Play the Schlechter Slav. Schlechter Slav = Best Slav. Works against 1.d4, 1.Nf3, 1.c4 and you can even play it with White in different variations <3
@vishnuss said in #9:
> I like my current repertoire just want to add to it.
Okay.
I've always though that there's a bunch of openings that every chess player would ideally learn to play at some point in their life because of their historic importance and/or theoretical interest - off the top of my head I'd say maybe the King's Gambit, Evans Gambit, Ruy Lopez, Exchange QGD, Sicilian, French, King's Indian - so if I suffered from having too much free time then I'd probably take up one of those.
> I like my current repertoire just want to add to it.
Okay.
I've always though that there's a bunch of openings that every chess player would ideally learn to play at some point in their life because of their historic importance and/or theoretical interest - off the top of my head I'd say maybe the King's Gambit, Evans Gambit, Ruy Lopez, Exchange QGD, Sicilian, French, King's Indian - so if I suffered from having too much free time then I'd probably take up one of those.
Queen's gambit, French defense, Ruy lopez.
play king's gambit or queen's gambit
@Akarsh_2010 said in #8:
> If you want to switch, Scandinavian defense is a good choice, i recently switched and I think it's pretty good.
I know many people agree with you, even some GrandMasters but.... After e4,d5; exd, Qxd play Nf3 instead of the usual Nc3 (or other). Then just develop normally with d4 and c4 like in queens gambit. It kills the Scandi. My statistical win rate (not on this site) is over 76%. The Scandi is busted in my world.
> If you want to switch, Scandinavian defense is a good choice, i recently switched and I think it's pretty good.
I know many people agree with you, even some GrandMasters but.... After e4,d5; exd, Qxd play Nf3 instead of the usual Nc3 (or other). Then just develop normally with d4 and c4 like in queens gambit. It kills the Scandi. My statistical win rate (not on this site) is over 76%. The Scandi is busted in my world.
e4 e5 is the best
a4 a5 a6 axb7 bxa8=Q
But good luck getting this in a game
But good luck getting this in a game
@RamblinDave about that.... what would you say about the dragon variation (and its variants accelerated, hyperaccelerated and dragdorf)? I actually quite like the idea but everyone keeps saying the the yugoslav is deadly and there are insane amounts of theory and you need to be master at tactics and one tempo can cost you the game and I don't have too much success against the yugoslav yet.... After all this I am hesitant, and stockfish hates the dragon. Idk.
@SD_2709 - I'm not an expert or a coach or good at chess or anything, so take anything I say with a pinch of salt. But...
In terms of "openings that everyone should aspire to have some understanding of", I wouldn't really put the Dragon up there, because it doesn't feel like it's been quite as historically important as, say, the Classical, the Najdorf or the Scheveningen. Those kind of feel like the "core" of the Sicilian to me - the lines which have at some point been seen as the critical ways to challenge 1. e4 and which have been thrashed out again and again at the very highest levels.
In terms of practical playability, IDK. I've always been told that getting middlegames where you understand the plans and generally feel comfortable with the style of play is more important for a normal player than whether you're perfectly booked up or whether an opening is theoretically sound according to Stockfish / modern super-GMs, particularly since most amateur players will probably end up out-of-book sooner rather than later anyway. So on that level, if you like it then go for it IMO.
If you don't love super-sharp positions, the Accelerated Dragon might be better - you take a lot of the sting out of the Yugoslav Attack (because you can play d5 in one move, leaving you up a tempo) at the cost of allowing the Maroczy Bind, which also seems to be pretty good for white but in more of a slow, positional way, and which the database suggests a lot of amateur players don't know how to play anyway.
In terms of "openings that everyone should aspire to have some understanding of", I wouldn't really put the Dragon up there, because it doesn't feel like it's been quite as historically important as, say, the Classical, the Najdorf or the Scheveningen. Those kind of feel like the "core" of the Sicilian to me - the lines which have at some point been seen as the critical ways to challenge 1. e4 and which have been thrashed out again and again at the very highest levels.
In terms of practical playability, IDK. I've always been told that getting middlegames where you understand the plans and generally feel comfortable with the style of play is more important for a normal player than whether you're perfectly booked up or whether an opening is theoretically sound according to Stockfish / modern super-GMs, particularly since most amateur players will probably end up out-of-book sooner rather than later anyway. So on that level, if you like it then go for it IMO.
If you don't love super-sharp positions, the Accelerated Dragon might be better - you take a lot of the sting out of the Yugoslav Attack (because you can play d5 in one move, leaving you up a tempo) at the cost of allowing the Maroczy Bind, which also seems to be pretty good for white but in more of a slow, positional way, and which the database suggests a lot of amateur players don't know how to play anyway.
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