

lol that was a fun game thanks for posting

It's popular because begining chess players favor the Queen. It's the BFG of chess and they want to bring it out right away. The other pieces require more skill and subtlety of thought.

Of course, white gains all the advantage by developing pieces while chasing the Q around.