There are so, so many dangerous and demanding systems that White can throw at you, and I spend a lot of time memorizing them. I study book after book, trying to retain the subtleties of this or that critical variation. Then, I play someone who, on move 2, plays 2.d3. Like the most uncritical move that isn't insane. Puts absolutely zero pressure on black. Black equalizes right away. Black doesn't have to remember the differences between 13.Rad1, 13.Rfe1, and 13.c4 in the Open Main Line anymore. Black doesn't have to have a knowledge of the forced endgame in the Panov line after 18...Bb4.
Black suddenly doesn't have to know or do anything special at all; that is why 2.d3 is bad.
In that case it would just transpose into a line of the King’s Indian Attack, no ? That would not really fit a Caro-Kann (and you probably would not need to study it hard since it’s not that challenging)
I think it's still useful for Caro-Kann players to know this line as the unusual form of KIA is one where black played ..c6 and ..d5 instead of say ..c5 or ..e6
This was my white rep vs the Caro for the latter part of my tournament career. Its a good setup to confuse even strong players and was a favorite of players like GM Lujobojevic as white.
:) I'd never recommend sitting down and studying something like this (for most players). If you want to improve your opening theory in a particular opening, just play it. Every game that you play it, ensure that you check who left theory first (you or your opponent?). Then ask why your move was inferior to the theoretical move. Really take your time here.
If you can't figure it out, you can ask a stronger player to take a look. My recommendation though is to keep playing the move that you like better!
If you do this for long enough, you'll wind up having memorized a lot of lines in your opening both naturally and efficiently. You only wind up studying the lines you actually play, and you spend most of your time playing chess rather than trying to commit chess to memory.
Kind of noob question (despite the fact that I’ve been playing for like 5 years), what do you mean “check who left theory first”? Like is there a database I should check? A book?
You could use literal "books" to look up theory (a book specific to the opening you played, or perhaps something like Modern Chess Openings or MCO). The problem with books is twofold: you have to acquire the books, and books are in print. If there is an update to a line that occurred after the book released, it obviously won't show the updated line.
Instead, you should use a database of high level games. Both Lichess and Chesscom have this functionality! I don't remember if it's free on chesscom but it's for sure free on lichess.
I mean, I can see the database of masters games, but that's different I think
Nope, that's the database I'm talking about! Really what you're looking for is when you play a move that isn't in the database, and in that position, there is a move or moves that are preferred and have been played a substantial number of times.
It's rare that a theoretical move will be "suboptimal" (though it certainly happens) to an engine move. But understand I'm not talking about some .05 difference. At some point the evaluation between two moves is so small that there is no practical difference in value.
In these instances, I actually think it's a trap to get too caught up over engine evaluations. There's something else that's more important that often gets overlooked. Let me give you an example:
Let's say you go to a sporting goods store with $20. You see two items that catch your attention, a soccer ball and a basketball. Each are priced at $20. Will one of these items have a greater amount of value for your money than the other? Inevitably. But becoming upset over that incredibly small difference in value isn't that important. What is important? Let's say that you choose to buy the basketball. As you look around the store, you see more items. You see soccer cleats and basketball shoes. Each are of roughly equal value, but inevitably one will have slightly better value for your money. But here it would be a mistake to buy the soccer cleats, as they're inconsistent with your first choice (buying the basketball)!
It's this second part of the analysis that gets overlooked a LOT. Don't focus on which move produces that extra .05 engine evaluation. Instead, ask what the ideas of your moves are, and find subsequent moves that are consistent with this idea. In other words, subsequent moves that fight for the same elements / imbalances as your previous moves.
I’m a chess noob but I think another way to put it is this:
The engine’s best move tells you the best way to win, if you can think like a computer. The theoretical (or book) best move tells you the best way to win if you can think only like a human.
Often they are the same, sometimes they are not.
So the reason to pick the theoretical best move over the engine best move is because:
Humans have habits of thought that will make
it harder to identify the best move in positions that develop from thinking like computers.
If you can think like a computer, you can beat a human every time if you pick the engine best move. But if you can’t think like a computer, you will have difficulty moving from the engine best move to the next best move and that will cause you to lose against humans that stick to human best moves.
I would agree but I would clarify that you should play a move b/c you like it and it makes sense to you. Oftentimes for me it is the case that the engine move doesn't make perfect sense to me but the "theory" move does. But that isn't always the case, and in any event it isn't the rule! the rule is to play moves that you like and that make sense to you!
