1.d4 d5 2.Nc3!? Nf6 3.Bf4 (My new favorite opening)

There are 2 schools of thought nowadays in the world of chess openings. There is the school that studies grandmaster openings and sleeps with ECO under his/her pillow (they love to play the sicilian and other such openings), and there's the other school that likes to throw the first school for a loop by playing irregular openings. I played one guy the other day who told me about one of his favorite openings; a hybrid of the Scandinavian Defense and the Danish Gambit.

Obviously, this opening is the furthest thing in the world from sound, but he says he's able to win games just by being able to dominate the board with his bishops. I believe him, too; consider the tournament setting where you've spent days perfecting your Sicilian openings (without a doubt endlessly debating between 9.Bd4 or 9.O-O-O), just to be thrown completely off-guard with your opponent handing you 2 pawns and ripping open his own queenside.

I'd suspect, though, that 2.Nc3 on a Queen's Pawn opening isn't the worst decision in the world; only at higher levels do the imbalances of the openings really show their strengths and weaknesses. More likely than not, your opponent will be thrown off guard and miss something because he's used to the "normal" chess opening positions.

wow, crazy position! I wonder if declining the b-pawn is best, just take a single pawn lead and develop

There seems to be a missunderstanding, when I said that time spent studying random ape opening nr 46 is time wasted if he wants to improve. I didn't recommend memorising the sicillian. I´d recommend tactic puzzles, and positional studying, both middlegame, and opening books that touch on the subject. And let's not forget that there are a myriad of usefull and pedagogic ideas in the Ruy Lopez (and other more mainstream openings), which there usually aren't in random ape opening nr 413. And all those ideas will help your game grow, ape opening number 146 is most likely going to help you improve your game as much as smack is.

This opening is known as the "Barry Attack".

It's main proponent over the years has been English GM Mark Hebden and his results with it have been pretty good. The problem with the Barry is that it's a bit of a one trick pony, the white knight on c3 really gets in the way of white's central play. Overall not too scary.

Like all non-mainline d-pawn openings I like to meet this with a fiancetto approach.

I have little respect for crude openings like the barry or veresov.

It's another cop-out like the London or Colle. 

Not that there's anything wrong with copping out...

Thanks for the notes.

I appreciate all of your comments on the opening. I think it is very good and gives White some great chances to win. There is only one move that goves Black equality (Which I will not disclose) and so far nobody as mentioned. See if you can find it.

Any more comment?

The problem with this opening is that first of all there are tho obvious disadvantages, and second of all, it is clear that black is trying to win with the bishops, and therefore are an easy target for white. When you know what is more valuable for your opponent, you know to trade it off. And if you put your bishops in the same diagonals and they refuse to trade, well now your bishops are more powerful. In my opinion, when facing those strange openings the most important thing is staying calm and looking for the best moves rather than panicking because you think the only way he would give away that much material is if he has a clear advantage. That is why, like I said, you should destroy his advantage and use the advantage he gave you. But that's just me...

Interesting comments.

I love irregular openings, this being one (I also like 1.a3, but that is another forum...). I love to play it and almost everybody loses to it. The common moves are Nc6 and Nbd7 and the lose to Nb5.

Any more notes.

Playing for Nb5 tricks to work is not how chess is meant to be played, in my opinion. Below class B, pretty much anything goes though, but those who only play for tricks or curde h file attacks are missing out.

Didn't you argue with me on my 1.a3 forum, Elubas...

Anyway I used Fritz 8 for weaks and there is only one set of moves that gives him equality. All other lines give white a substantial advantage. I have it saved to my computer and would show it to you, but don't want you stealing my new ideas.

Any more comment??

every try I punch into my engine shows black is better... heck, even after the starting spot (1.d4 d5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bf5) it says the game is -0.03. so black has already equilized with only 2 moves played. Its a swindle opening, if you want to take risks at a lower level I would just throw out a different gambit each game :)

Yeah, that computers suck at analysing openings because they don't understand the position. That's why they rely on opening books, at that part of the anti computer strategy is to play a weird move to get out of book, so in fact putting in those opening moves is probably confusing the computer! This opening can't be bad, but it's too simple to be using for a long time. It might make a decent surpise opening, I dunno.

 The answer is somewhat misleading...

1) What engine are you using? Rybka? Fritz 2?

2) The computer makes the mistake of the rating when he follows the mainline. So -0.03 is the best Black gets if we both play accurately. Black can still go wrong in many ways.

Any more notes??? 

C'mon leave a note somebody.

Another thing I like about this opening it takes away from what you need to learn.  That is becasue the opening can come from both main queen-pawn defenses for Black, d5 and Nf6.

Any more notes???

Seems pretty straightforward to play against to me, as long as black realizes he needs to eventually counter in the center with ...c5.

Not true,

The c5 counter-thrust only works in the mainline or else it doesn't matter.

after looking a bit more, I realize that I can just keep it simple and get a much better position with no risks.

1.d4 d5 2.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bf4 Bf5 4.e3 e6 5.Nf3 c6! 6.Be2 Bb4 7.0-0 0-0

now its slav-like, but without a pawn on c4 which hurts because on move 8 its hard to find a good square for the queen to connect rooks.

so I dont think c5 is needed anytime soon at all, although still playable

Very Slav-like.

The reason the Barry Attack works with similar opening moves for white is because black plays g6 and Bg7, so there's something for the h pawn to attack. It's not just a trappy opening. It's been used by several grandmasters. But unlike the suggestion in this thread, the Barry is only used against king side fianchetto move orders by black.

--Fromper