Let's play the Ruy Lopez
Let's learn the Ruy Lopez! This opening is unstoppable. It's irrefutable. It's so good that not a single line in this ENTIRE course will leave you in a bad position. Master this course, and I guarantee you'll have a significant advantage in every game you play. First things first: pawn to e4.
Let's continue with the Ruy Lopez
Second things second: knight to f3.
Let's kick off the Ruy Lopez
To kick off the Ruy Lopez, we play bishop to b5. This does two things: 1. It lets us castle (nice). 2. It puts pressure on their knight, which is the only defender of their e5 pawn.
That was a very passive move, and it lets us play pawn to d4 immediately.
Now we have a more-or-less forcing line that will win us a pawn. First: bishop takes knight on c6.
Now pawn takes pawn on e5.
Now queen takes queen on d8.
Finally, we win a pawn with knight takes e5.
Well done! We are up a pawn and also threatening a nasty fork on f7. The computer loves our position and graces it with a +2.5 point advantage.
Let's castle now
OK, back to winning a free pawn. First: Queen takes queen on d8.
Now we finally get the pawn: Knight takes pawn on e5.
Sweet! A free pawn!
Knight captures back on d4, adding more pressure to the c6 knight.
Let's just play simple chess: knight to c3.
Black is trying to break out of the position. Before we capture back on d4, let's play bishop takes bishop on d7.
NOW we can play queen captures back on d4.
Instead of castling kingside, let's actually play bishop to f4 and try to castle queenside.
OK, now castle queenside :)
Now we can unleash our master plan: Pawn to e5, hitting the f6 knight and adding a ton of pressure down the d-file.
Well done!! There's a few ways black can try to untangle themselves out of this, but honestly none of them will work. We have a crushing position.
Black put their bishop in a bad square. Our plan is to boot it out with pawn to d4, but first we have to prepare that move with pawn to c3.
This falls right into our d4 plan: pawn to d4.
We take back with pawn to d4 to hit the bishop.
Now for a move you've probably NEVER done before. We aren't going to block check with the knight. We aren't going to block check with the bishop. We're going to MOVE OUR KING over to f1. No, seriously. The idea is we don't want to give a way for black to trade their dark squared bishop. This king slide to f1 will mean we'll likely win one of black's pieces.
Queen to a4, attacking the bishop and adding a bit more pressure to the c6 knight
Black's most common move here literally just loses them a bishop. No, seriously, the bishop is trapped right now. Pawn to a3 wins it on the spot.
Nice!! I won't complain about a free bishop.
OK, we have the ability to trap black's bishop. First, we play bishop takes knight on c6.
Now queen to a4 and the bishop is TRAPPED.
Nice try black, but that does nothing to save the trapped bishop. Pawn to a3 now.
Nice! That bishop is ours.