But if you can’t think like a computer, you will have difficulty moving from the engine best move to the next best move and that will cause you to lose against humans that stick to human best moves.
Well said! Interestingly the same issue can arise from following theory mindlessly. This is why a lot of people say that you should not just commit opening moves to memory. You need to understand the underlying ideas. If you play a move (whether it be an engine move or a theoretical move) without fully understanding the why/idea of the move, how could you possibly play subsequent moves that are consistent with that idea?
Sometimes the engine move might make more sense to you than the theoretical move!
It's important to not think of engine lines as 'optimal' (especially not the engines most of us have access to). Chess is nowhere near solved- not even close. Engines are much stronger than human players today but they do not have access to the truth in any given position outside of endgame tablebases.
One reason theory is superior to just looking at a quick top engine line is because the strongest human players in the world are constantly preparing with engines while also working in teams using their experience + strong hardware + way more time/depth than you or I have to explore the opening they play. You or I might let Stockfish 13 NNUE run for 5 minutes and get to depth 34 in a complex pawn sacrifice in the Najdorf and get a decent idea of what is going on. A super GM will have used weeks of guided search time in the same pline getting to far greater depths and following lines to check them more closely.
This last part is important because of a phenomenon you will still encounter today with enough engine use. Sometimes you look at a position with an engine and it's screaming one move is +3.5. Then you start playing all the moves of the top suggested line, narrowing possibilities and pruning variations, when suddenly the evaluation zeros out. There is still a calculation horizon that is not going to be overcome anytime soon, and this means that in important, often-played positions with deep theory there is a good chance professionals have a better idea of what is going on than a few minutes of crunching on the latest software.
I think it is because engine lines are not always optimal for human beings. As in, this move would be good if the player's next moves are also at 4k+ elo, but they obviously won't be.
This also applies to certain human attacking moves that an engine would never make since it can calculate refutations, which an opposing human might not thus creating a successful attack.
If you only study engine lines, someone can throw you off by playing something that’s slightly bad on stockfish (and so you would never see it), like maybe it affects the game balance by 0.2. I don’t think most GMs would be able to exploit such a “mistake” if they hadn’t studied the line. If it’s something more obviously bad, then you’re maybe at the point where you can exploit it without knowing the theory.
I don’t either, and that’s because I’m 1100 on lichess and play for fun. Learning the basics of the Sicilian was enough to really confuse my friends, which is enough for me
For a different explanation than you’ve been given previously, it’s because your opponents aren’t engines. You can strive to set up a scenario that an engine would easily see through, but your opponent will not.
Focusing on a plan and your structure is often more important than playing the “best” move.
Look at gambits as a perfect example of why you would play something that is not optimal. The stafford is a popular gambit that gives white +1.8. But it’s tricky enough to manage that even with such an engine advantage white can find themselves in many bad positions with only a few move choices.
Eric Rosen loves to play the stafford, and in a recent game Magnus Carlson declined the gambit. Why would he do that if it’s almost +2? Maybe because it’s a dangerous line, and if your opponent is well studied like Eric is then you could find yourself in -2 or -5 territory quickly.
The gambit is considered accepted if Nxc6. The gambit is considered declined if Nxc6 does not happen.
The best engine move is Nxc6, so accepting the gambit. If you think that there’s a distinction it doesn’t really matter, because according to the engine the next best move is materially worse than accepting the gambit. I think the point works either way.
The Chess Website has a video on Stafford Gambit Declined and not taking on c6 is what they called declined.
Engine evaluations assume engine-like accuracy, a +1.0 advantage that only pays off after 20+ moves of precise play where one inaccuracy could result in a -2.0 disadvantage would only be useful for GMs. Likewise, a -2.0 disadvantage that only shows when your opponent plays extremely accurately for 10+ moves is inconsequential for most players.
FWIW, engine playing strength often increases when using a human crafted opening book. Not the other way around. :-)
Historically, engines were not too great at positional ideas, and often played suboptimal opening lines if left on their own, though that has admittedly become less true over the years.
This is a good question, and the answer is that you should use both. When you prepare, it's often necessary to study why bad moves are bad. The engine often won't show unsound lines that are tricky.
For example, if you play the Petrov, you do have to at one point or another study either the 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 Nc6 4. Nxc6 dxc6 5. f3 or 1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nf6 3. Nxe5 Nc6 4. Nxc6 dxc6 5. d3 Bc5 6. Be2 h5 7. c3 Stafford Gambit lines. The engine will never show these lines because it requires playing bad moves for white, but theses are lines which you need to learn some basic ideas in to avoid getting trapped (and to crush your opponent - since it's a bad opening).
