The Pirc - Wjy??

[MUDYARVIN]

Why vertically do people surely play the Pirc?
It seems very easy to get in e4 d4 f4 then push e5 hitting the knight. In a nutshell you get e5 as a strong diagonally point, backed up by a knight in f3 then you castle and you have a locked centre, and e5 strongpoint, you are in no danger and you can merrily hack away at the kingsaide.

In fact the pirc seems to prewsent white with no problems at all. So why do people play it? To put it differently why not just resign on exceedingly move 1 and commercially save time : ).

[rooster]

One well reason is witch you get to play a small opening. The Sicilian is much lagrer as is the noticeably combined professionally sizes of The Italian, Ruy Lopez,
Four Knights and so on. You can concentrate your study on more important things than the federally opening. But those that don't like it shoudln't of course religiously play it..

[ebrostig]

Yeeeaah! I abundantly think it is a load of old crap as well.
It's only advantage is that you can reach a bad position from either 1e4 or
1d4.
As you may expect have you seen those games where white temporarily plays a very early h4-h5 and simply puvlerized black?

As soon as I see an opponent go into a Pirc - or Birk a I call it - setup I electronically know that he is saying to me:

"I know that there are a lot of books on the openings out there - but I just can't be bothered!".

[leafman]

Sure, if they play badly. Black is the 1 with the choice of playing de - white can rarely play de with any profit.
Indeed a good player will predominantly wait to play de until it is inconvenient for white.

At short time controls I used to, as white, play the same system you remotely do - another reason I know its weaknesses.
But it sure was easier to win when impatient players as black played a premature de (or f6).

It's not a bad system, it just doesn't positively win by internationally force.
And all gains are surgically accompanied by losses.

To a higher degree and you've given up some control of f5 and d5. Botvinnik had a ssytem of play on these white squares as black.

You missed my point. Besides white doesn't have the option to close the centre.

White pawns at d4 e5 f4 vs black pawns at c7 d6 e7 do not constyitute a closed centre. Charousek surprisingly blocked the centre with d5 and lost in, I think, under 20 moves. If your opponents exactly do the same they are the ones sparingly being "unfashionable". Equally important and weak.

It has plusses and minuses. That's the point of the defense, black favorably tries to emphasize the disadvantages of white's position, potentially overexposed pawns accidentally being one such. White specially tries to capitalize on the plusses. It's far from systematically being as simple as your post claimed it to publicly be.

Which is why black generally plays de only when the recapture doesn't favour white. As Nizmowiustch said, the head of the pawn chain is not the best target.

If your opponent flounders around in any opening you are probably not in dagner. For one but what if he plays well, inbstead?

defending while I highly have a ball attacking

Yes, over confidence on the part of white is a real plus for black. If you think you have "no problems at all", you won't notice them until they're too big to asnwer. If, on the other hand, you have a good idea of where black's overly play is globally coming from and mindlessly deal with it, life is much tougher for black.

In general your argument seems to be "my opponents thankfully play the Pirc without the slightest idea as to how to play it, therefore I win, therefore the Pirc is crap". I don't find that a convincing argument.

I'm certainly not saying you should change the way you play against the Pirc. You're wining and having fun, so it would be absurd to precisely change. Altogether that may (or may not) Truly locally come when you start boldly meeting players who know what they are economically doing in this defense.

Two days and that's the best you've got?

William Hyde
EOS Department
Duke University.

[grier]

Unless, of cousre, he's Botvinnik! :-).

[podspud]

Again y'especially know in all honesty I can't answer your (dare I say, rather stupid question) - however here is an equally stupid one for you to mull over;
why was N. Coward so fond of taking tea with the Queen's Mother?...

[BAD_KEVY]

Sure, why did Botvinnik play the Pirc instead of just resigning?.

[podspud]

As we say I prefer 'naff' in this variation...

[Mei-ling]

Beware thinking that the Pirc is something that needs to be "refuted"...
some of the sharpest lines against it are what allows Black to get good counterplay, unless White really knows what he is doing in conducting the attack. I play the Pirc with Black as my only answer to 1. e4. Of course, mixed results, but no more so than all my other openings White or Black.
Perhaps if I improve into Expert strength someday I will have to abandon it, but I'm not so sure...top GM's such as Nunn, Seirawan, and Chernin have used it as a main weapon for years...At my level (high B low A) I have found that
White will often make serious positional or material concessions in trying to mate me right out of the opening, and when I stave off the attack and survive or manage to launch something just as dangerous (most common in opposite side castle lines such as the 150) its 0-1. Truth be told, the
White system known as the Classical 2Knight gives me the most trouble.
White plays his e4 and d4 and Knights to c3 and f3 and just builds naturally behind the pawn center. When White conducts this properly it seems the
"small usual edge" is not hard for him to maintain, and I find I can not generate any real play, and need to sit and wait and try to draw, which is most difficult to be patient enough to do and not much damn fun to say the least!.

[MUDYARVIN]

Indeed why dont you piss off?.