Breyer, Marshall or Berlin Wall?

Yes, 7...Bd3 is the way it's played.  Below is a game between myself and another 2000+ player, from the FICGS server where engines are allowed.  My comments to my opponent after it was finished was that "to retain some advantage you had to play 15.Ne4 or 16.h3".  You can see a dump of my engine analyses regarding these options at:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/t5kifa0xjwkyoxy/analysis.15_Ne4_d5.pv2.txt?dl=0

and

https://www.dropbox.com/s/pi1u6bvq0iz1rl2/analysis.14__Rae8_15_Qxa4_d5_16_h3_Bd6.pv2.txt?dl=0

And more pertinent to the final moves:

https://www.dropbox.com/s/vc4azmybom5307b/analysis.20__Ng4_21_h3_Rxf2_22_Bxf2_Bh2%2B.pv2.txt?dl=0

There are maybe 20 reliable variations on ruy lopez...

And probably more...

True- many reliable answers to the Ruy. And the list begins at move three.

Hereis a game I recently won as white in a correspondence game. It's a nice 100% technical win, but Black had a fine position well after the opening phase, and the funny thing is that I still don't know where Black went wrong...

In response to the text I highlighted in green:

Well I believe the OP shouldn't limit himself to 3 options.

As others have said there are over 20+ different playable lines against the Ruy Lopez. The OP has reduced himself to 3.

Breyer, Marshall or Berlin.

The OP is 2100+ so he is strong enough to know this information.

Which is why I am surpised he said it.

However, I wanted to mention it because maybe the OP has been a little hasty in disregarding some of these other lines!

In response to the text I highlighted in red:

I don't think the OP should limit himself.

However, since he has already done that than really he has no choice.

Out of the 3 options he gave Breyer, Marshall or Berlin.

The Berlin will be the best every time.

Which is why if you really look at the 3 options.

The Berlin towers over the other options in every situation.

The Berlin has been used in World Championship matches the past 10-20 years. Since the Kasparov and Kramnik games in the early 2000's.

Which is why the OP should compare the Berlin to the other options the way he is doing.

Well, it is not at all obvious.

The path of black's QB is from c8 to d7 to g4 to d7 does not look great.

So the move 13 ... B-g4 could be the culprit.  It forces you to close the center, sac a pawn or take on f3 with a pawn.  But after white playes d5 and h3 the bishop can't go to h5 maintaining the pin and black must retreat or concede the 2 bishops.  It could be the lost time, and the QB on d7 still isn't great, leaves black with a position that looks OK but isn't.

The other thing that occurs to me is maybe black's set up with the bishops on e7 and d7 is too passive.

I don't know for certain, but black lost and must have gone wrong somewhere.

The truth is that ideally white wants to play h3 before he commits himself to the move d2(3)-d4, since ...Bg4 puts pressure over d4, and usually forces white to push the pawn to d5 (I did not think highly of the artificial recipe 13.d4 Bg4 14.Re3). Then Black's ...c6 is the most natural, and best plan of action. In that game, white had no time for the prophylactic move, since Black has already adequately protected e5- 13.h3 d5! looks fine for him.

No, the mistake is not there... probably later a few minor inaccuracies were played.

I am sure everything in your 1st paragraph is true.  And likely the rest as well.

You outrate the player by 260 odd points [and me by more, I know], so its not surprising if you gradually outplayed him.

I take it black's play to move 6 is approved by theory?

Yes. While 4...Bc5 is the most trendy line, this one has been played before by several strong GM's with the Black pieces.

Thanks.  I kinda guessed that, it's implicit in your previous post.

I have just taken up the Ruy Lopez for both sides having heard M Carlsen advise playing a variety of openings to deepen your understanding.  It has changed the habit of a lifetime.  And playing openings I have less theoretical knowledge of weakens my play, but only slightly, much less than I thought.

I think Pfren might be under valuing his position. I don't have my engine around to check; however, I think the move 13.h3 is playable for white in Pfren game. I think all chess players in general sometimes under value there strength or dismiss lines really fast. Obviously when black can play the move d5 in the ruy Lopez they often have fine position. Which is why Pfren didn't play 13.h3 because he felt the reply d5 was fine for black. However, I would like to argue is 13...d5 in this position really benefiting black? I am not so sure. Maybe an engine can show why 13...d5 is good however using my own human eyes I can't see it right away. Let say white plays 13.h3 black responds with 13...d5 after a few exchanges 14.exd5 Nxd5. Surely white has the move 15.d4. Which begs the question how does black respond to that? I feel black is in no position to handle the opening of the center.

Next I was reading joyntjezebel post. In his post he was asking about culprit moves which were played. Which when I was looking at the game I felt the move 14...Ne7 was suspicious. The knight went to e7 than to g6. Once it went to g6 it did nothing the entire game except exchange itself off. Which doesn't inspire a lot of confidence to me. Surely 14...Na5 was the more natural square for the knight to go. From a5 the knight as so many options it can go to c4 or reroute to b7-c5. Obviously these ideas with the knight work in harmony with blacks queenside play. Further, I would like to argue the knight on g6 was a liability. Black in some cases will drop the dark bishop to f8 just like this game than they can implement a pawn storm with g6 + f5. They often than move the dark bishop from f8 to g7 pressuring the white center & aiming queenside with the bishop on g7.

