Scotch Game or Vienna

I am looking for a solid, practical white opening for 1. e4, e5 that I can study to reach at least 1800 in chess.com rapid (I am currently 1400).

I began my search deciding between e4 and d4. I chose e4 because d4 can lead to many openings including the KID, Slav, QGD, Nimzo... (I am not fond of the Accel. London) while white tends to have more control over the opening in 1. e4 games. Also, I seem to prefer whites attacking chances in e4 positions rather than d4 positions (however, I am not a great risk taker in chess, and want something solid).

Looking into the options of 1. e4, e5, I decided against the Ruy Lopez for now because of its complexity. I also disregarded the Italian Game and the 3 and 4 Knights Games because they are pretty well-known, and I would rather catch opponents a little off guard.

That left me with the Scotch Game (1 e4, e5 2. Nf3, Nc6 3. d4, ...) and the Vienna Gambit (1. e4, e5 2. Nc3, ... (3. f4)). To help make a decision between these two openings, I am asking for the opinions of some more-experienced chess players, as well as intermediate players.

My understanding is that the Vienna Gambit kind of has its limits since opponents will ultimately play the mainline 3... d5. In contrast, the Scotch seems to hold up better in higher ranges. Do you consider this to be true?

Also, how do you consider the Vienna in comparison to the Scotch Game, and which one would you recommend for an intermediate player? Perhaps you recommend a different practical opening.

Note: I play mainly on Lichess, the games on my profile aren't necessarily the most descriptive of my style and abilities

I still play the Vienna at 2000 rapid level and always recommend it, I have excellent results with it. The Vienna Gambit positions after ...d5 are mostly fine/good, but there is one line which White is more or less forced to enter if Black chooses it (1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. f4 d5 4. fxe5 Nxe4 5. Qf3 Nc6 6. Bb5 Nxc3 7. dxc3 Qh4+ 8. g3 Qe4+ 9. Qxe4 dxe4) which is very drawish and no fun to face. I don't face this very much though, I think in part because it's not much fun to play as Black either. If I saw this a lot, I would simply not play the gambit and go into the Vienna Game instead, where White prepares f4 later. For example 1. e4 e5 2. Nc3 Nf6 3. Bc4 Nc6 4. d3 Bc5 5. f4, this is a very common position in my games more normally reached with 2...Nc6 and 3...Nf6 (3. f4 after 2...Nc6 is playable but quite a bit more dubious, and 2...Nf6 is slightly less common so I am in these positions more often than the gambit). I continue to play the gambit only because I continue to have good results in it.

I've never played the Scotch as White and haven't played ...e5 as Black in years so I can't really speak on that. I know both the Scotch and Vienna are considered drawish at master level. at 2000+ on Lichess White has a slightly better winrate in the Vienna (52%) than the Scotch (50%). One other thing in favor of the Vienna is that it cuts out some learning, because in the Scotch you will have to know what to do against the Petroff, which is not a thing against the Vienna. Another nice little short-circuit is that against the Nimzowitsch Defence (1. e4 Nc6), if you are a Vienna player, you get to play Nc3. 2...e5 transposes back into the Vienna Game and Black does not have any other options really, everything else is quite bad.

My opinion is for Vienna. I use it as my main weapon. Sound, simple, with clear plan and if black is unprepared or careless, white can easily generate mating attack.

I really like playing AGAINST scotch. It serves for an opinion.

I was once recomended to play steinitz variation against it, it was a goldshot. Steinitz varaition is considered dubious, but at amator level it causes enormous problems. If you want to learn scotch, you definatelly schould learn how to defend ( yes, defend) against it which is quite tricky - one needs to go deeper then typical "internet refutation", for as with many dubious lines, the supposed refutation is not clear at all.

But steinitz variation tdoes not occur, don't you feel that the position tends to quickly dry up in scotch? That white's activity and spatial advantages seem plain illusory?

So to sum up, scotch game is not as easy and beginer-friendly as it is often said to be. Deffinately quite a lot of learning.

I personally play the Vienna. But Scotch is also very good.

@1

"opening for 1. e4, e5 that I can study to reach at least 1800" ++ Any opening can do that. You do not win or lose because of the opening, but because of tactical mistakes.

"Scotch Game (1 e4, e5 2. Nf3, Nc6 3. d4, ...)" ++ Good

"Vienna Gambit (1. e4, e5 2. Nc3, ... (3. f4))" ++ More solid 3 g3 or 3 Bc4.
Here are 2 correspondence world championship finals games.
https://www.iccf.com/game?id=1360150

https://www.iccf.com/game?id=1164280

"Vienna Gambit kind of has its limits since opponents will ultimately play the mainline 3... d5." ++ Yes, but even then it is still playable.

"the Scotch seems to hold up better in higher ranges"
++ Yes. Kasparov played it in 30 games, including in 3 World Championship Matches.
https://www.chessgames.com/perl/chessgame?gid=1067288

Grob!

