However, it’s still irrelevant to FIDE, which has been the question.
And to repeat, a TD room is not a rule. The rule, rules.
And to repeat, my latest question only pertained to US Chess rules. Everyone else in this thread seemed to understand this already.
We all understand TD TD Tips (not a “TD room”) are not rules. However, the point we are making here is expressed well by the following two posts that are quoted below:
This thread has never been exclusively about FIDE. The very first post asked questions about both US Chess and FIDE practices in this situation. And there are ambiguities regarding this situation in the rules/laws of both.
Regarding TD Tips: When a TD Tip makes a definite statement, such as “a final time control with an increment of 30 seconds or greater is not considered sudden death (implying that sudden death rules do not apply in such a TC)” – if that’s true, it ought to be stated unambiguously in the rules. If it’s not true, that TD Tip needs to be deleted. It’s extremely bad form to have TD Tips that contradict the rules.
+1
If you are referring to the last Chronos model that had a switch on the bottom (ca 1996), then it can be set for increment, as long as there is only one time control. Try mode CH-P3. That mode defaults to G/20 inc/6, which seems kind of silly, but it can easily be changed to G/90 inc/30, or whatever you want, and saved that way to a user mode.
Bill Smythe
Nope, no switch on the bottom. This is a “long” model (about 9 inches) in a light-colored (off-white?) metal case with a black plastic button on each end (mechanical, not touch-sensitive) and a red on/off switch in the middle (all on top). CH-P3 on this clock has a maximum time of 9:59 (that’s minutes and seconds), and says it’s designed for blitz play. I actually don’t remember which mode I used to set up increment – I did it long ago and saved it, and now I just go to that saved TC when I need increment. But it couldn’t have been CH-P3. The word “increment” never appears anywhere in the manual for this clock. You have to set it up as an endless series of one-move time controls to get the increment effect. I don’t remember when I bought it (other than “long ago”), but the copyright date on the manual is 1995, for whatever that’s worth.
Your model is more recent than the one I thought you were describing. It has many increment modes, but Chronos uses the word “progressive” rather than “increment”. I think on your clock increment with one time control is mode CH-P5. At any rate I’m sure it’s one of the CH-Pn modes.
Bill Smythe
Very likely it is CH-P5 for one increment control, CH-P6 for two increment controls and CH-P7 for three increment controls.
Those modes do not include clock-press counters, which is a good thing. If that does not hijack this thread beyond hope, nothing will.
Agreed. I think all TD Tips need to be removed from the rule book.
At the risk of continuing the derailment, I’m quite sure that my clock has no way to add an increment while remaining in the same time control period. The only way to get the increment effect is for each increment to be a new time control, and to do that you need to have a move counter (or clock press counter, if you will) and define the number of moves as “one” for each time control (including the initial one). Then each clock press literally starts a new time control, each of which is a 30-second (or whatever length you specify) increment. Also, at least some of the CH-P modes do have such counters. CH-P1 is literally defined as 40 moves in 2 hours, followed by 20 moves in 1 hour, repeating indefinitely. They may have changed the definitions of the progressive modes on different versions of the clock, but that’s how they work on mine.
No, no, no. You don’t need to pull any of those “one move per control” sneaky tricks.
Let’s walk through this, using G/90 inc/30 as an example. Set your clock to mode CH-P5. Then long-press the center button to specify your desired details. The first thing it should ask for is the main time, and it will be formatted as h:mm:ss (e.g. 1:30:00 for G/90). If what you see isn’t what you want, just change the digits in the usual Chronos manner – short-press through the digits, using the left and right play buttons to change any digit that is not what you want.
Next the clock should ask for the increment time, probably formatted as m:ss (e.g. 0:30 for inc/30). Again, short-press through the digits, changing each digit as necessary.
Finally, the clock should ask you a few more questions, such as “beep at end?”. (PLEASE set this one to zero so you won’t bother other players during the game.) Finally, long-press, and you’re done.
Simple. No tricks.
Bill Smythe
I disagree. I have found many of the TD Tips to be excellent clarifications on the rules and good supplementary material. It’s of course possible to have this stuff in a separate document but it’s much better having it right next to the applicable rule in the rulebook. Having TD Tips in the rulebook has worked well for decades. Thankfully, I think there is about a zero percent chance of all the TD Tips being removed from the rulebook.
+1
A big NO on that one. Many of the TD Tips are extremely helpful. There are only a handful that need revision or deletion.
Bill Smythe
About the only benefit I can see to abolishing TD tips is that we won’t have to read the smug pronouncement that “TD tips are not rules” on the forums. We only need to abolish incorrect TD tips.
I would not term that pronouncement smug. You would be surprised how many people think that just because something is in the rulebook it must of necessity be a rule. While it is convenient to have the tips alongside the rules, it might lessen the confusion if the tips were all split off from the rules. In golf they have the Rules of Golf, and they also have separately Decisions on the Rules of Golf showing how the rules have been interpreted in various real life situations. Something similar here might be a good idea.
