What would you do here

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Stewart Reuben
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Stewart Reuben » Sun Mar 29, 2009 11:22 pm

Sometimes arbiters do have their uses. In Simon's case, a good arbiter would have noticed there was a discrepancy on the two scoresheets. He would need to stick around for the time trouble. In Simon's case, I would have drawn attention to his error in advance of a situation arising, as he is somewhat disabled. I might also have done so for anybody.
In the European Senior Championship in Italy the scoresheets did not have very good distinguishing lines between the moves. Twice I had missed out a line. Twice, the very good Italian arbiter noticed this and pointed out my error to me. She did it for other players as well, so that it was not a simple courtesy to another well-known arbiter.

The prime reason why it is required the offer a draw is recorded on the scoresheet was the historical record. I am almost sure I introduced the idea. Others may have voted for its inclusion because of alleviating confusion. The only discussion ws on how it should be recorded.

Bck to recording the moves in advance. It is alleged that a player made a practice of writing a bad move down in advance, allowing his opponent to see this, and then making another better move. He was cured of this by an opponent who wrote down the player's bad move. The player made the good move and the opponent claimded the player had taken the move back. The evidence, why else was the move recorded on both scoresheets?

Stewart Reuben

E Michael White
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Re: What would you do here

Post by E Michael White » Mon Mar 30, 2009 2:26 pm

Roger De C and Stewart Reuben

Re R de C: Sat Mar 28, 2009 1:47 am

In your example Roger, I took it that this was an actual game you played during the 60s or 70s and your flag fell before you had completed the first after the time control. Mr Reuben's reply misses 2 main points, which are that the game was played pre 1997 and it was your move when a flag fell. I was stating what the rules said during the 1960s.

Like you I played League Chess in the late 1950s and 1960s and periodically since then. Many players including me did not know the rules fully then as the official version was in French and team captains generally made up rules based on incidents they had seen previously. You are right that many players would stop the clocks in the 60s. Many players at that time also stopped the clocks after offering a draw while their opponents considered the offer.

I have checked the documentation I have, which shows that the type of situation you describe was decided in 1959 by the FIDE rules commission and this was specifically written into the rules from then until 30 June 1997 so covering your game. The current rules are less clear as a paragraph has been missed out and ambiguised up by various other word changes; however the only reasonable interpretation is the same. Some abiters will no doubt continue with the arbiter dubious discretion approach, which only leads to more disputes and problems as players become less aware of what the rules really are as in the recent Davies v D'Costas discussion elsewhere on this forum.

The clearest, apart from gratuitous use of hyphens, description of the FIDE finding is in the Thessaloniki 1988 rules which state:-

11.6. If, after the time-control, one player alone has to complete his score-sheet, he will do so before making another move, and with his clock running, if his opponent has moved.

11.7. If, after the time-control, both players need to complete their score-sheets, both clocks will be stopped until the two score-sheets are completed, if necessary with the help of a chessboard under the control of the arbiter, who should have recorded the actual game position before-hand.

11.8. If, in Article 11.6, the arbiter sees that the score-sheets alone cannot help in the reconstruction of the game, he will act as in 11.7.

(the last section 11.8 allows for one player, using his and his opponents scoresheets to reconstruct in his own time, discovering that his opponents is also incomplete, in which case both clocks are stopped)

The arbiter only has the power to stop both clocks if there is an interruption for which neither player is responsible.

E Michael White
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Re: What would you do here

Post by E Michael White » Thu Apr 09, 2009 11:49 am

Stewart Reuben wrote: I certainly had never thought about the problem E Michael White points out. When I'm the arbiter, it cannot be necessary if I am there because I will be armed with the four pieces. Had he pointed it out, it would have been considered.
Stewart. I have only just noticed this posting of yours. Just so you know a senior arbiter passed an advanced copy of the 2005 rules to me in April 2005 and asked me to look for inconsistencies prior to his discussion with yourself. I replied within 1 day and listed several along with the pawn promotion issue and the incorrect paragraph cross-reference which later hit the worlds chess BBs and found its way onto the ECF and FIDE website. This latter point is discussed somewhere on this BB and the rogue version with the incorrect cross-reference can still be located by the unwary on the ECF site.

