Kramnik - No Castle Chess - Propose as an experimental Variant

Kramnik - No Castle Chess - Propose as an experimental Variant
No-Castling Chess - Vladimir Kramnik proposes an exciting variant!
www.chessbase.in/news/No-Castling-Chess-Vladimir-Kramnik-proposes-an-exciting-variant-

"Kramnik says No-Castling chess will ensure more than 50% decisive games at top level play!"

"SS: After you started working with DeepMind, at what point did you think that No-Castling chess was good to go out to the public?

VK: I was convinced even before checking it with this monster AlphaZero that No-Castling would only make the game more dynamic. First of all, every opening theory goes out of the window in this variant of chess right from move one. It is hard to say which is the best move to start with 1.e4, 1.d4, or 1.c4. In fact, I think 1.f4 makes a lot of sense under this new circumstances as it allows you to go for the quick Nf3-g3-Bg2-Rf1-Kf2-Kg1 (laughs). I don't know 1.f4 might as well be the best move here but the point is it completely destroys all theory! "

I like the idea a lot! Three points:
1) Leads to more decisive games, as Kramnik rightly points out.
2) Opening knowledge is useless. It also makes opening prep with engine irrelevant.
3) More fun.

@Archer66

No Opening knowledge is not useless! The principles to keep the king safe is still alive, or you are risking asap attacks.

But there is a new idea: King to let in centre, closed openinggames can help here.

But of course there are much new ideas to explore.

@MarkusNemetz By opening knowledge, I meant theoretical knowledge. Some of the principles of chess are still relevant.

@Archer66 Of course I understand, however some opening lines can be still relevant (basically closed games) - I think frome here ideas can be explored.

I think that the centre would be not so relevant there however more flank openings could be played.

Chess before castling was invented was no castling chess. So players can revert back to previous opening lnowledge theories. In india chess was played without castling for a long time. After castling was invented.

#5 "I think that the centre would be not so relevant there however more flank openings could be played."
Of course the center is still relevant. The idea behind flank openings is indirect control over the center.

#4 "Some of the principles of chess are still relevant."
All of the principles of chess are still relevant.

#2 "Opening knowledge is useless. It also makes opening prep with engine irrelevant."
This will create its own opening theory prepared with engines.

The french advanced would suddenly become one of the best possible responses as the king is quite safe in the center lol

But I think this variant is boring, it reminds me of King of the Hill where you already avoid castling..

@tpr regarding center I meant the pawn control of the center - moves which center pawns now expose your King more. This must be practically discussed

Would not stop using preparatin not memorized openings. Would just change the set of openings. Finding such opening would be lot faster thistime over as we have the computers. For starters you could train Leela-Chess-Zero with new rules. Probaby wont even need re-training sufficiently long lookaheas with modified move generator would do the trick as well