Chess Etiquette/Behavior gone wrong.

All Things Chess
21

I’d consider this more of a bad work ethic (not the type of TD I’d want on staff) than bad behavior. If somebody was being quiet and unobtrusive (and was in an area open to spectators) then spending all your time watching a single game would be fine for anybody other than a TD that has other games to also keep track of.

TD errors are different from TD etiquette violations/bad behavior. Waking a player that is sleeping is an error (as long as the sleeping/snoring was not becoming a distraction to other games), but many would see that as good etiquette.

22

The above quoting carved out the primary problem with this TD. Viewed in that context, the above is not so much a primary example as a supporting statement. That said, I think it’s reasonable to state that proper TD behavior, when working any larger event, does not involve spending ~80-90% of one’s time watching one game unless specifically assigned to do so - especially if the TD has a personal tie to that game in any way.

They are different. They are not, however, mutually exclusive.

23

I was trying to teach a child a lesson that was more important than the result of one game. I didn’t want to force him into moving the touched-piece, I wanted him to do the right thing. I understand that children, who show early talent at chess, are under a lot of pressure from both themselves and sometimes their parents. Whenever possible, they have to be taught to do the right thing. Chess is a game that we play for fun. If you are a cheater, then you not only lesson the fun for your opponents, you also lessen the fun for yourself. If you know you are capable of cheating then you will suspect that any one of your opponents could well be cheating you. And that means that chess becomes less fun and more of an ordeal.

Many years ago, when I was a decent scholastic player, my friend and I went to our first “adult” event. I was playing an older player, who was lower rated, and during one of his “deep-thinks” I conversed with my friend, far away from the board, but in view of my opponent. It was a long talk, but nothing about the game. Nevertheless, he complained to the TD. The TD knew me from scholastic events, and explained to me that although he was sure I wasn’t talking about the games, that it was rude and inconsiderate to have a long conversation, because my opponent thought I might be discussing the game, and just that thought in his head might give me an advantage. The TD then stopped the clock, and made me apologize to my opponent. Over 40 years later I appreciate the time the TD took to teach me a lesson about etiquette and sportsmanship. He could have just told me to shut up and stop talking with my friend,and I would have complied, but copped a typical adolescent attitude. Instead, the TD kept his calm and acted as a mentor

btw, I shouldn’t have called the kid a cheater so that others could here it. The resignation would have delivered the message a lot better, without acrimony.

24

In a situation as you told, I would have (and also have used in actual, similar incidents) the Socratic Method, or at least a Modified Socratic Method.

Rather than give the kid his choices I would have replied, “What do you think?” to his question of whether he needs to move the piece he touched or not. If he truly had played tournament Chess for as long as you say, he would know the true answer. There was no need to provide him with the extra information of how he could cheat, which he then proceeded to do.

I also would have just asked him over the board with no need to take him out to the hallway for a lengthy explanation and presentation of his choices. If you felt the need to take him away for a discussion of the rules and their applicability I would have included the TD in the discussion as he would be the one whose true role at that tournament would be rule enforcement. That would have been the correct thing to do.

25

Sometimes, a bad TD attitude leads to a bad decision.

30 years ago, I was playing in a large team tournament. Our team needed a win on the last game still going (in our match) to eke out a 2.5-1.5 win vs a lower rated team. Our first board, rated 2300 had a probable win vs his 2200 opponent, but it required a lot of technique and shuffling around the pieces. At move 55 or so, our first-board’s opponent, claimed a draw by 3-fold repetition. It was a difficult claim since it was one of those situations where the repetition did not occur on consecutive moves. In fact, it was an invalid claim, since the first time the position had occurred, there existed an ability to castle kingside, but, later on the rook on h1 had been moved to h2 and then later back to h1.

We called the TD over, and he happened to be an NTD, who had consulted on the first major revision of the rule book (edition 3, I believe, the first revision since Martin Morrison left his post as the USCF’s Technical Director.) Upon recreating the game, the NTD upheld the draw claim. I then interjected and started to inform him that not all the dynamic possibilities were the same, and was about to add the specific instance of castling privilege, when he interrupted me and yelled, “Don’t you dare tell me about the rules, I WROTE the Rulebook!” And then he stormed away with the draw claim upheld.

30 years later, what still ticks me off is not that he made an improper ruling (we’re all human), but that it was his arrogance and hubris that prevented him from gathering all the evidence. I think that has led me to distrust any and all TDs that claim to know everything.

