Actually white has a hard time actually winning against the Tarrasch when strong grandmasters play it with black. See the just released book by Aagaard on it. The problem is lesser players have a hard time justifying the weaknesses they made with piece activity when they have the black pieces. This actually applies to a lot of openings. At your level though, players have a hard time dealing with any initiative from their opponents making the Tarrasch a good choice. In so many master vs amateur games, the master will often have only one positive thing about his position or source of counterplay and the amateur wonāt deal with it leading to him losing the game even if his position was objectively better.
The Kingās Indian defense is a good choice at around 1700-2300. You will just attack and checkmate tons of people with simple pawn storms in the Classical Kingās Indian. Players at that level often wonāt know the lines where black canāt attack the white king (or where doing so will have very unfortunate consequences) such as the Gligoric (1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 d6 5. Nf3 O-O 6. Be2 e5 7. Be3), fianchetto (even there black still has rather simple pawn play in the Panno line, itās just on the queenside), or Saemisch (Black is well advised to just play Benoni lines and know them really well).
At your level though, I just would say the classical Queenās Gambit Declined with emphasis on playing the Tartakower main lines as played by Fischer, Geller, Short, and Kasparov. All your pieces find decent squares and you can break with c5. The Tarrasch would also be okay as it will force you to play actively with your pieces.
For white openings, does anyone use the London System?
I whoop so much ass, and itās seriously the most theoryless thing Iāve found thus farā¦
Strong center, good bishops, and knight flexibilityā¦ only weakness I see in it is that stuff goes to hell if your pawn structure gets broken upā¦
d4, e3, c3, black bishop on f4, knight on d2(flexible knight movement), and white bishop on d3(in the middle of the pawn structure)ā¦ itās pretty gdlkā¦
Strong defense and offenseā¦ you donāt even have to castle until late in the game because that center is so hard to break upā¦ however losing that black bishop will hurtā¦
Iām so glad that the Kingās Indian Defence is useable, but from the sound of it, Iām not really learning much from using itā¦
I really like the opening but it seems like yall are leaning more towards the Tarrasch openingā¦
Man, everytime I try it, the ass just keeps getting whoopedā¦
I used to play a lot and study from a younger age (compared to the kids around me ). started heavier studying/playing/tournaments in freshman year of HS and was the best in my class (and arguably up to the Senior class) but I havenāt touched a piece in about 10 years : / I would love to go to huge tournaments again with all the games happening everywhere. It was pretty intense and was a taste of what was to come when I moved on to fighting games and went to FG majors.
I donāt know if I want to put all that time in again, but Iāll definitely try to start playing again in 2012 (New Years Resolution!). Difference is I didnāt do a lot of online playing 10 years ago so maybe it wonāt be so bad. itāll be interesting because I guess a lot of games of top players are easily accessible now too. plus a billion other chess related things on the internet. With all the discussion in here there seems to be even more to look into. I feel overwhelmed already @.@
I am also curious on the answer to Warriorās Dreamsā question.
Sheās not that hot. She is kinda eh irl and is married to like some old Cuban guy who is 30 years older than her. Chess tournaments are not good places to meet women.
HAHA. The London System was my main go-to opening for a huge part of my chess career.
Iāve logged dozens upon dozens of tournament games and victories with it. I still use it on occasion. It was taught to me by one of my chess coaches, an old Moscow player who had gotten a ācandidate masterā designation back in the late 60s; not an easy thing back then!
Anyways, itās not a very good choice once you reach 1800+ or so, but until that point, itās plenty potent.
The main thing is to get your f3 knight to e5.
Yeah, EvilSamurai speaks the truth. Not only is she married to some old guy, but sheās not particularly attractive in real life. Just because she looks good in a professionally done photograph means nothing.
In addition to that, sheās a weak player even by female standards. Yeah, because of FIDEās fucking retarded āKnockout Championshipā format, sheās technically a āformer world championā, but sheās rated a mere 2430, and 44th on the female rating list last I looked.
Frankly, even that modest rating might be overinflated; I watched her play at the recent Womenās Team Championship, and she was fucking awful, with a performance rating of 2319, and play that reminded me of a weak national master (2200 strength) more than anything else.
At least itās an opening I can work withā¦ not seeing that 1800 rating anytime soonā¦
Does anyone play on FICS?
Looking for a good place to play some human opponentsā¦ well until I can get back into irl playā¦ Iām on vacation nigga:smokin:
Also, how many people play against this(free)A.I to learn openings and different lines?
Itās an excellent program, as it actually teaches you as it whoops your assā¦ it also calculates piece advantage/disadvantageā¦ Iām sure you upper level folks that can take advantage of someone being down half a pawn would even find this helpfulā¦ unless yall already were using something differentā¦
EDIT: In retrospect, that Russian bitchās face does look kinda like it got smashed inā¦ with a sledgehammerā¦
Also note that you can play the London System as a solid drawing weapon that gives Black a slight edge but makes your position very hard to crack, or as a wild, aggressive, attacking set-up. If you do the latter, after moving play Ne5 at some point, you might want to play g4, h4, or possibly both.
So I guess my assessment of my ranking was accurateshrugsā¦
I blundered my Queen away when I had the upper hand in both of those lossesā¦ I guess I get nervous against higher ranked players(both were 1200ās)ā¦
That bishop sacrifice on a castled King is the truthā¦
Does that work on better opponents? Or is the loss of material not worth it as you play better opponents?
You donāt really have to be smart to be good at chessā¦ imo most of it is memorizationā¦ if anything showed me that, itās Fischer Random Chessā¦
I only play on the Internet Chess Club (ICC). Playchess is free with most Chessbase products but it sucks for everything but games against engines and bullet.
All the games in Reggio Emilia were straight up bone today.
You donāt compare them. You accept that they have concepts that relate to each other and appreciate the fact that they all involve different skill sets.
There absolutely ARE combos in chess. Itās funny you know that checkers have combos (although theyāre extremely simple ones), but not chess.
But anyways, I would agree that fighting games and chess are dissimilar. The main reason being that chess has no execution requirements, whereas thatās of such vital importance in any fighter.
