Bd6 then Ne7, and bang goes your 'boring' draw!
But yeah ,there must be at least 12+ exciting gambits lines for White in the French Defence, shame that people don't go for them.
That said on LiChess - around 1600 - I find the Advance to be the most popular with an exciting game. Second to that the Winawer variations but nobody plays the Qg4 lines, Trassach is extremely rare.
I struggle to understand why people just assume if white plays the Exchange French that they're going for a draw. Could someone explain that to me please?
I struggle to understand why people just assume if white plays the Exchange French that they're going for a draw. Could someone explain that to me please?
Going for a symmetrical position is drawish. They are almost always a draw at the top level and in the Exchange Variations, the positions are simplified leaving very little tricks involved in the positions that you opponent can fall in.
@27
"Going for a symmetrical position is drawish." ++ That is not necessarily true. Nepo and Ding got good results as black with symmetrical positions from the Petrov Defence.
"They are almost always a draw at the top level and in the Exchange Variations" ++ At top level most games are draws in any variations and the exhange variations do not draw much more.
"the positions are simplified leaving very little tricks involved in the positions that you opponent can fall in." ++ That is not true. Here is an example: a French Exchange Variation reached by transposition:
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=2330933
Fischer struggled as white against the Caro-Kann and tried various variations: the Two Knights, the Panov, the Classical, and eventually he ended up with the Exchange Variation:
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1044326
Both openings are fine, so check a few sample games for both and decide which one looks the more fun for you. Don't worry about 'correctness' and 'objective strength' too much, i.e what AlphaZero prefers and Carlsen says. Any main line defence is fine for Black, so it is more about your personal preferences.
Both have in common that you have to study a ton in one variation. For the french it's Nc3 and for the Caro Kann it's the Advance. IMO both of these variations are very hard to play and moves come not natural.. at least for me
Caro is definitely better.
The French cramps your position up more that the Caro, which has many counterattack ideas with an early 2... c5 against the advance variation. Your LSB is much better and can actually be used unlike the french. When playing Caro, it is normally a solid game till the end, where white normally (when I play OTB) has a IQP and I have 2 solid, strong pawn islands. I reccomend Caro more than the French.
Play the French, so less people are prepared for my Caro!
My opinion is the deeper you go in the French it gets very rigid in the move selection you have that is playable for Black. Very concrete play is needed to make a multitude of lines work and even then the engines will still prefer White. Black may be prepared to pounce on a mistake by White, but this becomes less likely the higher up the food chain you go ...in my humble opinion.
I think this has happened to 1...e5 as well
I am 1300 rapid so take everything that I say with a grain of salt:
For me personally, The French Defense is a little bit too passive, I really hate it when your so-called "Bad Bishop" (The Bishop that is stuck behind the pawn chain) just sits here and it's hard for you to get the Bishop out, atleast the "Bad Bishop" in the French has a chance to get out and not feel very sad in the Caro-Kann
I have never faced someone who did anything except lose playing french. I come at it with the advance variation, and while I know I am a weak player (worse now, getting older), it really seems to offer absolutely nothing to black (esp to equal to me players) except a lot of hard work to get back to equal footing. The exchange gives black some play, so I don't go there. Maybe black shouldn't allow the advanced, but at my level, the players often do.
Caro players give me a rough time of it frequently. Its stronger, and does not fall behind so easily.
Whether or not you like the French or the Caro, we can all agree that the Exchange Variation is terribly boring. It's for people who lack ambition
I mostly win when White plays the Exchange French. It often is a sign that they aren't interested in studying the French and they imagine they're bothering me or pulling some psychological ploy.
A feature of the French that has not been mentioned is there are hordes of instructive classic GM games that involve the French, whereas a couple of decades ago the Caro-Kann was considered a GM side-line. In fact, it's the sheer solidness of the French that has caused the interest in the Caro as most of the French lines have been played-out over the decades by the GMs, hence the lack of interest in the French - as well as modern day engines doing nothing to undermined the solidness of the French. Needless to say this most definitely doesn't apply if your not a GM etc.
Recently even Magus has started to play the French to dodge opponents' prep and one suspects to exploit his superior endgame ability.
The main modern day practical drawback of the French is that White can hold the initiative for a long while so it's less advantageous for Blitz/Bullet games which favour attackers, however this rarely happens at lower levels. Also having a mighty LS-Bishop in the endgame is less of an practical advantage - White generally loses their LS-Bishop in the middle game, or even foolishly swaps it off in the opining!
As far as the Exchange variation goes, it's pretty foolish to hand Black equality after 3 or 4 moves in an opening, no matter your level. Better off learning well one of the French Gambit lines, especially with on-line chess you are far less likely to play the same opponent twice.
Also note that if you go over to LiChess you can see that the AVERAGE player is as likely to go for the Exchange as the Advance, indeed these two are by far the most popular. So half the time you're getting near instant equality with zero effort, which can't be bad if you're playing Black! This pretty much negates the principle advantage of playing Caro - the freed LS-Bishop - so why play the Caro?!
Certainly from my own low-level gameplay the only French study/lines required involve the Advance Variation, with the Exchange, Bd6--> Ne7 is playable against anything White has to offer - so you're 6 moves in with equality and a freed LS-Bishop as Black.
I usually Play Caro kann because it is better than french, but french can also be better.
You should try both, and then make your decision which one is better.
https://www.chess.com/sr/announcements/view/new-variation-in-caro-kann-b12 Check it! Leave your impressions.
French or Caro my variations destroy Blacks mind. Have it to enjoy
My opponents also go into the exchange most of the time, there is just a little bit of advance. This is how it goes most of the time...
A fun thing about the French is how many players are eager to Greek gift black in the exchange. See this game for what I mean https://www.chess.com/analysis/game/live/43971375429