Mentalist, on 06 September 2011 - 02:10 PM, said:
what does the collective think of b6?
I guess with the idea of developing the bishop to a6? Not a huge fan, myself. After white plays b3 it'll be pretty useless there, plus it blocks in the diagonal for the queen to come to b6 or a5 and weakens the c6-b7 pawn chain opposing the bishop on the long diagonal. On the plus side, it would keep the lines open for our dark-squared bishop, but not sure how useful that would be.
Tapper's d6 idea seems the most solid to me. As he points out, it gives us some nice options on the kingside. Also, there's the potential to end up with a Stonewall type structure in the centre (if white plays d5 and we respond with c5) which is very solid and negates the fianchettoed bishop quite considerably. It also allows us to play Qb6 without too much of a problem, as white can no longer follow up d5 with d6. The clean lines for the Queen should allow us to complete development reasonably smoothly.
Couple of slightly wilder suggestions:
-Qa5: Develops the queen to facilitate castling, and also pins the Knight on c3. We could consider playing Bb4 later (dependent on when we end up playing d6) to add to the pressure (and a timely exd4 could become quite irritating as well).
-Ng4: Not a development move, but it further harasses White's dark-squared bishop. If we can kick it from e3, then we could play Qb6 as planned before. Would probably have to look into the repercussions if white decides to ignore the threat and castles instead...the open file that manoeuvre creates could be very dangerous.
ST