Not bad at chess... useless at 960. Need Guidelines

I fall apart in the first few moves in 960. I suspect that I am losing the moment I move a piece. If I survive the opening I can give a good account of myself.

Maybe I am more reliant on opening theory than I know. I also suspect the strongest part of my game is late-middle/end-game positions or closed games where there is a nice balance between tactics and long-term strategic goals. I don't handle and try to avoid situations where there is a large branching ratio - my instincts fail me.

How should I approach opening a chess960 game???

Not that I'm any good at 960, but one thing I heard that sounded good was to figure out where your pieces are going to go first (including where you are going to castle). Then use your pawn moves to support that plan.

I find that the positions that lend themselves to a closed positional game is easier for me by far with 960. Any of the games that have two weak squares to defend are almost impossible to manage if you yourself don't quickly mobilize an attack of your own. I find that people who are good at exploiting weak squares and using two or more minor pieces, in a well coordinated attack give me fits also, much more than in standard. Part of the problem I have with 960 is, I tend to make one move attacks, just to probingly see what my opponent responds with. A good standard opening has a multitude of facets to its over all attack. You almost need to come up with what would be considered the book opening for that position(if it were standard) to be really good at 960. It can be really tough to do that from raw calculation.

Thanks for the advice. Figuring out a whole opening sounds tricky. But I sounds like I need to spend a good while analyzing before I even move. I like the idea of counting weak pawns to determine strategy. I think I probably will continue to struggle with the "two weak pawn" games if that is an all-out attack scenario but at least I know that that is a time to abandon my usual opening style. I guess I need to practice more... But it's disheartening when I have to resign after 8 moves or 12 moves. Would it be considered cheating practicing a given 960 starting position with a computer. Obviously it's not cheating to practice the standard starting position with a computer, or a random 960 position with a computer. But if I'm going to play a tournament with a fixed 960 position is it cheating to explore openings on that position with a computer?? Maybe I should start a new thread with that question...

A friend of mine here, beat me in 4 moves by moving his lone knight 4 times and then forking my king and queen. My king was blocked on every side. I didn't see it coming or even consider his lone knight a serious threat. I normally never worry about my opponent's first few moves as a serious threat, partly due to the style I play but also because, the standard setup is more balanced in defensive strength and ability to stave off sudden threats.

I was too busy trying to strategize an attack and tactical chances. I am sure he did that by study and also seeing what he could do to manipulate me as Alekhine did with his opening. I had been avoiding his attempts to draw out my pawns,while attacking the knight,that would have helped to take away my kings defenses. This lent to me being lulled into allowing that to happen to me. Making threats that have a good counter in store after your opponents retort is the key in chess, but it seems compunded in 960 with certain positions.