Best first opening repertoire for beginners to improve

hi dear chess player. i need to book (Chess openings: theory and practice Book by Horowitz). What person can to send me the PDF version of this book?

Benko for active play.

By the way find sources with a lot of explanations, not only lines to rote memorize (quite useless).

+1 

Would not recommend.

https://chessmood.com/course/1-starter-course-winning-with-white An unlocked course from grandmaster!

@cocolove2018 you shouldn't be "memorizing" the moves just for the sake of moving... I hope you are trying to understand why the moves are played. Also, it's hard to say this without sounding egotistical, but... sub 1500s are kinda bad.

LOL. How many of your 1100 opponents play 10 moves of theory?

I mean beginners should play whatever to gain a sense of what they like (beginner being 800-1400). I remember being 1100 and played everything: the Van Krujis, the Reti, QG, English, French, Vienna Game, Italian, Caro Kann, Sicilian, you name it. As I progressed, I gradually found some opening which I liked and stuck to them, after which I eventually stopped playing other openings. I'm at 1600 and I now know what openings I really enjoy playing--now it is time for me to invest further time into researching those openings. 

However, people who are completely new to chess should play stuff like the Giuco Piano, and maybe, on occasion the queen's pawn opening for something slightly different. THe Giuco Piano is very easy for most people to grasp and the setups are generally the same. 

Also I think that 1400 is the rating in which most people have already decided which openings they really like. I think the stage of opening experimentation comes at around 1000-1200. 

1900 FIDE is very high to not have any opening repertoire.

I can recommend a few:

Ruy: Barden's old book is excellent IMO (descriptive notation tho) and I've heard very good things about Caruana's book.

Tarrasch: There were a few recent articles in Chess Life that give the opening lines in less than 20 pages. Samarian has an old pamphlet that does so too. For a book I really like Bezgodov's. It also has more than 300 annotated games which is the best way to learn how to  play the MG positions that result.

Open Sicilian: 3 come to mind: 'Sicilian Sacrifices', Yrjola's book on 'Classical Sicilian' and Kopec's 'Mastering the Sicilian'

For IQP's 'Isolani Strategy' is great.

For the French, there is an old RHM press book that I think is the best at explaining the French (although not latest theory).

For the Panov vs C-K-- if you play the Tarrasch you  can do OK by just playing it like a generic IQP position rather than seeking critical lines.

-Bill

Probably from someone who has not read it.

It is so good, that New In Chess has trimmed the price of the e-book to less than half the initial price, at 10 euros.

I have read it, and it is a bad book. You can find many more suitable ones.

In some lines his analysis is just sketchy, or nonenxisting, while in some other lines he goes down to analyse tiny details, which will be never understood by his audience.

Heck, even himself may make some grave error in these lines- proof his Tata Steel game against Magnus, where he blundered that juicy d4 pawn in a line he was advocating in his book!

  Thanks! Your reply just saved me some money!  - Bill

I am taking your statement at face value, comments of yours that I've read have been "to the point". I haven't read the book, so don't have my own opinion on this matter .

but ..why is this happening these days??

In the old days there was a lot of book "outsourcing". A book would shipped instead with a great player's name but the analysis would be outsourced god knows where. Here however you mention he does play the lines he preaches.. , so this can't be the case.

Also in the old days a book could be too ambitious and contain a lot of analytical errors, these days I gather this is rare as books are computer checked and editorial standards look much higher as well.

Caruana is a top GM, an ex WC candidate, he plays the Ruy and at the same time in the market there are good and accurate books written by FMs these days ( not intended as a veiled snarky comment for FMs but there's a gap between a FM and a WC candidate ).

I don't mean to sound like a fanboy but Caruana is also considered to be one of the best prepared players, openings-wise. Why isn't a book these days on par with the brand and performance of the player...

The Panov does not always lead to IQP positions, Black has choices. It's a great line ( though one needs to pay attention to drawing sublines, two endgames in the Panov that are fairly drawish ) but it's not only about IQPs.

 I'm sure you are right- it's just that every time I've played it, roughly 1 time in 3 CKs, it has.

 I've done better as white by just looking for good moves rather than trying to recall theory.  At my level (the step below NM whatever its called) there are plenty of drawish endgames winnable against typically younger opponents.

- Bill

By the description of "beginners" here which I think more aptly is weak intermediate players, I don't think there is a "best" repertoire for improvement.

I can make a case for true beginners that the Italian as white, e5 Nc6 as black, and d5 QGD, but by the time you're in the 1400s players already have certain characteristics to their game that make different opening choices valuable to them.  The Najdorf is a great choice for some people and a terrible choice for others.

IMO the best repertoire for improvement is the one you enjoy playing and will keep trying to get better at. Some variety in position is also desirable to get exposed to different ideas, but I think "system" players get more of a bad rap than they actually deserve. 

