Queen Openings

I just don't get it. Why play an opening that risks bringing your queen out only several moves into the game? Personally, I think it's ridiculous. Of course, though, I love it when my opponent starts into one of these openings. It gives me a chance to chase the queen around and develop my pieces at the same time, so that 2 or 3 moves later I have some sort of foundation and the opponent has nothing. I mean I realize that such a powerful piece in the middle of the board is definetly not something to disregard but still! Here is a blitz game I played in live chess yesterday..

They let time run out so you might get bored and resign...

Well, Qc6?? is obviously a blunder, but the Center Counter or Scandinavian defense is quite viable -- the usually-played move is 3...Qa5.  Like many hypermodern openings, the idea is to tempt white into occupying the center, and then attack it from the flanks.

Not the type of thing I would recommend to a beginning player -- you're better off sticking with classical openings until you understand why hypermodern openings work, and have the tactical wherewithal to see the necessary defenses in cramped positions.  But it's no outright blunder, either.

If White has no real way to take advantage of the queen on d5, is that rule still relevant?

After the more normal 3...Qa5, the game often starts to look like a Caro-Kann sort of structure, in which Black is a little less active than normal, but White also lacks a few aggressive options he does have against the C-K, like the advance variation and the Panov.

Of course, whether a 1100 player should play like that is debatable, but a whole different discussion...