That’s why I ended up learning the Closed Sicilian as white. It at least gave me a slight sense of control over the game’s direction. 
No problem!
I used 1. e4 c5 2. c3 myself.
But I want to reiterate that beginners and improvers should aim to understand an opening, not memorise it.
I reached an 1800 rating before acquiring loads of opening analysis (and I understood my openings by then.)
It is, and a new copy is cheap. Also, still a good read.
Incidentally, Bobby states the value of a Bishop is 3.25. I thought it was 3. What’s the modern consensus on that?
Well, I am far from an expert, but I believe the consensus is “it depends”.
At the start of the game the bishop pair is generally seen as more valuable than the knight pair - so yeah, 3.25 is probably right. In the middle game what I’ve been taught (or picked up, more accurately) is that it depends on who controls what squares. That is, your light-squared bishop could be very weak if I control all of the light squares or if it is trapped by your own pieces. I think that generally in the middle and end game stages closed positions prefer knights (because they can jump over the locked pawns) and open positions prefer bishops (range of action).
Similarly, not all pawns are equally valuable. Clearly at the start of the game I will happily exchange a flank pawn for you center pawn (which is one of the main points of the Sicilian).
Other experts can chime in here.
glee, do you really recommend the Scandinavian to beginners? I’m very much a beginner, but I’m always happy when my opponent plays it. Maybe the fact that it reduces my choices as white is why I like it. A quick look at lichess shows I’m at 58/6/36 against it (always as white, I never play it as black).
One big advantage knights have in the late game is that they can switch colors. If a bishop on white squares is one of your major assets, then your opponent can keep safe from it just by keeping most of his pieces on black squares.
On the other hand, in the very late game, two bishops are adequate mating power, or even a bishop and a knight, but two knights are not. Though that only becomes relevant once every last pawn is off the field.
Sitnam: I picked up the game just two years ago, and it’s been a ton of fun. I’d be happy to play some games on chess.com and review them afterwards (perhaps in a thread at SDMB) if you’re interested. Or feel free to PM me your chess.com username, and I can look at some of your past games and give some feedback.
If your chess.com tactics rating is around 700, then far and away the most important thing to do is work on your tactics. Understanding the basic plans of a very small set of openings will also help you get into sensible middle games with some sort of plan. But I have to imagine that most of your games are being decided by whoever hangs the most pieces.
Chess.com also has lessons on tactical motifs. Having some instruction on key motifs to look for may help tactical improvement. Undefended pieces, pins, skewers, forks, back-rank weaknesses, overloaded pieces – if you don’t know what some of these terms mean, you may not know to look for those patterns in the first place. Also at this tactics level, a lot of the posed problems will be forced mating sequences that follow some basic patterns. Chess.com has lessons on basic mating patterns as well, and you should try to get to where those are pretty automatic.
Hey Glee and Pasta,
I do have a chess.com account. My most resent game at chess.com was 10 months ago.
But, my Wife has become interested, and we play about 4 games a week.
I will have some downtime in two weeks because of a hip replacement. The surgery is 11-21-19.
Soooo… if anyone is interested, in a few weeks, I should be able to play. I’ll need to re-familiarize myself with chess.com site though.
Yep. All your advice is great.
I have taught my Wife to play and often have to remind her to stop playing defense all the time. If you do, you are sure to lose. Get that power out there.
She’s gotten quite good actually. I have to watch my ass. She’s an Ironman, so competition is in her blood (I, as her husband, am the Sherpa). I’m sort of stunned how much she loves the game. She may win 1 in 15. It took ~ 100 games before she beat me. Knowing each other as well as we do from 23 years of marriage I suspect has a part in that. I know what she’s going to do. And I taught her, so it may not be a level playing field. We both recognize that and have talked about it.
For myself, a big reason to castle is to help develop the Kings Rook. It’s not always about safety. IMHO.
Pressuring your opponent to move the king to prevent castle can be good to. If you can force a move, you basically get an extra one to pursue a plan.
And my advice to my Wife has always been “You have to play both sides of the board”. Flexibility is key, which is why it’s good to have your power out there.