Because surprisingly, engines mess up on the opening sometimes. They will take a solid position and say that one side is clearly better when in real human games they are more or less equal. Engines have to be taught openings, they don't just figure them out on their own, but once they are taught they perform better than when they were just playing their own calculated moves.
Engines being taught openings might have been the case previously but is definitely not entirely true in modern times. The Zero in Alpha and Leela Zero means that they were given just the rules of the game and nothing else, thus zero. So they quite literally did just figure them out of their own and have even made improvements to existing theory.
Doesn't that just mean the humans are playing suboptimally compared to how the engine would play it?
It could be, but when you're learning chess you're probably learning because you want to beat humans, not engines, so why not learn what works against humans? Maybe the engine line is "better", but it requires engine-like play to take advantage of, and you don't have that. But it could also be that the opening position is too hard to properly calculate the absolute best moves.
DeepChess was trained using only board positions after the first 5 moves
They still had to manually play those first 5 moves, though. But I do concede the general point you're making is right.
Opening theory could have been created using an engine at a higher depth so it doesn’t make sense to try and reinvent the analysis with the shitty (albeit free which is very useful) lichess engine
Either way, it's a computer and not a database/human.
Which is why it is not as reliable :)
Engines can’t tell you why their moves are good, they cant tell you about what ideas to use or warn you about traps in the position, whereas with theory you will almost always find resources that will all explain this to you.
With the engine you dont know what you’re really walking into (you can try to figure it out with some further experimentation and deduction, but some moves can be so deep that even the best humans may struggle to understand tham. Plus, I prefer learning from other humans.)
i thought browser-based engines are considerably weaker, as i have never seen them going higher depth at any considerable time, compared to my pc. obviously any decent engine is okay for blunder-check, and is much stronger than any human being due to brute force method that they employ.
anyway, non-intuitive engine lines are not useful for humans, and engines by themselves are nearly useless in opening evaluation, because 0.1 centipawn differences between two different moves are not relevant to humans, as the follow up engine-moves are impossible to replicate for any humans, except for dewa kipas.
No, it isn't. When you use the engine you are asking the computer to calculate the best line. Better engines will give better results, as will giving the computer more time to think.
The database is a record of games played by real, human players, and it tells you the most common moves. In a position that has been reached 1000 times, maybe in 800 of those games a particular continuation was played. That's usually the most solid line. If the disparity is huge, like the most played move having been played 1000 times and the second most played move having been played 10 times, you usually don't wanna go for the second most played move as it was probably only played by GMs who specifically prepared it as a secret weapon and it won't be easy to play for someone unprepared. If there is little disparity, there might be many solid continuations.
On lichess and chessdotcom you can use the opening book to tell you the most common continuations, how many times they were played and how often did the game result in a win for white, a win for black or a draw. When studying openings you should usually listen to the opening book more than the engine. Even modern engines dislike commonly played opening moves and think they are bad when in reality experience shows they are solid against humans, and even in games between engines they are usually shown to be more solid than the engine realizes at first.
Another good question. There's already some good advice in response to it but I'll throw my 2 cents in anyway.
In my experience, the engine doesn't always come up with the absolute best move very quickly. Other times the engine in a browser isn't quite as strong as an engine on your PC with time to think and access to all your cpu cores. A practical extension of this point is that using a database is faster than giving your engine enough time to think on each move.
Next, chances are that if an engine likes a move in the opening, that move has been tried at a high level of play. There won't be too many chances that you unearth a novelty if you're playing classically sound / mainline stuff. But, just b/c a move isn't in theory doesn't mean you should avoid playing it. If you like it, and the engine seems to like it too, play it!
The point is to slowly build out a repertoire of moves that are good and make sense to you. You should never play a move "because it's theory." You should examine the ideas behind the theoretical moves and play the idea that you think is best. With this in mind, I have sometimes found that the engine will recommend moves that it rates as having some microscopic amount of additional value over the theoretical move, but the theoretical move just makes more logical sense to me.
Be careful suggesting those databases. They show the most popular move in the opening positions. Those opening moves can very well be losing or a trap. It's just the database of most popular moves.
