What I Don't Understand

So I've been playing chess for roughly two months now. I've taken one lesson with an IM, read half of logical chess move by move, and have watched countless YouTube analysis videos and tips and tricks. My problem is that in the opening, every time I play someone I run into that one person that for lack of a better word just drives me absolutely nuts and wants to do some stupid like below where I know he wants to go 3...Bxf2 so that I cannot castle. Or I fall for some other opening trick and it just drives me nuts. What I don't understand is that I know my basic principles. 1. e4 or e5. Develop knights before bishops. Castle before move to 10. Develop to the middle. But it seems like every game I play, I cannot get these principles down because the person I am playing wants to do the 4 move check mate or fried liver or this or that that totally gets me every single time. Does any one have any advice on how to not get killed in the opening like this?

You should download some chess analysis software, which you probably have by now and then repeat the moves like you described (early mate with queen and bishop and other bad moves aimed at new players.) You'll quickly see how to respond to them. The variety of these "scholar's mates" is very low so it should be easy to see the correct response in each possibility. Once you know them, and it is usually just one move and the opponent won't be able to make a quick checkmate, you'll be able to take advantage of these players to punish them for their tricks. 

I still get caught by these tricks sometimes but now because I get checkmated but rather because I am very careful to make sure I make the right response and in the process I lose time.

You should download some chess analysis software, which you probably have by now and then repeat the moves like you described (early mate with queen and bishop and other bad moves aimed at new players.) You'll quickly see how to respond to them. The variety of these "scholar's mates" is very low so it should be easy to see the correct response in each possibility. Once you know them, and it is usually just one move and the opponent won't be able to make a quick checkmate, you'll be able to take advantage of these players to punish them for their tricks. 

I still get caught by these tricks sometimes but now because I get checkmated but rather because I am very careful to make sure I make the right response and in the process I lose time.

I just played two more games where the person wants to do the fried liver attack. I'm about done with chess

For someone seeking help with openings, I usually bring up Openings for Amateurs by Pete Tamburro (2014).
http://kenilworthian.blogspot.com/2014/05/review-of-pete-tamburros-openings-for.html
I believe that it is possible to see a fair portion of the beginning of Tamburro's book by going to the Mongoose Press site.
https://www.mongoosepress.com/excerpts/OpeningsForAmateurs%20sample.pdf
Perhaps MrCPA12 would also want to look at Discovering Chess Openings by GM John Emms (2006).
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627114655/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen91.pdf

That is a typical trick that usually beginners go for. But really after Nxe5 (winning a pawn, which should already be enough to kind of win the game if you know what you are doing) you are just a pawn up. Bxf2+ is innofensive.

Being the kibitzer and serious chess player I am I can invite you to the Analysis board and try and solve some of your doubts with all these cheap sacks on f2/f7.

Mmm. I wouldnt trust your advice, specially considering how our games are going. Lol.

lol

lolol

It's an attempt to fool the left brained not so seasoned chess player into making a mistake in the opening.  Taking the pawn is okay, and Bxf2 really isn't that big of a deal.  This type of tactic only works in bullet or fast blitz time controls.  Just defend normally.  Usually in pointless sacs like this the person attacking attempts to use his remaining pieces to attack the king taking advantage of the weakened pawn structure, being a pawn down in the king side of the board.  However, in this case, since you grabbed a free center pawn, he is going to have to play without that little structural weakness.  Games like these should be easy wins.  A simple game of down swapping until there is nothing left but your extra piece and some pawns.  Eat all the pawns and then get a queen or two and win.  Simple.

If you are losing games like this then I wouldn't recommend opening books.  I would say the best course of action would be to become more aware of mating nets and basic tactical motifs by doing the appropriate exorcises.  Your losing because you are hanging pieces, missing tactical shots, and not recognizing when you are able to trade to simplify the game.  Or you are just not seeing his "tactics."  There is that word again.  Tactics tactics tactics.  It's not the opening.  It's tactics.  I got decent at tactics by playing people like this over and over again and seeing their threats over and over again.  Over time I learned to counter them.  You can learn these things by way of chess mentor, tactics trainer, chess tempo, or hiring a coach.  I'd recommend for you to do a mixture of lichess trainer puzzles, chess tempo, and chess.com puzzles.  Why?  I'm told chess tempo has an option to train on certain tactical motifs, and you can set the puzzle difficulty on lichess  to easy and do those all day till you get tired of it.  The goal here is to do as many easy puzzles as you can until you can do them in your sleep.  chess.com puzzles are good for speed.  If you can't do a lot of the puzzles in under 2 minutes on chess.com then you need to make some kind of change.  I'd recommend getting a good attacking book, or a theory book like bobby fischer teaches chess.  But there are some that think I do not know enough to give advice to beginners.  So do what ever makes you happy.  Have fun!  I always personally recommend A Guide to Chess Improvement by Dan Heisman.  In that book, you will have all that you need to know in order to get better at chess.  It is not a theory book, but rather, a book, that gives you a simple basic idea of what to do to improve your rating, as well as give you a good thinking algorithm for chess, which is by far a lot better than the one you employ currently, as I see you are losing to this crap opening.  Good luck in your future chess endeavors.  I hope you can use what I have said to your benefit.  Or simply ignore it, I don't care.  All you need to know right now about the opening is what you will learn from chess.com in the beginners section of the learning plans.  The learning plans can be found in the right of the screen on the articles section, on V3.

Analyze why you lost after every game. At the beginning I used to analyze every single game I played (without an engine), that helped me improve a lot, and I learned why those f2/f7 "tricks" don't work.