In any other setting I’d agree with you. On the forums, where it’s mostly the same people, especially on the rules discussions, it’s smug. Especially when you’re making the comment to the same few people. And I’m not just picking on Allen from this thread. I’ve done it. Ken Ballou did it. Several people posting on this thread have done it.
Surprisingly, that seems to work, but it’s still non-intuitive. It doesn’t exactly “ask for the increment time” – it just shows some digits. If you don’t already know, you wouldn’t be able to tell whether that’s delay, increment, or a second time control. And, as I’ve previously mentioned, the manual never uses the word “increment”. The first time I wanted to play in a tournament that used increment, I went out and bought a DG-NA clock, because I couldn’t find any way to do increment on my Chronos. I figured that it just wasn’t supported. Then, later, I read somewhere about the “tricky” way that I previously described. I was not aware of any simpler way until just now. I guess writing clear instructions wasn’t one of Chronos’s strong points.
Anyway, thanks for the detailed instructions. Too bad Chronos didn’t hire you back in the day. 
ETA: Actually, I take all of that back, sort of. Upon checking my manual, even though it works as you describe, it is actually doing what I described. The description for CH-P5 says “This is the same as CH-P4, except that the first time control can be as large as 9:59:59 … .” And the description for CH-P4 makes it clear that the first setting is the main time, and the next setting is the second (repeating) time control. It then further states that “the main and second time-control number of moves (is) set for 01. The move number is not displayed because it is always 01.” It does not give you any opportunity during set-up to change this number. It is literally an endless series of one-move time controls, just as I described. Since it works exactly like an increment, you can think of the second setting as being the increment (and that’s effectively what it is). But the description in the manual is clearly that of a series of one-move time controls. This must have been the setting I originally used. If you were just reading through the manual looking for an increment time control, you’d never guess that this was it, unless you were thinking outside the box.
The FIDE Laws of Chess are just that - the rules. All the other stuff is in the arbiters handbook. That makes it much clearer what are rules and what aren’t. All the tournament administration stuff aren’t rules either.
The information is useful. But separating it out, as FIDE does, makes sense.
This is true. I guess you’re supposed to know, from the displayed format (h:mm:ss vs m:ss) when it is asking for main time and when it is asking for increment.
This is true as well. Actually, the Chronos (even my old 1996 model) had increment capability before the concept even had the name “increment”, or any other name.
In fact, FIDE (at least in some passages) uses the word “increment” to mean what we in the USA would call “either increment or delay”. Generically you could call these two concepts “cumulative add” and “non-cumulative add” respectively. FIDE calls them “Fischer” (or “bonus”) and “Bronstein”.
So perhaps it could be argued that Chronos was wise not to use the word “increment”, since that word has different meanings around the world.
You might actually have read that in one of MY posts a long time ago! I offered it as a way of, essentially, having increment and delay both turned on at the same time, using a mode called DL-CU on my 1996 model. That stands for “delay, move count, unlimited” and was intended for something like 40/2:00:00, then 20/1:00:00 indefinitely, with a 5-second delay throughout. By setting it instead to 1/1:30:00, then 1/0:00:30, and a 5-second delay, essentially you would have G/90 with a 30-second increment and a 5-second delay.
But that idea has pitfalls. For example, if a player let his time run out in one of those “secondary” controls, the clock would simply stop until the player pressed the clock, and then it would “unflag” by giving the player another 30 seconds.
It appears, then, that CH-P4 on your clock is similar to DL-CU on mine, and may have the same pitfalls. By now, though, we both realize that CH-P5 is really the one you want.
Bill Smythe
There is no rule that states that an increment of at least 30 seconds is not sudden death and that an increment of less than 30 seconds is sudden death. It has nothing to do with the notation requirement. Time Pressure, as defined in rule 11D1 as “a situation where either player has less than five minutes left in a time control and the time control does not include an increment or delay of 30 seconds or more” is what should determine if notating is required or not (and it currently does except notating isn’t required if there is a delay of 30+). Based on rules 5A and 5B, I would say the best definition of sudden death is that it is simply the phase of the game where all moves or all remaining moves must in a certain amount of base time plus any possible increment or delay time that segment of the game may include.
Therefore, I think the following three TD Tips should be deleted and a new TD Tip after rule 5B1c would be beneficial.
TD Tip after rule 16T: “An increment time control of 30 seconds or more is not considered sudden death, therefore if both players should exceed time control, the clocks should be reset to the “next” time control of the time increment (e.g. 30 seconds) per move.”
Second TD Tip after rule 14G: “An increment time control of 30 seconds or more is not considered sudden death; therefore, 14G does not apply.”
TD Tip after rule 14G2 “TD TIP: An increment time control of 30 seconds or more is not considered sudden death; therefore, 14G does not apply.”
Proposed new TD Tip after rule 5B1c: "A time control where all moves or all remaining moves must be completed in an allotted period of base time and includes any amount of increment or delay is still considered sudden death.
What do you think about all of this?