Choose Chess Openings that Fit Your Style
If you are an intermediate chess player, the first few moves in a chess game are considered the most crucial moves that most likely predict the middle game quickly as chances of making mistakes get limited. Over the last hundred years, thousands of chess openings have been discovered and studied all over the world. However, most of the time, players get tangled and are unable to decide which chess opening should be opted at different instances.
In this article, the most predominant chess styles are going to be discussed that will help you find an opening that will suit your playing style.
If you are not sure what is your playing style, try to solve this puzzle. What will you play here?
Why should you have a decent playing Style?
Most of the grandmasters throughout the decade are familiar with at least one opening style that allows them to stand out in the audience. A good playing style helps you in piece positioning, protect your King, and develop material to reach middle-game with an outstanding approach to either take advantage of the mistakes your opponent makes or advance for an attack.
Opening Styles:
Basically, there are two chess playing styles, tactical and positional. A tactical player is one who relies on tactics and tries to gain an advantage through tactical combinations, while a positional player is the one who is always looking to occupy important squares and gain a positional and space advantage.
- Attacking style – as White:
The most popular opening for white is known as the King’s Pawn opening, where white plays e4 that has the best possible replies to the set of variations that black plays. The advantage of including this opening in your playing style is the high range of possibilities to attack and control the center, as well as the immediate development of the bishop and the queen.
- Positional style – as White:
The second most popular opening is the d4 move which is also known as the Closed Game. It is a strong opening because the pawn immediately gets defended by the queen, controls the center, and avoids your opponent to play e4. The English Opening(1.c4)is also a good option to add to your style.
- Attacking style - as Black
The best way to play with the Black side is to note the white's opening move. In the case of the King's Pawn, the frequently played move is c5 to bring out its queen’s side pawn, also known as the Sicilian Defense. It is the only opening in which you can play aggressively regardless of knowing it is the defensive side.
- Positional style - as Black
The other openings for black most likely include the Open Game such as playing e5 which allows you to set up your opponent with Petrov’s Defense by responding to white's e4 with Nf3. Caro Kann and French are solid openings for positional style too.
How to Improve Your Playing Style
The fastest way to improve your chess opening skills is to think proactively about the openings you are working on. Do not try to switch to another opening unless you have mastered the first one as it helps in spotting the opening patterns and use the same tactic in the middle of the game. If you are playing with your style and you are confident, the best benefit you could get is you will end up in positions that match your strengths.
Conversely, if you are a good positional player but need to work on tactics and attack, create a tactical or dynamic opening repertoire which will force you to improve in that area. You might suffer for a while, but once you’ve gone through this “initiation by fire” you’ll find that you’ve suddenly become a balanced, well-rounded chess player who can do everything reasonably well.
Another way to improve your playing style is to keep on experimenting unless you find the style that suits you.
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