sell me on 1...e5

I have very good advice for you:

play 1.d4

So your suggestion is 1.e4 d4

I think that will just cost him a few minutes of his clock, unless he repeats it enough to get disqualified or lose on time.

I can't buy 1...e5 for Black. I'd like to but I can't.

You have to have lines for:

1 Kings Gambit

2 Centre Counter

3 Danish Gambit

4 Goring Gambit variants

5 Scotch Game

6 Italian Game/Two Knights ...many sharp variations where Black has good chances but lots to learn

7 Ruy Lopez including early deviations like the Exchange, delayed exchange and Centre Attack

8 Four Knights including a couple of sharp gambit lines

9 Vienna Gambit

10 Vienna Game including the g3 variation

11 Bishops Opening

12 Bishop's Gambit

Well lets consider the Sicilian

1 Your choice of "open" variation - perhaps get ~ 50 % of the time

2 Bb5 variations if you choose d6,or Nc6 variations. No need to learn if an e6 Sicilian is studied

3 c3 (VERY popular). Learn one good line of many

4 Grand Prix attack.Greatly overrated. Look at Games Explorer

5 Closed Variation. Strategic rather than tactic intensive IMO.

I LIKE the idea of standing toe to toe and slugging it out with 1...e5 and I keep looking at it every so often....I "converted" to the Sicilian two years ago after playing chess for over 35 years and answering 1e4 with e5. I'm now 49 and my ECF grade thanks in no small part to the Sicilian is the highest I've ever had. When you get an Anti Sicilian on move 2 or 3you have already equalised and if you get an open Siclian - you have a central pawn majority which is more significant IMO than Black's mooted queenside expansion.

Yes! This is a really important post. A lot of people (myself at one time, for example) stay away from Sicilian defense because there's a lot of theory, but in reality, there's not more theory with Sicilian, for black, if anything, there's less! 

Because i'm santa clause and if you don't play e5 you go on the naughty (patzer) list!!

When I do play the sicilian (not much), I play the kan, but anyway in long time controls I just use my understanding of chess to combat the anti sicilians, and honestly, it not only works very well for me, but it's actually interesting because I get easy equality yet the game is still imbalanced (generally not as sharp as usual though, which is a plus for me) and I have the fun of figuring out what white's plan is and how I respond to it.

And when I actually get into the kan I just use some of the ideas I learned in a book, and soon I am able to use that and my strategic knowledge to judge when and when not to commit to a certain pawn or developing move and just play once I have a plan in mind. Like I said it works out really well, and at the moment my rating suggests I'm class A (though I think I'm expert strength; but then we all can have tendencies to overrate ourselves, so who knows).

In blitz, this isn't as effective because a lot of subtle things in these lines would be very tough to figure out given a small amount of time, but on the other hand it's still a very solid position, and the opponent will probably get confused too.

So yeah there's always a ton of minor lines, but I can figure them out over the board given a lot of time.

I would of course agree that a main main line sicilian like najdorf etc could be brutal.

Anyway what I think Anthony is saying is that 1...e5 is more of a branch of many different openings while the 1...c5 is siciliany enough to consider every move after the first move one single, giant opening. I think as a whole 1...e5 has more theory because there are just so many options, not the mention the absolute giant that is the ruy lopez. But that doesn't tell the whole story, because the variations of 1...e5 are not necessarily more critical to learn than those of 1...c5, much because the moves are more natural and straightforward, which is what you were getting at. I mean, there's a ton of theory on say the english if you want it, yet people play it to avoid theory! There are of course tons of subtleties to it, but those subtleties are not quite as critical to know to play successfully as more direct, aggressive openings.

Yes you can mention lots of lines like sveshnikov, najdorf, schevinegen, but some of these lines often share similar pawn structures (well at least the fact that they have two center pawns... now I know that a najdorf can have a very different structure as a schevinegen, but then a lot of times they overlap with the same e6 d6 structure too. A classical sicilian can share any of those pawn structures as well.), so are they all really that incredibly different? Like for example how different is a classical sicilian from a schevinegen? I dunno, maybe they are

THANK YOU.

