Don't Study Openings

@screamingmonsters
I noticed that you mostly play the same openings. That is opening knowledge.

@wannabe2700, you're right, I mostly play 1.e4 and 1...e6 or 1...d5, but I assure you, there is a great difference between the opening knowledge acquired by practice and the so called "theory".

Opening last till 12 to 15 moves after which you need to prepare for middle game and endgame
Your planning and strategies in the mid game will help you in endgames

20, 40, 40 rule 20% opening 40% middlegame and 40% endgame.

Forgetting openings are for bullet players only. The longer the time control the stronger I can use my theoretical openings. If openings are not important how come Kasparov and Magnus had and has team of seconds and databases.

I mean you need to work through openings to get a solid understanding of why certain moves in the openings get punished. That's how you win a lot of games: decisive positional advantage before move 15. It's not all memorization, it's also a lot of fine aspects that the general guidelines of openings does not cover.

@screamingmonsters Learning openings through just playing is the slowest way, but also the most solid approach. By making all the possible mistakes you will learn the opening inside out. Learning only the best moves leaves many holes behind.

@wannabe2700 Learning is inevitable! However, play before you learn.

There is so much you can learn by playing bad. I am still catching myself missing basic tactics like a hanging rook on e1.



I may have won the game, but only out of luck. After all, I had 01:30 left and I still failed to see that a rook was hanging on e1 at the end. (I premoved Kh2?? Expecting Qxe1...and still failed to realize my opponent may fail to realize himself a rook is hanging).

Play bad openings so you don't only rely on traps, but it engages you to think!