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Very Hot Topic (More than 25 Replies) The Kaufman repertoire (Read 135895 times)
barnaby
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #282 - 08/22/12 at 13:49:21
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But that was not the case for the Kaufman book as I have spoken directly to him at length at a recent tournament (World Open).
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #281 - 08/22/12 at 13:45:44
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Often writers get the # of pages in advance and have to make do with that. They can bargain for more but usually not easily.
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #280 - 08/22/12 at 13:35:44
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How is it 'a waste of valuable space?'  It simply adds length to the book.
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #279 - 08/22/12 at 13:16:18
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Neric wrote on 08/22/12 at 12:37:48:
The funny thing is that Kaufman not only covers Qc2 against the Nimzo, he also covers 3.Nf3 and 1.Nf3. Basically he covers everything. While many may consider this to be a bonus, I consider it to be somewhat inconsistent and more or less a waste of valuable space.


Precisely. And as I said in my previous post it is worse because it is not limited to those instances.
  
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Schaakhamster
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #278 - 08/22/12 at 13:15:18
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Quote:

Quote:

Quote:

Starting Out: 1.d4 by John Cox.


that was good one, although I remember not being impressed by a few lines. His coverage of the Qc2 Nimzo was up to date till that point (and very fashionable at that time) but he failed to look that bit further. That being said: Kaufman also covers the QC2 I think but as don't play neither d4 nor nimzo these days I don't really feel checking his analysis out.


Possible to be more specific? Think criticism is valid on this forum when specific. Otherwise a danger that it may be just casually unfair.


I knew I would get some question like this.

Well it is quite a while ago and I don't have anything with me but there is a specific line in the Qc2 Nimzo that was all the rave back then. I believe it involves a pseudo queen sacrifice and Cox, like most people thought that white was better. Around that time I played that line with both colors and got the feeling things weren't that easy. Then Leko played a splendid game as black and kind of confirmed my suspicion. 

But all in all Cox repertoire book was quite good and at first sight Kaufman can't hold a candle to that book. But I do think Kaufman's work is a honest attempt even if he is a bit too optimistic in his evaluations and a bit too engine happy.
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #277 - 08/22/12 at 13:14:00
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I had a look and I have to say the book is not worth buying. 

A number of users have pointed out the various problems in different lines. What I don't get is why the NIC editors get paid. 

The White part of the book is 240 pages long. It includes a main repertoire plus a bunch of add ons: Avoiding the Nimzo (30 pages); Playing 1. Nf3 (8 pages); Anti-Moscow Gambit (2 pages); Slav with 4. Qc2 (6 pages); QGA Exchange (2 pages). Claiming to offer the Anti-Moscow gambit for White as an alternative in 2 pages is ridiculous. Any editor worth their salt would have forced Kaufman to take out that 50 pages and use it to look into other lines of the main repertoire. 

The Botvinnik variation is a prime example, given White's move order he could have avoided the Slav had he played a Meran or anti-Meran (1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nc3 Nf6 4. e3). So you would think the only reason Kaufman allows the Slav is because he has a very promising line for White in Botvinnik ... well he does not.
  
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TalJechin
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #276 - 08/22/12 at 12:43:20
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Schaakhamster wrote on 08/22/12 at 05:55:26:
TalJechin wrote on 08/21/12 at 08:16:40:
I liked his first repertoire book, but when seeing the bibliography of the new ones it just seemed very skimpy to me. I'd guess many of the users here have at least twice the library he claimed to have consulted. - If I remember correctly, there even seemed to be missing specialised books on some of the major openings...


honestly I could care less about that. For instance Sokolov's The Ruy Lopez Revisited doesn't even have a bibliography and I consider that an excellent book. 

I even have become a bit cautious of books with large bibliographies because sometimes the author becomes lazy and just copies lines (with the correct attribution) without looking critical at them. 

In this golden age of information I value writers that are willing to be critical and look for new and orignal ideas not just rehashes of other peoples works (which has become the new database dump of this age).

That's not to say Kaufman's book is that great. But at least he is willing to push the envelope.


Well, if you intend to use engines as your main investigators then you should make sure that the engines are at least analysing the MLs or recommended moves for the opponent...

