Michael Ayton wrote on 06/29/25 at 07:09:12:

I think Michael Ayton already anticipated MNb's point.

MNb wrote on 06/30/25 at 16:35:17:

Us old-timers remember when after 1.c4 Botvinnik gave 1...e5 a question mark. Times have changed, the engine gives 1...e5 as the top move, and it's therefore very popular. Still, maybe your opponent is an old-timer and it's not in their black repertoire, when after 1.g3 e5 2.c4 they have been move ordered. I realize MNb you are talking about a black player who has thought deeply about the move orders. Even so 1.g3 can lead to a little dancing around in the opening instead of the rapid fire moves that result from white beginning with one of the top four moves.

I have played 1.g3 on occasion, with unremarkable results, and gave some thought to who might benefit from it. In order of most benefit to least benefit:

1. 1...g6 players, who like the idea of getting a position they know with an extra tempo. On the minus side, they give up some of their white advantage. But does that really exist these days? On the plus side, for zero effort in preparation they get a position they understand very well. Any sharp try they are a tempo up, any quiet try and they can hope to outplay the opponent on positional understanding. I'm thinking here of David Norwood, Charley Storey, and perhaps even Nigel Davies.
2. Play everything players, particularly if they have 1.d4 "Catalan style" with g2-g3 somewhere in their repertoire. This type could be very dangerous. If black makes a few routine moves then they could find themselves in a book opening where white has an edge and knows exactly what to do. Larsen was the epitome of this type of player. But the play everything player, by definition, isn't going to use 1.g3 all that much.
3. Specially prepared players, who may have noticed an inconsistency in their opponent's repertoire. I guess it's the younger black players who may get burned here. The old-timers have already fallen into the trap before and know enough to go around it.

As for myself, I was in category 2, but against the King's Indian I never liked the g2-g3 variations for white. Back in the day, the King's Indian was the default reply to any flank opening, so 1.g3 didn't bring me much joy. Again, times have changed. Engines really like pawns in the center, so that's what (almost) everybody does. I catch a lot of young fish with 1.Nf3 d5 2.d4! intending 3.c4, when they have been move ordered out of their 1.d4 Nimzo-Indian. I even caught a Benko player like this! I blame youtube.

Michael Ayton wrote on 06/29/25 at 07:09:12:

With the same forethought Black can annoy White: 1.g3 e5 2.Bg2 d5 3.d3 Nc6 4.Nf3 Nf6 5.O-O Be7 6.c4 dxc4 7.Qa4 O-O. This is for Black a good version of 6...O-O 7.cxd5 Nxd5. So objectively best is 2.c4, which raises the question why not 1.c4 at once.

I found two more mentions of Bamboozle here on chesspub.

Repertoire based in 1.g3!
https://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/YaBB.pl?num=1354633999/5#5

Bird's DVD by Andrew Martin
https://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/YaBB.pl?num=1288506788/1#1

And the second one led me to find a review by Sean Marsh.
https://marshtowers.blogspot.com/2010/11/chess-reviews-162.html

Does anyone know what lines both or either of the two (?) Davies 'Bamboozle' items (ChessBase DVD, Fritz Trainer) recommended, or have a List of Contents?

The Bologan DVD was discussed here:
http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/YaBB.pl?num=1498229526/all

and the Ramirez DVD here:
http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/YaBB.pl?num=1374870644/all

Of the DVDs, I only have Ramirez. It's a decent way to quickly start playing the Reti, but a bit lacking in depth. And his line with c4 and b4 against KID and Grünfeld setups may not be worth playing.

I wonder if the ones by Breutigam (which I hadn't heard of before) and Bologan are worth getting.

There's also an iChess DVD by Lemos on double fianchetto systems for White, but I don't know anything about it.

Reti - a repertoire for White - Bologan (ChessBase 2017, DVD)
Reti-Eroffnung, richtig gespielt - Konikowski & Bekemann (Beyer 2015)
Reti-Eroffnung, ein modernes Repertoire - Breutigam (ChessBase 2015, DVD)
The Reti, a flexible attacking opening - Ramirez (ChessBase 2013, DVD)
The King's Indian Attack: Move by Move - McDonald (Everyman 2014)
The White Sniper - Storey (Foxy Openings 2011, DVD)
Bamboozle your opponents with 1.g3! - Davies (ChessBase 2010, DVD)

There's a Réti repertoire for White by Demuth soon (reportedly) to be published:

https://www.schachversand.de/e/detail/buecher/15298.html
http://www.thinkerspublishing.com/forthcoming-publications.html

The Fianchetto Solution by Neiman and Shoker is less than two years old and (for the White half of the book) uses 1.Nf3 with 2.g3 usually to follow. We discussed it here: http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/YaBB.pl?num=1473943311/all

There are also older books on the Réti by Delchev (2012) http://www.chesspub.com/cgi-bin/chess/YaBB.pl?num=1325513514/all and Davies (2004) that I sometimes refer to. 

And then there's the 3-volume Wojo's Weapons series, and the Donaldson/Carsten Hansen repertoire book, and no doubt several DVDs and Starting Out and Move by Move-type books that I'm forgetting. For one thing, books on the King's Indian Attack can be revelant to a 1.Nf3 or 1.g3 move order.

All of these have their own choices of lines. They're all less detailed than Marin, with Wojo's Weapons, Delchev and likely Demuth coming closest.