As an exception I can think of the Marshall attack from black side.

From white side there is 1.b3 which is called Nimzowich-Larsen attack. Quite an attacking first move don't you think ? :)

Generally, the variations are named with a terminal attack or defense. For example : Chigorin Defense in the Queen's gambit declined. Sozin attack in the Sicilian defense etc.

This link from wikipedia sums it up for us. To continue the discussion would be futile.

Src: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chess_...

Opening nomenclature

Major changes in the rules of chess in the late fifteenth century increased the speed of the game, consequently emphasizing the importance of opening study. Thus, early chess books, such as the 1497 text of Luis Ramirez de Lucena presents opening analysis, as does Pedro Damiano (1512), and Ruy López de Segura (1561). Ruy Lopez's disagreement with Damiano regarding the merits of 2...Nc6 led to 3.Bb5 (after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6) being named for him as the Ruy Lopez or Spanish Opening.[3] Opening theory was studied more scientifically from the 1840s on, and many opening variations were discovered and named in this period and later. Opening nomenclature developed haphazardly, and most names are historical accidents not based on systematic principles.

The oldest openings tend to be named for geographic places and people. Many openings are named after nationalities, for example English, Spanish, French, Dutch, Scotch, Russian, Italian, Scandinavian, and Sicilian. Cities are also used, such as Vienna, Berlin, and Wilkes-Barre. The Catalan System is named after the Catalonia region of Spain.

Chess players' names are the most common sources of opening names. The name given to an opening is not always that of the first player to adopt it; often an opening is named for the player who was the first to popularize it or to publish analysis of it. Eponymic openings include the Ruy Lopez, Alekhine Defense, Morphy Defense, and the Réti System. Some opening names honor two people, such as with the Caro-Kann.

A few opening names are descriptive, such as Giuoco Piano (Italian: "quiet game"). More prosaic descriptions include Two Knights and Four Knights. Descriptive names are less common than openings named for places and people.

Some openings have been given fanciful names, often names of animals. This practice became more common in the 20th century. By then, most of the more common and traditional sequences of opening moves had already been named, so these tend to be unusual or recently developed openings like the Orangutan, Hippopotamus, Elephant, and Hedgehog.

Many terms are used for the opening as well. In addition to Opening, common terms include Game, Defense, Gambit, and Variation; less common terms are System, Attack, Counterattack, Countergambit, Reversed, and Inverted. To make matters more confusing, these terms are used very inconsistently. Consider some of the openings named for nationalities: Scotch Game, English Opening, French Defense, and Russian Game — the Scotch Game and the English Opening are both White openings (White chooses to play), the French is indeed a defense but so is the Russian Game. Although these don't have precise definitions, here are some general observations about how they are used.

However, I have two comments. One is that I don't think there's a great need to avoid the Staunton Gambit or 2.Bg5--there are perfectly respectable lines for black in both, it just involves more preparation. The second is that maybe you don't need to play the French if the game should go 1.d4 e6 2.e4 (which isn't likely to happen very often anyway)? How about 2...c5?

If you want to stick with the Stonewall, play over all of Botvinnik's games with it (well, here are all of his Dutch games: http://www.chessgames.com/perl/ches... ). I found them to be somewhat helpful. Actually, if you are to play any form of the Dutch (except Leningrad), I'd find those useful.

I wouldn't suggest trying out the Leningrad. It seems to give a very different game to me. I found it harder to understand. Maybe it's theoretically better, but at the level we play chess, those better chances are very hard to find.