Another great video, katar! Thanks!

I don't have time to watch many videos, so I often get to things weeks or months after things have died down... I just stumbled across this one.

I've been playing this stuff in CC games of late, and it really does simplify your life tremendously to answer 1.e4 with 1...e5. Sure there's a lot of theory that's accumulated over the last 150 years, but it rarely changes and practically speaking there really isn't need to memorize much at the club level, since figuring it out over the board is usually pretty logical if you are generally familiar with it.

And the best part is you get a lot of easy wins against 1.e4 players who don't know what they're doing. If White doesn't play 6.Bf1 in the Ulvestad s/he is simply dead meat unless you screw it up. Conversely, I've started playing 1.e4 again as White and I find myself playing these same openings from the White side -- and guess what? It's just as logical over there too if you don't do the stupid crazy stuff that you often see White play at the club level. If Black doesn't know what s/he is doing in the Ulvestad after White plays 6.Bf1 then s/he is toast too! You don't need much theory to punish stupid mistakes in these openings -- which isn't something you can say for the Sicilian...

A recent conclusion is that regardless of what you play against stronger opponents, IMNSHO you should play 1.e4 and 1.e4 e5 against weaker opponents, particularly in something like a tournament where you don't want every game to go 6 hours all weekend long. Much too draining... It's nice to chalk up a couple of 20 move wins and go have fun or relax or nap until the next round.

Here's a perfect example of what I'm talking about. Chess is pretty easy when you're effectively a rook and two pieces up and they're all pointed at your opponent's king. This CC game started on August 15 and ended 20 days later (i.e., this morning - not 2-3 months down the road). Yes, I would have most likely won anyway with any reasonable opening, but why spend 60 moves grinding your opponent down in a French or a Caro-Kann?



[Event "Experiment 1 - Round 2"]
[Site "Chess.com"]
[Date "2011.08.15"]
[White "NN"]
[Black "YeOldeWildman"]
[Result "0-1"]
[WhiteElo "1771"]
[BlackElo "1695"]
[TimeControl "1 in 3 days"]
[Termination "YeOldeWildman won by resignation"]

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4 Nf6 4.Ng5 d5 5.exd5 b5 {Thematic Game - This is the starting position.} 6.Bxb5 Qxd5 7.Bxc6+ Qxc6 8.O-O Bb7 9.f3 Bc5+ 10.Kh1 h6
11.Nh3 O-O-O 12.d3 g5 13.Qe2 Rhg8 14.Qxe5 g4 15.Qf5+ Kb8 16.Ng1 Bxg1 17.Kxg1 gxf3 18.g3 f2+ 19.Kxf2 Qg2+ 20.Ke1 Rge8+ 0-1

Playing 6.Bxb5 followed by 9.f3 seems to be a very common disease and is very typical of what I've been seeing lately. To be fair, this is the second round of an Ulvestad theme tournament (so I've seen quite a few Ulvestad games recently...), but of the 20 other players in the event only one other knew to play 6.Bf1 as White.

Of course, if White does play 6.Bf1 then the worst that happens is you end up a pawn down with reasonable compensation - and you get to play a real game against a real opponent.

FYI
Chessexplained, a German IM, is presenting a repertoire for black after 1.e4 e5. It looks like he will recommend many of the same lines as Katar!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fi9qmB5i0RI&feature=g-u-u&context=G280d34eFUAAAAAAACAA



…Except against the Big 3:

Italian game with 3…Bc5, rather than the two knights defense
4…Bb4+ against the Scotch
3…Bc5 against the Spanish

looks very promising indeed -- fyi the creator is FM Christof Sielecki, 2400 ELO. He plays 1...e5 as his main defense. He says his intended audience is Beginner to 2100+.

What i like about 1...e5 is that Black has so many good options and it's easy to branch out to different subvariations.

"forcing white to make positional concession", sure, but that's like the wood for the trees or something. The heart of the thing is to create an irrevocable imbalance in the position, that's just how you go about doing it. Imbalance is the enemy of draws. Now, I pretty much go the opposite way: one of the reasons I like 1...e5 is that trying to keep that symmetry seems more in line with the philosophical approach I like that is that with black you first try to equalize. Not saying you can't equalize with other replies to e4 like the french, etc, but symmetry in the pawn structure that can arise more often makes it easier to judge a lot of times I think, which I like.

As for the sicilian, to me, as someone who gets attacked a lot, blacks play makes sense. It's not so much how many pawn moves you make but how much space those pawn moves leave behind how much they open you up. Sure you're invite white to come get you but they have to come get you, you're not going to them. But I wouldn't play it (for either side) because I really don't like the type of middle game play that arises.