For instance, iirc his coverage of the Dutch gave +/- in a sideline that McDonald considers the ML and about equal - while the ML was an anti-positional g5-g4 giving away f4 to a white horse...
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #275 - 08/22/12 at 12:38:57
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Schaakhamster wrote on 08/22/12 at 08:18:27:
TN wrote on 08/22/12 at 07:02:39:
Schaakhamster wrote on 08/22/12 at 06:05:58:
TN wrote on 08/21/12 at 07:48:45:
After looking at Kaufman's coverage of the Benko, I decided to look at another sideline, the Zurich Variation of the Nimzo-Indian (4.Qc2 Nc6) to see how Kaufman covers this. Unfortunately this isn't one of the strong points of his work - he fails to consider Black's best moves in the key lines and doesn't in any way explain how to play the resulting middlegame positions as White, often just saying that White is better because of the bishop pair or similar at the end of a variation. If you own Palliser's Tango! book and play an opponent relying on Kaufman's repertoire book, you will equalise out of the opening and probably outplay the opponent in the resulting middlegame. 



Can you name a one volume repertoire book that doesn't suffer from that problem? There are going to be weak spots in every book of that type. 

I tend to pick and choose from repertoire books. I play 1.e4 e5 and most of my repertoire is a mix of lines promoted in various 1.e4 e5 repertoire books. You do need to put in some work to make them fully playable (let's be honest, 1 annotated game won't make you understand all the nuances of even minor lines) but they are nice building blocks.

For me Kaufman has some interesting suggestions in minor 1.e4 e5 lines that I want to check out. At leas the is a bit more ambitious then the average d5 approach most authors take against Danish/Goring/Ponzani lines.    


Starting Out: 1.d4 by John Cox.


that was good one, although I remember not being impressed by a few lines. His coverage of the Qc2 Nimzo was up to date till that point (and very fashionable at that time) but he failed to look that bit further. That being said: Kaufman also covers the QC2 I think but as don't play neither d4 nor nimzo these days I don't really feel checking his analysis out.


Possible to be more specific? Think criticism is valid on this forum when specific. Otherwise a danger that it may be just casually unfair.
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #274 - 08/22/12 at 12:37:48
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The funny thing is that Kaufman not only covers Qc2 against the Nimzo, he also covers 3.Nf3 and 1.Nf3. Basically he covers everything. While many may consider this to be a bonus, I consider it to be somewhat inconsistent and more or less a waste of valuable space.
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #273 - 08/22/12 at 08:18:27
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TN wrote on 08/22/12 at 07:02:39:
Schaakhamster wrote on 08/22/12 at 06:05:58:
TN wrote on 08/21/12 at 07:48:45:
After looking at Kaufman's coverage of the Benko, I decided to look at another sideline, the Zurich Variation of the Nimzo-Indian (4.Qc2 Nc6) to see how Kaufman covers this. Unfortunately this isn't one of the strong points of his work - he fails to consider Black's best moves in the key lines and doesn't in any way explain how to play the resulting middlegame positions as White, often just saying that White is better because of the bishop pair or similar at the end of a variation. If you own Palliser's Tango! book and play an opponent relying on Kaufman's repertoire book, you will equalise out of the opening and probably outplay the opponent in the resulting middlegame. 



Can you name a one volume repertoire book that doesn't suffer from that problem? There are going to be weak spots in every book of that type. 

I tend to pick and choose from repertoire books. I play 1.e4 e5 and most of my repertoire is a mix of lines promoted in various 1.e4 e5 repertoire books. You do need to put in some work to make them fully playable (let's be honest, 1 annotated game won't make you understand all the nuances of even minor lines) but they are nice building blocks.

For me Kaufman has some interesting suggestions in minor 1.e4 e5 lines that I want to check out. At leas the is a bit more ambitious then the average d5 approach most authors take against Danish/Goring/Ponzani lines.    


Starting Out: 1.d4 by John Cox.


that was good one, although I remember not being impressed by a few lines. His coverage of the Qc2 Nimzo was up to date till that point (and very fashionable at that time) but he failed to look that bit further. That being said: Kaufman also covers the QC2 I think but as don't play neither d4 nor nimzo these days I don't really feel checking his analysis out.
  
