On Feb 26, 3:53*pm, Aftermath Fan wrote:

I run into the Philidor a lot for some
reason.

Philidor is a common opening for people who haven't studied openings,
but are at least starting to know what chess is about. It's the
tendency to attempt to defend the e-pawn without putting a piece at
risk from a miscalculation of the exchange. Obviously, f6 opens a
castled position to a diagonal attack, so that leaves the d-pawn to
carry out the mission, despite leaving the king's bishop on one side
of the board. But Philidor is a valid defense, and people don't change
any more than they have to, so in order to break from that Philidor,
black has to finally become dissatisfied with closing his KB off from
all that dark square action.

If you know the player is going to go that route anyway, and as white
you're bored with it-- well, don't open with 1. e4 --, because you're
dealing with cause and effect, as is clearly seen by the older
notation of pawn to king four, P-K4. If you're solid on tactics AND
development (a combination of the help bot's and chess one's advice),
you'll be sticking close to some type of opening, but maybe just less
familiar with the position. If someone above your rating is still
willing to play Philidor, punish them with what you know. Win or lose,
somebody gets a lesson in school. If the winner is you, then you're
not gonna stay at sub-1400 for long.