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Normal Topic Mysterious X (Read 2291 times)
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Re: Mysterious X
Reply #2 - 12/12/11 at 21:41:14
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Well, the Raetsky and Chetverik book on the Catalan is not any of my favorites. I think both Wojo 1 and Davies - Play the Catalan explain the plans better. Of course Avrukh has more extensive analysis, but to learn how to play the Catalan, I have had the most use of Wojo 1. The old Winning with the Catalan is a bit skewed towards the White side and didn't help me as much.

I liked A Strategic Opening Repertoire. I think there are two edition, I have the latest in that case. These books combined give a pretty good choice of lines and set-ups for White. I am trying to learn the Fianchetto KID with Wojo 2 and Avrukh, but so far usually use Donaldson's approach with (often) a reversed Sicilian style.
  
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Re: Mysterious X
Reply #1 - 12/12/11 at 21:02:31
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Here is X's comments for those less eager to search:

Quote:
I recommend Davies' The Dynamic Reti as an intermediate step towards tackling Khalifman's Opening According to Kramnik, if you are thinking about adopting a repertoire based on 1.Nf3. 

In my opinion, learning the Bayonet Attack and the Botvinnik Semi-slav all at once is a bit overwhelming. In the Davies' book, I think a lot of the suggestions allow white to gradually adopt new systems (in particular, those in Khalifman's volumes), without drastically changing the base repertoire. (I found this to be a bit of a problem with many of the recommendations in Kosten's The Dynamic English.) 

Also, I think Donaldson's A Strategic Opening Repertoire for White is worth looking at, though it is hard to come by. Unfortunately, the book is very disorganized and the games are printed like a database printouts, although there many good ideas in this book. 

Also, the recent book on the Catalan by Raetsky and Chetverik (not sure about the spelling) looks very good. (You may want to look at the German version also, since it is not the same book. The English follows an annotated game format, while the German follows a tree format.)

There are several transposition possibilities to the Catalan available with the 1.Nf3 and 2.c4 move order, I think this is a good opening for 1.Nf3 players to keep in mind, at least as a second-string weapon. Often you can obtain favourable transpositions to a Closed Catalan by delaying d4. For instance, you can avoid the ...Bb4+ check lines where Black provokes Bd2, where the bishop is not on its ideal square (b2) in the main Closed Catalan lines.
 
(This line is recommended for black in Kaufman's recent book {The Chess Advantage for White and Black, I believe is the name} advocates this line for black. This is another book that is certainly worth looking at also, though I am getting off topic a little.)
 
Playing 1.Nf3 offers white a great deal of flexibility, and I am of the opinion that players of the white side seeking to improve, should take advantage of this flexiblity and adopt a repertoire with secondary options, to broaden understanding of the game. 

Studying openings arising 1.c4 and 1.Nf3 has led to me toward fascinating, deep openings such the Catalan and the Fianchetto King's Indian, besides the multitude of stategically rich pure English and Reti openings. 

In these openings, it really pays to understand the positional and tactical nuances as there are so many transpostional posibilities. I believe that the study of these openings has improved my overall understanding of the game. I think openings like this are great, if you want to improve your positional play. Though, learning these openings on your own is certainly not an easy task, as good books on the openings are sometimes hard to come by. 

Sometimes, you'll just have to look at what experts in these openings are doing. For example, Wojtkiewicz and Vaganian are two 1.Nf3 players that come to mind. (Oh, yeah, and of course, Kramnik!) There are many professionals (many Russian) that make a living on these systems. 

In a way, it is little surprising that not more is written on openings like the KID Fianchetto, since it is regularly played by many grandmasters. I suppose it is because it is not a very appealing amateur opening, since there is so much to learn. 

By the way, does anyone know of good book to learn the King's Indian Fianchetto? The book by Janjgava is the best I've seen, yet leaves a lot to be desired, since there is little written explanation relative to the massive compilation of game references. This strikes me to be kind of funny, since I think this is the type of opening where it is more important to the know the main strategic themes, rather than reams of concrete analysis. Of course, the problem is that this is a very complex opening, and there are several complicated tactical lines that need concrete analysis.
 
Well, maybe I have answered my own question. I think few authors would want to devote the time to writing a comprehensive work that would number over 600 pages, and I doubt many publishers would be intererested, due to the limited audience and the size of the publication. 
  
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Sylvester
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Mysterious X
12/12/11 at 20:42:36
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http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/yabb2/YaBB.pl?num=1071941618

Kindly check out this thread and make the short search for the comment made by X on May 26, 2004. 

I'm intrigued by what X typed and would like to bring it forward for extended discussion in light of the new chess books on the market. 

Alumbrado has already endorsed X's comments. 

What do you have to add to X's or Alumbrado's comments?
  
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