Well, dear joyntjezebel, as you can see not everybody in this forum can be great.

His majesty x_patzer needed just a couple of minutes to find the flaws of play in a game played by two players rated some 1,000-1,500 points above him, which lasted for eleven months and a half, and both players used silicon aid.

I wonder why chess.com has not awaded him the tile of Resident Chess Genius yet.

I've been having trouble as white in the old steinitz believe it or not. It's really hard to crack, especially when black plays g6. This is why I decided to just play 4.0-0 and c3-d4 instead of 4.d4.

https://shop.chessbase.com/en/products/my_best_games_in_the_spanish_vol_3

It's been avoided like the bubonic plague, at least against me.

You mean the line promoted by Dzindzi in THIS video?

This is not good for Black.

Look around 6:22. After the pawn grab 11...Nxe4 white gets a clear advantage by 12.Nxe4! Bxb5 13.Bxg7 Kxg7 14.h4. White gets the pawn back in all variations, and has a better pawn structure and safer king.

Two ideas, one new, one old.

A) 4.Qe2!? the idea being 4...Nf6?! 5.d4 and Black finds himself in an inferior variation of the 4.Qe2 line of the Berlin.  Otherwise you can play those other ideas including c3 d4 (or d3) and 0-0

B) 4.Bxc6+!? -- this might particularly be suitable for someone who plays the Exchange variation anyway, though not strictly to exchange anyway, but rather to get practice against the kind of pawn formation Black gets if he plays 4...bxc6 against the Exchange variation

I think because there is too much competition.

I make no claim to be a great player.  But I am at least realistic in what I say.

One of the points of Kasparov's wondrous books, both on Chess History and on Kasparov, is that perfect play is essentially impossible.

Even the best games by the best players have errors, and their earlier annotations are full of mistakes too.

You can be much stronger than I and still be a complete fool if you believe your pronouncements on chess are definitive.

I am very pleased with myself on post # 54-55.

I did all of that with out an engine.

What is even shocking is I finally checked the lines with an engine.

The engine I am using thinks my continuations seem fine.

The above continuation is what I was looking at in my mind.

The engine believes the above set of moves are equal.

However, on examination from the engine.

It shows white can try and change the move order I was using.
Sometimes strong chess players will tell people to try different move order around to see if it makes a difference.

In this situation the engine believes white can do a move order switch up.

It was reading 0.34 small edge to white in this continuation.

Instead of playing the exd5 + d4 after.

It thinks we should play d4 first.

Again the goal or idea on why we are doing this is to try and cause pawn tension to open up the position.

We was using the exd5 + d4 to open things up.

Engine is suggesting d4 first causing a whole cluster of tension.

Now again this edge the computer engine is reading is a small edge.

Which is to say you such a small edge might not amount to anything.

For all intensive purposes I would call this position equal if humans were playing it.

Its the sort of position where its tricky equal!

What I mean by tricky equal is that there is alot of ways for black to go wrong.

Black has to be careful.

When you look at all of the black pieces and compare them to the white pieces.

You can see visually with your eyes that the whites pieces are more aggressively placed.

The below picture is at move 12.

This picture is something worth thinking about.

You can see how white can generate alot of king side action here.

Now obviously black is no fool!

They can see what white is doing.

They have taken steps for protection.

Do you see how white has the more aggressive pieces than black?

Which when you have more aggressive pieces it can be easier to play.

Attacking is often considered alot easier than Defending.

One old chess phrase I remember they use to say is:

Strong Attacking players when they are successful in the attack they checkmate the opponent.

Strong Attacking players when they fail in the attack they at least have draw by perpetual check.

Which is a phrase that trys to highlight the hardships of Defending.

Lastly, I would like to talk about the other move I recommended.

My engine compared both moves 14...Na5 & 14...Ne7.

The difference was very small.

Na5 = 0.26

Ne7 = 0.37

At depth 25

It was a difference of 0.11

Surely the engine believes both moves are playable.

However, it favors Na5 as best move instead of Ne7.

In my post I say clear as day I felt the move Ne7 was suspicious.

Than I said the reason I believed it was suspicious was because Na5 seems like the more natural move.

Plain as day!

Which makes me very happy.

@joyntjezebel

The sad truth is it is impossible to have a conversation with Pfren.

Pfren believes everyone is beneath him.

If you don't have an IM or GM title next to your name.

He will not even acknowledge you other than to insult you.

You can't really blame Pfren though.

This feeling of superiority complex Pfren has stems back thousands of years before his birth.

After all Pfren is Greek you know.

The Greeks were foolish enough to go to war with 300 men.

Their superiority complex caused them to actually believe they would win with 300 men against the entire persian army.

How on earth can you have a conversation with a person who has a heritage like that?

It simply is impossible.

@X_PLAYER_J_X 

I honestly couldn't care less for your war against pfren, but for the record, the Greeks (more specifically, the Spartans; as there were also 9000 other troops on the first few days) went to war with 300 men to delay the attack on their capital. They knew they were going to lose, but they just needed time to evacuate their capital; after all, they did win/defend their land in the end.