John Carleton

[James Pratt]

The press release for the forthcoming ECF Congress and Championships mentions a number of local players to the Mersey beat including the following which worries me a bit:
the 15th Correspondence World Championship winner John Carleton
No disrespect but really .. ? (News to me)
James

[Matt Mackenzie]

He did indeed participate in said tournament, that much is correct.

For the record, however, he finished equal 12th-13th (out of 16) with 4.5 points.

[Kevin Thurlow]

Reaching the final is an achievement of course, of stamina and ability. The 3/4 finals took 7 years to complete, and I think the final about 6 years...

[Matt Mackenzie]

Oh, no disagreement there. They were indeed marathon events.

[Joey Stewart]

It's a shame John doesn't post on this forum, I used to find his 4ncl match reports highly entertaining and would imagine he would have plenty to say which would add a lot of value.

[Alex Holowczak]

The 33rd Final is ongoing: https://www.iccf.com/event?id=100104

I have seen quite a bit of controversy about it - every single game so far was drawn, except for those including Dronov - who died during the tournament and so lost all of his unfinished games. There was controversy about one player playing on games interminably, allegedly "in the hope that another player would die". It seems the Championship could well be a 10-way tie, with the 5 players who didn't win being the ones to halve out with Dronov before he died.

The 1st World Team Cup just ended, the Final was between Spain and Germany. A 20-board match, two games against each opponent. It finished 20-20, with all 40 games drawn: https://www.iccf.com/event?id=107486 -- This was the 5th such match in the event where that happened.

The 2023-25 British Championship had one decisive game: https://www.iccf.com/event?id=103375

It seems to be relatively well-supported though. Do people still play correspondence chess, and if so, why?

[Ian Thompson]

every single game so far was drawn, except for those including Dronov - who died during the tournament and so lost all of his unfinished games

I'm pretty sure that's a change from when I used to play ICCF correspondence chess in the 1980s and 1990s. At that time I think games were adjudicated if a player died in an individual event. (In team events a substitute player was allowed to take over the games and continue playing them.)

I don't know why that would have changed because the notes to this event say "If needed, adjudicators will be selected by the server.", so it can't be because adjudications have been completely abolished.

[Kevin Thurlow]

"I'm pretty sure that's a change from when I used to play ICCF correspondence chess in the 1980s and 1990s. At that time I think games were adjudicated if a player died in an individual event. (In team events a substitute player was allowed to take over the games and continue playing them.)

I don't know why that would have changed because the notes to this event say "If needed, adjudicators will be selected by the server.", so it can't be because adjudications have been completely abolished."

I think that is still the case. You can claim results by "tablebase" as well. There was controversy in one event where three people won on time against an individual, all the other games were drawn, and the three winners shared first place, leaving the others disgruntled. If you lose on time excessively, sometimes they just cancel all your games, and that can be unfair as well.

"Do people still play correspondence chess, and if so, why?"

Yes - I was planning to give up after two successive events where I got +0=14-0, (the winners got +2=12), but the opponents are generally nice, you can practise different openings and some of the games are exciting. So I have entered the British Championship again. If you only need +2 to win it, you might get lucky!

[Matt Mackenzie]

It seems to be relatively well-supported though. Do people still play correspondence chess, and if so, why?

Even now, correspondence chess can be useful in terms of opening theory.

(indeed, quite possibly most of the occasional decisive results that still happen come about that way)

[IM Jack Rudd]

I play daily games on chess.com; it's mostly a reaction to the unreliability of both my laptop and my home internet connection.

[Joey Stewart]

. There was controversy about one player playing on games interminably, allegedly "in the hope that another player would die". It seems the Championship could well be a 10-way tie, with the 5 players who didn't win being the ones to halve out with Dronov before he died.

They better hope Peter Lilac never turns his hand to correspondence...

[Matt Mackenzie]

. There was controversy about one player playing on games interminably, allegedly "in the hope that another player would die". It seems the Championship could well be a 10-way tie, with the 5 players who didn't win being the ones to halve out with Dronov before he died.

They better hope Peter Lilac never turns his hand to correspondence...

Why, will he leave his opponents feeling blue?

[Roger de Coverly]

They better hope Peter Lilac never turns his hand to correspondence...

I think they still have compulsory adjudication.

The server version where moves bounce backwards and forwards by email or equivalent could enable very lengthy ganes.

[Kevin Thurlow]

"Why, will he leave his opponents feeling blue?"

Excellent.

CC games can last a long time - but as I mentioned earlier, you can make claims on the 7-piece tablebase, which helps. More events now have a faster time control as well. The tradition is 50 days for each 10 moves, and if (say) you have 24 days and 1 minute left when you make your move rounds up to 25 days. So a current opponent has played more than 20 moves, apparently in zero days, but all that means is he has used less than 24 hours for each move. But ICCF is now introducing new time limits, like "Triple Block system for a 550 day event, with 75 days initial bank and 3 days increment for the first 50 moves is used." So each player has 225 days for the game, and if you have 24 days and 1 minute left after a move, it will not be rounded up. This allows you to work out what time zone your opponent is in and to send a move in the middle of the night where (s)he is, which might remove a couple of vital hours.

Triple Block gets more decisive results, but they are either due to blunders as you have moved too quickly, or losses on time. How that is an improvement is open to question.