How to respond to strange moves during opening phase?

Hello Folks!

As a beginner, I have couple of doubts which I hope the vastly experienced lot out there can clear or at least enlighten me to an extent.

1) How do you respond to some unorthodox or strange moves during the opening phase? Do we just judge them on a move by move basis and correspondingly move our pieces or continue with the moves in the line till all your pieces are developed.

2) What are the things which one should keep in mind or watch out for when the opening enters an unchartered territory, considering beginners do not play most of the book lines.

3) As black, Silman recommends that for everything but 1.e4, QGD's opening moves can be followed for a quick development and also that beginners can use this for building an repertoire initially. And for 1.e4, he recommends the Caro-Kann. Basically, in short he wants the beginners to just concentrate on just these 2 openings till he/she becomes comfortable with it. Assuming, we follow this to T, what important considerations should we take before exchanging pieces on the board for these openings.

4) Also, I see lot of 1100-1400 range players bringing their Q out on move 3 or so and get busy attacking the player just with that piece running around the board provoking a response from opponent, either to get him/her into a reactionary play or some sort psyching. How do you tackle this sort of play & is this detrimental to chess improvement for both sides?

Thanks in advance.

The answer to your questions 1, 2, and 4 is the same: develop your minor pieces normally, and strive to control the center. At the beginner level, openings don't really matter all that much, unless you stray enough to make an actual blunder. If your opponent strays without making a clear blunder (such as dropping a piece), then keep developing normally, and you may actually find yourself playing a game where all the pieces seem to fall into place without much effort. Especially if they take out their queen too early and use it to attack without fruition, just develop your pieces, this time prioritizing those that can force your opponent to move their queen once more. Every time that you develop a piece and your opponent only moves their queen, you advance one step closer to a won game. Just make sure to defend against any easy pickings that your opponent might aim for with the queen - these are almost always easily parried.

As for your third question, you can exchange pieces all you want, if you can do so profitably or at least with no loss. You incur a theoretical loss if you relinquish your bishop pair (and let your opponent keep theirs) - and vice versa. You also don't want to exchange pieces when down on material (even just a pawn), since if everything else is exchanged, you'll end up facing superior material with your lone king. Finally, it's always best to exchange a trapped piece for a mobile piece whenever possible.

I havent yet got onto a standard opening I use for white,just follow the normal development moves or which I feel are better. But, I am trying to play London System as white more and want to thoroughly understand its nuances first before thinking of any other opening or other bells-whistles.

If they play Nb4 (Ng5 if they're white), and have an early developed bishop, they're trying to use the classic Nf7-fork-king-and-queen trick. Don't fall for it.

Don't get this the wrong way but beginners shouldn't focus too much on openings. Its a waste of time until your chess understanding has matured. I agree with Silman. Focus on doing the same moves and stick to those openings for a while. If you play one opening this week and a new one next week all the ideas will confuse most beginners more than it will help them. Play the openings until you understand them and you see them as a good friend. If you throw out openings because you fail in them getting new openings will rarely help.

Do puzzles everyday. Do endgame training too. And look at games where masters play the openings you also play. While you are at it when they reach endgames notice what kind of endgames they are and add them to your training.

When should you look into opening theory? When you have build experience in the same sort positions by playing and analysing.

1. you notice getting into the same kind of position where you feel uncomfortable or you feel are losing.

2. pinpoint the key moves that lead to it

3. look before those moves and see if you can do something else instead so you don't end up in those kinds of positions

4. then look up theory. It will be easier to remember the move order and/or kind of position you are heading for. And you will have an idea what to do with it.

If you just remorize opening moves like I did when I started chess. I remorized the main opening lines of 10-12 openings sometimes 10 moves deep. The ruy lopez chigorin variation was one of them. To this day I haven't met it even once but when I did met the ruy lopez I had no clue what to do beyond the opening moves or if the opponent went out of the book.

1.) That depends. You cannot simply spit out the same opening moves in the same order every time. If the opponent threatens nothing and made no blunder, then develop normally. Also don't overextend yourself. Something may look like a blunder but it may be a gambit or a trap. I always take material if I don't see anything really wrong with it. That way the other player will just have to show me what I did ''wrong,'' and I learn in the end.

2.) Complete development, castle, and work the middle game with your pawn front. For example there are some basic strategies, like:

A) If I played one pawn, I will also play the adjacent pawns and use this duo or trio to create an assault. For example with e4 there comes d4 and f4. If I played d4 then c4 and e4. You must be mindful of playing e4 and c4. This is of course playable, but it leaves you a hole on d4 and you may not be able to play d4.

B) If I castled one way and the opponent went the other way, we simply plant the heavy pieces behind the pawns and hammer down on the king with a pawn storm on the flank.

C) In games with halfopen files, like 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.d4 cxd we make play on the halfopen file. For example Rc8 comes, maybe Bg7, maybe I plant a knight on c4 to badger the b2 square. If white plays b3 then the c2 pawn should become really weak.

3.) In a typical Caro-Kann (with 1.e4 c6 2.d4 d5 3.Nc3 dxe) black can build up a strong bind on the light squares. For example the d5 and c4 squares can become really strong for the knights. Your c8 bishop is naturally weak, since all the pawns go on white squares. You're pretty much forced to exchange it anyway. The dark squared bishop is good, but you should not mind it too much either. This is one of the few setups where the knight or the pair of knights can be good up until the endgame, especially if white loses the c4 square. Look for some Karpov games to understand.

If black was playing a QGD, it's a bit different. Again, say 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6 and the c8 bishop is bad and inside the chain. A difference is the play is more dynamic. I have no idea what you want to play, but something with b6, Bb7, c5 and dxc4 is playable and then the ''bad'' bishop is a fine piece. If the centre gets broken open like this, the owner of the pair of bishops should be happy, who ever it is. Strategically, these games are not easy to play if an isolani comes on the board. That means the centre exchanges start and one side only has the d4 pawn left, and the c- and e-pawn are then gone. The pawn is hanging in the air. This is usually white. Black is holding the pawn down with his remaining pawn on e6. The owner of the isolani should be mindful of exchanges and try to attack. In other words if you are black try to exchange it down without losing the pair of bishops, which might give white compensation. In the endgame the weakness of the pawn will show. That is unless you chop everything off blindly without building up any pressure on the pawn, then it's ok for white.

4.) Develop, and try to gain time by attacking the queen. Don't make unnatural moves to insist on the attack, especially pawn moves. Try to move every piece once. You may choose to gambit a pawn, especially the b2/b7 pawn. You don't have to do it if you're unsure, just be aware of the possibility.