When opponents mirror your opening

I come across this a lot lately if I try and play the London System.

1) d4, d5

2) nf3, nf6

3) bf4, bf5

4) nc3, nc6

5) e3, e6

...Knights to move by attacking your developed bishop etc.

I suppose I could spice it up a bit with a gambit or something but I also come across a similar game playing e4, namely, the four-knight's game with bishops to follow.

The two are almost identical. It doesn't bother me if my opponent decides to mirror the opening but for me makes it so boring!

Does anybody know any nice lines to get out of this symmetry mirror BS?

First of all I find it funny that someone who plays the London would call a reply by his opponent boring. There are many ways to get an equal position against the london and just copying the white moves is one of them. The opening  is boring and does not set black any real difficulties. 

Having said that i do not think that Nc3 fits in a London setup (I am no expert) but in my opinion the knight should go to d2 (with the idea to play Nf3 - e5 and Nd2- f3. Moving the knight to c3 invites active back counterplay based on c5 (at some point) taking on d4 and gaining a central majority. 

It is boring. It's the "playing it safe" mode to me. I'll just mirror my opponent until the middle game comes along, that's the vibe I get from them.

Its understood that its not good for black to keep the symmetry and must break it at some point.

Please mirror me!  You'll be sure to lose!

ThrillerFan - amilton542

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Nxe5 Nxe4??

Again I say, Please Mirror Me!  PLEASE PLEASE PLEASE!

And by the way, the original poster needs to learn notation before he starts trying to learn the most boring opening in all of chess.

1.d4 d5 2.Nf3 Nf6 3.Bf4 Bf5, etc.

Capitalization matters.  After 1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 Bb4 4.Bd2?! (Not a good move, but proves my point) 4...Bxc3 and now 5.bxc3 is taking with the b-pawn, 5.Bxc3 is taking with the Bishop.

With your notation:  1.e4 e6 2.d4 d5 3.nc3 bb4 4.bd2 bxc3, now you tell me what I mean by 5.bxc3?????????   And don't even try to tell be bbxc3 and bdxc3 (b on the b takes c3 and b on the d take c3 - that's Knights, Rooks, and multiple Queen scenarios, not pawn vs Bishop capture)

Not a blunder.  It ain't clear-cut how White acheives a significant advantage after the further moves 4.Qe2 Qe7 (every Russian, and American, schoolboy knows 4...Nf6?? 5.Nc6+ wins) 5.Qxe4 d6.

Although, sticking with our theme, 5...Qxe5?? would indeed be quite bad.

^^^^ I disagree completely.

You are not forced to learn only 1 line in chess.

My Beginner Rep. included London system, Italian Game, KIA

http://www.chess.com/blog/X_PLAYER_J_X/chess-repertoire

All of which are same move openings that can be auto piloted. Yet they proved to be very effective in lower level chess. The reason why is becuase they consistantly developed pieces. An when my opponents went on 1 or 2 piece attacks(which is seen alot in low level chess) they found themselves in trouble. Which helped me grow faster.

Later on I began to evolve my opening and add more lines to the lines I already have played. So no it doesn't have to stunt your chess growth.

Are you kidding Fiveofswrds

I always play the London System when I want some excitement. King side attacks are brillant with the London. you can even castle queen side. It can get nasty fast.

My ranking went from 500-2000 in 1 year.

I don't think my ranking was stunted much? You just have to be willing to keep evolving as a chess player.

I use to say I would never play the Caro-Kann becuase I thought it was boring, slow, and the positions didn't appeal to me. Than I realized I was only setting self-restrictions upon myself. It was a self imposed Dogma.

Than I remembered something a forum poster once wrote.

His user name was FiveofSwords.

He said " The Queen is more powerful than the Pawn only becuase it is less restricted. Dogma's make you like the Pawn."

I than tryed out the Caro-Kann and it became one of my favorite openings to use against 1.e4. I still use it every now and again.

Your success in chess will revolve around your ability to break through your own self imposed Dogmas. You just have to keep pushing yourself to never remain static.

Oddly enough one day your hatred of the London System will probably turn out to be your salvation in improvement.

Are you trying to improve? If yes avoid making any system opening a oart of your repertoire. Its just lazy.

