Reti Opening: Is it good?

The Reti: 1. Nf3, is it good?

I've personally been successful with the Reti in a few tournaments. What are your thoughts on this flexible Knight opening? Give some lines and game analysis if you want to.

yes. if you can play with it. The Réti Opening is a hypermodern chess opening whose traditional or classic method begins with the moves:

i play it often. i have trouble with players who use the queen right away but i'm getting better. i like putting my knight on f3 right away to defend the queen going to h4. 99% of the time that i start with Kf3 my opponent plays d5. there is another variation, i'm not sure what it's called, it goes g6 and b6 then bishops to b7 and g7. i don't see that often. after kf3 i usually push my center pawns and respond to the way my opponent defends.

The November 2017 issue of Chess lists the top twenty openings compiled from a list of 2402 September games where both players were rated over 2400 Elo. One can not take position on this list too seriously because it is greatly influenced by how the openings are grouped. For example, all the Retis are grouped together, while English is separated into 1...c5, 1...e5, etc. Nevertheless, for what it is worth, some of the list entries are: 126 Retis, 100 King's Indians, 97 Nimzo-Indians, 84 Caro-Kanns, 76 declined Queen's Gambits, 73 Slavs, 63 Catalans, 61 Najdorf Sicilians, 58 1...c5 Englishes, 55 Berlin Lopezes, 55 Queen's Indians, 49 Guioco Pianos, 48 1...e5 Englishes, 45 Kan Sicilians, 43 1...Nf6 Englishes, and 42 Taimanov Sicilians 

 its as good as any opening, many players want to search the best opening to crush in only 10 moves, but, if you are facing a good opponent, it doesnt matter if you played a really nice opening, because he is going to do the same, if not he is going to have a decent opening and wait to get back on his feet on the middle game, what matters most for me is the endgames, you made a mistake in the opening and still have the middle game, you made a mistake on the middle game and still have the endgame, you made a mistake on  the endgame and its game over, the slightest inaccuracy can make you lose the entire game, or to draw a winning game

I came across a variant I now use. I like it because it is not as common as the e4 or d4 openings. As a lower rated player, many opponents are not familiar with it, so it tends to catch them off guard and does two things: 1. As I am not focused on the centre, they tend to think I don't know what I'm doing (and maybe they're right?) and let down their guard. And 2. As they are not too familar with it, I can get away with mistakes I might not get away with playing on more familiar territory for them.

I suspect against a higher rated player I would get crushed, as I am just starting with it and a more experienced player would likely know the weaknesses to exploit.

I think you can still play P-QB4 (c5) for black and if white takes, then black doesn't have to try and get the pawn back straightaway...

I like playing a plan with Nf3 followed by g3, Bg2, O-O, then playing on the Queenside with d3, c3, possibly e4 if available, but the pivotal move b4, followed by possibly a4.

https://www.chess.com/blog/EOGuel/path-to-chess-prosperity-3-9-22-17-tournament-analysis-part-1

I prefer to use 1. Nf3 move orders to get in to d4 openings, you still have options to play in an english style for quite a while (if black looks like he's going to play a d4 defense you don't like).  There is also the option to just play it as a hypermodern approach of it's own.  Nf3 gives you plenty of chance to play for a good position while avoiding some more dangerous lines.  You'll want a fairly broad grasp of opening systems since transpositions are common, you could even end up in an open sicilian still!  That said if you're looking to play for a positional edge it's not a bad way to go about it.

The reason why people like the Reti Opening is not because it puts Black at a significant disadvantage, but because of its flexibility.

Each pawn move you make cannot be reversed - this makes each pawn push/capture a committal move. However, knight moves are different - as knights are much more mobile than pawns (which is why they're worth more), each knight move isn't as committal. As a result, the Reti opening is a decent choice for players who don't want to commit any pawn moves too early.

Why, you may ask, isn't Nc3 a more common opening then? It's a reasonable knight move as well! The counter-argument is that the c-pawn is a pawn which is moved in many openings, usually to accompany a pawn at d4, either side-by-side or supporting it, in controlling the center if e4 can't be played. However, Nc3 blocks the c-pawn which is usually better pushed forward one or two squares from moving (unless you plan on moving the knight and playing c4, which will cost you at least one tempo for the knight move). However, the reverse isn't true; it is true that Nf3 blocks the f-pawn, but it usually shouldn't be moved anyway (there's a reason why it's sometimes called the "forget-about-it pawn"). Plus, the kingside knight's development is more important than the queenside knight's development as 1) it helps castling and 2) it helps in protecting the king. As a result, Nf3 is played much more often than Nc3 as it doesn't block the c-pawn (and since the f-pawn shouldn't be moved anyway).

As Nf3 is played in many openings, the Reti can be transposed to other openings. This means that the Reti can "transform" into many openings e.g the QGD:

The KID:

Or even the Sicilian:

So the three (or one, since all of them are sort of synonymous) reasons why people play the Reti is because:

• It has many transpositional possibilities
• It's not committal
• The kingside knight's best square is f3 anyway

#6 post awesome !!! notice how the chess notation was in german these days, S=Springer(Knight), T=Turm (Rook), L=Läufer (Bishop), D=Dame (Queen)   

Of course it is good.  If it wasn't it would probably be named A00 "Out of Book."  

The real question is:  Is it good for you?

If you like playing it,then probably yes.

LOL - and I always thought that those using that notation were using the letters for Stallion (Knight), Tower (Rook), Llama (Bishop), and Darling (Queen)!  Shows you my German ignorance!