Positional or tactical?

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Avatar of E_Check

What openings are more positional and which are more tactical? What GMs are good tactically and which are good positionally? Who are known for these? Mainly i ask this question because i think i am better positionally but i dont know whether to play E4 or D4.

 

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Avatar of orangehonda

Both can go either way, but with 1.d4 you have more control over keeping it closed (more positional) while with 1.e4 you can't always stop an open position (more tactical).

I don't know the top 10 players too well really, but Kramnik and Gelfand come to mind as positional players while Topalov and Ivanchuk are on the attacking wild side.  Classically you have positional players like Karpov, Smyslov, and Petrosian, on these forums Reb mentioned Spassky as a strong positional player... and for attackers you have Tal and Alekhine, I'm sure there other others... Shirov was never world champ but worth mentioning as an attacker/tactician.

Avatar of PrawnEatsPrawn

In general:

1. e4 more tactical

2. d4 more positional

Avatar of E_Check
orangehonda wrote:

Both can go either way, but with 1.d4 you have more control over keeping it closed (more positional) while with 1.e4 you can't always stop an open position (more tactical).

I don't know the top 10 players too well really, but Kramnik and Gelfand come to mind as positional players while Topalov and Ivanchuk are on the attacking wild side.  Classically you have positional players like Karpov, Smyslov, and Petrosian, on these forums Reb mentioned Spassky as a strong positional player... and for attackers you have Tal and Alekhine, I'm sure there other others... Shirov was never world champ but worth mentioning as an attacker/tactician.


 I have been looking at games by Kramnik and a little of Gelfand. TY for the clarification btw, it was a big help. At Scholastic matches im going to stick with D4 now, since i have a very good end game.