Curtains vs PoG

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Or just have curtains honestly post a few remarks about his move along with the notation to even it up.

[fnord_too]

To people who think curtains reading the thread is bad for us: I think our best hope is he he gets corrupted by our flawed reasoning at some point and blunders [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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I don't like na6. I really hate developing my night to the edge of the board, and I dont really see following that up with bc6 redeeming the move. Curtains will develop a piece and then likely move his queen effectively.

I voted d5 because I think that is possibly the best move but definitely the move that will teach me the most. (My chess game is uber rusty and was never stellar to begin with.)

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I agree, Na6 sucks.

[fnord_too]

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Or just have curtains honestly post a few remarks about his move along with the notation to even it up.

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This would be nice. He should at least give a quick analysis of each move post mortem.

[ChrisV]

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Or just have curtains honestly post a few remarks about his move along with the notation to even it up.

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I like this idea actually. He wouldn't have to tell us his entire analysis, but he could for instance say a few words about why he didnt make other candidate moves.

[curtains]

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this makes a lot more sense. my main concern then would be
10. Ne2 which allows a3 as well as a castle at a later move, and really leaves us scrambling to protect a center pawn without a queen or rook. seems like a very bad proposition.

all in all i just don't think playing a vulnerable move like ..d5 is so hot against a clearly better player.

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Are you forgetting that we're UP A PAWN at this point? Even if we have to hand the pawn back at some point, why is that a bad deal for us?

I've gone through a few variations, which I won't bother with here, but suffice to say that Black has no immediate way to win the pawn back. And even if we decided dxe4 was bad, there's nothing wrong with dxc4.

Bottom line, I believe we must play d5 now because we may have no future opportunity to play this important central thrust. d6 leaves the pawn backward and weak, unsupported by any other pawns. OK, the pawn will be weak if it's isolated too, but we will have the only central pawn and a space advantage.

It's wrong to think we should play weak, "safe" moves against a better player. We should always play the best move. The better player is the one who plays the better moves, period.

d5 is by far the most popular move in this position for a reason.

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Wow good thing Im reading this thread, had no idea I was down a pawn. [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

[metsandfinsfan]

i am not a good chess player but i would go Bb4

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i am not a good chess player but i would go Bb4

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How do you respond to Bd2? Trade? What's the point? Our dark square bishop is our best piece.

[Stephen H]

Ugh. I hate openings; I always feel like the stuff I'm looking at is already solved by someone and I should just know the answer - and that my opponent already does (perhaps actually true here, unlike most of my games). Which is why I never got good at chess - hard to play a lot of games if you don't enjoy the beginning.
Hopefully I'll find time to add thoughts as we move forward, though; if nothing else, I've already learned a lot.
I assume the goal of Na6 is to get into Bc5 or Nb4? He really can't let Nb4->Nc2 happen, so there's probably an immediate response to Na6; something like Bd2, a3, Na3. So we get to follow with Bc5 almost certainly.
On the other hand, 5 ... d5 seems like it will lead to us very shortly using our c-pawn to capture, and we'll have the opportunity to go Nc6 at some point instead of putting the knight on the board's edge.

[dmk]

the center is what we need to concentrate on right now. Na6 just allows curtains to develop another piece that further controls the center