Last Thursday, at the local chess club, I played against a young, up-and-coming opponent. He opened with a line that was very similar to the Veresov that I have been practicing. I responded with symmetrical moves to see how the game would proceed. The game was practically devoid of tactics and, although I enjoyed playing against my opponent, the game itself was boring. We finally agreed to a draw with a Rook and 4 pawns (all on the King-side) each.
I came home and thought about how I could add more spice (i.e. fun) into my White offering. My black lines had gambits in most variations and I found them enjoyable. The problem with white is how to get a gambit without offering lines that that are too deep for my poor memory (like the Ruy Lopez or the Sicillian). The Blackmar-Diemer Gambit seems to meet my criteria.
For the last few days, I have been exploring the opening lines of the BDG and thought I'd share this game against Scid vs. PC, a free chess interface/engine available online. The opponent's strength was set at 1350 and it was set to respond to 1.d4 with the Queen's pawn.
This program plays a tactical game that is very close to the type that I see OTB. Some of the tactical situations I saw and responded appropriately. Others were missed. I used the game analysis feature to generate a score graph to show where mistakes were made. The game is below for those who might consider using Scid vs. PC.
Lesson learned: The Blackmar-Diemer Gambit will be added as an option with my Queen Pawn games.
P.S. I added Scid vs. PC to my portable computer, and deleted Fritz12, the free Chessbase and ChessMaster10, but leaving Shredder11. Scid vs. PC does a lot of things nicely.
I am glad you are enjoying Scid vs PC! It is a great program! The material search function is just as good as it was for Chessbase! I think I am done with Chessbase.
ReplyDeleteAnother good free GUI is the Tarrasch GUI. Not quite as feature rich as Scid vs. PC but a great free program and it is really easy to set up games and analyze. REALLY easy to put in verbal annotations. Between these two programs I am slowly getting ready for life after Shredder which has been the program I started with and have really enjoyed but it might be tough to shell out money with such great and EASY to use free software being produced!
Have a great week.
Tommyg,
ReplyDeleteLiked your review of the Tarrasch GUI and The Art of the Checkmate (which I am almost done reading). Thanks.
P.S. With the new "Comment as:", I could not comment on your post and surprisingly, could not comment on my own post. So I switched from Google Chrome to Internet Explorer and that works. Hope they fix this soon.