Hope no-one minds if I bump this thread rather than start a new one - in the absence of playing an actual game over the SDMB (for the time being, anyway - my Diplomacy game will probably conclude in the next week or two, then I should be up for a game), I thought it might be fun to post a couple of recent games I played against a colleague at work. We’re on a fairly similar level - our games so far have typically been decided by fairly basic tactical blunders. I’ve also included some analysis/commentary - but if people are able and willing, I’d like to see their thoughts on things.
You can play the game over by following this link. Here are the moves:
- e4 e5
- f4 Not the best choice of opening for me, because I don’t understand it well enough. For example, I know that Black can get into difficulties if he tries too hard to hold on to the gambit pawn, but I don’t really know how to exploit this. This becomes evident later.
2…exf4 - Nf3 d6 I’m happy to see this move as it means if he wants to play d5 at some point in the future, it loses a tempo. Hence:
- Bc4 Bg4 Possibly I should have played h3 to prevent this, but I was wary of creating a hole on g3.
- O-O Nc6
- d3 g5 I wonder if I should have played h4 here, swapping my h-pawn for the gambit pawn. It seems to me now that activating my black-squared bishop immediately might have been worth the extra weakness on my kingside, given Black is not exactly in a position to exploit the latter at the moment.
- Nc3 Nf6
- Qe1 Bxf3 I probably should have recaptured with the rook instead, I can’t remember why I didn’t.
- gxf3 Qe7
- Qf2 a6
- h4 h6 Obviously I was hoping for gxh4, but I should have given my opponent credit for being better than that. Poor move on my part, really.
- Qh2 Bg7 Again, a poor choice by me - ‘forcing’ him into a good move.
- Qh3 Nh5
- Nd5 Again, in retrospect this looks a poor choice - instead hxg5 followed by Qg4 would have been interesting.
14…Bd4+ - Kh2 Qd7
- Qxd7+ Kxd7
- c3 Bb6
- Nxb6+ cxb6
- Bxf7 At this point I’m feeling OK about things - the opening hasn’t worked that well for me, but I’ve finally regained the gambit pawn, forced him into doubled pawns on the queenside, the exchange of queens makes my weak king less of a worry, and I have 2 bishops vs 2 knights. Now, if only I can get my bishop into the game, I feel I have good chances. However:
19…Ng3 This makes it all look rather different - suddenly I have a pawn and a rook en pris, one bishop is in no-man’s land, and the other is out of the game. What’s more, my rooks aren’t connected yet. Now, I wasn’t exactly in time trouble here (since we weren’t using clocks), but it was getting to the end of our lunch hour, which is my excuse for the following disaster: - hxg5 hxg5+
- Kg2 Ne5 I asked my opponent afterwards why he didn’t simply take the rook, and basically it seems that he liked the knight on g3 so much, he didn’t really consider it. I was expecting it to be grabbed straightaway. Since I now face losing a whole piece if I move the rook, I save the bishop instead - I considered Bb3, but considered it too passive - he can’t take both the rook and pawn at once, after all! So:
- Bd5 Rab8 Now this is too passive from Black, in my view. Just take the rook!
- Rd1 b5 Another strange move - restricts my bishop a bit, but hands me the initiative.
- d4 Nc4
- b3 Nb6
- Re1 Nxd5
- exd5 Rbe8
- Ba3 Re2+
- Rxe2 Nxe2
- Bb4 b6
- Re1 Ng3
- Re6 Nf5
- Rf6 a5 I’m now feeling pretty pleased with the way things have turned out - not only have I recovered from potentially losing the exchange, I now look to be winning a pawn. But I was greedy, and thought I could win a second pawn before taking the knight.
- Bxa5 Ne3+ Whoops. I forgot about that check. And now I’m lost again.
- Kg1 bxa5
- Rg6 Rh3
- Rxg5 Rg3+
- Rxg3 fxg3 I had never seen this setup before, where the king is completely trapped by just a knight and pawn. My last-ditch attempt is to try and fashion some sort of breakthrough on the queenside - but that isn’t really viable, since it will give black a winning passed pawn as well.
