No opening repertoire

I have no opening repertoire, I think the problem is I just can't get the mindset to actually look at the matter properly. You need to find an opening that suit your style of play, understand the basic principles and plans of said openings, you need to study games of said openings too. Anyone any basic tips on how to get into some sort of routine? Lets start with something simple like an hour a day. Is it better to watch a couple you tube videos on one or two each day and play through a couple games? Is it best to have a sort of weekly plan? (Mondays play through games, Tuesday watch some videos etc)? Any help most welcome.

I like using the NCO. It's really out of date but it's not like your competing in the Gran Prix. It's really concise. Easy to navigate. A good road map. I'm starting Emm's book 1 e4 e5 about the Italian Game and the Bishops Opening on Kindle. I open a Kindle window next to a Scid vs PC window so the book is right next to the chess screen. You can find games on Caissabase if you want to go through games. At your level I think you could become a deadly specialist in some opening in about a years time. That's my guess anyway. Books are really great. I would stick with them. You can take pictures of the pages if you can't find it online.

He plays the same stuff every game, so it's not as if he's just doing random stuff.

As white he always played d4, and goes for a queen's gambit declined, exchange variation... funnily he doesn't follow the standard middlegame plan for that structure (a minority attack) he plays Ne5, f4, and tries to attack the kingside.

As black against d4 he plays a stonewall setup but with an early c6 (pawns on d5, c6, e6, f5). In the middlegame he treats it as his white games (sticks knight on e4 and tries to attack).

As blak against e4 he plays a Kan Sicilian and seems to know what he's doing (although none of his opponents do heh).

Basically over the years I have picked up bits and bats of all sorts of lines, I do like to play the Sicilian Kan against e4. Against d4 I don't really have anything, I just know enough not to lose quickly in some tricky gambit lines. I am trying out the semi slav against d4, I haven't done much beyond a cursory glance of a couple lines and games. For white I like to start d4. I do occasionally, nothing close to what you could call study, look at games, watch the odd bit of 'content' by levi rozman for game plans.

I've never seen an opening video I've liked, so... I woudn't recommend them.

Some people buy opening books... but that always seemed way too advanced for me. That's what IMs and GMs do. They want to know a new tricky idea on move 15 and want to be sure they've covered all the important sub variations... plus if you're not playing OTB then it's doubly a waste, IMO.

My approach isn't common (AFAIK) so take it for what it's worth... but I use a database, and prepare something for each of the popular moves. I like to use a database because instead of being told to play this or that variation, I can look at ALL the popular variations and pick something I like.

So yeah, that's how I do it... that plus play a lot of games which is an important part of learning...

As a simple example, let's say I want to play the Nimzo Indian, and I prepare all sorts of stuff after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 e6 3.Nc3 Bb4

But then I get a blitz game where my opponent plays 3.Nc3 (or doesn't play 2.c4). Oops, I didn't  think to check that. I was only looking at Nimzo Indian stuff. So after the game I go back to the database and look at popular moves against what my opponent did.

So it's a long process... it might take me a month before I'm not really seeing anything I haven't prepared for... but it's also a lot more fun (for me at least) than a book or video, because I'm either getting to practice something I recently learned, or I'm seeing something new and learning that for next time... with a book or video, you might be looking at some rare line 15 moves long, and then you NEVER see it in any of your games in the next 5 years... plus the middlegame didn't make sense to you, so even if you did reach that position you wouldn't like it.

The best software for this is probably chessbase, which is a little pricy... but not more so than buying a lot of books, and not much more than online memberships for access to databases.

I just got this book. I'll probably never get to it. I have to play the Slav first. That was an impressive analysis of his games llama.

Thanks. Chess.com lets you download games quickly, and I downloaded 300 of the OP's.

With just a click, Chessbase creates a something very similar to this https://www.chess.com/explorer

Except it only uses the games you've selected... that way you can find patterns in a group of games very quickly.

llama's way with the database sounds really good. I never thought about doing it that way. It would allow you to get right back to playing with some good retorts.

Well thanks very much for that summation of the games you looked. It's surprising that despite me not playing the standard plan in the Queens Gambit declined exchange I still win quite a few games. Same with black against d4, not really knowing what to do but somehow finding a way. The kan I did sort of study but about 20 years ago and it's stayed with me ever since. I just looked at a few wins and losses for black and over the years I have picked up more and more hints and tips about what your supposed to be doing. It is surprising that even up to around 2100 blitz on chess.com most players don't know what they are really doing after coming out of the opening. Did you focus on blitz games?

@5

"Basically over the years I have picked up bits and bats" ++ That is the right way

"I do like to play the Sicilian Kan against e4" ++ That is good.

"I am trying out the semi slav against d4" ++ That is good.

"For white I like to start d4" ++ That is good.

"study" ++ No need to study openings

"look at games" ++ Analysing your lost games is key. Study of grandmaster games helps too.

"watch the odd bit of 'content' by levi rozman" ++ Useless.

Queen's Gambit as White, Sicilian or Queen's Gambit Declined as Black. There is nothing with any of your favoured openings, so all that remains is finding some games where you are going wrong in these openings, understanding which variations those are and fleshing out your knowledge of those. There are reasonably good videos from Hanging Pawns on those openings and if you want to go even deeper there are many Chessable courses by FMs, IMs and GMs.

So far this I have managed to stabilize my rating, now staying above 2000 much more consistently and not crashing in rating as much or as badly as before. I am still rather light on an opening repertoire but this last month I seem to have come up with a path forward. I'll come back to this thread in a couple weeks time and share what I aim to do and why.

I don't actually employ that strategy as much now but the reason it did 'work' was that although it's not a sound strategy other players middle and end game technique lets them down. Also remember you only have 3 mins, it's not a lot of time and I just knew how to stall and keep my position from cracking too. If I tried this regularly against 2100+ I think I would likely lose more than win.