Arbiter puzzles in a new Chess Handbook

[seki]

I recall seeing a game from a Women’s Candidates event where each side only had a Knight and King and were told to play on as it was “possible” for a mate position to occur even though unlikely. There was some hubbub about this, but the game result, a loss for the player who ran out of time, was allowed to stand. The game was played without delay or increment.

I remember that incident. An incredibly bad and unjust decision!

[artichoke]

@tmagchesspgh

As compositions go, this one is fine for beginners or even people who know little to nothing about chess. The moves are forced from beginning to end. A player looking at this is simulating real calculation. It is similar to other early compositions where the inferior side must move and allow a checkmate.

If White’s flag did fall, he should lose as his next move, the completed move, did not result in immediate checkmate. Black’s extra pawns could constitute mating material if they are able to promote, which can occur in this composition. What FIDE would rule is up to FIDE, but this is one of the instances where USCF rules and FIDE rules differ. I recall seeing a game from a Women’s Candidates event where each side only had a Knight and King and were told to play on as it was “possible” for a mate position to occur even though unlikely. There was some hubbub about this, but the game result, a loss for the player who ran out of time, was allowed to stand. The game was played without delay or increment.

In postmortems, one can always demonstrate a series of “forcing moves” that would inevitably lead to checkmate. But if your flag fell when executing move 5 of a twenty move sequence, you lose in a practical game even if you, your opponent, Fritz, and Alphazero can see the end. As long as we use clocks, these results are going to occur. In compositions, the clock is not a factor.

The ruling given to Firouzja when he flagged against Carlsen in the World Blitz Championship, where Firouzja had bishop and 3 pawns and Carlsen had only a bishop, was that you lose if any game, no matter how bad, can end in you being checkmated. Since such a helpmate was possible, Firouzja lost.

(He complained that Carlsen had been murmuring to him in Norwegian, distracting him, but there was good video with audio and easily provable that that was not the case. Firouzja’s appeal held up both championships, the open and the women’s, for over a half hour.)

In this case, the only possible sequence of moves ends up with white checkmating black, so I would say that no possible game results in black checkmating white. Therefore black does not win, so it has to be a draw.

[artichoke]

@seki

I recall seeing a game from a Women’s Candidates event where each side only had a Knight and King and were told to play on as it was “possible” for a mate position to occur even though unlikely. There was some hubbub about this, but the game result, a loss for the player who ran out of time, was allowed to stand. The game was played without delay or increment.

I remember that incident. An incredibly bad and unjust decision!

This seems like the correct decision, at least by FIDE rules. For example WK a1, WN b1, BK b3, BN c2 checkmate, and since kings can triangulate to lose moves, it is certainly possible to get to such a position.

[Smythe_Dakota]

Since this thread has just been revived, let me take this opportunity to correct part of what I said four posts earlier.

The FIDE rule allowing an arbiter to intervene when a player “cannot win by normal means” or “is not attempting to win by normal means” only applies (Guidelines III) to “Games without increment including Quickplay Finishes”.

“Quickplay Finishes” means a final sudden death control.

FIDE uses the word “increment” to mean either “cumulative (Fischer) mode” or “delay (Bronstein) mode”, i.e. to mean either what we in the USA call “increment” or what we call “delay”.

So, to translate the name of the rule into U.S. Chess-ese, we would say “Sudden death controls with neither increment nor delay”.

In such a situation FIDE Guideline III.5 applies:

[b]III.5. If … the player having the move has less than two minutes left on his clock, he may claim a draw before his flag falls. … He may claim on the basis that his opponent cannot win by normal means, and/or that his opponent has been making no effort to win by normal means.

III.5.1. If the arbiter agrees that the opponent cannot win by normal means, or that the opponent has been making no effort to win the game by normal means, he shall declare the game drawn. Otherwise he shall postpone his decision or reject the claim.

III.5.2. If the arbiter postpones his decision, the opponent may be awarded two extra minutes and the game shall continue … The arbiter shall declare the final result later in the game or as soon as possible after the flag of either player has fallen. He shall declare the game drawn if he agrees that the opponent of the player whose flag has fallen cannot win by normal means, or that he was not making sufficient attempts to win by normal means.[/b]

The above looks like a much-improved approach to the U.S. Chess rules 14H (now largely discredited) and 14E (which has serious flaws). It requires the player to make the draw claim before his time expires, but still allows the arbiter to declare a draw, if appropriate, even after that.

In fact, in the book that started this thread, it is even recommended that the arbiter’s best course, in most drawish-looking time scrambles, is to postpone a decision and watch for developments. The arbiter is off the hook to make a quick decision, since he can still rule a draw even after either player’s time expires.

Bill Smythe