- a3 Ke8
- Kh1 Ke7
- Kg1 Kd7
- Kh1 Kc7
- Kg1 Kb6
- Kh1 b4
- cxb4 axb4
- a4 I’m quite happy that I’ve managed to stop the Black king from coming through on the queenside, but I now realised that he can win extremely easily by marching his king round the board while I oscillate between g1 and h1, picking up my f-pawn on the way, and eventually getting the winning promotion with me powerless to do anything about it. Even if I run my f-pawn he doesn’t need to move his knight as his king will still reach its queening square in time. However:
46…Nf1 My last hope (if he had made a king move towards the kingside I would have resigned). - Kg2 Nd2
- Kxg3 Nxb3 I now have to move my king to stop his b-pawn.
- Kf2 Nxd4
- Ke3 Nxf3 And I can’t take the knight for the same reason.
- Kd3 Ka5
- Kc2 Kxa4
- Kb2 Nd4
- Ka2 b3+
- Ka1 Ka3
- Kb1 Nb5 Black avoids …b2 (stalemate) and that really is it now.
- Ka1 Nc7
- Kb1 Nxd5
- Ka1 Ne3
- Kb1 d5
White resigned
In the next game, my opponent was rather distracted, so I scored a quick win by taking a leaf out of glee’s book :).
- e4 d5
- e5 Nc6 I’ve never played this opening before; having looked it up since the game, I see e5 isn’t necessarily the best, but neither is my response, though I think it’s fairly reasonable.
- d4 Bf5
- Nc3 Qd7
- g3 I thought about playing Nb4 here, but since White can block with Bd3, didn’t think it was as good as just continuing with my development.
5…O-O-O - Bg2 Nb4 Now Bd3 isn’t available, so White is losing a pawn.
- Qe2 Nxc2+ White admitted afterwards Qe2 was “pointless”. He could have limited losses to a pawn with Rb1. Now he’s losing at least the exchange.
- Kd1 Nxa1
- Bxd5 e6 White tries to fight back, but runs into more trouble.
- Be4 Qxd4+
- Qd3 Bxe4
And White resigned. Qd3 was in a way the worst mistake, but White was lost by then anyway.
So, if I do get to play any of you, this gives you a fair idea of what you’re dealing with! Comments welcome, however offensive :).
I’m a middling player so take my thoughts with a grain of salt, but here they are anyway! My comments in italics.
- e4 e5 2. f4 exf4
The King’s Gambit isn’t something I play, but I understand the main ideas are to either play up the f file that you opened with the gambit pawn or to play an early d4 to dominate the center. You did neither, so your compensation for the pawn was somewhat lacking and you ended up cramped. The early d4 plan gives your light squared bishop a little more breathing room as well, and for the half-open f file plan, you had an opportunity to re-take with the rook on f3, which I think would have been more accurate, even with black having played g5. As played, you closed off the file with gxf3.
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Nf3 d6 4. Bc4 Bg4 Possibly I should have played h3 to prevent this, but I was wary of creating a hole on g3. A hole on g3 is not a concern in an opening like the King’s Gambit! Attack! That said, you can wait until after Bg4 to play h3, saving that tempo until needed. You don’t mind a trade on f3, especially if that knight has no obvious immediate future. The trade helps clear the f file (if you take back with a piece and not a pawn).
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O-O Nc6 6. d3 g5 7. Nc3 Nf6 8. Qe1 Bxf3 I probably should have recaptured with the rook instead, I can’t remember why I didn’t. Ah, I see you had the same thought. (I’m not reading ahead so as not to bias my thinking.)
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gxf3 Qe7 10. Qf2 a6 11. h4 h6 Obviously I was hoping for gxh4, but I should have given my opponent credit for being better than that. Poor move on my part, really.
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Qh2 Bg7 Again, a poor choice by me - ‘forcing’ him into a good move. * Oof. Yeah, black is the one attacking now. *
I looked at the rest but don’t have comments beyond tactical observations that an engine can provide, since the rest was pretty much a series of tactical… um… choices. Your opponent backing off when he had the exchange opportunity was definitely a chance for you to come back, but it looks pretty topsy turvy after that still.
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e4 d5 2. e5 Nc6 I’ve never played this opening before; having looked it up since the game, I see e5 isn’t necessarily the best, but neither is my response, though I think it’s fairly reasonable. Yeah, e5 is pretty rare in the Scandinavian. Given 2. e5, 2…c5 seems like the far and away most obvious choice. You opponent will have ceded a lot of center control, and you can play Nc6 after that to get your knight behind that center (and still pressuring the e5 pawn, which also can no longer be supported by a simple 3. d4 as in the game if you play 2…c5 first.) But, yeah, 2…Nc6 is certainly playable.