I directed the 1981 Monadnock Marathon in Jaffrey, NH. It was a 12 round swiss with each round starting every 3 hours, around the clock. It was expressly announced that you could not wake up a sleeping player and that to do so would mean automatic expulsion. And yes, the snoring got VERY loud.

26

There are always improvements to me made, with hindsight. But when you’re in the midst of a competitive game, and you’re suddenly hit with the realization that your opponent is ready, winning and able to cheat, it’s difficult to do it 100% correctly.

And for the record, I feel it is a disturbance to surrounding players to have a discussion over a board issue. Since “stopping the clock” became a viable option, it should be used to resolve issues away from the other players.

27

Where does it say in the rule book that players can stop the clock without getting the TD? A stopping of the clock should require that the TD become involved.

28

It doesn’t.

It does.

29

UNLESS both players quickly agree to the claim/resolution/remedy.

Examples:

a) Player A claims a win on time vs Player B just after Player B has made his move and pressed his clock with a fallen flag. Player B is not sure and wants to see your scoresheet. You can either stop the clock and get a TD, or stop the clock and show him your scoresheet. Your scoresheet looks compete to Player B and he resigns without TD intervention.

b) Player A touches a piece, doesn’t move it, moves another and presses his clock. You stop the digital clock (since your time is running, btw.) Make the touch move claim, he agrees, and then you continue without TD intervention. (Noting, btw that the digital clock internal move counter is now off by 1)

c) Player A makes an illegal move in a Game 30 and presses his clock. Player B stops the clock and says, “You made an illegal move, what do we do now.” Player A, a certified TD, replies, “I have to make a legal move with the touched piece, and you get 2 minutes added to your time.” Player B accepts Player A’s remedy as correct and no TD is summoned.

Stop the clock and either player may request a TD, but many times the issue can be resolved without one.

30

None of which involve getting up and leaving the board. There is a time and place for everything, educating almost 1800 rated children at a higher stakes tournament is probably not one of them. But you are right Hindsight is very helpful. And sometimes you just have to accept things and move on.

31

There are no exceptions to the rules when it comes to stopping a clock on a game in progress. There is a fairly obvious reason why corner cases such as the one cited in the previous post are not used to make rules.

32

I don’t comprehend the term “corner cases,” but if there is a dispute over a board issue, then my understanding is that you a) stop the clock, b) see if you can reach full agreement quickly c) summon a TD if there is any disagreement.

In the case of stopping the clock over a touch rule dispute, the issue was resolved without a TD by virtue of my resignation.

In the case of a player claiming a violation of Rule 20C, what would you recommend? As I mentioned in another forum, when I first returned to rated chess after 9 years, I found out that Rule 20C was enforced by my opponent interrupting me on my time to point out my “pre-notation.” The proper way to make that claim would have been to stop the clock, inform me of the rule violation and then proceed to get a TD if he wanted to pursue a warning or imposition of penalty. If, however, he was just wanted me to make me aware of the rule, it would have been entirely justifiable to return to the game.

What was not correct, however, was to interrupt me 5 times later in the game to tell me that I’d just broken the rule again. (Remember, this was a habit that I’d used for over 4,000 moves from 1972-2005.) 6 interruptions, on my time, over a 45 move game should not be allowable.

-Stop the clock.
-See if there is agreement on a correct and quick resolution. (Example, the player realizes that the TC was 45/2, not 40/2)
-Failing resolution, summon the TD.

Remember it’s a GAME of chess. Try using common sense.

33

Aye, there’s the rub. Your understanding is faulty.

If a clock is stopped for any “board issue” (i.e., a situation where a claim is to be lodged), the procedure is to (a) stop the clock, (b) find a director, (c) lodge a claim. Review Rule 5I.

Now, this rule will refer you to Rule 16Q, which discusses the specific situation where a game needs to be stopped for some reason beyond the control of both players, such as a defective clock. Neither of the corner cases you mentioned earlier fall under 16Q.

(Incidentally, a “corner case” is a situation that only occurs under a confluence of extreme conditions, the combination of which generally falls outside of normal operating parameters.)

[Several paragraphs, based on the above misunderstanding, deleted for space. -bmr-]

I’ll give that a shot. I must admit, though, that reading and enforcing an existing ruleset without prejudice seems an awful lot like “common sense” to me. To each his own, though.