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ghenghisclown
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #272 - 08/22/12 at 07:38:27
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Yeah, that's a pretty good book. And Cox generally hits almost all of Black's options. Kaufman's sidelines, which he weaves into paragraphs in the illustrative game, often miss the strongest move which makes the side line playable in the first place. 

Having said that, the book can be very helpful, but you MUST go through it with a database and do a lot of independent research.
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #271 - 08/22/12 at 07:02:39
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Schaakhamster wrote on 08/22/12 at 06:05:58:
TN wrote on 08/21/12 at 07:48:45:
After looking at Kaufman's coverage of the Benko, I decided to look at another sideline, the Zurich Variation of the Nimzo-Indian (4.Qc2 Nc6) to see how Kaufman covers this. Unfortunately this isn't one of the strong points of his work - he fails to consider Black's best moves in the key lines and doesn't in any way explain how to play the resulting middlegame positions as White, often just saying that White is better because of the bishop pair or similar at the end of a variation. If you own Palliser's Tango! book and play an opponent relying on Kaufman's repertoire book, you will equalise out of the opening and probably outplay the opponent in the resulting middlegame. 



Can you name a one volume repertoire book that doesn't suffer from that problem? There are going to be weak spots in every book of that type. 

I tend to pick and choose from repertoire books. I play 1.e4 e5 and most of my repertoire is a mix of lines promoted in various 1.e4 e5 repertoire books. You do need to put in some work to make them fully playable (let's be honest, 1 annotated game won't make you understand all the nuances of even minor lines) but they are nice building blocks.

For me Kaufman has some interesting suggestions in minor 1.e4 e5 lines that I want to check out. At leas the is a bit more ambitious then the average d5 approach most authors take against Danish/Goring/Ponzani lines.    


Starting Out: 1.d4 by John Cox.
  
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Schaakhamster
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #270 - 08/22/12 at 06:05:58
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TN wrote on 08/21/12 at 07:48:45:
After looking at Kaufman's coverage of the Benko, I decided to look at another sideline, the Zurich Variation of the Nimzo-Indian (4.Qc2 Nc6) to see how Kaufman covers this. Unfortunately this isn't one of the strong points of his work - he fails to consider Black's best moves in the key lines and doesn't in any way explain how to play the resulting middlegame positions as White, often just saying that White is better because of the bishop pair or similar at the end of a variation. If you own Palliser's Tango! book and play an opponent relying on Kaufman's repertoire book, you will equalise out of the opening and probably outplay the opponent in the resulting middlegame. 



Can you name a one volume repertoire book that doesn't suffer from that problem? There are going to be weak spots in every book of that type. 

I tend to pick and choose from repertoire books. I play 1.e4 e5 and most of my repertoire is a mix of lines promoted in various 1.e4 e5 repertoire books. You do need to put in some work to make them fully playable (let's be honest, 1 annotated game won't make you understand all the nuances of even minor lines) but they are nice building blocks.

For me Kaufman has some interesting suggestions in minor 1.e4 e5 lines that I want to check out. At leas the is a bit more ambitious then the average d5 approach most authors take against Danish/Goring/Ponzani lines.    
  
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #269 - 08/22/12 at 05:55:26
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TalJechin wrote on 08/21/12 at 08:16:40:
I liked his first repertoire book, but when seeing the bibliography of the new ones it just seemed very skimpy to me. I'd guess many of the users here have at least twice the library he claimed to have consulted. - If I remember correctly, there even seemed to be missing specialised books on some of the major openings...


honestly I could care less about that. For instance Sokolov's The Ruy Lopez Revisited doesn't even have a bibliography and I consider that an excellent book. 

I even have become a bit cautious of books with large bibliographies because sometimes the author becomes lazy and just copies lines (with the correct attribution) without looking critical at them. 

In this golden age of information I value writers that are willing to be critical and look for new and orignal ideas not just rehashes of other peoples works (which has become the new database dump of this age).

That's not to say Kaufman's book is that great. But at least he is willing to push the envelope.
  
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TalJechin
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Re: The Kaufman repertoire
Reply #268 - 08/21/12 at 08:16:40
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I liked his first repertoire book, but when seeing the bibliography of the new ones it just seemed very skimpy to me. I'd guess many of the users here have at least twice the library he claimed to have consulted. - If I remember correctly, there even seemed to be missing specialised books on some of the major openings...
  
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