Queen Sac for Two Rooks?

I know without a specific game to analyze, it's often hard to state hard-and-fast whether a specific exchange is beneficial or not.  Still, I've often come up against the situation where my opponent's in-line rooks are attacked by my queen and another piece (say, a bishop on the diagonal behind my queen).  Thus, I can take the first rook only by saccing my queen first and then recapturing with the trailing bishop.  Is this a good exchange?

My logic dictates that being ahead material is a good thing and that giving up 9 points to gain (10-12, depending on what scoring system you believe in) is worth it.  On the other hand, there's a little voice inside me that is horrified by the thought of my opponent still having a queen on the board when I don't.  Some of this might stem from confidence in playing my own rooks, but I'd like to hear from the experience of the masses.

In the same situation (an open middlegame that's fairly even and a few minor pieces are gone), would you give up your queen to gain two rooks?

It's hard to make a general rule on this, it really depends on the position.

You speak of fear of them having a Queen on the board when you do not, but you have two Rooks, and they have none.

It's usually a pretty even game and hard to win, I would say that a very open game favours the Queen because she has more meneuverability but if the game is very restrictive to where anyone can move and your Rooks are in a battery up the only active file then the Queen is dead meat.

As soon as you let your Rooks stray from the protection of each other you are weakening your position, and potentially leaving yourself open.  You must also keep your King very safe from the Queen otherwise the chances of a draw by perpetual/repeated position are very high.

similar thing for two minor pieces and a pawn for a rook. Some people seem to do it early in the game just to shake things up. The other day though, this exchange had me from equal to winning in a second;

If there are specific weaknesses ( on either side) two rooks are generally better, only my opinion.

They can defend a weak pawn twice, a queen can only attack it once.

They can attack a weak pawn twice, a queen can only defend ot once.

well this is a funny matter, because when i have 2 rooks, i find the queen extremely annoying (their queen of course), attacking every pawn and i have to defend... without an oppurtunity to attack

however, when i have a queen, i find it extremely hard to attack, and their rooks ARE well defended, lined up together...

on both situations, both sides, i feel uncomfortable. so i always try to avoid exchanges like these (a big weakness if there is an advantage gain!). however, i will do it if i see some good insight to it (so my weakness isn't that big). if there is a time to exchange for the sake of exchanging (no advantage, no disadvantages... well the queen vs 2 rooks advantages and disadvantages come into play, but no extra), then i usually won't.

I would say, that the only way of working out whether the trade is worth is by looking at the position you have left on the board. 

If they are several weak pawns and/or a vunerable king then the queens manoverablity will enable you to snatch a couple of pawns. Thus, in this scenario, the trade has not been two rooks for a queen, but rather two rooks and a couple of pawns for the queen (which clearly favours the queen).

Equally however, Rooks that work well together can easily overpower the Queen (i.e two attackers vs 1 defender), and create mate threats (a lone queen is rarely able to do this).

I think  example are the best illustration, so here is my entire thought process behind the trade in this game: (in progress so no comments)

http://www.chess.com/echess/game.html?id=25904715

Diagram from said game: (again no comments)

Trading the queen for two rooks is, imo,  a favourable trade for black for several reasons:

a) after the trade, Black has two rooks placed on the only open file, meaning that both rooks are immediatly useful.

b) the black king is nicely tucked away (helping to prevent perpectuals or nasty imbetween checks)

c) the only weak pawns in blacks position are a5 and d6.  Even if white could capture a5 it will be a long while before white can actually create a passed pawn (thus, the a5 weakness seems irrelevant). Qxd6 is not much of a threat either (explained below)

d) Black gains a rook on the 2nd, which immediatly threatens Rxa2 and/or doubling the rooks on the 2nd rank. (on a similiar note, the fact that whites king is on the 1st rank means that rooks on the 2nd are more powerful. for example, mate threats.

If: exf4 Rxe7 Qb1 ...Then Rd2 Qf5? g6 [the idea of g6 is to avoid perpetual checks) Qd7? [trying to capture at d6] Ree2.

Now white has a few defensive tries, if Qg4? Rxa2 -- after Rxa2 black can trade his two rooks for the queen eg. if white then tries f4?? Rxg2+ Qxg2 Rxg2+ Kxg2 a4!! bxa4 b3...  Instead of Qg4 white might also try Qxd6, but after Rxg2+ Kf1 Rxa2 Qd8+ Kg7 Qe7 Rgb2 [threatening mate] Qe5+? Kh7 Qe1...after which black has a more positional win with Rxb3, or a tactical shot with Rh2 Kg1 Rag2+ Kf1 Rh1+ Kxg2 Rxe1.   

hope someone finds this useful. Better hope my openant doesn't this post now!