Openings Crash Course (just to avoid blunders)

Qf6 or Qg6, I think its possible to hang on after that, especially at our level.

The move you played is good, though I think it's not considered best these days. It's called the Classical Defense and I don't know it. Maybe someone else can tell you more about it. Also 3... Nf6 and 3... f5 are played a lot at the top level these days, and there are other good moves.

The most common move is Paul Morphy's 3... a6. The important thing to know about this move is that White isn't quite threatening to win a pawn by capturing your defender yet. If White does capture your defender the most accepted way to play as Black is to recapture with the d-pawn. After that if White tries to grab the pawn with the Knight it runs into several tactics involving the Queen. The simplest and probably best one of these is Qd4 forking the Knight and pawn. Because Black will recapture the pawn with check White will lose the ability to castle and people tend to think the opening hasn't been a success for the first player. Other interesting ways for Black to regain the pawn do include the fork you mentioned with Qg5.

Don't play 3... h6. See #29 and #30 etc... in this thread and also this question was answered in some of your other threads too. The losing move in this game was 7... Ke8. 7... Ke6 is required but Black suffers a lot in that line. A more practical idea is to play 5... Na5 or 5... b5 or 5... Nd4, like you said not recapturing the pawn. If you don't want to give up a pawn simply play 3... Bc5 or 3... Be7 and skip the whole thing. 3... h6? is a terrible move.

Thank you.  Yes, it seems better is playing the 3... Bc5 , instead of the knight. Lessons learned!

Nice, trapping a Q is beyond my ability right now.  Thanks for the demo!

Yes, but of course 3... d6 4.Nf3 Nxe4 is the usual continuation. By delaying the recapture of the pawn, Black avoids some unnecessary troubles.

5.d4 leads to a mainline Russian. I played several times 5.Nc3 Nxc3 6.dxc3 which is also ok.

this petroff trap is not an opening to memorize but a trap to be aware of :)

JackOfAllHobbies wrote:

Nice, trapping a Q is beyond my ability right now.  Thanks for the demo!

Most fun ive had in chess is kicking a queen around until I have a winning position.

In the original game ... Bc5 is OK, Jack. After Bxc6, you recaptured with the wrong pawn. The idea is to be able to play Qd4.

Which game are you referring to?  There are now many games posted in this thread....

Here are two more I encountered today.  
Did I play the correct response?

12/8 GAME 1:

12/8 GAME 2.
Prety sure I botched this.
Was was the correct response?

First Game is good but there are other good options for Black.

Second Game I think your d4 should be good but it looks surprisingly tricky. 3. Nc3 seems to be the most popular move. The opponent really needs to play c6 or Ne7 to stop the Kinght coming into to d5 and after that you can play as you did but with the Knight already on c3 you're gaining an important tempo.

see #47 for more on your post #58 game.

Ok, so first game, I can attack the Q via g6 as well.  I'll give that a try.

http://www.365chess.com/opening.php?m=6&n=4033&ms=e4.e5.Qh5.Nc6.Bc4&ns=3.5.332.838.4033

I think in the 2nd game, I should have just played Qd3 to protect the center pieces, instead of trying to attack the Q and leaving an unprotected pawn.  Basic error here.