Side by side
Silman's Complete Endgame Course vs Classical Sicilian
Silman's Complete Endgame Course
16 positive (89%) · 1 mixed (6%) · 1 negative (6%)
Trust + time weighted: +84%
Top excerpts
Silman’s book is very likely the only book on theoretical endgames you’ll need for a long time. Quality book on a fundamental topic, presented well with no unnecessary fluff.
first you have to go through basic endgames (say DeLaVilla's"100 Endgames..." or Silman's "Complete endgame Course")
Silman's complete endgame course is my Bible and made my endgame step up so much. It's very well structured, you can skip the first chapters at your level but the last ones will give you very important theoretical knowledge.
If you want to improve your endgame overall, I suggest reading silman's complete endgame course.
The answers I believe in here are Silman's Complete Endgame Course (which shares a lot of your philosophy - there's no N+B mate in it)
Classical Sicilian
12 positive (86%) · 2 mixed (14%) · 0 negative (0%)
Trust + time weighted: +86%
Top excerpts
I play the classical and the Rauzer is, well, playable. I play the old mainline with Be7/O-O. ... the classical is simply very good against anything that is not the Rauzer.
I think it’s double-edged like most Sicilians are. Compare to other d6 Sicilians, it struggles more against Bg5/Bc4 (Rauzer/Sozin/Velimirovic) lines (compared to the Najdorf, for example, where Nbd7 is a big help, and the Dragon which doesn’t fear these moves at all), but does better against Yugoslav/English attack lines because the Boleslavsky e5 is so playable and so is Ng4.
Yes, greater than many other Sicilians like Najdorf, Kan, or Taimanov because the main line often is opposite sides castling where a single tempo may be decisive.
More aggressive than the Najdorf. I often use it when playing for a win vs lower rated players. There’s few piece exchanges or symmetrical pawn structures. In the main lines, black gets the bishop pair and queen trades always favors black.
The classical sicilian (the Rauzer in particular, which is certainly white’s most pressing try) can get really sharp, complex, and sometimes irrational, but nonetheless seems relatively sound with lots of dynamic chances for both sides.