Bad Bishop Problems

I was looking at the game analysis on this thread (Thanks Jackofallhobbies) when the opening sparked a lot of questions for me that are almost completely unrelated to the discussion on that thread. Therefore I wanted to bring them up here.

The opening made enough sense to me, and I find that I am good at being a logical player. But it seems that after a solid opening, I am out of logical ideas and I'm not sure what the plan is suposed to be for white. Here is the position:

If black responds with Nf6, the e pawn is very weak.

@xman720

You have a few good options at move 8.

However, I think the best option is to play 8.h3

The move h3 and h6 are not always considered good moves and they are not always considered bad moves.

It depends on the position and the idea behind the move.

The reason the move 4...h6 by your opponent is bad is because it is designed to prevent a Ng5 move.

However, chess theory has already shown black can prevent it or defend against it using various of other options.

Which is what makes that move bad.

The move 8.h3 in this position is used as a restriction move.

It restricts the scope of the black's light square bishop

Or

you can consider it a prevention move.

It helps white consolidate the center better.

It prevents Bg4 which would cause the d4 pawn to be weak.

Yeah I would definitely play h3 to prevent Bg4. 

Also you should wait to develop a piece if you don't have a good place to put it as is the case with your dark squared Bishop.

I don't think this is a very healthy attitude. Sometimes it might seem like this is what players have in mind if you look at the moves independent of annotation, but if you have this view of the opening it will lead to very passive and unfocused play.

If a piece has no good squares you shouldn't just wait until it has good squares. Good squares won't just appear. You have to figure out why it has no good squares and actively work to create good squares. What you are describing is hope chess- you would see that every square for the bishop is bad, so you just ignore it and move on to something else, and hope that eventually a good square will pop up. Well if you did that, your rooks would remain unconnected and the tactics would allow your amazing center to get crushed. Black would out coordinate you. You need a plan for the dark squared bishop, you cannot just hope he will have something to do. What is the plan?

X_PLAYER_J_X

8: h3 does seem like a good move... but the fact remains, the computer insists there is a +1.2 advantage after 8: Nc3, and 8: Nc3 Bg4 is certainly a logical continuation.

So my question is, regardless of how the position arose, what does white do? Do you disagree with the computer evaluation? How does white deal with this bishop and what is white's plan? Think of it as an exercise rather than game analysis. Black made an inaccuracy with 4: ...h6 and I am looking for a way to continue the game without giving away my advantage. But I don't see what my plan for the dark squared bishop should be.

+Cubetacular- I think you are right about developing!

It's correct that you should try to improve your pieces, but this is a wrong use of "hope chess." "Hope chess" is used to describe a thinking process that does not include considering the opponent's possible responses (i.e. hoping that if he responds with a threat, there will be a defense.)

8. h3 is definitely a good move. Let me ask you, where is the c8-bishop going?

If you look at games of the Closed Sicilain and King's Indian Defense you'll see that Black usually waits a very long time before doing anything with his light squared Bishop because moving it doesn't do anything to help Black's plan and would get in the way of his other pieces. Sometimes moving a piece just to move it off the back rank is wrong. I've heard this many times from titled players and seen it in Master games. I'm not necessarily saying that this is the case here but maybe make other moves first like h3 to prevent Bg4 and Re1 before deciding what to do with the Bishop.

That's the Italian, not the Ruy Lopez.

In the following position.

The move 8.h3 is a very useful move.

In the above picture you can see how our pawns are keeping the light square bishop a little passive.

The obvious squares g4 and f5 would lose the bishop because we have a pawn guarding those squares now.

The e6 square would lose a piece to the fork with d5.

Thus, the only safe square for the bishop is d7 or c8.

Now when you compare it to the 8.Nc3 line.

This 8.Nc3 is a playable line.

However, even though this line is playable it does come with some baggage.

Which I will show below:

The burden you take on in this position is the fact black has alot of heat coming down on the d4 pawn.

The threat on f3 is not an immediate.

It is more of a longer ranged threat.

To show you why this is not an Immediate threat I will give you an example:

You would see the following position.

As you can see the threat is not immediate lol.

It can backfire if they get to greedy.

Normally after the bishop pin with 8...Bg4.

White trys to set up a pin of his own in most cases.

It helps reduce the pressure from d4.

As you can see white can try moves like Bb5 or Qa4.

Which pins the knight on c6 to the king.

By pinning the knight on c6 it would threaten the pawn push d5 winning material.

This right here is a perfect example of what people talk about when they say "Player Styles".

I looked this position up on an engine and the move 8.Nc3 & 8.h3 are equally the strongest moves in this position.

The engine evaluated both moves as 0.65.

Now the question is why does a person chose 1 move over the other if both are strong?

The answer is because of that specific players style!

I like the move 8.h3 because I am a Grinder.

That is my chess personally style.

I like restricting my opponents.

I am like a python squeezing the life out of them.

FOS is completely different than me.

Which is why he likes the move 8.Nc3.

In fact, he mentioned the Qa4 line.

Which is instead of Bb5 you can play Qa4.

All of which come from how he plays the game in his own way.

The move you like may be in accordence with your playing style.

Lastly, In closing I will say I do agree with some of what Cubetacular has said on post #6.

I agree with the idea of waiting with my dark bishop.

The reason why is because I am not working on that piece at this time.

I am trying to accomplish something with my moves right now at move 8.

The bishop is not helping me achieve that goal.

When your house is on fire you can not worry about the TV being to loud.

Worry about the TV later.

Focus on putting out the fire before you have no TV or no house!

The center d4 pawn is coming under fire.

We can not worry about the dark bishop.

It can't help us.

The only moves which can help us I have already showed.

Which might surpise you.

No dark bishop move can help solve this problem

Even the move Be3 believe it or not is not an effective response to dealing with this fire!

Which means we are not neglecting our dark bishop.

We are fully aware it is not developed yet.

However, we can not address it's needs yet simply because our opponent is got future threats and idea's we have to deal with.

To be a strong player you must know what your opponent is doing at all times.

Your opponent wants to check mate you.

If you let them do all of there plans than you are going to get checkmated lol.

You have to prevent, stop, or slow down some of their plans.

In the 8.h3 line we are preventing a pin which could cause our center to come under fire.

In the 8.Nc3 line we are stopping the Bxf3 plan by playing Qa4 or Bb5 which will cause the bishop on g4 to go back to d7.

In lines like the Sicilian Dragon/Yugoslav Attack opposite side castling happen.

In lines like those black will throw up the queen side pawns.

White will throw up the king side pawns.

You can not prevent them or stop them from doing those plans.

All you can do is brace yourself and try to slow them down long enough for your checkmate to come first.

What is the long term plan with the dark squared bishop? "Stay home" is not a plan. It's no more of a plan than "develop it to a random square as soon as you have the chance". What I see players doing is worrying about d4 and hoping a good square will eventually pop up for the bishop to go. This is passive play.

I like fiveofswords post the most because he talked about the plan for the dark squared bishop beyond just "don't move it this move." I KNOW YOU DON'T HAVE TO DEVELOP PIECES IMMEDIATELY. I'm not asking for the next move. The engine tells me the next best move, it's 9: h3. Question answered, move on. I don't need to ask you guys for that.

What I want to know is white's thought process and white's plan.  

Eventually the bishop will have to develop or the lack of rook coordination will be a problem. When you see this position, when and where would you like to see the bishop move?

Here's a cool game I found. The move order is different but it still reaches the same position.

You can look for more games in this position using a database to see more ideas.

That's not the Ruy Lopez and that's not a bad bishop.

Actually this is smart play!

Keeping your options open as long as you can before commiting is considered good chess.