Openings for 'experienced' beginners developing their game further

Hi Internet!

I have focused on openings London system for white and KID / Pirc for black. This is based on many youtube videos, chessable and other recommendations. Does this feel like the best set ups to learn as deep as you can/with variations or is it better to focus on other openings?  I want to do another one for each I'm thinking Vienna game for white and possibly Caro Kann for black to really study further.  What do people think is best for beginners who want to take their development to a new level?

Vienna Game & Gambit and Caro-Kann would certainly be good openings to check out

Several articles here on the topic of openings that you might find interesting...

https://www.chess.com/blog/RussBell

Ruy Lopez as white against e5. Sicilian defense: Nyezhmetdinov-Rossolimo Attack as white against c5, Petrov defense as black against e4, Queen's Gambit Declined as black against d4.

Focus on generating complications and/or slowly improving your position to the point where you get to a winning position. Then of course, do what is incredibly difficult to do, in a winning position and... Win the game.

Those openings are perfect for improving your positional play.

I wouldn't recommend studying the opening in the way you are describing. There are 2 problems with this in my view: the way you describe how you'd learn the opening (learning moves as far as you can), but more importantly the idea that you should be spending so much time on the opening at your level. 

I've written about this in greater length before (search the beginners' forums and you find more elaborate posts), but the gist of it comes down to this. Chess openings can be played on the basis of sound opening principles. These are: controlling the center (white wants the e4/d4 center, black wants to prevent this (or destroy it immediately by challenging it and making white move one of his pawns if white does get it), developing your pieces (as fast as you can, so move them only once) and getting your king safe. Almost all opening moves in almost all major openings can be explained with the use of these principles. Grandmasters don't do weird things in the beginning phase of the opening. 

Real theory starts at a later point during the opening. That's when GMs come up with new ideas. The hard part at your level is that you're unlikely to fully grasp the extent of the idea. That's because your middlegame understanding is not yet at the necessary level. Say a certain move is played with the idea of playing with the space advantage. You might know the move, but 3 moves later when you're out of your theory, you might trade a few pieces. However, trading pieces is usually the right strategy for the opponent who has the cramped position. So because you didn't fully understand the middlegame strategy, you've turned the GM's idea into a weapon against yourself. At this point it would've been much better if you had played an idea of your own that maybe isn't anything special according to theory, but that you are familiar with and can see what your goals could be. 

So what I'm getting at is that playing the opening should be based on ideas. You don't castle because the line says you need to castle at move 5. You castle because it's important to get your king safe. Playing with ideas leads to more creative freedom, which is important when you're responding to moves that you've never seen before. This way you can adapt. Is your opponent answering 1. d4 with 1. ...f6? Then it's just bad chess in my view if you continue with 2. Bf4 or 2. c3. If your opponent makes such a big mistake, you need to be able to punish it. And knowing 1. ...f6 isn't doing anything to combat the center, would lead you to knowing that 2. e4 must be the right way going forward. 

One more problem I have with studying the opening is that it's inefficient for players up to, say, 2000 (or higher, really). The goal of opening theory is to gain a small advantage for white or to equalize for black. Look at your own games: how many times has a small advantage carried you all the way to victory? Never, right? It doesn't even happen all that much in my games that the other side never really gets the chance to equalize. Mistakes are made and in lower rated games these mistakes are often larger than the small advantage you could gain in the opening. So it's more important and it'll get you more results if you'd know more about the middelgame and would be better at tactics. In lower rated games it doesn't really matter if you're equal or even a little bit worse in a certain position. If you outplay your opponent in the middlegame, you'll win almost any game. Another bonus is, of course, that if you are well aware of proper middlegame strategies that studying and understanding the opening will become easier. Knowing that in closed positions you play for pawn breaks, you know that in the French advanced variation with the d4-e5 vs d5-e6 pawn center, black will be looking to play ...c5 and/or ...f6 at an early stage of the opening. There's no opening theory needed for this, it directly follows from understanding the middlegame. 

I hope that by writing this you see how important ideas are versus learning moves. That's why, if you really must study the opening, make sure you look at games. See what the strong player is doing. Especially look for games between stronger players and weaker ones, because that way certain ideas will become clear sooner. Picking up an opening book or watching youtube to learn ideas in an opening can be useful too, but always be aware that there are always going to be parts that aren't going to be explained. Either moves that are obvious to the writer / maker of the video or other possible reactions from the other player. Sooner or later you will be on your own and at that point it's more important that you understand the position and feel at ease in the position than the objective evaluation.

london system 

exactly right.  thanks for taking the time to create such a detailed & informative post, CM RAU4ever.

i completely agree with the idea of playing according to various sound principles rather than just memorizing lines;  i'd only contribute by stressing that, although your choices ought to be filtered through desirable positional guidelines, it is paramount to strive for being as clear as possible when calculating the different upcoming lines.

Openings, endgames, strategies don't matter for below master players. Just try to not hang material and be good enough to calculate and lookahead a number of variations and that's all you need.

I laughed so hard on this. The timing was just perfect.

I would like to second the Queen's gambit. I've always taught my students to play 1. d4 and 2. c4 with white. The 1. d4 2. c4 openings lead to middlegames that are usually easier to understand than those coming from 1. e4, e5, because the position will be much less symmetrical. 

"Ah sh##t, here we go again..."

By the way i refuse to believe this was chessable's fault.

Although I completely agree with the post of @RAU4ever , if you want to try to understand the logic behind openings and play meaningful structures that can improve you as a player in the long run, I think this video of IM Andras Toth is really useful. Well, it was for me at least. Cheers.

Thank you internet!

Some really interesting thoughts here. Will reflect!  Nice community of people here, I appreciate everything said! 

Do not play the London. That opening will make you quit and hate chess in a few months. Go for a Queen's Gambit or an e4 opening. You will be a lot better if you learn any of those openings than if you play the London. Also, Caro is good although I prefer the French as it is a lot faster than the Caro and it is very easy to learn. I have an excellent French study which goes over everything except Nc3 (which no one at your level and hardly anyone at my level plays anyway) and will give you the basic understanding of the opening. 

Sure, you don't need to learn opening theory at your level but I see no harm in learning a little bit to understand an interesting idea or a potential trap you can set on an unsuspecting opponent as in the Bd3 lines in the French study

Glad to hear you say that because it affirms my VERY recent decision to play Queen's Gambit after watching an IM Andras Toth video. I've heard debates about whether it's a positional or tactical opening but honestly at my level (mid 800) I don't think that really matters. 

Went from playing London to some E4 openings like Spanish/Danish Gambit/Italian and for some reason Queen's gambit just feels right. Helps that the ideas are much simpler to understand after watching a GothamChess and Anna Cramling lesson on the topic.

Woah this was the exact video I watched a few days ago that made me pick Queen's Gambit! I agree it gave me some good things to think about and unlike a lot of other videos actually gave reasoning behind WHY these are some good beginner openings.

Great choice! Queen's Gambit is logical, principled and allows to play a variety of different structures to learn from. Remember, it doesn't matter if you don't know theory or you didn't study QG theory because your opponents won't know it either.

What matters is that you have in mind the main ideas of the opening and you constantly apply sound chess principles ( costant fight for the center, smooth development toward the center, etc. etc.), this will allow you to play instructive games that will help you to become a better player in the long run! 

@jimbolism5, have you watched a lot of GothamChess?

@sred It almost all I watch he is very good and that is where I got the recommendations for these openings to start with. Watching lots of games with these openings to see what he does.

Hi everyone!