Thank you for the responses so far. I have to say, I was leaning towards the Scotch but now I'm a little more attracted to the Vienna.

I forgot to ask this earlier, are there any resources/videos you would recommend to learn the Vienna/Scotch?

I wrote a Quickstarter Guide for the Vienna intended for beginners, probably worth a look just to get the basic idea of the opening. I was playing the Vienna before GothamChess was a thing but I did get his course on it and it was pretty good.

Personally against e5 I would just recommend the Berlin-Vienna Hybrid/Bishop's Opening as opposed to the Vienna Gambit (3. f4) or the Scotch, as then at least you have play, whereas against both the Scotch and Vienna Gambit Black can achieve very easy equality with the following lines:

Black can achieve equality in the Bishop's Opening as well, but it isn't like the Scotch and Vienna Gambit where Black can just memorize one line against your entire repertoire as White and be fine.

Realizing as I finish up my lines that you are currently 1400 and so the likelihood that you see more than 2% of the lines above is negligible. Ignore the full repertoire above for now (unless you mean 1400 FIDE) and use the tabiya below instead.

In theory you are correct that Black could do that, in practice I have 889 games as White after 2...Nf6 3. f4 across Lichess and chesscom and I am winning 64% of those games on both sites, so I'm not sure why I would want to avoid this position.

I think the Scotch is theoretically marginally more sound but at our level both can be played. Vienna black has more changes to equalize but the remaining game is more complex and both can win. The Scotch is a little harder to equalize against but once black does equalize neither party has much else than a draw. Make your choice

The Vienna gambit is a great position. As a good player what you want is complexity that you're familiar with and your opponent is not familiar with, and the Vienna gambit provides that. I went back to playing it recently and I find that... when I played it last, as a lower rated player, I greatly underestimated it. I got too caught up in the engine eval, that was just a foolish mindset at the time. In reality white scores significantly better in the Vienna Gambit than in the Ruy Lopez, yet the Ruy Lopez is the engines most ideal line for white, so try explaining that one.

My recommendation would be, at your level, to play a wide variety of openings. You said you don't like attacking chess since you have a more solid playstyle - one of the main things you learn from 1400-1600 is the value of initiative - how to seize the initiative, how to translate initiative into other forms of advantages, when to leave pieces hanging, and so fourth. So my recommendation would actually be that you do play an attacking opening, just to develop your skills further. On that note, you may as well play the vienna gambit.

On the other hand... you say you don't want to play d4 because there are too many openings there. So learn d4 defenses - play the various common d4 defenses as black, and work your way up to playing d4 as white. If you want a quicker way to get into d4... start with the Trompowsky, which reduces blacks options by quite a bit.

My advice would be not to fixate on a particular opening until you've played most of them and you're around 1800. Because you don't even really know yet what kind of player you are and what openings you really like, you have to learn that through experience.

The moves against the Scotch you gave are the first moves of one of one of the most complex Scotch lines going 20+ moves deep. While I do not doubt that black can achieve equality (as for example is shown for example in Ntrilis excellent e5 book - https://www.chess.com/blog/smurfo/book-review-playing-1e4-e5 ) the lines are very complex and black can easily go astray. Putting the easy first few moves in a diagram certainly does not cut it.

Your concerns would be valid were it not for the fact that the OP is rated nearly 600 ELO below you. I was 1400 approximately a year and a half ago and from what I remember of it, tabiya positions were reached in less than 25% of my games and I didn't face a single opponent who knew the lines past the tabiya.

However, the tabiya positions in the Schmidt Scotch, Four Knights Scotch, and Vienna Gambit are far easier to play from Black's 1400 perspective than those of the Bishop's Opening, Berlin System, and Berlin-Vienna Hybrid positions I showed. While both are completely even in terms of theoretical strength, to a U1600 player all that matters is easy development and simple plans, and White tends to have that in the lines I recommend whereas Black tends to have that in the lines I do not recommend.

Black gets to choose which variation is played in the Vienna and Scotch and thus they will likely have far more experience in the lines than White due to how forcing the lines in those variations are. However, in the Bishop's Opening lines tend to be far more positional and far more forcing, meaning that Black is very unlikely to have much experience in a single line which is theoretically even, while the positions tend to be similar enough to one another that White will be able to apply critical concepts and themes from one variation to another.

Sorry but you are changing the topic of the discussion. Black simply does not have easy equality in you position neither is there just 1 line black will need to learn that gives easy equality.

I can actually argue that the plans for black are more difficult than white in the position you are showing. White just has to develop (and it does not even matter to much in what way), castle and connect the rooks (the golden rules) while black has to make difficult choices on for example king safety, the development of his dark squared bishop and how to strike back in the center (or not). Making any wrong choices can easily land you in a bad position with either an unsafe king or a ruined structure.

Personally of all e4-e5 openings I think i disliked playing against the Scotch (with Qe2) most as white can just make auto moves while black has to make every move count or just slip in a worse position