Okay, I decided what first move I wanted to play, but now how do I decide my second/third/etc moves?

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Skynet

People always speak about how to choose your first move, but they never speak about how to choose your second move, third move, fourth move, etc. Okay, I decided what first move I wanted to play, but now how do I decide what second, third, fourth, etc, moves I want to play? Do I just pick the #1 most popular move every time? But then my repertoire would have no coherence, it would look completely random, it would be very hard to memorize and remember everything.

As Black against 1.e4, I play 1...e5. Then, I try to play all the following moves: ...Nc6, ...Nf6, ...Bc5 or else ...Bb4, ...d6, ...O-O. This is like a "system" approach, except that it's not exactly a system because I can't just play all the moves on auto-pilot without looking at what my opponent is doing, I have to choose the move-order very carefully, I have to constantly watch out for tactical combinations (such as ...Bc5, Nf3xe5, ...Nc6xe5, d4, forking my Bishop and Knight), and often I can't play my "system" and so I have to know exactly what to do. I often intentionally choose to not play the objectively best move (for example, against the King's Gambit I play 2...Bc5 rather than 2...exf4), but White never has an advantage that is bigger than his usual first move advantage (+0.30). I am pragmatic. I prefer to transpose into my "system" rather than get a slight advantage, but I prefer to get a large advantage rather than transpose into my "system". I prefer to play slow positional variations. I try to avoid sharp tactical aggressive variations. I still don't know what to play against the Scotch and the Ruy Lopez though. Against the Scotch, 4...Bc5 has the advantage of looking more similar to my "system", 4...Nf6 has the advantage that 20% of the time it transposes to the Scotch Four Knights. Against the Ruy Lopez, 4...Bc5 (the Classical) is objectively bad, 5...Bc5 (the Classical Deferred) is no better. My options are: 5...Bc5 (the Moeller), 5...b5 6.Ba4 Bc5 (the Neo-Arkhangelsk), 5...b5 6.Ba4 Bb7 (the Archangelsk), 5...b5 6.Ba4 Be7 (the Closed/Mainline).

crazedrat1000

Taking this sort of system approach works pretty poorly in e4 openings. It works well with d4, Nf3, Nc3, g3, c4... it even works well with obscure moves like 1. c3, which is actually surprisingly decent and some people do play 1. c3. But not really with e4. In e4 openings the lines are sharp and forcing, tactical rather than positional, and not very transpositional... it's better to just consider the position in a holistic way over deliberately trying to arrange the pieces in a way where they're sort of on similar squares in one opening vs another, but all the lines will never transpose and the tactics / forcing continuations are radically different in a couple moves anyway.

There might be a little value in doing this within an e4 opening if you plan on trying out a different 1st move later on - for example, the closed sicilian / paulsen french / mainline caro-kann / vienna game all feature Nc3, and if you wanted to play 1. Nc3 later you could do that and leverage your e4 knowledge. Likewise the mainline sicilians / nimzowitsch defense can be reached from the reti. If you're selecting a line against the pirc, modern, or french you might want to consider where you're placing the bishop - the Byrne / French burn both feature Bg5 and can be reached from various d4 setups like the chigorin or trompowsky. These are cross-cutting transpositions, but beyond this... having some within-e4 transpositional opening isn't very good since it just won't transpose probably ever and e4 is not a positional repertoire anyway.

If you were to take the system approach with another 1st move it's a whole different story.

When picking a move you should consider a variety of factors...

a) how common it is, the less common the better

b) how rich it is - the more opportunities to reach novel positions the better

c) how sharp / punishing it is of the opponent vs. your own mistakes

d) how complex or ambiguous it is - I generally think the more complex / ambiguous the better since you can figure it out during preparation

e) how much theory you'll have to learn

f) what its winrates are.

g) what the engine eval is

h) how it transposes with other positions you play

i) whether it is structurally similar to other positions you play (yes it's a factor but just one of many)

j) whether you think the ideas make sense - you should have a concept of what you're doing

k) whether you find the position entertaining to play. I don't play the rossolimo not because it's bad but because I don't enjoy it

l) whether you will actually be capable of remembering it, and how intuitive it will be to play if you do forget the lines.

m) the alternatives to the move

n) other?

