<ajile: < boz: The reason the Ruy Lopez and the QGD are still played at the highest levels is that they are inexhaustible wells of possibilities.>

No the reason they are played is because they give better chances to equalize as Black.>

Ajile, I agree that that is one reason, but we both know it is not the only one. Most serious Grand Master will tell you that those two openings are rich in possibilities and can lead to a wide range of themes. I've even heard some say that all of chess is contained in the Ruy Lopez and the Queen's Gambit Declined.

Maybe they want to finish on the weekend so they draw a larger crowd.

<Agree. I believe Capablanca and Morphy would have no problem succeeding at very high levels today. But the average player of 1850 or 1920 would struggle mightily against today's average player.>

But take a look at this game, for example. It's nothing revered in the annals of chess, but look at how complicated it is both offensively and defensively, and how the players create subtle problems for each other in ways that I don't think the average "high GM-level player" of the 1800s could have managed:

To be honest though, I wasn't really thinking of the 19th century when I asked the question. I know that, for example, techniques in defense developed to a much higher level in the 20th century. That is partly why the romantic swashbuckling style disappeared.

V Zvjaginsev vs Z Pengxiang, 2006

Benko vs Suttles, 1964

Kupreichik vs G Danner, 1966

You'll have a hell of a time finding anything like that in the 18th century, of course. And none of those games are necessarily anything that will be exceedingly praised 30 years from today.

Now, since Capablanca-Alekhine in 1927, most of the changes we've seen have been in the openings. The emergence of the exchange sacrifice is about all I can point to. But I do think today's highest-level GMs are better endgame players than they were in Capablanca's day. Capa, Rubinstein, Alekhine, and Lasker may have been exceptions, but I think they pale in comparison to the likes of Kramnik, Carlsen, Jakovenko, and Ponomariov, for instance, in complicated endgames.

Kramnik vs Ponomariov, 2009

The calculation in this one:

I will try to appreciate these games tonight but I'll have to defer comparitive judgments to better qualified players than me.

At a certain point, though the comparison becomes problematic. For instance, Capablanca seems, to have been ahead of most of his contemporaries in endgame technique making it very easy for him to steer the game towards positions he simply knew were winning. So in a sense one could argue that he wasn't really tested, at least not until Alekhine came along.

<beenthere> makes a good point about the exchange sacrifice. We do seem to see a lot of that these days. Aronian-Giri is an excellent example because I still don't see Black's compensation even if the result tells me it's sound.

V Zvjaginsev vs Topalov, 1995

sokrates, i think that's a huge simplification. gradually, over the past 50-100 years, there have been major changes in what kinds of middle games are actually being played, with relevant impact on strategy (although the changes have mostly been hand in hand, for strategies and position types played).

john watson has made extensive research in this field, and he points out numerous structures that are much more frequently present in modern middle game positions compared to older games, and how such positions and structures are differently understood and treated. a lot of groundbreaking developments took place after the second world war, for instance, mostly lead by russian (and other ex-soviet) players.

presenting lasker and schlechter with numerous modern middle game positions would most likely <not> have given the same low error rate as provided in bridgeburner's infamous study; it's not simply about opening theory, but about new strategical concepts and knowledge. it's about <experience> they didn't have. such experience can't simply be force-fed into their heads.

it's similar to how anand's accumulated opening knowledge can't simply be force-fed into carlsen's head <if> the latter would've wanted it - anand's experience in playing varying "popular openings" over more than two decades isn't something the youngsters simply can "fix" by loading the appropriate dvd "into their brains". it must be taken in, absorbed, practiced and only then it'll be fully understood and operable. the old master "crash course in everything modern" is simply a myth and a meaningless, hypothetical construct.

another example: consider how giri was taken by surprise by an older side line in the sicilian dragon against nakamura. of course 9... Nxd4 was available in giri's database (with several hundred games) - but at 17 he can't be acquainted with each and every line in a complex and concrete opening like the sicilian. and he's a kid of the computer age, who's grown up with the reality that even lesser players can be super-prepared in some topical line. it's everything but certain that every old master would've had the required <set> of talents needed to be competitive today; while carlsen is said to get out of the well-throdden path more often than not, people typically forget that he needs a lot of knowledge of opening theory simply to <know that he will be out of people's book>. even playing untheoretically requires a lot of theoretical knowledge.

a final example of what it means to navigate in new and unknown surroundings: giving me the necessary crash-course for how to drive a car in england wouldn't take very long. but i've driven on the right side of the road for more than 20 years here in norway, and every instinct and habit i have is based on that. putting me in a car with the steering wheel on the right side and letting me lose in the english traffic would immediately yield a driver with worse skills than in my parallel right-hand side world in norway. and it wouldn't be because i lacked theoretical information.

<In the endgame they may even be better.>

maybe, and mostly because they had the luxury of playing more end games without shortened time controls compared to the current pratice - and because they had their games adjourned just as the games typically were to enter (or come close to) end games. hence, there was an onus to work on the end game.

<Armenian GM Levon Aronian seemed well on his way to win the 10.000-euro first prize in Grandmaster Group A of the 74th annual Tata Steel Tournament at Wijk-aan-Zee on Wednesday.>