Patzer openings

[Ilan Vardi]

It wasn't that long ago that 1... g6 etc. was thought to be a patzer
type move. The ``Fred'' or ``Duckstein'', i.e., 1.f3 2.Kf2, 3.Kg3 is a
good opening to prove to people that there is no law that says that
you need to play standard openings (occasionally it allows you to win
speed chess games from people who refuse to play you when you do
that). I think that it is as difficult an opening to beat as any
``plus'' position, so the advantage it gives the opponent is that you
have solved all his opening problems. A similar statement can be made
for your patzer opponents openings.

[Noam Elkies]

In article <1990Sep2.0...@Neon.Stanford.EDU> il...@Gang-of-Four.Stanford.EDU (Ilan Vardi) writes:
>It wasn't that long ago that 1... g6 etc. was thought to be a patzer
>type move. The ``Fred'' or ``Duckstein'', i.e., 1.f3 2.Kf2, 3.Kg3 is a
>good opening to prove to people that there is no law that says that

>you need to play standard openings [...]

Not if you don't mind losing in <10 moves... This "Duckstein" goes
way beyond patzer: Black wins by force with 1.f3!? e5 2.Kf2? (which is
still better than 2.g4???) Bc5+ 3.Kg3?? Qg5+ 4.Kh3 Qh5+ 5.Kg3 g5 6.h4
(the only defense against Qh4# since 6.h3 Qh4+ 7.Kh2 Bf2 and Qg3 mates)
and now simply Bxg1 remains at least a piece up: 7.Rxg1? Qxh4#, and
otherwise Black has 7. ... gxh4+ 8.Kh3 (Rxh4 Bf2+) d5+ 9.g4 hxg3++
(double discovered check by e.p. capture!) 10.Kg2 Bh2 splat.

--Noam D. Elkies (elk...@zariski.harvard.edu)
Department of Mathematics, Harvard University