Why the heck does everybody I play play extremely off-beat openings?

But mostly becuz of the first one

I'll do you one better.

Don't try to lose!

I'll do you one better.

Just resign. a3 is superior. 

If you know a strong opening, then nothing should disturb you, I suggest watching openings from this channel (it has openings for white and black)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC99iLm4lpawrQrJJPV3qyJQ?view_as=subscriber

If you know a strong opening, then nothing should disturb you, I suggest watching openings from this channel (it has openings for white and black)

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC99iLm4lpawrQrJJPV3qyJQ?view_as=subscriber

The first and last one are (probably) just stonewall games. That's not so offbeat.

Sure the 2nd one is garbage, but after an eventual d5 or e5 black is probably just a tempo down in some normal line.

You say you exploit them just fine, but I don't know how. Sure they're passive and not great, but they're also not so terrible.

Bad openings will continue to haunt you until you get to a certain level where you can punish those with bad opening choices. 

And by punish, I mean develop all your pieces, and enjoy your lead by placing pressure, positioning your pieces well, and possible launching an attack if their king is weak and kingside is underdeveloped.

First and last are Stonewall, so study it with both colors and you'll be prepared.

"pawns are the soul of chess"

-- Philidor

Also, pawns moves aren't necessarily bad, even if they moved 178375286 times in the opening. Check out one of my games, make what you make of it.

Or this one #pawnpushers4thewin

And even if the moves are objectively bad, they accomplish something (get space, start an unsound attack, etc, which I'm pretty sure is what happened in the game directly above)

Hahahahahaha

"Chess is an art, science, and a sport"

-- Anatoly Karpov

imo, its more of an art than anything else.....sometimes I don't make the most optimal moves (even though I know they are) because they look ugly. It's still winning, but worse than the other "ugly" move.

Just imagine the horror of Carlsen's GM opponents when he plays on banter blitz where practically every game has ...g5 before move 5... and of course Carlsen wins 

First of all it annoying because after putting a lot of work into an opening you like to 1) make use of it and 2) learn about what variations others are playing that you may not have studied.

But to be frank, I think it's annoying for a different reason too. I think you're not comfortable breaking down a novel position and coming up with a plan. It might also feel like a lose-lose situation. If you win the game, so what, it was a bad opening, and if you lose that also sucks because it was a bad opening.

But you watch a GM play blitz on youtube and when their opponent gets out of book they don't mind. In fact top GMs purposefully never play their classical main lines because they'd be revealing their preparation.

As your rating goes up, sure, less people play less garbage, but also maybe you'll enjoy the opportunity to solve some novel positions.

That's when I do when it comes to sacrifices...obviously I calculate some, but mostly if it looks nice, i'll go for it. The same goes when I have a prettier (but longer) win, which I would play over an ugly win (if given the choice)

bruhh those are normal games

Playing weird is more fun than playing all that old hack.

....to pawnpushers

Please just play e4 and e5 once I had an opponent who played a3...b3...c3 and so on

a3 ftw! b3 is an excellent opening move as well. c3? That's debatable.

....but I don't know about playing them all consecutively in the same game..! 😱

I have played over 5,500 games and 85% were played with those moves. All of the standard moves have extensive back ground and percentages of winning. 

I thought why not take all that history and just throw it the hell out and see if the guy can beat me straight up.

I like the a3 and h3 myself,