KGA: (g5) In the olden days? What is agadmator talking about here?

This is the most recent one with top GMs I have found. Andreikin, Sargissian, and Ivanchuk have also played g5. 

I removed it because I mouseslipped. Sorry, I am human. I thought he played g5 so I posted that one. I updated it with the g5 move by a few other top GMs. Does that make it olden?

I was commenting on the use of "olden". That's all. People took a hissy fit because they think I am attacking agadmator. I am not, I just don't think it is "olden". I think it might be a good move to test your opponent's prep.

Just shut up. You were completely wrong to make this thread and should go back to chesskids. 

Just the reference to "chesskids" doesn't sound olden, LOL

The move 3... g5 is still played, just not as popular as years ago. In the early history of the King's Gambit 3...g5 was the most direct way to try and hold the pawn. That's probably all he meant by"olden" days. There can also be some bias in his statement because he may simply not like 3...g5. I play the King's Gambit and I like it when Black plays 3...g5. I have more success against that move than any other.

"I have more success against that move than any other."

I think it is a higher level move which might be why it is getting a bad rap. If you are below 1500, you probably don't know all the ins and outs. 

If you are also in the 1700s at least OTB, maybe your OTB experience might tell us something about its reach. Are people just getting into bad positions near the middlegame? Or, is it a situation where black is using up time, and or mental strength, to figure out moves to make that by the time the endgame is reached they are wiped out and blunder?

In other words, how many of these games that you won as white against g5 do you actually mate your opponent or get within mate in 4 (knowing it is mate in 4, I am not talking about you putting a game in when it is completed and the computer shows you could have won but you actually saw mate in 4 during the game)?

First off, I think many of my opponents are surprised by the KG when I play it because they are not expecting it unless they know me well. Many of them choose 3...g5 because as I said, it's the most direct way to hold the pawn. I play the Quaade Variation with 4. Nc3 and it's amazing how many times the following trap comes up: 4...g4 5. Ne5 Qh4+ 6.g3 fxg3 7.Qxg4 g2+(trying to win a Rook) 8. Qxh4 gxh1=Q 9. Qh5! and suddenly Black is lost.

Some of the hostility is uncalled for.

GambitShift, you have to understand not only that 1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4. 3. Nf3 g5 was once *the* way to deal with the King's Gambit, but also that that was true at a time when the King's Gambit was *the* way to play chess.  It sounds like you're thinking something like this: "Okay, so it used to be that 70% of KG games began 1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4. 3. Nf3 g5, and now it's only 40% of KG games. Sure, it's fewer, but it's not extinct or anything, and that doesn't seem like such a huge difference."

But that's not all there is to the math.  At the time he's talking about -- the mid- to late-nineteenth century, the King's Gambit was being played in something like a quarter of all chess games.  Now it's probably a quarter of one percent of them.

That means that 1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4. 3. Nf3 g5 used to be played with something like 200 times the frequency it is now.  In a single month of 1865, Anderssen and Zukertort claimed to have played several hundred skittles games against each other in just the Muzio Gambit, a single line of the g5 variation.  When you think about it that way -- when you try to imagine the sheer number of KG games that used to be played -- it's hard to argue with someone describing the g5 line as characteristic of an earlier era of chess.

This might be where we take pfren's idea to play d5, if not on move 2.

In the the line you mention above White has to play 7. Ke2 since 7.g3? doesn't work. White still has advantage even with the misplaced King. White is threatening Nxc7+ now.

"When you think about it that way -- when you try to imagine the sheer number of KG games that used to be played -- it's hard to argue with someone describing the g5 line as characteristic of an earlier era of chess."

I highly doubt the number of KG games are reflective of any groundbreaking theory back then. I think it was a result of purely number crunching at the time (like what A0 may be doing). Players were baffled back then they couldn't progress in similar ways as the Italian opening. So, they mapped out the possibilities. Get two people equally obsessed, and there are the numbers.  

We have seen the same thing in the Carlsen WCC matches with Karjakin and Caruana. They played the same openings rather than different ones. Obviously, the games were different but the goal was the same as back then. To explore the possibilities.