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d4 Bf5 4. Nc3 Qd7 5. g3 I thought about playing Nb4 here, but since White can block with Bd3, didn’t think it was as good as just continuing with my development.
5…O-O-O 6. Bg2 Nb4 Now Bd3 isn’t available, so White is losing a pawn. Nice setting up this opportunity. -
Qe2 Nxc2+ White admitted afterwards Qe2 was “pointless”. He could have limited losses to a pawn with Rb1. Now he’s losing at least the exchange. Rb1 doesn’t work since 7…Bxc2 forks the Q and R, so it’s still an exchange. 7. Kf1 was the only way for him to keep losses to just the c pawn. Not a move white wants to play!
The rest was a quick mop up.
Thanks for your comments and for going through it, much appreciated. I’m not going to make a habit of doing this, but I’ll just post one more quick game, from today when I was White:
- e4 e5
- Nf3 Nc6
- Bb5 This is my preferred opening as White.
3…d5 - exd5 Qxd5 I’m happy with this as although I have lost my centre, I gain a tempo with a developing move.
- Nc3 Qc5
- d3 a6
- Be3 Qd6 And again. I feel like I have a clear advantage now.
- Ba4 Nf6
- Bxc6+ bxc6 In retrospect, this sequence looks weird. I think on the previous move I was happy to maintain the pin for the time being, with Black still some way from being able to castle. But now I’ve captured anyway, it just looks like I’ve lost time. Then again, Black hasn’t really gained any. I think I just belatedly realised that I would create an isolated, doubled pawn with this move (as recapturing with the Queen would allow me to take on d5).
- d4 e4 Probably not the best - I like the knight on e5.
- Ne5 Nd5 At this stage we adjourned, and I thought I was winning a pawn outright on the resumption with:
- Nxe4 Qb4+ But I’d missed this response. Never mind; I’m OK with swapping Black’s e-pawn for my b-pawn, I just need to play carefully to avoid any tactical tricks.
- Qd2 Qxb2
- O-O Bb4 I didn’t expect this move for some reason (just hadn’t looked at it, I guess) and thought for quite some time about the best place to put my queen. I think I found a good choice, especially with Black’s king still in the open. For several moves prior to this I was thinking about Qh5 or even sacrificing the knight with Nxf7 first, but it never seemed to quite work out, so I left it.
- Qe2 Nc3 I was happy to see this move as it allows me to exchange off my rather passive knight for his active one.
- Nxc3 Qxc3 I thought he might recapture with the bishop in order to try and exchange his queen for both my rooks, but I guess that wasn’t his plan. Again I thought for a long time before my next move, trying to work out if I could create an opportunity for a double clearance of the e-file, but in the end I thought my choice would at least take control of another open file and delay him castling for the time being, as he has to move his queen.
- Rab1 f6 He didn’t see that the queen is now going to be trapped. 17…Be7 was probably called for.
- Rb3 Qxb3
- cxb3 fxe5
- Qh5+ Kd8 The final mistake, as it allows my bishop into the attack with tempo. Instead with 20…Kd7 he could have fought on a little longer, albeit in a pretty hopeless position.
- Bg5+ Kd7
- Qf7+ Kd6
- Qe7+ Kd5 And at this point Black resigned as he saw he was losing his bishop, but it’s worse than that: 24. Qxe5 is mate.
I admit I was quite proud of the accuracy with which I finished off, I’m well aware it was fairly easy and won’t impress anybody but I’m glad I looked for better moves rather than just taking the pawn on e5 and then trying to win the endgame. What I’m more interested in is any comments on my thoughts in the opening/early middlegame. I know my opponent made some poor choices and was eventually punished for starting an attack prematurely, with his king still exposed and not all his pieces in play. What should we have done?
I see no reason not to have a chess game analysis thread going. As long as people engage, no reason not to. (There are chess-dedicated forums for this, of course, but that can be said for most of the topics discussed at SDMB.)
My comments in italics.
