Anything wrong with e4?

Hey everyone!  So recently I've been playing with some friends, and I find this opening (I think it's called the Vienna Game) really comfortable to use, and I use it quite a lot. (Look to my history of games if you want)  But they (my friends) all say this opening is "boring" and it doesn't take any "risks."  Do they just not know what they're talking about?  I know it blocks the Queenside pawn, but I've never been a really good center-of-the-board player.

And while I'm at it, what are some of the pros and cons of this opening?

Thanks everyone!

e4 is "best by test" according to Bobby Fischer :P

If you want interesting games, try the Kings Gambit. 

You're right, it is the Vienna Game, and the Vienna Game is a perfectly good opening - if you like playing it then by all means play it! I get criticized for playing the Italian instead of the Ruy Lopez, but I win games with it, so I have no reason to stop.

And no, the Vienna isn't boring unless you go into the Four Knights Game, Four Knights Variation Guioco Piano or something symmetrical of the like. Just find some lines you enjoy playing and go from there.

The Vienna Game position that will probably be the most "boring" (If you want to avoid it) is as follows:

The vienna can be positional or tactical. It just depends on how quickly you play f4 (if you do at all).

The problem with 1.e4 is that it immediately creates a weakness -- an unprotected pawn.

Just kidding   1.e4, 1.d4, 1.Nf3, and even 1.c4 are all excellent opening moves.

I've been told the same about middle-game and end-game.....  I guess chess is pointless!!  FREE AT LAST!!! 

I believe the vienna is a great opening, there's plenty of dangerous lines within it. Look up the frankensten-dracula attack, or some of the Qg4 variations. You could also play the vienna gambit which is very aggresive.

So in summary, no, your friends do not know what they're talking about.

Opening don't matter at your level if you're playing against an IM... 

If you play against somebody else not far from your level, than having a solid opening you feel good enough and can trust, does matter - because feeling good and trusting what you do lead you to enjoy your chess more. 

What doesn't really matter is to study deeply variations in the opening... just choose one or a couple that you like - and then get your pieces out, prepare to castle, don't let your opponent get the whole center to themselves and try to get it for yourself if possible. 

Then after that watch out when they give you stuff (material) and don't give them anything for free...

But as you're 1200+ you probably know all of that and try to do it when you play...

I suppose that two things that can help you progress from that point are - 

1) tactics training - this will give you ideas about what can actually happen in your game...

People at your levels don't often just hang pieces (they hang pawns all the time though...) - but they are very vulnerable to simple two-move tactics - temporary sacrifices when you get back the material with interest, devastating pins and forks... 

When two people at your level play each other, in EVERY GAME they 'hang' these two-move tactics to one another, and these tactics stay on the board often for many moves, unsuspected, unseen and unplayed... 

Every stronger player knows what I mean - you can stare at these two guys playing, and you're aching to tell them - "just take on h3 - after he takes the bishop you get his knight with the queen"...

2) try to get some of your games reviewed by someone several hundred points (or more!) stronger. Get some advice. They will be quick to pinpoint to you some ideas that you're missing. Chess evolution is greatly based upon familiarity with ideas.

Good luck! 

+1
100% agree with this. However, just to reduce a bit of ambiguity:
In regards to an opening you can learn 'what' constitutes an opening (ex/1.e4 e5 2.Nc3 being vienna). And playing it in your game is good for some continuity, but you should NOT study it's theoretical lines. At your current level simply experiencing it is enough.

Right. Not necessarily studying variations and trying to memorize them way deep, unless this is fun - and of course it's always great to catch people in opening traps - it also pushes rating up somewhat...

Here in the vienna (or in any other opening), even for an intermediate player it can be useful to know some ideas beyond move two - where the pieces typically go, how the opening is typically attacked - maybe even watch a bunch of games in that opening, from a database (today with www.pgnmentor.com you can download bunch of games from any opening). 

