MartinC wrote on 11/14/25 at 08:34:58:

You are describing this variation!

FreeRepublic wrote on 11/13/25 at 13:32:21:


Perhaps that's slightly over doing things but still

The sort of thing you're after are positions where it's an unclear mess, the computer plays 10-15 often totally amazing moves and it's *still* an absolutely unclear mess.

Because at that point the result of the game will absolutely come down to how well you play as humans  (also a good bit of luck of course.), and +- 0.5/0.75 isn't worth anything.

It's positions which can dry up and leave you depressingly worse with a bit of memory work you have to beware of.

For most practical purposes you're probably way past deep around move 15-20

I also put it in Stockfish, but not at any great depth. It's interesting but not my opening.

FreeRepublic wrote on 11/12/25 at 14:40:11:


FreeRepublic wrote on 11/12/25 at 14:40:11:

Your use of "unclear" confuses me. I remember GM Patrick Wolff (who tended more towards Huebner than Capablanca on the annotation spectrum) saying that "unclear" means the annotator stopped the analysis short. Actually he was more blunt and said a GM who says unclear is being lazy. He was talking about Informator annotations back in the day. Some GMs were known for phoning it in.

But when you say unclear after 22...Rbc8, Stockfish tells me equal.

And when you say advantage after 23...Nc4, Stockfish tells me +0.75 or a little higher. I know a few people who say +0.75 is "winning", but in my experience an engine can hold worse positions against another engine, and +0.75 is usually a draw (although not being an engine I have trouble holding the worse side). So when you say it tends to unclear, if you mean it tends to equality then I agree. Again, I did not let the engine run to great depth.

But I think this is the type of position where home analysis can pay off. 24.Ng3 and 24.Nc5 are transposing into each other, white comes within a whisker of nailing the black king, but it's a miss and then it's the white king in danger. Plus the black counterplay with ...Qa7 and ...a5 is kind of looming, so white can't just play some quiet moves and avoid the issue.

Well Stockfish has been running in the background as I type and 24.Nc5 and 24.Ng3 are down to 3rd and 4th place. 24.Nc3 and 24.a3 are trending but more like +0.33. So the engine found a defense (for both sides), but could anybody find the engine lines over the board?

I was having a coffee with Alexandr Fier in a bar by Strasbourg cathedral a few days ago (I know, chess players have a tough life!) when he told me that he thought David's KID book was fantastic, and he found it really helpful.

honestly I have not gone though the Schandorff book yet (life with 2 little kids!) but I will put it on my to do list. keep in mind though the KID does not necessarily promise "equality"...

I am not sure what the "conflict" is. I cannot predict what future repertoire books for White will recommend!
when I wrote my book, 10.b3 looked very unthematic and even now it hardly looks earth-shattering. A book is printed once in time, but if it really becomes popular I am sure it will get coverage on chesspublishing.com!

Are you saying that David Vigorito's February 2011 book does not contain some moves recommended by Schandorff in his November 2012 book?