brag: just took down a WGM in 18 moves, in an opening i've never played against: 1. d4 Nf6 2. c4 g6 3. Nc3 Bg7 4. e4 O-O 5. Nf3 c6?!

Pics or it didn't happen

lol

was going to post the game but I think the critical tactic in the middle would make a pretty decent blitz tactics thread. it was thematic and wasn't immediately obvious to even a wgm.

so you're a wgm now?

(how else would you know that it isn't immediately obvious to a wgm)

highlight my first post.

pics

just played a 180 move 1 min game on FICS....bishop + pawn v. bishop v. pawn

btw, just signed up for a FICS account to play bullet at work. after played seriously in close to 2 years, rating is up to 1950 (not even sure if that is good). hopefully i can get it up to over 2000 soon

brag: finally got a new 1-min best and can now stop playing that silly game

beat: now have to actually learn how to play chess properly to see results at 5-min, where my speed is no good

dire, your first post where?

Haha, this is so funny, because I haven't played a single blitz game on FICS since I hit 1900. I've been playing bullet instead, and I can almost guarantee you that when I finally hit 2000 in bullet I'll quit that and start playing 15 5.

15 5 donotwant.jpg

i can hold a 2000-ish 5-minute rating on icc but i raelly would like to get into the 2200-2300 or higher range... though it's going to take a lot of damn work. starting specifically with my openings.

Good news! I've decided on the Caro-Kann as my black opening against 1. e4. I'll be playing blitz using this opening (still sticking with 1...d5 until I get used to this) and seeing wassup.

Good luck!

Random thought: I have a lot of trouble playing against 1. ...d5 and 2. ...Qxd5. Part of it is that people play it so rarely that I simply don't have much experience against it. (The corollary here is, of course, that offbeat openings have some extra value due to their offbeat nature.) But part of it is that Black gets these really annoying, solid position with pawns on c6 and e6 and then a knight comes to d5 and I feel like the position has become equal. also, if White's not careful there are some tricks with ...Qh5 at some point after ...Bg4. Maybe I should actually look into the theory?

That is actually why I've chosen caro-kann!

This is the pawn formation I usually get with Scandinavian defense:



It looks like black is really cramped. But there are few attackable weaknesses in black's camp, as long as he keeps d6 under control! And even with no exchanges, his pieces can find comfortable squares. e.g.:

Nb8-d7-b6-d5, or Nb8-a6-c7 in some circumstances
Bc8-f5
Bf8-e7/d6
Ng8-f6
Qd8-c7
Ra8-d8

If white's blocked his c-pawn he can also move a knight to d5.

Generally people say I shouldn't play this because it's cramped and stuff but ok so what! What are you doing to do about it. Unless you know the theory or have good strategic sense, it's hard for white to find a constructive plan. But black has clear plans with c6-c5 and e6-e5.

And well, one of the caro-kann basic pawn formations is exactly this formation. There is another one that looks like the French defense, and another one that looks like a QGD. So the Caro-Kann is a natural transition for me from 1...d5.

(Pro tip: as white, some good themes to try include c4 -> d5; lockdown of the e5 square; trade his dark squared bishop away and kick ass on the weak dark squares; or the one I seem to face most often which is: go for a barbaric kingside attack and fail and trade into a pawn down endgame where black has a superior pawn structure but then lose because it's 5 minute blitz and black took too long moving and he falls into elementary knight forks which is totally annoying)

Yeah, I try to play for c4-d5 but I never seem to develop properly for it and it always just gives me weird back-rank problems when things open up. Meh. Care to share a game or two where white successfully implemented a c4-d5 thematic break?

Yes sir as early as move 11!
http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1442204

Sweet game, but tbh I'm not good enough to play so sharply and energetically. I was thinking of a more ABC example of black screwing up and letting white set up a simple d5 push.

Maybe I just suck too much at chess lol

Play 3. Nf3 instead of 3. Nc3. I know curtains has played this in the past and it allows d4 + c4 quite easily. Here's a game http://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1456165

Yes, Nf3 allows c4 and I think Nf3 is better imo. Also Nf3 has less theory. And black players will be expecting Nc3.

I just want to say that their are more possible (legal) chess positions than atoms in the known UNIVERSE. HYACHAHAHACHA. It hurts my brain comprehending that.

White can more or less force black into some extremely complex tactical positions in the caro kann. See any Shirov game on the white side for reference. Heck or even just head directly for the panov-botvinnik. White has alot of ways of giving black extremely tough problems in the caro kann without alot of risk on his part, which I think is why it might not be seen so frequently at the top levels anymore.

I think if black wants a 'solid' opening against e4, he should look at the sicilian. Of course everybody just thinks the sicilian is some sort of wild monster and will ignore that advice so the french would be my second suggestion. But the caro kann is quite dangerous, for black!

Also re: caro kann/etc. I think white's options besides the advance variation, or the panov-botvinnik are mild at best. But against those black is only going to get an immediately safe and easy game against very weak play from white.

Dire,

What do you do against 1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 c5!?

It's sort of a French Advance except Black hasn't played e6 yet. I was under the impression that the Advance variation of the French is so lackluster that White shouldn't go into it even up a tempo.

There's alot of ways to play against that. I like the ideas with an early Qg4. eg: 1. e4 c6 2. d4 d5 3. e5 c5 4. dxc e6 5. Qg4 with complex play. And this is not a superficial line. It's been played by the likes of Shirov, Kamsky, Grischuk, etc. Looking over some more recent games, it seems something like 5. a3 Bxc5 6. Qg4 is also being played at the top when the black king rapidly ends up on f8 and white's a3 turns out to be a very useful move.

Of course you can also just play more basic moves with Nf3/blah and get a standard steinitz french type position. I don't know the theoretic state of those positions, but they seem quite pleasant for white and in my database white is scoring incredibly well (roughly 60%) with just 5. Nf3