engines for openings

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EdwinMatthews1

I am not a player who is good enough to switch between openings. I need to play what I know. When preparing for a match and I know my opponents favourite opening is there any engine which an engine can match what the their prefererences to mine. For example I play the ruy Lopez and I know my opponent likes the caro kann. I want an engine which could look at how both players might go about getting the set ups they want which might not always follow the optimal line. In the real world players dont always choose the best move, but they try to get familiar positions. Both players want to reach the set ups they are familiar with. I want to see how these positions might best be reached not always by  the optimal move but where both players are trying to reach particular set ups. 

Can an engine do this. If not does anybody have suggestions how such games might be prepared for.

many thanks

Edwin

AlfredEp00pman

First misconception is that white plays one opening while the other side is playing another. This is not correct. The opening is defined by both black and white moves. Players don't independently develop their moves. Look at Sicilian which can illustrate this. The Ruy Lopez doesn't have c6 which is found in the Caro Kann. White can play c3 though. f6 would be an inaccuracy and bad development for black early on. 

 

What I would do is look up games from a database. You will see some moves are more popular than the engine top choice. I would start there and study those. I wouldn't limit your games to only games you have played in the past. It will be highly inadequate.

EdwinMatthews1

Hi Alfred,

Many thanks for the reply

If I take the advice of the gingerGM. He suggests you learn three openings, one for white and two for black.  One if they open with the kings pawn, one for all other moves. I always try to play my favourite three openings based on that advice. I guess most players at my level do something similar.  This is despite opponents having a wide variety of responses.  I believe both players usually try to fit in their best opening so they have positions from which they feel comfortable. What I think would be a usueful tool is for the engine to try to optimise what both players can do given that they both want a particular set up. Probably much too ambitious a requirement

take care

Edwin

AlfredEp00pman

"What I think would be a usueful tool is for the engine to try to optimise what both players can do given that they both want a particular set up. Probably much too ambitious a requirement"

 

There are no shortcuts, you can't get a crib sheet. It boils down to two things, calculation vs. pattern recognition.

 

If you spend a lot of time in an unknown position and calculate a "winning solution", two things come from this. First, will you remember to do it the next time? What if the position is changed slightly? The second thing that happens is the energy you expend in calculating.

 

Another approach is to focus more on pattern recognition where you can see patterns that are not dependent on setup. This relies on less energy and less memorization. I am not sure about limiting to one or two openings. I very quickly end up with transposed positions and the variations (especially with the Sicilian) can easily count for a half a dozen opening lines. 

 

Take a look at your games and see what moves could be played instead, not the opening. Here there is no need I see in moving the knight twice. It later gave black a chance to take the d4 pawn. If you want to look at an opening, perhaps going over the London would be good since a lot of study in it keeps the DSB. You can just play Bg3 if they try to trade it off. 

 

 

AlfredEp00pman

It's not letting me post the game, but the game is

[Event "Live Chess"]
[Site "Chess dot com"]
[Date "2021.04.04"]
[Round "?"]
[White "EdwinMatthews1"]
[Black "jecidi55"]
[Result "0-1"]
[ECO "A40"]
[WhiteElo "1451"]
[BlackElo "1479"]
[TimeControl "1800"]
[EndTime "6:13:34 PDT"]
[Termination "jecidi55 won by resignation"]

1. d4 e6 2. Nc3 d5 3. Bf4 Nc6 4. Nb5 Bd6 5. e3 Bxf4 6. exf4 a6 7. Nc3 Nf6 8. a3
Bd7 9. Nf3 O-O 10. Ne5 Ne4 11. Nxe4 dxe4 12. g4 f6 13. Nxd7 Qxd7 14. c3 Rad8 15.
Qb3 b5 16. Bg2 Qd5 17. Qc2 f5 18. g5 g6 19. h4 Qc4 20. Bf1 Qd5 21. Bg2 Na5 22.
h5 Nc4 23. hxg6 hxg6 24. Rh6 Kg7 25. O-O-O Rh8 26. Rdh1 Rxh6 27. gxh6+ Kh7 28.
Qe2 Nd6 29. f3 Rg8 30. fxe4 Nxe4 31. Re1 Qd6 32. Bxe4 Qxf4+ 33. Qe3 Qxe4 34.
Qxe4 fxe4 35. Rxe4 Re8 36. d5 e5 37. b3 Kxh6 38. c4 Kg5 39. c5 Kf5 40. Re1 e4
41. Kd2 Ke5 42. b4 Kxd5 43. Kc3 Re6 44. Rd1+ Kc6 45. Kd4 e3 46. Re1 e2 47. Kd3
Kd5 48. Rxe2 Rxe2 49. Kxe2 Ke4 50. Kf2 Kf4 51. c6 g5 52. Kg2 g4 53. Kf2 g3+ 54.
Kg2 Kg4 55. Kg1 Kf3 56. Kf1 0-1

EdwinMatthews1

Thanks Alfred,

I will review the above game.