Queen's Stone wall attack

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TihidiKunmun

Is Queen's Stonewall attack is the best attacking openning for white ?

ViktorHNielsen

No, but the Pillsbury Attack (Ne5 followed by f4 in a 1. d4 opening) can be quite aggresive IF played at the right time. Study Kasparovs games, and you will see how to get an attacking position after 1. d4!

pentiumjs

Hi TihidiKunmun--here's what I like to tell people about the Stonewall.  It's a system rather than an opening, very much a pre-packaged series of themes that have little to do with the opponent's setup.  White establishes his c3/d4/e3/f4 bastion, gets Bd3/Nf3 in there, usually castles, plays the inevitable Ne5, and then tries to destroy h7 through some combination of h3/g4/g5, Qh5, Rf3/Rh3, so on and so forth.  This 20-move plan works wonders against the inexperienced as well as weaker computers with shallow lookahead.  White dooms himself to a nearly useless dark-squared bishop though, as well as permanent central holes in the form of d3 and e4.  So assuming his attack dies out as it often does (or else everyone would play the Stonewall), white faces an uphill battle in the endgame.  He may find himself left with a backwards, doubled e3 pawn (after Ne5 Nxe5 fxe5 earlier, etc.) an opponent's knight firmly entrenched on e4, or fatal weaknesses on the queenside while he was busy on the other end of the board.  It's not a terrible concept, but you'll rarely see it at higher levels because its long-term positional setbacks are more trouble than they're worth against defenders who know what they're doing.

TihidiKunmun

Thanks for your comments.