I was bored with the slav and lately I play Chigorin Defence (1.d4 d5 2.c4 Nc6) and I love it! I have some analysis of mine if you want i can send you.
tactical opening against 1.d4?
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Thanks playe4 about theVHSG. Also a lot of other interesting openings I am hearing about. Very nice posts.
I totally relate with what you are saying as I've devoted a lot of time myself exploring this issue. It can be hard to shake up a 1.d4 player into a tactical game, and after a lot of exploration here are my favs:
1. benko gambit (rapid piece development and queenside expansion for black. If you haven't explored this one, you gotta try it! Fun and not a lot of theory to learn.)
2. modern benoni (a cousin to the benko and king's indian). This opening requires a lot of patience to learn, but if you like complexity and tactics, you'll eventually be right at home. Notably, white will often shy away from entering into the benoni, so be ready for possible English transpositions).
3. king's indian defense (although this opening can definitley be a tactical tinderbox, in my own experience, there's usually a lot of long and very careful positional manuevering before the fireworks begin. Truth be told, I'm still learning this complex opening and am hoping to have better success with it in the future.)
4. dutch defense (or the dutch leningrad)- this also works really well if you want to force white out of the English opening. However, you'll need to be ready to play closed positions (usually with the pawns locked up in a kind of saw tooth formation), as the dutch frequently leads to
Some of the sharpest defences popular at the GM level are:
1. the Budapest Gambit 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e5
2. the Queen's Gambit Declined Albin Countergambit 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e5
3. the Benko Gambit 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 b5
4. the Dutch Defence 1.d4 f5
5. the Queen's Gambit Declined Chigorin 1.d4 d5 2.c4 Nc6