In the meantime, I hope you’ll patronize USCF by picking up an electronic copy of the sixth edition rulebook. Who knows what discoveries await?

(Although, Rule 5I hasn’t changed in a while, so perhaps I’m aiming high.)

34

Over the years, I have witnessed a fair number of bad behaving players.

During a tournament at a chess club, one man actually threw his chair over the table and hit his opponent. Fortunately, the victim got far enough out of the way enough to avoid serious injury. The thrower was kicked out and suspended from club.

A youthful opponent of mine was making substantial noise while eating chips from a super size bag. It didn’t bother me, but one adjacent player had summoned the TD. At that moment, the boy managed to spill the the entire bag onto our board and the floor. He was rebuked by the TD, but no further penalty was assessed. I was mostly just amused, and proceeded to crush him.

In a FIDE rated RR tournament (not a norm event), my opponent phoned me 30 minutes before our game to inform me that he had withdrawn. Unfortunately, I already had commuted about an hour and was minutes away from the club. When I arrived, none of the staff knew of the withdrawal. They did tell me about my opponent’s painful defeat the previous round. At least this story ended happily, as the withdrawing player refunded the entry fees of all 9 players.

Like many others, I could relate a few stories about opponents using profanity in a variety of languages. One particular opponent got himself into a lot of pressure, both on the clock and in his bladder. The rest rooms were on another floor, and he had less than a minute to make 10 moves to time control. I had about an hour on my clock. He launched a desperation attack, forcing me to take my time calculating wild tactics. He repeatedly cursed in Russian and English, which didn’t bother me, except that some of my young students walked by the board.

But my craziest story could have ended much worse. During a round in the mid 1990s, a stranger enters the room and walks up to a master. There is a brief commotion, and both the master and the stranger walk outside, passing right behind me. As I was low on time in a difficult position, I tried not to look. Police arrived in 2 or 3 minutes and, after some shouting, arrested the stranger. I found out later that the stranger had pulled a loaded gun on the master, forcing him outside. Apparently there was some love triangle. Triangular opposition anyone? (The master later offered draw to his much weaker opponent, which was accepted.)

On the bright side, I don’t have too many bad TD stories to tell. Maybe I have just been spoiled by a number of good directors in my area.

Michael Aigner

35

As for me, if I see a player who is unconscious at a chess board, I’m not going to take time and try to figure out if he’s sleeping or if he has fainted. I’m trying to wake him up to make sure that an ambulance doesn’t need to be called.

36

I saw a WFM once getting crushed by a class A player. He was chasing king around the board. She was quite obviously lost to all watching the game, many of the observers hoping she would get through soon, as it was already getting quite late in the evening, and they wanted the next round to get started. But, she played on. Incredibly, the A player could not “seal the deal” and stalemated her.
After the game was over the WFM looked at her audience and made this comment “boys, one does not become a master by resigning”.

Rob Jones

37

This is the kind of story that often begins threads with titles like “What pairing would you make?”. I’d enjoy a few more details, that might shed some light on why the TD paired the way he did. You seemed to be saying that, because of the half-point byes, it should have been easy to make all the colors work in round 2 – which is probably true, but I’m still curious.

Bill Smythe

38

A friend of mine once claimed triple occurrence, and got a ruling from an NTD who might have been the person you’re talking about (I’m not quite sure, because your story omits a few details, which is just as well). The NTD granted the claim. As soon as the NTD walked away, my friend realized that the claim was not valid because it had been white’s move twice and black’s move once during the three occurrences. Rather than posting the result as a draw, my friend had the good sportsmanship to resign (he was busted anyway). As far as I know the NTD was never told about his error.

Bill Smythe

39

I once managed to prevent a situation like this. Another spectator (from the same club) and I were watching a time scramble. This spectator was relatively new to tournament chess. Somehow, I had the feeling he might try to blurt out something. I was ready. As soon as he reached out his right arm to point at the clock and announce that the flag had fallen, I pushed his arm down with my left arm. Fortunately, he got the message, and said nothing. Later, he told me, “Geez, I didn’t know I wasn’t supposed to say anything.”

Bill Smythe

40

A win for which player? Historically, checkmate replaced capturing the king. If you have no moves that don’t put your king into check, and it’s your move, you’d have to move into check and have your king get captured.