So you wouldn't want to ignore all these considerations just to focus on one particular consideration, especially if you're playing e4 and your moves aren't going to transpose anyway, and will all lead to vastly different positions by move 8.

tygxc

@1

"how do I decide what second, third, fourth, etc, moves I want to play?"
++ You are rated 1522.
You do not win or lose games because of the opening, but because of tactical mistakes.
Do not worry about openings, worry about avoiding hanging pieces, pawns, or running into checkmate. Play moves that develop pieces into play and control the center.

Lasker formulated 4 common sense principles:

  1. Only play your d- and e-pawns
  2. Play knights first and only then bishops.
  3. Do not play the same piece twice
  4. Do not pin opponent's king's knight with your queen's bishop before the opponent has castled O-O

"Do I just pick the #1 most popular move every time?" ++ No.

"it would be very hard to memorize and remember everything"
++ 'Chess should not be memorized' - Lasker

"As Black against 1.e4, I play 1...e5" ++ Great.

"I try to play all the following moves: ...Nc6, ...Nf6, ...Bc5 or else ...Bb4, ...d6, ...O-O."
++ Makes sense, but you have to consider what white plays.

"I can't just play all the moves on auto-pilot without looking at what my opponent is doing"
++ OK.

"I have to choose the move-order very carefully" ++ Yes.

"I have to constantly watch out for tactical combinations" ++ Yes.

"I have to know exactly what to do" ++ You do not have to know: think and find out.

"against the King's Gambit I play 2...Bc5 rather than 2...exf4" ++ OK.

"White never has an advantage that is bigger than his usual first move advantage (+0.30)"
++ OK.

"I prefer to transpose into my system rather than get a slight advantage"
++ There is no black advantage and the white advantage is small and vanishes over time.

"I prefer to play slow positional variations." ++ OK.

"I try to avoid sharp tactical aggressive variations." ++ OK.

"I still don't know what to play against the Scotch and the Ruy Lopez though."
++ You do not have to know. You can think and find out.

"Against the Scotch, 4...Bc5 has the advantage of looking more similar to my system" ++ OK.

"4...Nf6 has the advantage that 20% of the time it transposes to the Scotch Four Knights" ++ OK

"Against the Ruy Lopez, 4...Bc5 (the Classical) is objectively bad" ++ Not much.

"5...Bc5 (the Classical Deferred) is no better" ++ It is OK too.

"5...b5 6.Ba4 Bc5 (the Neo-Arkhangelsk)" ++ OK.

"5...b5 6.Ba4 Bb7 (the Archangelsk)" ++ OK.

"5...b5 6.Ba4 Be7 (the Closed/Mainline)" ++ Great.

Skynet

"In e4 openings the lines are sharp and forcing, tactical rather than positional, and not very transpositional... it's better to just consider the position in a holistic way over deliberately trying to arrange the pieces in a way where they're sort of on similar squares in one opening vs another, but all the lines will never transpose"

"These are cross-cutting transpositions, but beyond this... having some within-e4 transpositional opening isn't very good since it just won't transpose probably ever"

"you're playing e4 and your moves aren't going to transpose anyway"

You are correct that transpositions are much rarer in 1.e4 than in 1.d4, 1.Nf3 and 1.c4. But transpositions will be frequent for someone who plays the Modern, or the Philidor, or.....my Double King's Pawn system that I just described in the first post. Here are a few examples.