Sean Hewitt

Re: What would you do here

Post by Sean Hewitt » Thu Dec 03, 2009 8:46 pm

Interesting incident tonight in a league game.

Player has long think on move 4 then writes his proposed move down before continuing to stare at the board. Opponent politely points out that you can't do that to which the player replied that someone else had told him that only a few weeks earlier!

It looked like that was it but he then asked what the penalty was, to which the reply was that that would be up to an arbiter but could be anything from a warning to a loss. To which he replied "well there's no arbiter he so what are you going to do about it?"

I for one was speechless!

Jonathan Bryant
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Jonathan Bryant » Thu Dec 03, 2009 9:14 pm

Sean Hewitt wrote:"well there's no arbiter he so what are you going to do about it?"
Well that's not a particularly pleasant attitutude to be sure ... but having a situation (in chess or otherwise) where there's a law/rule saying "you can't do x" b ut no follow-up stating clearly "or y and z will follow" is a little silly.

Sean Hewitt

Re: What would you do here

Post by Sean Hewitt » Thu Dec 03, 2009 9:23 pm

Jonathan Bryant wrote:
Sean Hewitt wrote:"well there's no arbiter he so what are you going to do about it?"
Well that's not a particularly pleasant attitutude to be sure ... but having a situation (in chess or otherwise) where there's a law/rule saying "you can't do x" b ut no follow-up stating clearly "or y and z will follow" is a little silly.
I agree entirely!

Ben Hague
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Ben Hague » Thu Dec 03, 2009 10:12 pm

Sean Hewitt wrote:Interesting incident tonight in a league game.

Player has long think on move 4 then writes his proposed move down before continuing to stare at the board. Opponent politely points out that you can't do that to which the player replied that someone else had told him that only a few weeks earlier!

It looked like that was it but he then asked what the penalty was, to which the reply was that that would be up to an arbiter but could be anything from a warning to a loss. To which he replied "well there's no arbiter he so what are you going to do about it?"

I for one was speechless!
I think it's fair to say that this description of the events would not meet with universal agreement.

On the other point of set penalties I think the problem you would have would be one of intent. A fixed penalty would be either too lenient on someone acting maliciously, too severe on someone making an innocent mistake or both at once. I think that the current system of captains acting as arbiters and escalating to a dispute committee when necessary works quite well on the whole despite the occasional unfortunate incident. I can only think of four problems in the maybe 500 plus matches that I've played in.

Stewart Reuben
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Stewart Reuben » Thu Dec 03, 2009 10:29 pm

Concerning the above 'incident'. The player offended against could write down what had happened. Then get his opponent to sign that it is correct. If he did, then he could claim the game. I would advise against this, the appeal committee might rule in favour of the opponent.
In a very different context my opponent refused to sign the record of what happened. So I played on, retaining my manuscript. The problem was such that he lost the game with, from his viewpoint, still having time on his clock. I probably did not point out that he had lost on time. then I won on time even from his viewpoint.

People said that was the only game they have seen where the player won 3 times!
*************************************

E Michael >Stewart. I have only just noticed this posting of yours. Just so you know a senior arbiter passed an advanced copy of the 2005 rules to me in April 2005 and asked me to look for inconsistencies prior to his discussion with yourself. I replied within 1 day and listed several along with the pawn promotion issue and the incorrect paragraph cross-reference which later hit the worlds chess BBs and found its way onto the ECF and FIDE website.<

E Michael my memory is highly fallible. But surely the Laws had been passed by the FIDE Presidential Board in January 2005 and thus it would have been very difficult to make any changes. My book may have got to proof stage by then. I have no idea whether that Senior Arbiter made any comments to me.

The schedule was well-publicised.
***************************************
Again people have written about the arbiter having discretion. That is the intent of the Laws, there are, I believe over 20 references starting with the preface about the arbiter having discretion. You my not like that and would prefer automata. Then attend FIDE Meetings and argue your point. The next round of discussions about the Laws will start in 2012.