I am sick of the people that just go for symmetry as black. Leaves me as bored as a tree stump in termite season.

Okay just to give you an idea of what you need to play 1...e5 using my experience.

Against the Italian, I play the Two Knights Defense.

Against the Ruy Lopez, I play the Chigorian.

Against the Danish Gambit, I grab the two pawns and refute it.

Against the Scotch, I play Qh4.

Against the Scotch Gambit, I transpose to the Italian.

Against the King's Gambit, I play the main lines.

Against the Three Knights, I play the Four Knights.

Against the Vienna, I play the main lines.

Any other sidelines are not a problem for black to deal with.

Now was that so bad?

If you find 1.e4 e5 is boring, you really do not know how to play it.

I'm almost the same:

In the 2 Knights when they try for the fried liver, I play the Fritz variation.

In the Ruy I play the Schliemann

In the KG I play the Cunningham

And yes, Qh4 in the Scotch is killer!

It seems to me that, from the Black's perspective, clearly more theoretical knowledge is required to play 1. ...e5 than to play the Sicilian. Of course we all know the Sicilian is a theoretical monster but if you are playing it from Black side you don't have to know even a half of all that theory, you just need to know your favorite variation in the Open and the anti-Sicilians. With 1...e5 you have to be prepared for several theoretical heavy weights like the Italian, the Scotch, the Ruy Lopez, plus all the gambits and even the off-beat tries like the Ponziani. The things are different from the White perspective as in 1.e4 e5 the White can usually get his favorite opening on the board and doesn't need to worry about the others. The question is which side gets to choose the opening / variation.

If you are going to play anything beyond casual woodpushing and offhand games, you are going to have to learn quite a bit in any system. The big questions are: What kind of middlegames are you looking to play? What kind of pawn structure do you want? How do you want to fight for the initiative?

When you answer these questions, you'll know what opening system you want to play.

was this not stated in my OP?

"i enjoy sharp, open, attacking positions mostly."

i may be wrong, but i'm assuming "open" refers to the pawn structure and the middle game; "attacking" refers to the middle game; and i should have mentioned i prefer tactical over positional games.

so can you answer my OP question now with that info?

I think this is pretty equal. Black has an awkward king but  an extra pawn.

Yeah, if you have two kings, it probably doesn't matter if one of them is awkardly placed.

And isn't Qh4 considered dubious by theory? If it was to give black equality in just 8 moves that would pretty much be considered the refutation of the scotch.

There's been some debate about this. I have always battled against the Scotch, till I started playing this move, and my results are really much better than before. But, I suppose at my level that doesn't really matter.

I remember a while ago (here, or another site, can't remember), some strong players lamenting that it has never been tried against real top quality White players. It needs to be tested at the top level to get a real evaluation.

But till then, it's good enough for me.

I actually read the same Davies' quote awhile ago on another website that actually made me say to myself "Wow, I actually do not anything about the Ruy Lopez (having never played it as white/black) or other 1... e5 stuff since I play the sicilian, and to top things off I'm still a beginner!"  So I instantly decided to switch to 1... e5 - at first I had to force myself, but after a bit I actually grew to like the positions I got as black (a lot thanks in part to people playing the four knights' italian or transposing into it for who knows what reason - I surprisingly get this a lot - and they think Bxf7 is such a great move, I don't know why).  I'm still trying to get more comfortable with the Ruy Lopez, but everything else is fine - I get excited when I see someone play the italian so I can go for two knights' defense, or the king's gambit (I play the fischer defense against that).  Vienna game (though it is rare and I have yet to see it) doesn't seem like too much of a challenge for black, center game isn't that great, I think I'm now just repeating what others have said.

So, to finish up, 1... e5 is NOT boring!  Just try it out - it has now become my new, solid response to 1. e4.

