Quality vs. Quantity

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Avatar of pchelalondon

As beginner is it better to learn one opening and all its variations, or is it better to learn few openings but less accurately?

Right now I am playing English Opening for my both black and white games. What other openings would it's good to learn?

Avatar of Crazychessplaya

You can't play the English as black. The English is defined by 1.c4. If, as black, you respond 1...c5 to 1.e4, you are playing the Sicilian Defence.

My gut feeling is that as a beginner, you should first experiment with a wide range of openings, to find out what your style is, and which openings fit you best. So, as white, you should experiment with 1.e4, 1.d4, 1.c4 or 1.Nf3. Then once you have your "style" defined, learn two or three opening systems in depth.

Avatar of AndTheLittleOneSaid

"Beginners" should learn opening principles - not memorize openings.

Of course, if you're beyond that stage, then you are beyond my advice anyway. Wink

Avatar of DonnieDarko1980

You won't get far learning one opening, since a chess game is played by two players, and you can't force your opponent to play your opening ...

I don't learn openings, there are a few lines I know and like to play (with White 1. e4 and the Spanish or 1. d4 and the Colle, with Black the Spanish too or some inverted Colle if it happens to be possible, ...), and basically I just follow the general guidelines of developing the pieces. I like the openings which obviously follow those principles, like the ones mentioned above, I don't play the more advanced ones like the Sicilian, Caro-Kann or Indian since I'd have to learn a bulk of moves which I don't even understand so I stay with the simpler ones :)

Avatar of nimzo5

Play 1. e4 as white.

Play 1. e4 e5, 1. d4 d5 and 1. c4 e5 as black. Learn classical chess then proceed forward. In general don't focus on opening study, focus on tactics and visualization. Study your games afterwards, by noting where you made a move outside your opening, when did the game change hands and whatever positional and endgame motifs you learned.

Avatar of pchelalondon

Thanks you, guys I shall do so :) Up to now I am was using c4, a1 and Nc3 for all my games and managed to have slightly better win ratio with black:D

Avatar of orangehonda
nimzo5 wrote:

Play 1. e4 as white.

Play 1. e4 e5, 1. d4 d5 and 1. c4 e5 as black. Learn classical chess then proceed forward. In general don't focus on opening study, focus on tactics and visualization. Study your games afterwards, by noting where you made a move outside your opening, when did the game change hands and whatever positional and endgame motifs you learned.


It's hard for me to say what would be best for a beginner in terms of openings, but if I had to say something, I think this would be it.  Even at my level, as it is, opening prep isn't that necessary (talking OTB tournaments here).  Although I get the feeling to get better I'm going to have to start taking this phase more seriously.

But as a beginner, unless you're playing someone way out of your range, memorized opening moves are going to count for very little, so just study them on a need to know basis, like nimzo5 said.  Especially if you get blown up in the opening just use a database to see where you (or your opponent) left book and what your options are.

Avatar of nimzo5

The advantage of learning classical chess openings first is that you have a foundation for understanding good opening principles and will have a familiarity with positional concepts like strong point etc.