English Chess Forum

OK, here is my next question...

My opponent has a better position (this is normal) but I am playing for a win (unusual).

He / she is in time trouble and gets down to less than 2 minutes in a non-Fischer type time control.

There is sufficient counter-play and swindling / cheapoing chances for me to play for a win.

Am I permitted to play for a win or am I obliged to accept a 10.2 claim?

If we are saying that one is not permitted to play for a win when one is worse then perhaps I should stop playing altogether?

(This was a point made at the recent AGM but I cannot recall the response since the discussion became overly heated and irrational).

John

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In this sort of situation, I agree that "all moves in x minutes" seems harsh. Most people will agree that the person who doesn't accept the draw is a twit, and will be hesitant to play him in future. So he'll probably end up changing his ways just so that he isn't universally hated. In that situation, I would agree a draw.

I suppose an argument (not one I agree with) would be that if you play quicker than your opponent and can hold a draw, then you deserve to win? In an ideal world "all moves in x minutes" only works properly with incremental time controls. As soon as that becomes the norm, then 10.2 needn't exist.



Well, none of these situations involve checkmate. That's the problem. If white has K & 2R v black K & P and white runs out of time, and black has ~ 1 minute left, why should white get the win? Black may have lost because he was playing quicker to avoid losing on time. It may have just evolved from a K 2R & 2P v K, 2R & P and black blundered in time trouble. In that situation, I wouldn't take a draw, or resign if I were black.

As soon as incremental time controls become the norm, 10.2 needn't exist. With a 30 second increment (or similar), the problems with "all moves in x minutes" can be completely avoided. You won't get players sandbagging to get down to the last 2 minutes. You won't get bishop shuffling problems. It's the perfect solution.

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February 16-17: 2013 BUCA Team Championship
April 20: 2013 British Blitz Championship
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There's no reason why not. Let's take the rook and 2 against rook and 1 as the example. If the pawns are on (white) e3, f4 and black f5 , white king f3 and Black king f6 then I do not think Black can reasonably decline a draw offer. Move the black pawn to a5 and it's much less clear and I don't think a 10.2 claim should succeed. At least one distinction is that in the former example, White could just move his rook as close to his clock as possible and try to win the physical battle of moving and pressing the clock. In the latter case (pawn on a5), Black would have a clear plan of a4,a3,a2,a1Q.

Leonard Barden once suggested window dressing as a prelude to adjudication. He meant by this getting the position to optically look right to impress the adjudicator. So for a 10.2 claim you steer for a position where the only plausible winning chances are your own. Obviously as you increase the number of pieces on the board, it becomes less clear cut. That's one of the points of having intermediate time controls instead of straight G/90 - so you don't get players in their last 2 minutes at around move 24.

White doesn't get a win, he get a draw (and only if he offers/claims a draw with his flag still standing). There's also the premise that if you play for a win, you risk losing on time. The safest way of playing King and two Rooks against King and pawn is to sacrifice the Rook for the pawn and play King and Rook against King. That way you have a draw at least. You might do it differently if you were so short of time that you couldn't make the moves in the time available. In that case you try to mate with the two rooks - but you risk a loss.

Yes, sorry, I meant a draw. And that's why I chose that particular ending. The point is, I don't see why black should be prevented from playing on (under 10.2) by trying to avoid defeat.

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February 16-17: 2013 BUCA Team Championship
April 20: 2013 British Blitz Championship
July 27-August 10: 100th British Chess Championships

Are you trying to say that a player with one pawn against two rooks is trying to win in any other way than on time? A point of 10.2 is that the player with 2 rooks can concede a draw as an alternative to trying to win a clock hitting contest.

No, he is of course trying to win on time. He may only be winning on time because he played faster ten moves ago to avoid losing on time, but blundered his material in the process, ending up with the lost position. I think it should be a clock-hitting contest in such a situation, just as it would in a blitz game. I don't see why a game that lasts for 7 hours should have different rules/customs from a 10-minute match.

Like I say though, the perfect solution is to have time increments. Then you have infinite time, rather than finite.

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February 16-17: 2013 BUCA Team Championship
April 20: 2013 British Blitz Championship
July 27-August 10: 100th British Chess Championships

I suspect many of the chess playing population would completely disagree with you. In fact I would regard adjudication - at a really high number of moves, at least 80 as a better solution. Delay or increments resolves the issue of course, but it doesn't apply when you have mechanical clocks, a fixed time period for the game or you want the traditional 40/2 time scramble.

Yep, so do I.

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February 16-17: 2013 BUCA Team Championship
April 20: 2013 British Blitz Championship
July 27-August 10: 100th British Chess Championships

I agree with R de C that adjudication after say 80-120 moves would be better. Or more moves if the session were longer. It should be possible, and be the expectation, to play 30 - 40 moves in the last 5 mins of a QPF.

In effect this is what happened when QPF started. After a flurry of moves a flag would fall and/or the arbiter would intervene and say to a strong player/spectator "you cant win that normally can you ? " Over the years arbiters have curved this law in the wrong direction where "normal means" is more at the level of mediocre 8 year olds than a higher chess quality.

A good test of the quality of this law would be if you are on either side of the result and you come away feeling that in 95 % of cases with adequate time, this is what the result would have been regardless of the strength of players.

I would favour a law with more definiteness and less arbiter decision which may have some imperfections but at least be consistent

The real problem with 10.2 is that there are not many arbiters who are good at chess. (However, the proportion of arbiters who are good players is greater than the proportion of chessplayers who understand the Laws.)

But even if you are a brilliant arbiter and brilliant chessplayer, deciding whether someone has "made progress" can be rather difficult...

At a rapidplay I encountered a player with 2 minutes left claiming a draw against somebody with 20 minutes left, and they were barely out of the opening. I turned that one down immediately, on the basis that the concept of a Rapidplay was that you moved at gretaer than a move a minute.

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Kevin J Thurlow

"One of the nicest people in English chess." - S Giddins 2011
"Not a gracious gentleman" - D Howes 2011

Oops -submitted it twice, one more and I can claim a draw by repetition.

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Kevin J Thurlow

"One of the nicest people in English chess." - S Giddins 2011
"Not a gracious gentleman" - D Howes 2011

If your opponent makes a 10.2 draw claim you do not have the choice of whether you accept it or not. The decision is the arbiter's alone. Unlike draw by repetition claims, a 10.2 claim is not treated as an offer of a draw, as well as a claim of a draw.

When your opponent makes a 10.2 draw claim you are at the mercy of the arbiter. If there are sufficient counter-play and swindling/cheapoing chances for you to play for a win then the arbiter should not accept the 10.2 claim. He should either reject it or postpone his decision.

My concern here is that some arbiters feel they should be adjudicating the position : they are wrong.

They should determine if one of the players is making a attempt to win by improving their position or mating their opponent.

A player should be allowed to attempt to win even if they have a worse position.

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There is no doubt that draw claims made by the "inferior" side are difficult to judge. Most of this thread has been about whether claims by the "superior" side should be allowed without further ado.




I think it reasonable that you should lose if you haven't claimed a draw or have turned one down. I've seen a player with plenty of time but next to no material (sportingly) offer a draw to his opponent with mate in several but no time. This draw was turned down so he was gambling on completing the game before flagfall (and lost).