Stewart Reuben

Jonathan Bryant
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Jonathan Bryant » Thu Dec 03, 2009 11:00 pm

Ben Hague wrote:A fixed penalty ...
Just to clarify ... I wasn't calling for a fixed penalty system - just that any rules laid down should always be clear and what should happen as and when they're broken. "What should happen" could be fixed in certain cases or be a range of options in others.

Obviously I would always hope that a player's captain would step in and ensure that rules were not broken by their own players but in my experience captains [edit: orginally wrote "very often" but that's too strong] sometimes don't know the rules themselves.

In the kind of situation as we are discussing unless you're willing to do something along the lines as suggested by Stewart then it's probably best not to mention anything in the first place. I probably wouldn't bother for what it's worth. On the otherhand I've seen somebody on numerous occasions making extensive notes on their scoresheet after virtually every move played. I'd certainly take action about that if he ever played me and did the same thing.

Peter Rhodes
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Peter Rhodes » Fri Dec 04, 2009 12:31 am

William Metcalfe wrote:In my game last night my opponent was wrighting his moves down before he made his move which i was ok with
An interesting point. Although it is contrary to the rules it somehow feels unsportsmanlike to make an issue of it.

I had an opponent a couple of weeks ago who was also writing his moves down in advance. What made me chuckle is that he was also shielding his written move with his other hand so that I would not be able to peek at his move and thus gain an advantage of a few seconds extra thinking time !!
Chess Amateur.

William Metcalfe
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Re: What would you do here

Post by William Metcalfe » Fri Dec 04, 2009 1:21 am

My opponent did the same thing then he placed his pen over the top of it before he played his move i must admit i nearly burst out laughing 3 or 4 times.
I am speaking here for myself and not the NCCU which i am now president of

Andrew Farthing
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Andrew Farthing » Fri Dec 04, 2009 8:44 am

I had an opponent a few weeks ago who wrote his moves down before playing them, usually about 15-30 seconds before. It didn't bother me and I did enjoy having the extra time to think about my reply! (It's against the rules to cover your scoresheet, I believe, so you can really bug the people who block your view of their move by telling them they have to let you see it.)

During the post mortem, I politely mentioned to my opponent that what he was doing was strictly against the rules, stressing that it hadn't bothered me but that he might come across other opponents who did object. He said that he had no idea it was wrong and I believed him.

At one point I saw him write down a losing blunder and then 10 seconds later cross it out and replace it with a perfectly good move. Was the joy/disappointment rollercoaster a distraction? Or should I just have taken encouragement from the fact that a bad move went through his mind?

I remember reading a match report years ago (by Harry Golombek, I think) noting with astonishment how Petrosian at one stage wrote down a move, crossed it out and replaced it with a different one about three times. Golombek asked the question, "Can it really be possible that there are so many good moves available to the great man?"

Jonathan Bryant
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Jonathan Bryant » Fri Dec 04, 2009 9:06 am

Andrew Farthing wrote:(It's against the rules to cover your scoresheet, I believe ...
I didn't know that. Is it really? Why's that then?

If you demand to see a move written before it's played might you not become be party to the original offence? What happens then? Double default???

Anyhoo, covering scoresheet like, writing a move in advance, is not something I think I'd want to make an issue out of. I'm not sure I'd see that as 'unsporting' exactly like the earlier poster ... just not worth it. Similarly, when a few months ago I played somebody who recorded the moves in descriptive notation I didn't bother calling the arbiter on that one either.

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Carl Hibbard
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Carl Hibbard » Fri Dec 04, 2009 9:13 am

Andrew Farthing wrote:During the post mortem, I politely mentioned to my opponent that what he was doing was strictly against the rules, stressing that it hadn't bothered me but that he might come across other opponents who did object. He said that he had no idea it was wrong and I believed him.
What is the purpose of this rule anyway - as a youngster the suggestion that I write down a move before playing it was recommended (although I never followed it...) and I really don't see the harm in it now?
Cheers
Carl Hibbard

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Ben Purton
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Re: What would you do here

Post by Ben Purton » Fri Dec 04, 2009 9:16 am

The point is it counts as note taking. There will not be a player here who has not played a move which he had earlier calculated why he/she should not play it. Note taking could aid in avoiding this.
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