Chess openings and Things to Watch out For

I am by no means the best player in town... I had the Judit Polgar account and my brother took control of it and started making a mess of things so I have made this account...

...and no, I am not Judit Polgar, only a very good fan to quell the doubts here :)



I have formulated some of the best attacks and defenses for those to read.

a) Try and keep bishops if you can. Try to not pin knights down to queen or kings with your bishop, as your bishops will become superior pieces to use in the endgame.

b) Don't use queens gambit, one can use the counter gambit and put your game into jeapordy using the Lasker Trap.

c) Try to move your knights into center position, this is one of the earliest forms of defense and attacks you may learn.

d) Knights are dispendable for bishops, if and only if you have both your own bishops in-tact. If you have both your knights, then it is up to you to decide whether having both knights is a better deal rather than a sacrifice. If you cannot help a sacrifice, try and keep a bishop and a knight for the endgame.

e) If someone attacks your pawn with a promoted piece (whilst being attacked by a pawn) always try and use a pawn which attacks to the center, not away from the center.

f) On the opening move, it is best to use your pawns to gain center control. However, this is not required, some games which have never had center control with pawns have came up on top.

g) Try not to sacrifice your queen for a queen very early in the game, the best time to do it is when you are either a few pawn up or even a major piece up. It is hard to not do this when there has been a centralized attack and queens are facing each other... The idea at this time is to take a queen and make the adjecent king move.

h) If a persons knight moves out, say from G8 to F6, it can be advantageous to move your pawn from H2 to H3, to stop any advancing attacks. Indeed, this is my own personal favorite.

i) If someone major piece can be attacked with a pawn very early on in the game, and can be successfully attacked with advancing pawns causing the knight to move further pieces is a very good move for you. It advances your pawn structure and puts you usually in a very aggressive position.

j) It is usually not a good idea to go on a pawn vs pawn fest. It can expose your king very early on. 

k) If a king has castled on the either the king or queen side, the best advance of attack is to try and diagonalize your bishops to the side of the castle for an aggressive attack. To add to this, make sure the side castled is not the side you have castled; the reason why is that you want to advance your pawns and break his cosy structural defense.