I find the immediate 1.e4 d5 2.e5 Bf5 to be worse than 2...c5! from a principled perspective. This way white essentially gets a greatly improved Caro-Kann because they had not wasted time with c7-c6 before playing the immediate c7-c5. Taking the center is just more accurate as now white has issues putting two pawns of their own in the center and black can still get the bishop outside the pawn chain, but in some lines prefer to put it on the h1-a8 diagonal.
It draws on a lot of ideas from the Caro-Kann and French advanced variations for plans, and even has a plethora of tricks and traps. For example 2...c5 3.d4 cxd4 4.Qxd4 Nc6 5.Qf4?! (the second most common response on the lichess database) ...g6! with the two most common moved 6.Nf6?? and 6.Bb5?? blundering to the sneaky skewer 6...Bh6! picking up a piece. I've played a few games that went like this.
I think 2...c5 deserves credit as the best way to respond to the most common Scandinavian sideline online 2.e5.
Dont think anyone plays the queens gambit anymore
@Gen_E_chess said in #21:
> I find the immediate 1.e4 d5 2.e5 Bf5 to be worse than 2...c5! from a principled perspective. This way white essentially gets a greatly improved Caro-Kann because they had not wasted time with c7-c6 before playing the immediate c7-c5.
"Many people call it a better Caro, or a better French which is only true if White goes for d4, which they sometimes don't do, especially if we play 2... c5 — choosing f4 instead."
If you like to play the positions without d4, then c5 is definitely a better move, as the only way to get d4 with white is to play c3 first, which isn't easy to find. Me personally I struggle in these position a lot, therefore I came up with a way to avoid them, and still getting something I'm comfortable in.
At the end of the day, openings are very personal and there isn't the best response for everyone, +2 is meaningless if you can't convert, -2 doesn't matter if nobody can punish you
What about the Portuguese variation of the NORMAL Scandinavian opening?
It goes like this: 1. e4 d5 2. exd5 Nf6! 3. d4 c6.
Nota Bene: We think it should be considered. All antiScandi lines of play are dubious (to say mildly).
Ferdosco (member of AJEFECH, the national Chilean Chess Federation).
Great blog as a qd5 scandi player i wonder if theres a study with that stuff
So would Bogoljubov be a "good" Anti-Scandinavian?
As a kid I had very good results with 2. d3 and after queen exchange hide the king on c2 after c3, in longer classical games I would still consider 2 d3, in all the shorter games the Tenisson is an opening that I love to play but I like Ne5 over Ng5, more chaos is more fun... And sure it is not good but who cares, I definitely not, chess is much more fun with unsound openings and sound openings lead to chess that I do not like or even worse drawish positions and tbf I am allergic to drawish positions, nice blog btw
@Vanspodin said in #26:
> So would Bogoljubov be a "good" Anti-Scandinavian?
I'm looking at it from the side of prepared Black player. Bogoljubov is an opening where it's so incredibly easy to go wrong with both colors, so if I as Black feel confident in my understanding and preparation I'm really happy to face it. However if you feel the same with White, it's definitely a very good weapon, just not really an "Anti-Scandinavian" in general, only happens to be a possibility against me.
@Druismat said in #27:
> Tenisson is an opening that I love to play but I like Ne5 over Ng5, more chaos is more fun... And sure it is not good but who cares, I definitely not, chess is much more fun with unsound openings
Just because an opening, or a move is not objectively best, doesn't mean it's bad. Some of my favourite lines are
1. e4 Nc6 2. d4 f5?
1. e4 d5 2. exd5 Qxd5 3. Nc3 Qa5 4. Nf3 Nf6 5. Bc4 Nc6 6. h3 g5?
1. e4 c5 2. Nc3 e6 3. Nf3 Nc6 4. d4 cxd4 5. Nxd4 Qc7 6. Ndb5 Qb8 7. Be3 a6 8. Bb6 axb5 9. Nxb5 Bb4+ 10. c3 Ba5 11. Nd6+ Kf8 12. Bc5 Nge7 13. Qh5 Nd8 14. Qh4?/14. Qg5?
1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 Bf5 4. h4 h5 5. Bg5!? literally now I've just played this: lichess.org/RlwuzMe5/white
The most important thing (by far) is how practical the opening is. Objectivity only matters when your opponent knows in advance what's coming, and can prepare. If you are having fun with Ne5 that's all that matters, recently I switched my line against the London, because I didn't have fun in the slow positions, even though I had an amazing score there.
> and sound openings lead to chess that I do not like or even worse drawish positions and tbf I am allergic to drawish positions
Yeah, especially lines after 1. Nf3. I'm also allergic to slow or theory-heavy chess, I really don't like when people can compensate a lack of understanding a position with a lot of memorisation (like in Four Kingts Sicilian)
e4 d5 exd5 Qxd5 Nc3 Qa5 d4 c6 Nf3 Nf6 Bc4 Bf5 Bd2 e6 Nd5 Qd8 Nxf6+ Qxf6 Bg5 Qg6 c3 I really like this line instead of any anti-scandinavians.
@hikaruontwitch1 said in #29:
> e4 d5 exd5 Qxd5 Nc3 Qa5 d4 c6 Nf3 Nf6 Bc4 Bf5 Bd2 e6 Nd5 Qd8 Nxf6+ Qxf6 Bg5 Qg6 c3 I really like this line instead of any anti-scandinavians.
And I like to avoid this line with 4... Nf6–Bf5–e6, leaving the c7-pawn alone if I can, but more about it later ;)