Ideas for black on Pirc defense

I play pirc defense against e4. however I find often in hard situations specially due to kingside attack with agressive bishops.

I'm looking for some concepts and ideas specially for 6th move.

Some played moves:

6th: c6 (I guess this allows queen b6 later on is that the idea?)

6th: Nd7 (do you feel comfortable with that place for your knight?)

6th: b6 (fianchetto on both sides)

6th: c5 (challenging d4 pawn, often white moves d5)

6th: a6, preventing white bishop come down to b5)

BTW what's the role of Black's dark square Bishop in Pirc defense?

Do you try to maintain the king pawn structure formed in first 4 moves, or normally you go pawn storm on king side?

e5 is what white wants to play asap. if black prevents that and plays on the queenside or attacks/opens the center black can equalize or even be better

"pirc alert" by "lev alburt" explains black's plans very well. you can find it in pdf format online

6th move (or even a prior one) might be pawn to e5. But, doesn't that kill your own dark square bishop?

However e5 (white) can be just replied with dxe5, what's the big deal?

I'll try to find that one.

I'm not talking moves/move orders but ideas. white's ideas in the pirc involve e4-e5, f4-f5 and h4-h5, the most threatning is e4-e5 because it cramps black's position and kills the bishop. however if white pushes e5 too early he will lose his center and black will be better so can't do this without calculation. black's idea is to prevent e5 by white by 1-eliminating/attack the e-pawn while controlling e5 or 2-eliminate/attack the d-pawn or provoke it's advance to d5 or 3-play e5 himself , when this is achieved black will have free hand to attack on the queen side.

in the case of your example black wants black Nd7, e5 then b5, b4 then break the center with c5 or d5, wih preperation that is. the book I recommended explains all of this in detail

Is h3 a good idea for black? I got mated several times with intrusive white's dark square bishop and or same dark square bishop sacrificed which leaves my king castle vulnerable... I'm quitting pirc unless I can solve that, I had awful results.

I'm doing better on all other defenses (sicilian, french, caro kann, etc)

I am a Pirc player and my move here is 6.. c6. In my opinion c7 would be a better spot for your Queen rather than b6, where it blocks your queenside pawns development.

Thanks freecat, you're surely right.

why do you think c7 is such a good place?

How do you deal agains queen/bishop pair on c1-h6 diagonal? I often find my self in trouble on my kingside when playing pirc.

If White wants to exchange dark bishops, there's nothing sound you can do to avoid it. Meanwhile, you should develop your own pieces. An example on how I play this kind of games (just the opening part):

Nice game and thanks for sharing. I'd go for Nxc4 on 23 th black's

I fail to see what black gains after 7. e5 dxe5 8. dxe5 Qxd1 9. Rxd1 Nd5 10. Nxd5 cxd5.

Diagram for the visually-challenged:

FreeCat wait I thought 8. e5 was the mainline and one of the few therotical problems for Black. since both 8...Ne8 9. Bf4 dxe5 10. dxe5 Nc7 11. Re1 Ne6 12. Bg3 and 8...dxe5 9. dxe5 Nd5 10. Nxd5 cxd5 11. Bf4 Qc7 12. Qxd5 Qxc2 13. Bb5 are better for white. I would say the idea for White is to quickly exploit his space advantage and keep Black's pieces off balance. 

Actually, I think you're right.

Yereslov you don't have the same position as WildCat. White played 4.h3 preventing 6...Bg4.

A great idea is to play early h5 and develop the knight through h6 on f5.

True, true. My mistake.

There is a similar idea in the Sicilian. You can see it in the games of John Nunn.

Yereslov, in your position, move 6... c6 for black scores in the Chess.com Masters Games database as following:

34.3% white wins

38.1% draws

27.6% black wins

Not bad for black. And 6... c6 is the most played move.

berrychess, let's play a game. When I'm black I will play the Pirch.

Two observations.

(1) Nobody here is actually talking about the same position. The first post is the Classical Main line 5. Be2 not 5. h3, the Modern Classical. I think sanan22 is talking about an Austrian Attack. FreeCat's game was a Modern Classical that transposed back to the regular Classical without giving Black the option of playing Bg4. I think GreedyPawnGrabber is talking about some sort of Modern because Black's kings knight is always on f6 in a pirc.

(2) I would not trust statistics in these positions. The sample size is too small, the ratings diffrences between the players can be high and these positions are more popular in rapid play games. Say in my above line after 10...Nc7 the last five games from Chess 365 feature 3 draws and two White wins. However, one game was an early draw, one game had Black out ranking White by about 400 points, two fetured white outranking Black by 400 points which leaves us with one draw. Hardly significant.

Yeah, but I didn't like the counterplay White had after this move, so I chose a more conservative approach. My thoughts were that after exchanging queen and rook, I could likewise capture that pawn without any risk. But my opponent blundered before I could put that into practice.