Just curious how you all build your repertoire? I personally was a very aggessive attacking player at the dawn of my career so I picked up the sicilian (najdorf), kings gambit, gran prix attack against the sicilian, and exange variation against the french and 4 pawn attack against hypermodern openings. Now I play a larger variety of things including KIA, English, an ocassional D4, benko gambit, nimzo, kings indian and now even a french.
Looking at that list, I see very few common characteristics.In generall I think the wide variety of positions has make me a stronger player, but building a repertoire with similar openings/themes might reduce study time and make me even more dangerous.
2 questions then
1. How does one go about building such a repetoire
2. Is it worthwile, or is it better to keep playing whatever I feel like playing on any given day?
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Originally posted by zebano1. Practice
Just curious how you all build your repertoire? I personally was a very aggessive attacking player at the dawn of my career so I picked up the sicilian (najdorf), kings gambit, gran prix attack against the sicilian, and exange variation against the french and 4 pawn attack against hypermodern openings. Now I play a larger variety of things including KIA, Engl ...[text shortened]... Is it worthwile, or is it better to keep playing whatever I feel like playing on any given day?
2. The best thing about learning the different openings is the learning of the ideas behind them so you can apply them to different positions
Opening Systems for Competitive Chess Players by John Hall attempts to build a solid opening repertoire. He claims by playing the Torre Attack, QGD-Tartakower Var., and Caro-Kann, you can quickly learn related opening systems where piece placement is more important than specific lines. Winning Pawn Structures by Baburin, examines the Isolated QP which can arise from a variety of openings. (Baburin's book is heavy reading) If you are looking for gambit lines offering similar ideas, I don't know of any.
OTB I play the Grandprix against the Sicilian, for the simple reason I cant be ars*d learning line after line after line of theory which gets updated quite often, dont get me wrong I know what the Dragon or Najdorf are, I play the Dragon as black quite often and know some theory and ideas in most sicilan openings, but I want them to play down a line I play more often and feel more confortable with than they might. I suspect some people play openings like Caro Kann for the same reason. In OTB play I think its good to play lines you think the person might not enjoy, if someone plays the Caro Kann then i'll play the Panov variation since most Caro Kann players seem to loath it because its not the type of game they wanted when they played 1. ..c6.