- e4 e5
- Nf3 Nc6
- Bb5 This is my preferred opening as White.
If you were asked what the point of Bb5 is in the Ruy Lopez, what you would answer? Don’t look ahead at my answer below. Think about it first here.
3…d5
4. exd5 Qxd5 I’m happy with this as although I have lost my centre, I gain a tempo with a developing move.
Ok, so the point of Bb5 is to weaken black’s defense of e5. 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 is attacking the e5 pawn, and black has multiple ways to defend it. 2…Nc6 is one, and 3. Bb5 sets up, at some point later, the direct or indirect removal of that defender. Trading on c6 early is of course one line, but it can get messy. (The Ruy Lopez is theory-rich anyway, exchange variation or not.) In this game, however, your opponent gave you a beautiful opportunity with 3…d5. The knight on c6 is now pinned to the king! He removed (pinned) his only defender of e5 by playing 3…d5. 3…d6 would have pinned the knight as well but also adds a new defender to e5, so it’s playable for black. Anyway, the point is that the e5 pawn was straight hanging after 3…d5. If you think about the purpose of Bb5 in this opening – i.e., removing a defender of e5 through pin or through capture – then you might notice this free pawn more readily. After 4. Nxe5, you are also making a nasty threat on c6 (your knight and bishop both aimed at it) which black must deal with immediately.
- Nc3 Qc5
- d3 a6
- Be3 Qd6 And again. I feel like I have a clear advantage now.
- Ba4 Nf6
- Bxc6+ bxc6 In retrospect, this sequence looks weird. I think on the previous move I was happy to maintain the pin for the time being, with Black still some way from being able to castle. But now I’ve captured anyway, it just looks like I’ve lost time. Then again, Black hasn’t really gained any. I think I just belatedly realised that I would create an isolated, doubled pawn with this move (as recapturing with the Queen would allow me to take on d5).
Definitely an interesting sequence to examine. “Don’t capture a pinned piece” is not a hard rule of course, but it is often worth thinking carefully about why you would want to take it. In this case, the pin is still doing good things, your bishop is guarded, you don’t mind black playing b5, and your bishop can just move to b3 at any point and be on an excellent diagonal while with b5 black will have introduced queenside weaknesses. There is a tactical observation here as well, which is that black should have taken back with the Q, because if you do take on d5 as you state, black has Qxg2!.
- d4 e4 Probably not the best - I like the knight on e5.
- Ne5 Nd5 At this stage we adjourned, and I thought I was winning a pawn outright on the resumption with:
- Nxe4 Qb4+ But I’d missed this response. Never mind; I’m OK with swapping Black’s e-pawn for my b-pawn, I just need to play carefully to avoid any tactical tricks.
Agreed. And you did avoid the tricks, playing solid moves that maybe weren’t always the most testing, but also didn’t give up significant advantage. A relatively clean finish from here.
What I’m more interested in is any comments on my thoughts in the opening/early middlegame. I know my opponent made some poor choices and was eventually punished for starting an attack prematurely, with his king still exposed and not all his pieces in play. What should we have done?
Most of the above was about the opening and middle game, so probably the only thing more to say is how should the game have gone if not for the blunder 11…Nd5??. Instead, black could just play 11…Be7 and then castle, and white can castle and then decide which of the several black weaknesses to pressure. Re1 is natural: half open file with an annoying-to-defend e pawn there. Black could put a rook on b8 for similar reasons, forcing you to worry about your queenside. It’s a fairly equal, not terribly sharp, somewhat cramped, imbalanced (i.e., not “symmetric”) position. So maneuvering to increase pressure on weak point while generally improving your pieces would be the name of the game. As one more example, white might redirect his bishop to g3 via f4, opening up the rook and point the bishop along a good diagonal with some discovered attack potential on either the queen (short term) or c7 (a very weak pawn).
Thanks for posting games - it helps us understand what level you’re at.
Here’s my comments on the game above.
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e5 doesn’t challenge Black’s opening. I would play 2. … c5 for Black (to undermine a future d4 by White), followed by 3. … Nc6. Black can easily develop whilst putting pressure on the e5 pawn.
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Nc3 is unwise. After 3. … Nb4 (threatening Nxc2+), White has to play 4. Bd3. After 4. … Nxd3+ 5. cxd3 e6, Black is already better.