You believe the London System is lazy yet its lazy nature teachs you another skill/valueable lesson. The lesson you will learn will leave an impact on your chess the rest of your chess career.

If all you do is search for aggressive-unlazy positions. One day you will find yourself in a chess position were the way of aggressive-unlazy play will lead you to a lost game.

An the way of success/victory would be the lazy play position. The area in your chess you would simply be lacking becuase of your own self-imposed Dogma.

I wish to be a great chess player one day a true Chess Warrior. An as a Chess Warrior you can not be afraid of playing any position. No matter if its boring,slow, lazy, un-lazy,aggressive, tactical, positional, unsound, sound, equal, or unequal A Chess Warrior should be able to handle any position with confidence and success.

An when you look at former World Champions or some of the really great chess players in history, you see it don't you? They had an aura about them. The way they handled positions was unlike any other.

I believe if we all wish to improve as they did. We have to shatter our own  mind set barriers and its hard if it were easy everyone would be a Grand Master.

I think "miserable" is an exaggeration.  White can get a normal advantage but there is no outright refutation so the ?? on ..Nxe4 is not justified.

No, it is not a "free pawn at the least."  Black gets an initiative for the pawn, whether White wants to take the Queens off or not.  And 6...f6 is terrible, Black is playing 6...dxe5 instead.

Here is a sample game where White did not find a way to convert the extra pawn:

Addressing the text in red from above

Maybe you think I misinterpreted something when in fact I read and interpreted your post very clearly.

Addressing the text in blue from above

Yes, You said its good idea to learn the opening but not to have it part of your repertoire. My question is WHY NOT?

The reason you don't want people to have this London System part of their repertoire is becuase "You(hayabusahayate16) think(s) this line is Lazy".

Which is a Label you set upon the line by your own self-imposed dogma.

Gata Kamsky is a Grand Master ranked 2650+ who uses this line in his main repertoire every single day.

I want you to walk up to Gata Kamsky and tell him. He should not have this line in his main repertoire becuase its Lazy.

An if he laughs and challenges you to a chess game. You are going to see how it feels like to lose against his Lazy Line. Than maybe you will say " Hey that line isn't Lazy its very Solid I could not do anything against it."

Addressing the text in green from above

How wonderful. Please tell me how you really feel about me.

Terms like lazy, boring etc etc are simply a subjective evaluation. They are as far as the chess board is concerned, meaningless.  The chessboard doesn't care about lazy lines or boring lines, all it cares about are strong and weak moves.  If an opening is solid and gets any player regardless of strength to a playable middle game with clear plans and ideas its to be recommended, surely?  I play everything except 1.g4 and 1.b4, dragons, colle, london, najdorf, english, meran, four knights, ruy lopez, caro kann, stonewall anything that doesn't lose instantly and I would go as far to say that it makes absolutely no difference what anyone at my measly level plays.  If I am feeling fragile and I want something solid I play London or Colle, If I am in the mood for something sharp I play the Dragon.  Whats wrong with that?

What is it about it doesn't matter what openings people at beginner or intermediate level that you are having difficulty with?  People who play the London system or the Colle or anything else for that matter hardly ever lose games in the opening.  Its ludicrous to talk of opening strength.  Seriously club players are obsessed with openings, they think that it will give them some kind of advantage when the reality is that it probably doesn't matter what they play.  I know I have a book case full of opening books many of which I have studied and that have not added a single rating point to my game.  Why? because the vast majority of my games are lost in the middle and the end game.

openings dont matter and it may even be a bad idea to follow the theory of grandmaster games for a beginner intermediate level player.  I am playing a game at the moment which i cannot comment upon in detail, its a mainline kings Indian, i have the white pieces and knew the theory and understood the moves well into the endgame.  It followed a Shirov game in which he sacrificed the exchange for positional compensation.  I knew of this game and had even memorised it, but i am now probably going to lose it in the endgame after gaining what is considered an advantage, why? because its too sophisticated for my level! It would have been much better for me to have played something generic.

I have lost to it a few times but it makes no sense to me.  If i can find a rational for it then possibly I could try it.

White should go Queens off with a clear advantage: