Thoughts on all this memorizing

@ryan121 said in #5:

The advantage of memorizing first 8 to 15 moves, the player saves time during opening stage leaving plenty of time for middle game and endgame.

And suddenly they go out of book at move 3 and the whole 15 move line is useless.

@pointlesswindows said in #11:

And suddenly they go out of book at move 3 and the whole 15 move line is useless.
Then I made a 20 move Miniature Win. 2000 rated players love opponent deviates early.

Hmm I played chess for 1,5 years bow. Made it to Rapid 2000 so far without memeorizing lines or reading chessbooks. Oufcourse I pick up moves by watching masters play on youtube and twitch and I learn from analyzing my games. But I would never remeber if I where try to memeroize 20 moves in one opening. So when I play I might leave theory fast since I have not study it but then what does it do to my opponents prep if I dont play what he expect?

But maybe I would get much stronger If I where to read chesssbooks and prepare lines?

If I would study an opening I might go for Smith Morra because it looks so fun when Mark Esserman plays it but then your kinda restricted on if your opponent plays into it or not.

I prefer to play chess and not memory :)

It is tempting to try to learn everything in advance, but opening mistakes are a part of chess and one has to accept the necessity to experience them and gradually improve. Most of the time, one faces a position with no knowledge of a specific move indicated in a book. One has to think of opening knowledge as a sometimes helpful aid. After a game, it makes sense to try to look up the moves in a book and see if it has some indication of how one might have played better in the opening.
"... Review each of your games, identifying opening (and other) mistakes with the goal of not repeatedly making the same mistake. ... It is especially critical not to continually fall into opening traps – or even lines that result in difficult positions ..." - NM Dan Heisman (2007)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627062646/https://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman81.pdf
I think that this quote gives the basic idea for learning about a specific opening:
"... The way I suggest you study this book is to play through the main games once, relatively quickly, and then start playing the variation in actual games. Playing an opening in real games is of vital importance - without this kind of live practice it is impossible to get a 'feel' for the kind of game it leads to. There is time enough later for involvement with the details, after playing your games it is good to look up the line. ..." - GM Nigel Davies (2005)
In a nutshell, pick up what you can from quickly looking over some instructive games (skipping a lot of the details). Then use your own games as a guide for where to learn more. I once wasted a lot of time, reading about the position after 1 d4 d5 2 c4 c6 3 Nf3 Nf6 4 Nc3 dxc4 5 a4 Bf5 6 e3 e6 7 Bxc4 Bb4 8 O-O O-O 9 Qe2, only to realize (eventually) that the position never arose in any of my games. Many opening books are part explanation and part reference material. The reference material is included in the text with the idea that one mostly skips it on a first reading, and looks at an individual item when it applies to a game that one has just played.

Part of the issue is a matter of some openings being better for professionals and some being better for amateurs:
"... the most complicated variations demand huge amounts of time for home analysis, time available only to professional chess players. ..." - GM Lajos Portisch (1974)
Even professionals can find the best choices to be a daunting challenge:
"... There is no doubt in my mind that if you really want to test the Sicilian then you have to play the main lines of the Open Sicilian. The problem is that there are just so many of them ... and keeping up with developments in all of them is a substantial task. ... as you become older, with other demands on your time (family, job, etc.) then it becomes more and more difficult to keep up with everything. At this stage it may make sense to reduce your theoretical overhead by adopting one of the 'lesser' lines against the Sicilian: 2 c3, or the Closed Sicilian, or lines with Bb5. ..." - GM John Nunn (2005)
The Portisch advice:
"... to all players I can recommend the following: simplicity and economy. These are the characteristics of the opening systems of many great masters. They do not strain unduly for advantages in the opening; they would just as soon move on to the next phase of the game, hoping their skill will overcome the opponent in the middlegame or endgame. ..." - GM Lajos Portisch (1974)
There are degrees to which one can follow that sort of advice:
"... As a first step in mastering the Ruy Lopez, you need a solid, simple repertoire that will allow you to play practice games with your new opening without fearing nasty surprises. ... 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Ba4 Nf6 5 d3 ... This should be by far the most common position you reach after 3 Bb5. Until, that is, you feel ready to branch out from 5 d3 to other, sharper variations. ..." - GM Neil McDonald (2011)
Alternatively:
"... Alekhine advised beginners not to play the [Ruy Lopez]. We also recommend you get some experience first by playing relatively simple openings - the Scotch and Italian games - and only then move on to the Spanish one. ..." - Journey to the Chess Kingdom by Yuri Averbakh and Mikhail Beilin
Or one can be even more cautious:
"... teachers all over the world suggest that inexperienced players begin with 1 e4. ... Of course, you can also play 1 d4 ... A solid and more-or-less universal set-up is 2 Nf3 and 3 Bf4, followed in most cases by 4 e3, 5 Be2 and 6 0-0. I'd rather see my students fight their way through open positions instead; however, if you're not getting out of the opening alive after 1 e4, this method of playing 1 d4 deserves consideration. ..." - IM John Watson (2010)
It seems to be generally believed that increasing safety decreases the degree to which the game is likely to be instructive:
"... A beginner should avoid the Queen's Gambit ... and play open games instead! While he may not win as many games at first, he will in the long run be amply compensated by acquiring a thorough knowledge of the game. ..." - Richard Reti (~1929)
https://www.amazon.com/Masters-Chessboard-21st-Century-Richard/dp/1936490218?asin=B006ZQISDY&revisionId=f4836601&format=1&depth=1

I think there's a lot of value in learning some shallow lines to an opening if there's some good explanations to the moves. I'm a fairly new player, but my rating shot up after going through a chessable defense and opening to understand why specific moves are made. Which squares have to be defended - things like that.

The basics of "controlling the centre" "always be developing," etc, lead to good opening moves with careful thought, but a well-explained opening study helps a beginner see how these good, controlling opening moves are reasoned out and implemented. Then it makes it easier to improvise, because you have an idea of how sound opening moves come about.

Maybe (just mabye) if you're not a big fan of the memory element of chess, in that it's not rewarding enough to win or gain an edge that way, maybe chess960 is more for you?

Although it's more brutal to get good at, in that you really need to be excellent at tactics and strategic play to get a high ELO, because there's really not much (if any?) memorization in it (unless you randomly draw the standard chess setup). And also you are thrown into many diverse positions so can't just rely on 1 opening for white and 1 for black.

It's chess but without the memorization, but with more variety and fresh challenges from move 1. It does require a better tactical and/or strategic understanding to beat your opponent (on average) at, in that you're kinda thrown in this unfamiliar world and need to work with that to discover (or invent?) your solution at the time - from move 1.

To me it feels like the purer form of chess. By that I mean from move 1 each player needs to analyse the position.
Compare this to my standard chess game: 1. As white I play D4 so there's at least 1 move I don't think about (and TBH there's very little thought for the first 5-6 moves the majority of the time) and 2. c6 as black against e4 and d4, so once again no (or near-zero) mental challenge there for at best 1 move (most commonly first 4+ moves).

To me that does feel like the game that initially drew me into chess. So for me less memorization, without giving up anything beautiful and challenging about this game, is a win for me.

My idea is that the best way to learn an opening is by playing thru annotated full games. That way I learn opening, typical MG ideas & tactics and EG patterns. I do that, make my notes, then consult an opening book for more explanations, after a while I understand most of the moves' reasons and there are still a few I understand ''after the fact'' but just have trouble coming up with them a priori. I make puzzles of these few and memorize them.
I have a notebook where I record all these opening lines to make it easier to review something.
And I have a book of chess positions which are the non-intuitive moves, tactics etc.
I dont believe that memorizing opening moves wo understanding will help my play [or even that I will retain what I've rote memorized]. -Bill

@ryan121 said in #12:

Then I made a 20 move Miniature Win. 2000 rated players love opponent deviates early.

Well, I'm a 2000 player and I like to deviate early. I get good results with that even against players with higher rating. But then again, I have studied middle game and endings. I don't mind getting behind in development as long as I get a pawn structure that is promising in the endgame. In a way it's psychologically easy to play when I just need to survive the opening knowing that if I manage to do that, I have good chances of winning. This is the case when my opponent knows the opening lines and tactics but not much of pawn structure nor endgame.

Of course I remember the opening lines I have played hundreds of times. They just aren't the same lines that most players play and I haven't learned most of those lines from any opening books but by thinking by myself and playing them again and again and refining them according to the need.

@kindaspongey said in #15:

"... As a first step in mastering the Ruy Lopez, you need a solid, simple repertoire that will allow you to play practice games with your new opening without fearing nasty surprises. ... 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Ba4 Nf6 5 d3 ... This should be by far the most common position you reach after 3 Bb5. Until, that is, you feel ready to branch out from 5 d3 to other, sharper variations. ..." - GM Neil McDonald (2011)

Most players have maybe learned that line. But I play 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Bb5 a6 4 Bxc6 dxc6 5 d4 exd4 6 Qxd4 and after that all white needs to do is trade all the pieces (without changing the pawn structure) and the pawn ending is won. All the pressure is on black: he must win in the middle game or he loses the endgame. Probably I would lose against a GM or even IM with this approch, but against untitled players this has worked fine. On the other hand, I would probably lose against a GM and IM even in a memorizing competition and it would be more boring...

@jc52766
My opponent deviates early in the Scotch and I punish him.