After 5. g3, the line starting with Nb4 is even better for Black. Once White’s bishop is captured on d3, there are weaknesses on f3 and h3.
- Bg2? loses material.
If 7. Rb1 Bxc2 wins at least the exchange.
- Bxd5? is a blunder - but White is lost anyway.
Thanks again for the replies, really useful.
Ha, this is a classic case of “a little learning is a dangerous thing”. You are quite right to question it, but I was well aware of the point of Bb5. My thought process was something like: I know Black often wants to play …d5 in king’s pawn openings, as it challenges White’s centre and frees Black’s game. I’ve never seen it this early on, but maybe it’s good for Black. Also, I shouldn’t be too aggressive in the opening before I’m developed, don’t want to move a piece twice unless I really have to, etc.
In short, I just didn’t spot 4. Nxe5. So my lesson here is: yes, rapid development is important, but look out for any temporary weaknesses your opponent introduces, and exploit them!
I know I’m contradicting myself here, but I’m pretty sure my post-hoc analysis was wrong and that at the time, I expected Black to recapture with the queen, and I don’t think I was considering Nxd5 - this was something my opponent pointed out after he recaptured with the pawn and I expressed surprise. I would hope that had he actually recaptured with the queen, I would have seen that Nxd5 wasn’t playable. Of course, none of that answers why I decided to make the exchange at that point. I wasn’t concerned about …b5, and would have been quite happy with my bishop on b3. I think I just wanted to remove the defender of e5 before …b5 denied me the opportunity to do so, but I accept now that wasn’t the best choice.
I know I said I was more interested in the opening, but I’d be grateful if you wanted to point out any sharper lines I missed from this point on, or how Black might have defended better.
Given your forward knights and the ability to get your queen to the king side via f3, there was some chance for added pressure by playing 13. c3 rather than 13. Qd2. The knight on e4 would defend the c3 pawn after 13…Qxb2, so the white queen would be free to roam. This is a non-trivial line to calculate, though, since black can kick the knight with f5, and you can kick the black queen with Rfb1, at which point the queen would get chased around for a while. The engine says this is better, and since you have lots of initiative you might have thought to try it on that basis alone, but in a relatively quick game I can’t fault the practical choice to avoid the sharpness.
For black, a possible deviation is on move 13. Rather than taking the pawn, black has several initiative-gaining moves to consider that are probably more valuable than that pawn right at that moment. Bf5 develops with tempo. f6 happens to work tactically here, pushing the knight back. (1…f6 2. Nxc6 Qa4 3. c4! {only move for white} Qxc6 4. cxd5 Qxd5, and the material count is unchanged, but white’s initiative has been deflated.) Even just trading queens would be a good practical choice for black, willingly leaving the pawn on b2 so as to have some time to activate his pieces without a white queen harassing the exposed black king. With 3 minors and 2 rooks still on board, plus tons of pawns to attack, black would have plenty of ways to build pressure (aiming not to trade off pieces since he is down a pawn here, but rather pressing until he can regain the advantage.)
Thanks, again. I think I did consider c3 in the game, but I can’t say I rejected it to avoid a sharper line - I think it was more that I was hoping Qd2 might tempt Black to exchange queens instead of taking my b-pawn. Which is a poor reason to play a move - ‘hope chess’ rearing its ugly head again. Plus, I see from the rest of your analysis that trading queens wasn’t a good choice for White at this stage anyway. I just felt it would remove one of Black’s only two developed pieces, and make it more likely for me to be able to grab the pawn on c6 soon (or force the bishop into defending it).
Going to bump this one more time to say that now my game of Diplomacy has ended in ignominious defeat, I have a bit of free time for a training game - so if glee or anyone else is up for it, please post here and let me know! I would be most grateful.
OK, I’m up for it!
I suggest we can use this thread for all comments (including spectators) and I’ll start a new thread just for the game.
I can include references in the game thread to a website which shows the current game position:
I’ll post regular comments on the play.
Also Dead Cat can take moves back (it’s a training game 
) and ask me for advice on his best move.
I’ll offer Dead Cat a choice of colour and await his reply.
Amazing, thanks! I’ll start as White with 1. e4 please.