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From: William Hyde <wthyde1953@gmail.com>
Newsgroups: rec.arts.sf.written
Subject: Re: OT: Chess
Date: Mon, 30 Sep 2024 16:21:48 -0400
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The Horny Goat wrote:
> On Sat, 28 Sep 2024 17:04:11 -0400, William Hyde
> <wthyde1953@gmail.com> wrote:
> 
>>
>>
>> D wrote:>
>>>
>>> On Fri, 27 Sep 2024, William Hyde wrote:
>>>
>>>>> Never played that... lately I've been playing the scandinavian. I
>>>>> will meditate deeply on this!
>>>>
>>>> I do like the Scandinavian, especially the gambit variation.
>>>>
>>>> But I see videos on youtube of Magnus playing the rat.  If it gets
>>>> popular I'll have to abandon it, perhaps for the Great Snake,
>>>> Pterodactyl, or Hippopotamus.
>>>
>>> The hippo is a fascinating device! I have a book on it I haven't yet
>>> gotten around to read. I can't make up my mind if it is madness or
>>> brilliance.
>> The hippo scored a number of outstanding wins when it was first
>> systematized in the seventies (it had existed before but only as a "push
>> all pawns to the third rank" idea).  Ways were found to deal with it and
>> it's status now is that of an inferior defense.  But it you're not
>> playing against 2600 level opponents it's still quite playable.
>>
>>
>>>
>>> Usually, since I do not have a lot of time to devote to chess, I prefer
>>> "easy" openings and systems such as the Colle. The colle, although
>>> easily crushed by good players, serves me well when playing other
>>> non-professional and non-amateur players like myself.
>> The Colle does not lead to a disadvantage for white.  It's problem, from
>> my point of view, is that it is a strategically unsophisticated opening
>> which is easy to equalize against.  I enjoyed playing against it as
>> black as my opening problems were soon over.
>>
>> But Colle was no fool, and the opening packs a punch.  It doesn't take
>> much in the way of carelessness for black to be facing an irresistible
>> attack after white finally achieves e4.  Nowadays I am weak enough that
>> I'd probably lose to it against any kind of strongish player.
>>
>> American Senior Master (and world poker champion) Ken Smith recommended
>> that players without the time to learn a lot of theory try either the
>> Colle or the Stonewall attack as white. When I lived in Texas both were
>> very popular with players under 2000.
>>
>> For variety, you might want to take a look at the Stonewall, both for
>> white and black.
>>
>> William Hyde
>>
>>
> When I was in high school we had a player who was one of the top 3 or
> 4 players in the club and had fallen in love with the Stonewall. So
> the rest of the stronger players (including myself) learned
> anti-Stonewall techniques and by the time I had played 100+ speed
> games against it and thought I was coming out of the opening against
> it with a pretty good game.
> 
> Am not sure I'd be happy playing my system vs anybody 2200+ but then I
> don't know any masters who play stuff like that even vs "fish" like

The Stonewall was played by Mr and Mrs Vujosevic in Toronto.  Mr V was 
well over 2100 but has zero internet presence, not even at 
chessgames.com where some weaker people of the same name are listed so I 
can't check his peak rating.  I think but am not sure that he was over 
2200.  Mrs V was a WIM, with a top FIDE rating of 2030.

Both were quite skilled at it and I learned a lot about how to deal with 
it when played by reasonably strong players in our G/15 encounters.

The newsgroups reader I am using won't let me set followups to 
rec.games.chess.misc (or more likely I just can't figure it out) but you 
may be able to.

William Hyde
> me.
>