Is the London System good for beginners?

It is good for results and mixed for learning. You will not lose games in the opening, because the setup is sound against nearly everything and there is no line to forget. What you also will not get is any practice at reacting to what your opponent has done, and that skill is what separates a 1200 from a 1600.

What is the London System move order?

1.d4 and 2.Bf4 is the modern order, getting the bishop out before e3 shuts it in. Then e3, Nf3, c3, Bd3 and Nbd2, then castle. Against 1...Nf6 the same setup works. The one detail that matters is playing Bf4 before e3, because a bishop stuck behind its own pawn on e3 is the mistake the whole system exists to avoid.

How do you beat the London System?

Hit b2 and the d4 pawn at the same time. After 1.d4 d5 2.Bf4 c5 3.e3 Qb6 the bishop has left c1, so b2 is defended only by the queen, and White has to spend a move dealing with it. The other reliable approach is ...Bf5 or ...Bg4 early, getting your own light-squared bishop outside the pawn chain before playing ...e6.

The London System for beginners

Bf4, e3, Nf3, c3, Bd3, Nbd2, castle. Six squares, learn them tonight, and you have a first move and a plan for every game you play with White for the next two years. That is the entire appeal, and it is a real one.

A typical London: 1.d4 d5 2.Bf4 Nf6 3.e3 e6 4.Nf3 c5 5.c3 Nc6 6.Nbd2 Bd6 7.Bg3 O-O 8.Bd3 b6 9.O-O.

After 9.O-O. The pawn triangle c3-d4-e3, the bishop safe on g3, the other bishop on d3 aiming at h7, both knights out and the king castled.

Reading the setup

The pawns on c3, d4 and e3 form a small triangle that nothing can break quickly. The bishop went to f4 before e3 was played, which is the one move order point in the whole system: put the pawn on e3 first and that bishop spends the game looking at its own pawn.

From there White has one attacking idea worth knowing. The bishop on d3 and a knight arriving on e5 both point at h7. Bring the queen to f3 and swing a rook along the third rank and that is the entire London attack, and against a king that has castled and left the pawns alone it works more often than it should. Everything else is waiting.

What it costs you

Here is the part nobody says out loud. The London is fine and it teaches you almost nothing.

You play the same six moves whether Black replies 1…d5, 1…Nf6 or 1…g6. That is the selling point, and it is also the problem: you never have to look at what your opponent has done, so you never practise the thing that actual chess consists of. I have coached players who arrived at 1400 with a London and no idea why a pawn on e4 might be better than a pawn on e3, and undoing that takes longer than learning an opening would have.

It is also not free. After 1.d4 d5 2.Bf4 c5 3.e3 Qb6 the bishop is no longer on c1, so b2 hangs to the queen and White has to decide something on move four: defend with Qb3 or Qc1, or offer the pawn with Nc3. Black gets an easy game in several lines and Black is not obliged to be polite.

What I would play instead

If you want 1.d4, play the Queen’s Gambit with 2.c4. It is the same first move, it fights for d5 rather than tiptoeing round it, and the positions teach you what a pawn centre is for. If you want the quiet life while you learn tactics, keep the London for six months and then drop it.

Either way, count the moves. In the London the opening is over at about move nine, as the boards above show, and what happens after that is the part that decides your rating.