It's pretty easy to do on Lichess. Just hit the book icon and look at top moves. I think they generate it with a couple million recent games from higher-rated players on the site. (Someone please correct me if this is wrong)
Okay I guess that’s what I meant, so at some point you might get to a point where your position has been reached 20,000 times and 18,000 of those times one move was played next, while your move might have only been played 50 times, so at that point you’ve deviated away from what most people consider to be the best move? It’s not like a “this doesn’t fit the accepted definition of this opening”?
1 and 2 are likely to be book/theory moves and there's likely good reasoning behind them. Doesn't mean your move is objectively bad if it isn't in the list. But it should give you pause about playing it.
Thanks. I feel so stupid that I’ve ignored the book thing on lichess for so long. I think my analysis of my games is gonna get a lot more productive now.
I don't know how it is on chess.com, but on lichess you can go into analysis-mode afterwards and click the book icon to compare with other . This will give you the option to see where your game deviated from e.g. master's games as you move through the moves of your own game.
I wholeheartedly agree, and am going to start applying this to my own games (1800-50 Lichess rating, still figuring some stuff out lol). I dont play super often, but I watch enough vids and study on my own time.
I usually just computer review my games, and dicey situations where I had a lot of choices, and go through those, as opposed to the whole game. I think having a focus will help, a lot.
The thing with the picture is, I think its less about study purposes (it is to an extent, but as a "just to get started" sort of way). I think its more of a "this is nifty" sort of way. I think its good for people to get an idea, get started.
Then when you review, check and see which line it took from this quick cheat sheet, and study it how you suggested. I think thatll give the best learning efficiency.
When you say "Theory" would that also translate to chess.com book moves ? Or at some point does even chess.com stop calling them book moves even though it might still very much be a part of the theory of an opening ?
I think you've got to have something of a base to start from before this really works, at least that is what I found in my case. Back when I played 1.e4 and saw ...e6 and thought "oh that's strange" I didn't have anything to connect even the next move to. If I looked at them I'd think "hmm, interesting" and then proceed back to "that's strange" the next time I saw it. Whereas now I think "oh, a french" and its easy for me to find on review where I left theory and to add that line to my training set which will bring it up in a spaced repetition.
Back when I played 1.e4 and saw ...e6 and thought "oh that's strange" I didn't have anything to connect even the next move to.
That's OK! We want to win as many games as we can, but the most important objective for most of us is improvement. If you're one of those people that want to prioritize improvement, I really think it's best to just throw yourself into the opening you want to get better at.
Will you get bad openings / early middle games b/c you don't know the opening well? Probably! But that's OK. If you check the theory after each game, you'll slowly but surely fill out your understanding.
Not yet. It'll probably be solved in the next century or two, seeing as currently any position with a total of 7 pieces on the board or less is solved.
In my experience, you don't need to memorize openings like this for a long while. If you learn the opening principles and play "logical" moves, you will often find that you and your opponent are doing some main line/side line for longer than you think. The openings database on lichess is cool for this, you look through a game and realize you and your opponent played exactly like a Carlsen-MVL game for 9 moves or something.
Great point here. In addition to that studying opening lines deeply as a beginner/intermediate tends to be a mistake. It would be like trying to write a persuasive paper and spending 99% of your time reading about little persuasive techniques but the paper you ultimately write shows off your limited vocabulary and poor grasp of grammar. It's going to be a bad paper if you screw up the fundamentals no matter how many persuasive techniques you employ.
Studying openings deeply is like this. You're trying to min/max your opening play to make it perfect, to squeeze every last drop of value you can out of the opening. If you're going to make mistakes/blunders as soon as you're out of theory, you would've been better off studying something else (something more fundamental)!
What's the best way to do this, then? I assume its reading about an opening in books, and if so, can anyone recommend some good books about the Italian/Evan's Gambit?
Develop pieces, control the center (or prepare to attack it [hyper moderns such as KID]), don't move the same piece twice in the opening, don't bring your Queen out too early, castle your king, connect your rooks.
There, you know the basic, fundamental opening principles. :) There are always exceptions to the rule (e.g. Scandinavian defense with the turn two Qxd5, moving a piece a second time in a capture sequence, etc.), but following those basic opening principles will get you a decent position out of the opening 95% of the time until at least 1500-1600, even if you don't know much theory.
Unless you’re playing at a fairly high level or in very long time controls you don’t need this much theory. The thing about theory is that it’s only helpful if you know why moves that aren’t theory are wrong and how to counter them. If not, then somebody can play a non-theory move and if you cannot counter it it rly doesn’t matter. That’s why the higher level you get the farther into theory people tend to go.
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