You pretty much play exactly the same as me, will be interesting to hear answers. The question is a bit general though if you're after advice for your whole repertoir?
Main Ideas/Goals of Chess Openings
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Oh, no. I meant advice for each individual opening. Sorry if that wasn't clear.
I might be able to help you out but it'd be much easier if you gave diagrams of the kind of positions your talking about. Making plans and creating ideas from the openings is one of the things you get better at as you improve which is normally tied closely to your ability to break positions down in your evaluation more accurately.
Isn't that book outdated? Is it still okay for today? It sounds like a good idea.
Thanks all for your answers so far. Reccomended books would be great!
I have an opening repertoire that goes as follows:
AS WHITE: 1. e4 no matter what.
- If 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6, Bc4 and play the Guioco Pianissimo
- If 1. e4 e6, play the Tarrasch (although I have also tried the exchange- maybe someone of a high rating can give me some ideas because I don't know either one very well).
- If 1. e4 c5, play Nf3 and just exchange on d4. If the Dragon follows, play the Yugoslav.
- If 1. e4 anything else, just continue development normally.
AS BLACK:
- If 1. e4, then 1...e5. 2. Nf3, then 2...Nc6 or occasionally 2...Nf6 if I know my opponent and feel more comfortable taking risks.
- If 1. d4, then 1...d5. If 2. c4, then 2...e6 and play the Q.G.D.
- If 1. c4, then 1...e6 and transpose into a Q.G.D.- like position.
- If 1. Nf3, then 1...d5 and just develop normally.
- If anything weird happens, just develop and get castled and try for a playable middlegame where I can be comfortable.
The problem with this for me is that I don't know what the goals of the middlegames in these positions are. For most of them (except the French, which I need to study), I have some sort of system that I know well enough to understand what the position will lead to at the start of the middlegame more or less. But then this is where I stop. I know the opening moves, but I don't know the ideas. For instance, in the Italian Game, I know the goal is to build up c3 and play d4 and avoid trading the light-squared bishop. I can often accomplish this with ease and get a good position. But I don't know what the goals of the opening are for the entire game. I don't know what I'm supposed to do once I have gotten to the middlegame in each of these openings. For most of them, the positions will look about the same each time I play them unless someone plays an inferior move, so the middlegames will start off similarly. But I want to know what the ideas are for the middlegame in each. The only one I do know is the Yugoslav Dragon, in which both sides pawn storm each other until one or the other castle position is busted beyond repair. I guess I want to know what part of the board I want to be attacking in each and how I should do that. I have a friend who plays the Alekhine Defense. The reason it works out for him is that he knows exactly how he's going to get pressure on his opponents. He plays a variation in which he fianchettoes his bishop on g7 which freezes up white's queenside and then he pushes his queenside pawns and uses his knights on the queenside to make trouble for white. I don't know anything about that for my openings and I would like to have more long-term plans going ahead in my openings in this way.