If you are training today and you are told you can win more games at the lower levels without g5, now you have a century of theory to guide you that these guys didn't have. So, the point is, we can't look at the overall numbers back then to conclude that was the hip and popular move back then. It was simply a test like testing a rat in a lab. Expendable moves. If we are going to say g5 was the move to make, did someone like Steinitz win championship matches with the KGA g5?

I only see one game in which he played a KGA in a championship match, and he didn't play g5. He played Nf6. Later he played g6, not g5.

So, with all these KGA games they may have played back then, g5 was not the move to make when defending or fighting for a title.

Prosecution rests your honor. Enjoy the game.

Anish Giri's best friend is telling me there is no advantage.

It's not at all clear to me what point you're trying to make, but it doesn't address the basic fact, which is that the g5 line was indeed (for whatever reason you want to give), characteristic of an earlier era. Ergo, Agadmator's comment was an entirely reasonable one.

The era we are talking about is the era before Steinitz. Indeed, Steinitz is the one credited with putting openings like the King's Gabmit out of business (though it's more complicated than that; for one thing, Steinitz did try to refine the KG as the Steinitz Gambit within the Vienna Game). What he played in 1892 has no bearing on the fact that, a generation earlier, the g5 KGA was played with a frequency that is hard to fathom today.

The first World Chess Championship match was played in 1886... well after the period we are discussing. So your whole line of argument is worthless.

"which is that the g5 line was indeed (for whatever reason you want to give), characteristic of an earlier era"

The point I am making is, the greats of the past like Steinitz may have played KGA in pubs and less important tournaments, like Carlsen playing an early Na3 or intentionally losing to Liren in what was it 7 moves? But when push comes to shove, they don't play them in important title matches. They know NOT to play them.

"The era we are talking about is the era before Steinitz"

Then you could say anything is olden. I don't think championship matches were really a thing back in 1500's were they? Who was the champion of 1560? Was there one? Or just a bunch of celibate priests with nothing else to do.

"a generation earlier, the g5 KGA was played with a frequency that is hard to fathom today"

Generation or century? If you say generation, then we are talking more like 30 years. Is that the point you are making?

Who played this and why? Were there championship matches with g5? Don't just get wrapped up in the numbers, find out why. This is like CNN reporting new Coronavirus numbers, but they don't talk about the severity. Scare mongering, but here what do the numbers represent? Wise decisions or just experimentation? With lack of theory, I cannot say that g5 was the move to make because of concentrated effort to win a game. It was experimental to see what they could do without computer engine help. They had to play out the possibilities. I don't know how much clearer to state this point.

No it actually proves my point more. If you are talking about earlier people, then that gives more credence to the conclusion that they played g5 not out of theoretical preparation but for experimental reasons. g5 wasn't the hip and happening move. It was a move they were researching.

So, this is the earliest game I see with g5. It was a draw, and it was the only KG game out of 85 games I see from the tournament. How is this representational of how frequent it was played? It doesn't look like guys from 1851 wanted to even play f4. Or do we have to go back further?

Agadmator meant a specific period, one that anyone who has studied the history of chess is familiar with: 1850s, 1860s, 1870s, 1880s.  So yes, roughly a generation before Steinitz.  As a young man, he played it, of course.  And it didn't instantly die when Steinitz renounced all that in favor of his positional system.  But, yes, it would be reasonable to describe the 1860s (30 years before that 1893 game) as the heyday of the King's Gambit.

Agadmator didn't spell it out in excruciating detail because he had better things to do. (It's an offhand comment about a move that *wasn't* played in the move under discussion.)  And because what he said is correct enough already and is common knowledge for anyone familiar with the history of chess.

Also, the current COVID numbers give plenty of reasons for alarm, and there's no shortange of analysis from public health experts to back that up. I'd let it go, but it's important for people to take this stuff seriously.  Stay safe out there.

I think everyone here would agree that 3...g5 is playable but you seem determined to prove that 3...g5 is best. You mention Stockfish chooses 3...g5 implying it must be best. It's not that simple. If Stockfish always knows the best opening moves then why are there so many 6th move options for White against the Najdorf Sicilian? Why don't all the GM's just play whatever Stockfish chooses on move 6?