Not trying to memorize anything - but just watch maybe 25 games between strong players, that started 1. e4 e5 2. Nc3) - he will see that some ideas begin to repeat themselves. 

Then, if he'll try duplicating these ideas in his games, his play will have more of a direction, and he will know a bit better what he's trying to do - rather than just getting his pieces out any old way, and by move 10 wondering a) what to do, and b) why he can't really move anything, and everything is 'stuck' (people around 1200-1700 often have this complaint at that stage of the game...)

@MualPaTheta

The Vienna game  for some reason makes sense to you.  Eventually if you go far enough in chess, what you will discover is that chess, no matter what opening it is, is all about Siege Warfare on the chessboard.  It is about  the strategy/tactics of restrain, blockade and execute the enemy.

The other thing you will discover is that in almost all openings the position on the board will assume 1 of 6 characteristic pawn structures.  Then what will be important to you is knowing how to play those 6 characterisitc pawn structures from both the White and Black side.  Just in case you don't know it the pawn structure is the terrain of the battlefield.  The pawn structure is the mountains,  hills and valleys of the battlefield.  Your plan of attack/defense must make sense for the pawn structure on the board.  For example if your  plan of attack calls for going thru a mountain in the pawn structure, your plan is doomed to failure, and more than likely you will lose the game.  

Interesting, <Yaroslavl>

"Restrain, blockade, destroy" is Nimzowitsch :-) reading and studying him will hugely benefit our 1211-rated friend here. Some sections in his books (about the two bishops, about invasion in the 7th and 8th ranks, about general principles of endgame play) are right for him as he is, and other sections will be interesting for him as he keeps climbing the rating scale.

I'm more curious about your other statement - what are the six important pawn structures? And what are you supposed to do in them?  

@solskytz

The book is, "Pawn Power In Chess".  Whatever you do, DO NOT read this book from the beginning.  Begin on pg. 107, where the author, Hans Kmoch, begins writing about the 6 characteristic pawn structures and read thru to  the  end pg. 373.  Only then can you go back and read from page 1 thru 107.  If you read the book from the beginning you will get lost and confused and give up on the reading the book.  It has to do with strange terminology and advanced concepts that he uses in the first part of the book.    

Funny - I do have that book and have indeed started to read it, got the terminology (quartgrip!!) and then stopped at some point, while promising to myself to continue... 

It is interesting, I must admit - but life sometimes gets a bit too busy for me to persist with its study...

The big disadvantage of 1.e4 is that, assuming your opponent is right-handed, it requires you to extend the hand further to the left to reach the clock, making you lose about a fourth of second compared to 1.c4.

If all you know about a position is that you can remember that the book says your opponent should next play a particular move and that after that you can remember the next book move on your side, then you are in trouble. Like enough your opponent won't play the book move and now you are in a position in which your memorised sequence of moves does not help and meanwhile your opponent has some ideas that s/he is working on but you don't.

So don't sacrifice thinking about the position in favour of memorising sequences of moves.

But if you study an opening and focus on what the individual move or the sequence of moves is trying to achieve that can be useful whatever your level. Almost all children pick up the idea of attacking f2/f7 by some sort of scholar's mate, fried liver sort of attack. They experiment with it, have successes and failures and their game - and their grasp of that opening - advances.  It is opening study of the right kind, with an idea to work with not just a memorised sequence of book moves.

I agree that nothing is wrong with 2. nc3. but I think that 2. nf3 or 2.f4 is much more fun to play.

Capablanca said that no first move accomplishes as much as 1.e4 and 1.d4, so one of those two must be White's best chance for an advantage, and modern theory still holds true to this.

1.e4 occupies and controls the centre while activating the Queen and light-squared Bishop, which makes it a fantastic first move.

The only downside is that it gives Black the option of the Sicilian--and White really demonstrates no advantage in the Sicilian. At least with 1.d4, even Black's theoretically strongest response (the Nimzo-Indian) still gives White a slight edge.

Ever heard of 1.c4 / 1.Nf3 ?