what opening should i play as a 800 beginner?

i brought that comment back up

you said that you dont use anything gotham says yet that comment is everything that gotham says

dude, the only videos I watch are GTE lol. Look through my games, for white I play the London (did not watch Gotham cover it), Reti Gambit/English (can transpose with eachother or to other openings easily), or the Italian (rarely). For black I play the French or Sicilian into e4, and the Dutch into everything else. None of which Gotham recommend.

there’s no vienna and ostrich didn’t recommend the dutch to absurdly low-rated players like gotham does

he recommends the dutch tho

this comment isn’t implying anything I’m just pointing that out

I've climbed from around where you're at (850) to about 1400 over the past 3/4 months - and I will say that I believe it's much better to choose more tactical openings (usually 1. e4). I used to dabble in queens gambit/london but it never really took off - as a sub-1000, my positional understanding was far too limited and I needed something a little more aggressive to really start to see improvement. But feel free to choose whatever you'd like!

rlly? when? I never even saw it lol I just play it because I want an attacking, sharp response that throws opponents out of their prep

ayyyyy nice gains dude!

he recommends it in his “my favorite openings by rating” video along with the Vienna and the Caro-Kann (no surprise there)

There is some good and some bad in this comment.

The worst I would say is the Exchange French. If you want to enjoy the game and like to win, then don't play the Exchange French. Play 3. Nc3 or at least 3. e5, the Advance. 3. Nd2, the Tarrasch, is also a decent option. It's often more quiet and positional but still fairly interesting.

For the Sicilian, you can play the Open and if you actually put some effort into learning a bit about it then you will have a perfectly good game. On the contrary, you might play the Closed Sicilian to get the opponent "out of book", but if they put the effort into learning about it then you will not be so well off as in the Open Sicilian.

The Sicilian is actually an amazing opening for understanding piece placement, especially the Najdorf.

There are common themes throughout the variations where you can understand clear reasons for why a piece is better here or there. You can even go for different piece layouts with different ideas behind them, depending on preference.

It has a lot of flexibility and you can get far with good intuition.

This is 100% true. It's viable and solid at every level. An 800 MIGHT like it, or they might not like it in which case the Sicilian is another great option if they like it more.

personally ive been learning the pirc because im tired of the browlder attack and it can transpose into the benoni structures or something even sharper

I second this. This is the mainline:

The queen on c7 utilizes a half-open file to control vital queenside squares- where the enemy king stands.

The knight on d7 supports the knight on f6 and develops the knight to a square where the important c-file remains accessible to the queen and rooks.

The bishop on e7 allows kingside castling and protects the knight from being attacked by an enemy pawn- losing the piece because the knight would be pinned to the king.

The pawn on b5 gains queenside space, prepares a queenside pawn storm/attack to expose the enemy king, and allows the light-squared bishop to go to b7.

the pawn on a6 supports the pawn on b5. Simple as that.

The piece placement is easy to understand- which is better than memorization. The Najdorf, although it has mountains of theory, is one of the easiest openings to understand because its piece placement is extremely natural if you understand why.

but i also get the dummys who play like this

when i encounter the main line i play the poisoned pawn variation which is incredibly sharp and difficult for both sides

but i so rarely ever get open sicilians these days that ive been starting to forget how to play them

interestingly, before the chess boom i got more open sicilians

dodged a nuclear bomb of theory 😎

lmao yeah, i play the pp najdorf because i am built to remember 30+ moves of theory and its super sharp

i also hate those other lines where white has all these tricky moves and some big kingside attack

Might be slightly influenced by one person in particular who seems to love anti sicilians *cough* GOTHAM CHESS *cough*