Daniel, nothing is wrong with him. You're just taking this way too personally. What lines are you posting? None. You just make really broad generalizations which cannot be analyzed without lines. You think he needs experience? He is a NM. Trying to tell him he needs experience is like me telling Michael Jordan to practice basketball.
He's not a grandmaster man...
Daniel thanks for reiterating, but the last post on a page 3 is the Accelerated Panov.
Daniel, nothing is wrong with him. You're just taking this way too personally. What lines are you posting? None. You just make really broad generalizations which cannot be analyzed without lines. You think he needs experience? He is a NM. Trying to tell him he needs experience is like me telling Michael Jordan to practice basketball.
He's not a grandmaster man...
Fine. Would you rather me compare him to Tyler Hansbrough?
I started playing chess as an 1 e4 player and have stuck with it most of my 30+ years of tournament chess. In the past few years I have also started playing 1 d4 due to GM Spraggett telling me he thinks it "suits" me better than 1 e4. I expect to run into the carokann quite a bit but ofcourse the reply I see most is the sicilian. Any serious 1e4 player is gonna prepare to meet carokann, french, sicilian, pirc, alekhines, and anything else that is played with any regularity and carokanns arent that rare in my experience. The longer one sticks to 1 e4 the more responses you will face and thus prepare to face in future games. My first test in a latvian gambit was a nightmare for me as I didnt know the theory and my opponent did, I lost badly. I have since prepared to meet this opening but may never face it again. After the sicilian I see most often one of these : 1...e5 , french, carokann, pirc/modern, alekhines. I have a close friend who , like ozzie, plays nothing but ck against 1e4. I play several sicilians against 1e4 myself and use the french as my secondary defense....
I started playing chess as an 1 e4 player and have stuck with it most of my 30+ years of tournament chess. In the past few years I have also started playing 1 d4 due to GM Spraggett telling me he thinks it "suits" me better than 1 e4. I expect to run into the carokann quite a bit but ofcourse the reply I see most is the sicilian. Any serious 1e4 player is gonna prepare to meet carokann, french, sicilian, pirc, alekhines, and anything else that is played with any regularity and carokanns arent that rare in my experience. The longer one sticks to 1 e4 the more responses you will face and thus prepare to face in future games. My first test in a latvian gambit was a nightmare for me as I didnt know the theory and my opponent did, I lost badly. I have since prepared to meet this opening but may never face it again. After the sicilian I see most often one of these : 1...e5 , french, carokann, pirc/modern, alekhines. I have a close friend who , like ozzie, plays nothing but ck against 1e4. I play several sicilians against 1e4 myself and use the french as my secondary defense....
But as life-long 1.e4 player, if you had a "must-win" game and could choose which common opening black would use against you, I'm guessing you'd go with the Sicilian or the Ruy because those are really the thematic heart and soul of the king's pawn opening and you're probably most comfortable with those positions. Thoughts?
Personally, I don't like feeling like I have a theoretical disadvantage so even though I'm able to respond with competence to black's mainline defenses to 1.e4, it's unlikely that I'll ever know the theory as well as someone who specializes in the C-K, French, Petrov etc. I'd want to go back to my "roots" for a critical game.
If it was a must win game for me I would want a sharp sicilian variation, yes. My experiences in the Ruy are that I win and lose fewer games than in sicilians but have more draws so Ruy wouldnt be good in a must win situation for me. However, what I hope for MOST in such a situation is that it is also a must win situation for my opponent ! If a draw is ok for them it makes it much harder to win.
If I had a must-win situation against White, I'd go with the Slav defense against 1.d4, and the Sicilian against 1.e4. They are both very good defences against these openings.
If I had a must-win situation against White, I'd go with the Slav defense against 1.d4, and the Sicilian against 1.e4. They are both very good defences against these openings.
Slav isnt a good choice for must win games due to the exchange variation. Sicilian is an excellent choice.
If I were going for a win against d4, I would play the Benoni
If I had a must-win as black against 1.e4, I would play the Caro-Kann.
If I had a must-win as black against 1.d4, I would play the Nimzo-Indian.
I think it only makes sense to go with what you know best. There are enough choices later on in the game, where you can go for complications (or not, depending on who "needs" to win) that I don't wish to do it on move 1.
One thing you can shoot for is to go for an unbalanced material position (rook and pawn v 2 pieces, or 2 pawns and an attack for piece) or something. Maybe even a "crappy" exchange sac which only "gets some good squares and some difficult threats". This is the type of play I would go for if I _had_ to win a game.
Reb: The reason I chose the Caro-Kann is because of the exchange variation against the French. Way back when I was learning openings, and I was on my school chess team, I didn't want to play the French because I thought too many people would be scared by my rating (and would know nothing basically about chess except for the Fried Liver) and so would play the exchange variation. As it turns out, the Caro-Kann exactly suits my style. Lucky me!
And what I'm learning is that Gonnosuke seems to have the exact opposite style from me.
I always thought the Exchange would be annoying, but it really has not been annoying. I don't have too much of a problem dealing with the c4 lines and Black can make the game dynamic if he so wishes by castling queenside
Cochrane Gambit = ?
Sorry, too lazy to look it up, but I'm happy to hear a couple of sentences about why you like it?
Queenside fianchetto seems to help, not sure its right but against most it gets the game out of my oponents best memorised line and I get some good play from it. When a line seems popular and strong throw a wrench into it.
Cochrane Gambit is interesting. While probably not objectively sound, a human opponent will be hard pressed to defend the positions that follow.
Awesome, thanks for posting. Yes, those two guys are about as alike as Tal and Petrosian.
That game was nuts. Very cool to see such dynamic play and bring it into discussion when many of us--or maybe just me--forget how dramatic some styles of play can be compared to the normal lines that always seem to end up getting played.
The part of me that thinks that Topalov would never get away with that against a computer says not to play it as white. I'd rather go into a "system" (if you want to call it that) with the non-level playing field on my side.
A refinement in chess theory just recently (can't blame Phelon for missing it) is to offer a draw after 1.e4 c6 if declined then you can flounder around in a lost position or simply resign as most experts would do.
Ah, I suppose I should have kept more up-to-date on current theory.
While I agree that complex, irrational chess (note that in math this doesn't make sense) is fun to follow, and benefits us as the chess public, I wouldn't want to see stuff like the Cochrane Gambit do better. Instead, you should root for someone like Emory Tate to get his GM title, and tour through Europe playing his unique style of risky attacking unsound chess.
He's sort of like Tal, just a little crazier.
I like the way Topalov plays chess. He plays to win and isnt afraid to risk, this is rare at the top it seems but makes for exciting chess. I would like Topalov better if he would get a better manager, the one he has gives him a horrible image. I think Topalov will win the match with Kamsky and then face Anand. I am looking forward to an Anand/Topalov match as both these guys play to win more than most at the top, imo.
This argument is pointless, as I have pointed out before. How about we just get over it like the two agreeable people we should be, and stop making fools out of ourselves. We both are players of the Caro-Kann, we both play it in matches, and we both play the Black side. So what on earth are we arguing about?
I'm sorry if my previous posts seemed pushy, but I didn't even make up the lines, so don't attack me about them.
Agreed?