I reach the Italian Four Knights through the following move-orders:
2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5
2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Nc3 Nf6 3.Bc4 Bc5
2.Nc3 Nc6
2.Bc4 Nc6

I reach the same opening except that White has played f4 through the following move-orders:
2.f4 Bc5 3.Nf3 d6
2.Nc3 Nc6
2.Bc4 Nc6

Also White can play d4 and c3 at any time.
2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Bc5 4.c3 Nf6 5.d4 exd4
2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 exd4 4.Bc4 Bc5 5.c3 Nf6

crazedrat1000

"... except that white has played f4" 

you're playing against the kings gambit, it's a very tactical position, tactical continuations and the unique features of the position should determine what move you play next, not positional similarities with the four knights or whatever you're trying to coincide with. Because the game will be decided by tactics.

"I reach the italin four knights via..."

yes, the four knights can be reached a few different ways early on - this isn't a new idea though, it's just how you play the four knights. But what you describe is actually playing more complex positions, like the kings gambit or ruy lopez, in a positionally similar way. With that I do not see any value added, if you don't transpose very early you're not going to, and you're just not assessing the lines you play on their tactical merits, compromising the tactical possibilities in your e4/e5 repertoire - a tactical opening if there ever was one - for positional considerations that will never lead to transpositions, and as the lines proceed with their main continuations won't even lead to very similar positions due to the opening being primarily tactical.

"I prefer to play slow positional variations. I try to avoid sharp tactical aggressive variations. I still don't know what to play against the Scotch and the Ruy Lopez though." 

So why choose e4/e5 then? it's a tactical opening, there's not alot of value gained in trying to play it positionally. If you played a positional opening that way you'd get huge benefits, but not here.

BeastBoy06
Skynet wrote:

People always speak about how to choose your first move, but they never speak about how to choose your second move, third move, fourth move, etc. Okay, I decided what first move I wanted to play, but now how do I decide what second, third, fourth, etc, moves I want to play? Do I just pick the #1 most popular move every time? But then my repertoire would have no coherence, it would look completely random, it would be very hard to memorize and remember everything.

As Black against 1.e4, I play 1...e5. Then, I try to play all the following moves: ...Nc6, ...Nf6, ...Bc5 or else ...Bb4, ...d6, ...O-O. This is like a "system" approach, except that it's not exactly a system because I can't just play all the moves on auto-pilot without looking at what my opponent is doing, I have to choose the move-order very carefully, I have to constantly watch out for tactical combinations (such as ...Bc5, Nf3xe5, ...Nc6xe5, d4, forking my Bishop and Knight), and often I can't play my "system" and so I have to know exactly what to do. I often intentionally choose to not play the objectively best move (for example, against the King's Gambit I play 2...Bc5 rather than 2...exf4), but White never has an advantage that is bigger than his usual first move advantage (+0.30). I am pragmatic. I prefer to transpose into my "system" rather than get a slight advantage, but I prefer to get a large advantage rather than transpose into my "system". I prefer to play slow positional variations. I try to avoid sharp tactical aggressive variations. I still don't know what to play against the Scotch and the Ruy Lopez though. Against the Scotch, 4...Bc5 has the advantage of looking more similar to my "system", 4...Nf6 has the advantage that 20% of the time it transposes to the Scotch Four Knights. Against the Ruy Lopez, 4...Bc5 (the Classical) is objectively bad, 5...Bc5 (the Classical Deferred) is no better. My options are: 5...Bc5 (the Moeller), 5...b5 6.Ba4 Bc5 (the Neo-Arkhangelsk), 5...b5 6.Ba4 Bb7 (the Archangelsk), 5...b5 6.Ba4 Be7 (the Closed/Mainline).

My brother in christ u are 1500. All u need to do is develop centrally and not blunder stuff.

najdorf96

indeed. Abit of overthinking to me. I mean, anyone who can rattle off moves (possible candidates) I believe wouldn't have a problem with coming up with follow up moves as soon as his opponent makes his move. Heh. Besides, we do have Opening Principles to fall back on, right? Knights before Bishops, at least one pawn in the center, rooks on open files etc... Experience plays a factor also, even if you have never studied any Opening Theory. Soo come on now, why question yourself now? If such thoughts ever manifested in my mind, heck, I'd just stick to playing 960 chess. No problem 😊