This depends on the Black player, I am not challenging your experience, it certainly does happen that IQPs pop out of the Panov in CK, but it is not a universal truth, there are more pawn structures that can come out and often do come out.

The two endgame lines ( one for Nf3, the other for Bg5 ) can be played till bare Kings of course, aiming for a win. But it will be hard to win vs someone who has played these endgames a couple of times. The trouble with these endgame positions, as opposed to playing in general an equal position for a win, is that these specific equal positions have been exhaustively studied.

White of course can deviate so that those endgames are not reached, but again it's not the case that a technical IQP position must always be reached. 

The Panov is a great, but it's not only about IQPs, though the IQP is certainly one of the pawn structures that can come out of the Panov.

Ultimately, in terms of positions we can play well due to preparation, it's a bunch of pawn structures that we know plus a bunch of concrete positions that we've studied in terms of concrete lines. I guess system players keep these sets to a bare minimum but ultimately, ex-professionals, we all can only know a finite corner of chess.

E.g. if you take a (non-professional) Caro Player and ask them to play the Black side of a Dragon Yugoslav attack, it wouldn't be a surprise if they were playing 200-400 rating points below, and vice versa. Same goes for habits that stem from opening choices i.e. if they aim to go for a more static equality or a more dynamic one in the middlegame, it's not only about blitzing some theory moves. 

Some professionals of course do play excellently a very broad number of pawn structures and concrete positions. For the rest of us it's a case of choosing the geography we'll know well.

If a system player is happy with the part they know and it's sufficient to play against the opposition they want to play, there's nothing wrong with that.

From my point of view 

a : doesn't matter but the important thing is to play openings that we understand and that aren't bad or maybe outright losers.

with Black two examples of what not to do :

1 : mainline 1) e4 e6 2) d4 d5 3) e5 this opening is good or strong enough but if we do not understand anything we do not play it because for example we'll play "bad strategic moves" like 3)...Nc6 and as we don't understand anything we won't even have the idea to play a x)...f6.

2 : sideline 1) e4 e5 2) Nf3 f6 we'll just play a trash and if we are not an artificial intelligence it would be nice to use our human intelligence not to produce bots errors 

b : First the classic game because before playing the hypermodern game we have to understand and know more or less how to play the classic game which is still an important base of the game to know.

c : Preferably open because first of all it allows us to progress more quickly in tactics which is essential when we are "noob" and because when we are not good enough in closed games we make draw, laborious games etc. 

d : the question makes no sense to me, even if we cannot master the game of chess like a super super super calculator could perhaps do we always play the position because the game of chess has a mathematical dimension which makes a position either win, lose or draw. The tactic is to punish the tactical errors of the adversaries and the important thing in chess is first of all to have winning or very advantageous positions.

e : I still looked on the translator but hey it doesn't really help, by deduction I think it asks whether it is better to play dynamic positions but which also increase the risk of losing or timorous positions but which also increase the risk of drawing :

the goal of the game is to win not to make a draw so we take risks and we prefer dynamic games to timorous games but if we think that our dynamic position is losing or bad we prefer to play a timorous position instead.

I am also a intermediate who's trying to build a repertoire in order to expose myself to the variety of positions, So that I could understand chess well. 

My repertoire as of now with all the material I have access to is as follows:- 

AS WHITE :- 

1. e4 

Classic move, A lot of GM's I look up to play this move so it's my weapon of choice.

Against 1.. e5 

I play the 4 knight Scotch, I think it's pretty decent, positions does get dry sometimes which I don't really like, but then I see it as an endgame practice.

Against 1..c5 

I do think nothing is better than Open Sicilian, but it's just wayy too much of theory study and so much going on in a position also there is no specific material with me to get the theory. And I don't understand GM games in the Sicilian.( my reason for not playing this)

I play Nc3 in combo with Bb5 a little bit agressive positional approach.( I just switched so don't know much about it).

Against French:- 

I played advanced French but now I am thinking to change it, will play some Nc3 stuff followed by an exchange of pawns in the center.

AS BLACK :- 

Against e4 :- 

Sicilian ( Tried a lot of Variations) But I think I am gonna stick to Classical Sicilian. - it is the Sicilian in which we don't make a lot of pawn moves right out in the opening and actually develop pieces. Also very much simple compared to other Sicilians.

And having a variation against anti Sicilians is a must.

Against Alapin and Smith morra I play same line with Nf6.

And know what to do against Bc4. 

Against d4. ( Facing a Queen' Gambit is rare at beginner intermediate level so not much to do here as well.)

Although I played Nimzo a lot in the past. 

But I will change it to Slav Defense now. 

Also know how to challenge London System.

Against English you can do the same what you do against d4.

So this was my repertoire if you see any holes do inform me . I think it's pretty decent to get good rich positions.