*NOTE - I did not play any super-intense sicilian, just an accelerated dragon

I'm pretty sure that line is the supposed refutation, and it's not surprising that most players would rather be White. But it's really a question of style, some people might not mind to defend this position with Black just for that extra pawn. As long as they're not playing someone much stronger who would blow them off the board, they'd have a good chance of winning the game.

At the US Open early this month, I was Black twice against the Scotch and both times I played the Qh4 variation (Steinitz Variation). In my first game my opponent decided to trade Queens for some reason, which made my life a lot easier because I had an extra pawn and no danger of being attacked.

In my second game I made an inaccuracy early on, White even got the pawn back, my position was full of weaknesses, and my King was still stuck on d8. I even wanted to resign because my position was so ugly, but decided to play on because the position was still a bit messy. Luckily my opponent became to complacent and allowed me to slowly build up pressure against his King (ironically). 

Bottom line, while at the GM level I doubt many would want to defend that position against a fellow GM, but at the amateur level I think this line gives Black very good winning chances.  

Yeah, when looking at major databases, with people of all ratings, Qh4 scores pretty well, alot of wins for both sides with few draws, so it's probably a working weapon for most amateur players.

When I check the GM games though, it scores horribly for black.

I guess that proves your point.

what happens if 2. b3 after the sicilian

Elubas -

The Kan variation does sound very appealing. It is probably the least theoretical (mainline) sicilian so I have been tempted to play it, but the thought of being forced into a hedgehog position doesn't appeal to me very much. Even this opening though, which avoids the 3.Bb5 sicilians takes quite a bit of work as I already said. Also, if you switch from a 2...d6 or 2...Nc6 sicilian to a 2...e6 sicilian you need to revise most of your anti-sicilian repertoire to fit different move orders from white. 

I know what you mean when you say you can find good moves against the Anti-sicilians over the board. I often can too, but to me atleast, finding good, natural moves against the Italian, four knights, or scotch is just so much easier! It is because the positions are more open and strategically straight forward like I said before. I think with 1...e5 following the basic principles, knowing a couple mainlines against white's mainlines, and having a good eye for tactics will take you a long way.

When I started out with 1...e5 a few months ago I was playing the Sveshnikov before, with many losses straight out of the opening (yes, move 25 is still in the opening here). This was because I didn't have the memory and chess understanding to deal with the extremely irrational positions which come out of that opening, even though it is extremely sound. When I started playing 1...e5 I didn't bail out with "light theory" lines either. I took on the Ruy Lopez Zaitsev variation, which is very theory heavy, as well as 3...Bc5 against the Italian, allowing the Max Lange and Evan's gambit, and the Mieses variation against the scotch, which also has a lot of theory. I basically just learned the mainlines and understood what was going on strategically, and before I knew it, my blitz rating on FICS and Chess cube was like 100 points higher. I barely know the theory in these lines, but it doesn't seem to matter because my opponents don't know it as well as they knew the sicilian, and well, if I didn't know what to do, I would just develop a piece and I would usually be fine.

I know this over simplifies things a bit, but when I here people say "Play 1.e4 e5 until you are over 2000" I actually agree with them. This is because it is just so easy to play! Also, the Ruy Lopez is the cornerstone of positional chess. I believe it was Karpov who said something like "You can learn everything you need to about chess by playing the Ruy Lopez".

I am not sure what has more theory, 1...c5 or 1...e5. I am certain, however, that you need to know more theory to get a good game with 1...c5, especially at club level. I think the theory of 1...e5 is broader (there are more options) while the theory of 1...c5 is deeper, although the Ruy has been analyzed to incredible depth. Of course, I also really enjoy 1...c5 and I am playing the Najdorf as well as 1...e5, so I am not trying to say 1...e5 is better. My only problem with 1...e5 is that it can be hard to play for a win if white wants a draw. Anyway, just my two cents.