To improve your opening play, you'll need to learn the tabiyas for your chosen route to a playable middlegame. What is a tabiya (also spelled tabia)? Well, it's a word that you won't find in most dictionaries, not even the really big ones. It is said to be of Arabic origin and is used by chess players to mean a standard position in an opening which is usually reached by a normal sequence of moves (or sometimes more than one sequence) but after which the opponent usually has multiple options to choose from.
Dan Heisman writes, "If you learn about good opening principles, follow them, learn a few tabiyas, and start adding sequences - even if one move at a time - then you will soon be well ahead of other players with similar experience." - A Guide To Chess Improvement (The best of Novice Nook).
Dan's book includes a very well annotated sample Tabiya in the Closed Ruy Lopez. The Tabiya extends 9 moves deep and every move includes rationale for why's?, what happens if's? and zaps and traps. Here is a very watered down look at his tabiya although his wealth of comments and annotations are not included from the book [my comments bracketed]:
We will play many thematic correspondence games to help develop your own tabiyas.
To improve your opening play, you'll need to learn the tabiyas for your chosen route to a playable middlegame. What is a tabiya (also spelled tabia)? Well, it's a word that you won't find in most dictionaries, not even the really big ones. It is said to be of Arabic origin and is used by chess players to mean a standard position in an opening which is usually reached by a normal sequence of moves (or sometimes more than one sequence) but after which the opponent usually has multiple options to choose from.
Dan Heisman writes, "If you learn about good opening principles, follow them, learn a few tabiyas, and start adding sequences - even if one move at a time - then you will soon be well ahead of other players with similar experience." - A Guide To Chess Improvement (The best of Novice Nook).
Dan's book includes a very well annotated sample Tabiya in the Closed Ruy Lopez. The Tabiya extends 9 moves deep and every move includes rationale for why's?, what happens if's? and zaps and traps. Here is a very watered down look at his tabiya although his wealth of comments and annotations are not included from the book [my comments bracketed]:
We will play many thematic correspondence games to help develop your own tabiyas.