How do you play the Scandinavian

A. 2... Nf6

B  3... Qa5

C. 3... Qd6

D. 3... Qd8

I play 3... Qd6 as inspired by GM Tiviakov. He has good results with 3... Qd6

I am starting to play with Qd6 it has many styles. Nb5 is annoying so on move 4 I like a6 then develop. You can also castle queen or king side and have a fun game.

Carlsen won with 3. Qd6

Review the games of GM Tiviakov. He is the best Scandinavian player on Qd6.

I've played all those versions. Eventually I chose 3...Qa5 and use a repertoire book that I like a lot called The Scandinavian for Club Players. When I played 3...Qd6 I was constantly getting bad games against Shirov's 7 f4 (1 e4 d5 2 exd5 Qxd5 3 Nc3 Qd6 4 d4 Nf6 5 Nf3 c6 6 Ne5 Nbd7 7 f4).

Shirov 7. f4 has good results. I will still play Qd6 but search the antidote lines.

play nf6 instead of taking with the queen immediately

A. 2... Nf6 looks playable for Live Fast time control.

no way

A Beautiful Game by Carlsen in the Nf6 Scandinavian.

Is he the same guy Carlsen who recently at a certain event opened all his games with 1.a4 plus 2.Ra3 as white, and 1...a5 plus 2...Ra6 as Black?

Idk. Carlsen and Nakamura played Panzers Openings and won.

Ivanchuk played both Qa5 and Qd6

I don’t play the Scandi as black but here’s a nice game as white.

And Carlsen has played 3...Qa5/d6/d8, as well as 2...Nf6. This doesn't mean a thing.

It means the Scandinavian is a Sound defense. Carlsen, Ivanchuk and Tiviakov played it with success. We mortals can play only one variation.

Sure it's sound, but not easy to handle properly. No real weaknesses, but White has a considerable lead in development which requires precision to neutralize.

While always have advantage in any openings. Black can dictate the action from the first move.

Along with the Scandinavian I play the Tarrasch Defense based on the same reasoning --- strike in the center a bit too soon on purpose. (1 d4 d4 2 c4 e6 3 Nc3 (or 3 Nf3) c5. As a former long time QGD and Caro Kann player, my results have been better with the 3...Qa5 Scandinavian and Tarrasch Defense.

Technically the Tarrasch Defense comes under the heading of QGD, but it's not usually discussed as such.