George Jempty - I'm not sure whether you're referring to the Dreev & Basso database on the Armenian Variation or the excerpt for the upcoming book on h4 in the Winawer, so I'll give links to both. For the former:

https://www.modern-chess.com/course/french-winawer-play-the-armenian-variation/3...

Obviously, you have to purchase this database to get all of the information in the form of PGNs and videos.  However, the above link does give a couple of preview variations. Modern Chess is currently running a Cyber Monday offer that gives buyers 75% off the price of any of their products.

For the latter:

https://static1.squarespace.com/static/5856bd64ff7c50433c3803db/t/688cd233fd80b1...

George Jempty - The lines you give in Reply #34 are essentially the same as those provided by GMs Dreev and Basso in their Modern Chess database.  They also regard 16.f4 as more challenging, and in fact they note that 16...Rc8 overturns the conclusion Dreev reached a couple of years ago that White was better after 16.f4.

I wonder if there will be new ideas for White in the upcoming book Beating the French Winawer - The h4 Ram by Vassilios Kotronias, Mikhail Ivanov, and Andrei Obodchuk. Although the book is primarily concerned with meeting the Main Line Winawer with 7.h4, the excerpt that's available on the publisher's website shows that the authors also include a chapter on the Armenian Variation with more than thirty pages of analysis and games.

Keano wrote on 10/11/25 at 09:23:11:


Especially so when you 'have' to put the king on f8 then go f6 and smash the center to bits with your king still on f8!

You can kind of see the logic if you look at it with an engine - white's pieces are actually very tactically exposed and the black center does give the king a lot of cover. But.....

Keano wrote on 08/09/25 at 05:16:28:


It's these Kf8 things, a modern SF will give you the chapter and verse. Some of it really is very computery and concrete.

Rather less attractive to human eyes than the poisoned pawn style lines but you can't argue with silicon these days.

Nernstian59 wrote on 05/25/25 at 20:10:15:


Well it's all from SF not me of course, so no surprise it's fairly similar.

I am definitely amused though I mean that's an objectively very weird use of the word safe!

I can see it in some sense, as it's forcing in a way that Nge7 isn't. So if you've got a perfect memory for a few moves then....

I'm used to games between people who haven't looked at what they're playing for a good while. In which case the disaster potential is fairly obvious. For both sides mind, but even if white does go wrong and black wins a pawn white will keep chances.

The modern engines do produce some quite mind boggling lines here, although I can't quite believe anyone would put them in a book!

They get as far as 10 Bb2 above (7 Qg4 Kf8 8 Nb5 Bb6 9 Nf3 Nc6 10 Bb2) but then want to try 10.. f6!?!?

Just trying to utterly smash white's center, king safety apparently no object. Or it will come from black's center. White's b5 knight keeps getting trapped if they're not careful.

11 Qf4 is met with the quite absurd seeming 11.. g5!? and even 12 Qg3 g4!?

Or 11 Nbxd4 Nxe5 12 Nxe5 fxe5 13 Nxe6+ Bxe6 14 Qxe6 Qf6 etc, and even the potential ending is rather unbalanced.

You can even just about play the totally insane looking 11.. Nxd4 12 Bxd4 h5!? 13 Qf4 g5!? 

14 Bxb6 axb6 15 Nxg5 Qc7 16 Kd2 Qxe5 17 QxQ PxQ 18 Re1 ^ f3 might be a deterrent, although maybe it can be held most of the time.

14 Qe3 BxB 15 NxB Nh6 ^ Nf7 is a genuinely absurdist position. SF thinks about equal.

The disaster potential inherent in all of this is obviously quite terrifying.

FreeRepublic wrote on 05/24/25 at 13:21:12:

On the web page for the database, in the section titled "Introduction by Pier Luigi Basso", the recommended recapture is shown to be 4...Qxd5. The continuation that's then given is 5.Ngf3 cxd4 6.Bc4 and now 6...Qd7 instead of the more common 6...Qd6. While 6...Qd7 is played less frequently, it has been advocated in a number of sources such as The French Defense Revisited and Cheparinov's French Defence - Top Level Repertoire for Black (Modern Chess).

The Armenian variation is recommended for black by GM Alexey Dreev and GM Pier Luigi Basso at Modern-Chess:

https://www.modern-chess.com/french-winawer-play-the-armenian-variation-626