Owen's defense: Brilliant counter or terrible attack?

Owen's defense is a move after E4 where you develop and fianchetto the bishop into attacking whites central pawn. There are many ways to win or lose but let's look at the most plausible winning and losing scenarios.

In the diagram above, black is simply winning. That's a good Owen's defense scenario, but everything's not sunshine and rainbows...

As mentioned already in your other thread, you can make any bad defense for Black look good by playing bad moves for White.

1.e4 b6? 2.d4! Bb7 3.Bd3! Advantage White!

Anyone with any sense will protect the pawn with the Bishop, not the Knight, against which ...e6 and ...Bb4 just validates Black's point behind ...b6 and ...Bb7. Punish naive players that play that junk by taking the center and protect the e-pawn in a better manner. Even if Black does something stupid like waste his time with ...Nc6-b4-xd3, White can recapture with the Queen or c-pawn, both of which would continue to protect e4, unlike a captured knight on c3, then neither bxc3 or Qxc3 would protect e3.

The lines you give are junk!

Not to mention, your second diagram is a continuation of the first. So how the bleep is the first winning for Black if the second is winning for White? Your post makes ZERO logical sense!

plenty of players stronger than you and I play 3.nc3 over 3.bd3 all the time, lets not kid ourselves here. And personally, the lines with early nge2 practically worry me a lot more than those engine bd3 qe2 lines

Those that do play 3.Nc3 still play 2.d4, Not 2.Nf3.

1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3.Bd3 is simply the best of many good options. 1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3.Nc3 is also advantage white, just a smidgen less than 3.Bd3.

Where Bd3 is far superior to Nc3 is in the English Defense.

1.e4 b6 2.d4 Bb7 3.c4 e6, now 4.Bd3 is far superior to 4.Nc3 as after the latter, 4...Bb4 really is trouble for White. With perfect play, White's fine, but there are numerous ways to go wrong and be lost while 4.Bd3 in the English Defense or 3.Bd3 or 3.Nc3 in Owen's Defense are all better for White, Just Bd3 WITHOUT c4 is the best of three good lines for White.

In fact, there are a number of strong players I have seen who will only play 1...b6 against 1.c4, where Owen Defense is not possible, it will be an English Defense, either a main line where White plays d4 and e4, or a Two-Prong attack where White plays e4 but keeps the d-pawn back on d3.

If you like to play the English Defense but want to avoid the Owen's (the inferior of the two), then the best is to play 1.c4 b6, but against 1.d4, play 1...e6 first. This does allow 2.e4, but now instead of the inferior Owen's Defense, Black should play 2...d5, Which is now the French Defense.

The French can be a very convenient opening to know in many cases.

English Defense - 1...e6 first against d4 allows its transposition.

e6-Dutch lines - Avoid the Staunton Gambit or 2.Bg5 or the poisoned-Spike by playing 1...e6 first, allowing a French Transposition.

In addition to the French being good for English Defense and Classical or Stonewall Dutch players, the French can also resolve other avoidable annoyances.

Nimzo-Indian and QGD players can avoid the Trompowsky and Levitsky attacks by playing 1...e6. If you know the French, like I know someone that played the French and Nimzo that would play 1.d4 e6 2.c4 (2.e4 d5) Nf6 etc.

Veresov - After 1.d4 Nf6 2.Nc3 d5 3.Bg5, if you want to avoid the Theory-ridden 3...Nbd7, 3...e6 is s goof alternative. Now 4.e4 and you have the French.

The French can also be used to decline the Blackma-Diemer Attack (1.d4 d5 2.e4 e6).

So weather than Owen's Defense, if you like those Queenside Fianchetto lines, but want something more aggressive than the solid but passive Queens Indian, include the French in your repertoire and combine it with the English Defense.

Leela thinks it's about +0.41 for white. The eval threshold for defenses I'm willing to play I've kept at around +0.32 for a while. That's where lines like the nimzowitsch sicilian and Alekhines evaluate. I had tons of success with the nimzowitsch when I played it. Out of a hundred games I think I encountered the main line three times. Of course, engine is not the only thing I assess - if it's a very specific line that scores well sometimes I ignore it, but I really want to know that, once the game gets messy, I will likely have a good position. I'm not keen on playing lines where I'm down by .4 and every move the opponent makes maintains that advantage.

I might loosen that threshold at some point, in the past I cared more about engine evaluations. Nowdays, I care about how a line feels to play more than that. I haven't played Owens, but I have played the nimzo larsen and the english defense, and I can tell you that they both play very well. If the opponent missteps, your queenside bishop eyes down their king and it gets very punishing. There's also alot of complexity to the pawn structures in the center, which always makes for an interesting game. Owens specifically I've avoided because there are certain engine lines where I just don't like how the position looks, but I have not actually played it to really know how much of an issue that is. My suspicion is that it plays very well until you run into someone who knows the line and then it becomes difficult. In practice, that's probably extremely rare to encounter. So as a repertoire used in an online context, I think it's probably a good line. It's much different than lines players are used to seeing, that alone will give you wins. But if you play OTB where people can prep for you, I would not use it.