I wish I could be as optimistic. Nationwide, however, there are still a lot of G/5 d/0 blitz events – including, unless something has changed recently, all the blitz side events associated with CCA tournaments.
I will not play blitz unless there is a 2-second increment.
Bill Smythe
The national scholastic tournament blitz rules were last updated in December 2015 and are still G/5;d0. Supernationals VI had 942 players using that time control.
For the FIDE-philes, how do you deal with the following?
Black is in check. Notwithstanding, he plays Qxg2#!!!. (This is not some gimmicky problem situation—this happens not infrequently in practice, either by missing a pin, or just being overeager). If White picks up any piece (whether to capture the King or not), he apparently waives his right to call the illegal move. Is White now actually checkmated, despite Black being in check? If not, what is White permitted to do?
White does not give up his right to claim the illegal move when he picks up a piece, he gives up that right when he makes a legal move. Until he hits the clock he has the right to correct his own illegal move and make a legal move.
I’m sorry but you spent an entire post saying that nowhere in the Laws does it say what the penalty is for capturing the king. The penalty is whatever the illegal move penalties are and it is also quite clear it is not an illegal move until the clock is pressed.
A blog post I wrote after the St. Louis Rapid & Blitz covers your question of what happens upon castling with two hands. It can be found here… chesstournamentservices.com/2017 … ly-1-2017/ (Hopefully the moderators won’t pull this post because of me posting the link.)
Basically the way I see it is once you make a legal move, or you make an illegal move and press the clock, you can no longer claim an illegal move so it is a case of last illegal move loses. However, if a player makes an illegal move and doesn’t press the clock then he has the right to correct the illegal move with a legal one, with touch move in effect. In this case he can still also claim his opponent’s illegal move, until he makes a legal move on the board.
I believe I’ve already provided my answer to the original question (twice) and so I’ll leave this be for now. Please remember that all these rulings are made based on the assumption of an unsupervised blitz/rapid game. One illegal move doesn’t lose the game in the regular competition rules or for supervised blitz/rapid.
I’m confused about how that squares with what Ken Ballou says:
viewtopic.php?p=319822#p319822
Obviously, there’s a difference here because White has no legal moves because…well, he’s in checkmate if it weren’t for the fact that Black’s in check as well. It sounds like Ken is saying that if (in a different situation) White captures the King with a piece which has some legal move, he does give up his right to call the illegal move even if he hasn’t hit his clock. It’s that interpretation which I (and others apparently) find a bit hard to fathom as it can lead to really absurd situations.
OK, so where are we? By now it seems that:
The latest version of my suggested fix is as follows:
A player who completes an illegal move shall lose the game, provided that (a) the positions immediately prior to the player’s completed move and immediately prior to the opponent’s previous move were both legal, and (b) the opponent’s previous move was legal. If either (a) or (b) is not met, the game shall revert to the most recent legal position and continue from there.
A position is “legal” if it can be arrived at from the opening setup position via any sequence of legal moves. This means that, for example, any position with a king missing would be illegal, as would any position where the player not on move is in check.
I think this takes care of “typical” capture-the-king scenarios, as well as GM Browne’s intolerable KxK.
Bill Smythe
In the original scenario that started this thread, the arbiter did NOT have to bend FIDE rules to make a ruling. FIDE rules are crystal clear on that one. In your hypotheticals an arbiter might have to bend rules or make something up.
Your proposed rule still allows capture-the-king, as long as the player neither completes the move by hitting the clock, nor pauses the clock. Am I the only one who thinks this will produce a lot of ambiguity and need for rulings in blitz games?
For example, let’s extend the original scenario to create new hypotheticals: A left her king en prise and hit the clock. B took A’s king and declared that A had lost, and did not press his clock. A said “wait, you’re not allowed to take the king in FIDE blitz.” Then:
[1] They call the arbiter over, clock is still running, and B’s flag falls (B loses, because he did not properly claim the illegal move and therefore the win before his flag fell or the arbiter stopped the clock.)
[2] B pauses the clock so they can call the arbiter over (B loses because he improperly stopped the clock during a game. That’s been stated.)
[3] A pauses the clock so they can call the arbiter over (?)
OK, you’re right, since player B had not yet pressed the clock. Duh. 
The problem would have started if and when B had pressed the clock.
My proposed rule, and the existing FIDE rule, both allow capturing the king – or, for that matter, moving a rook diagonally, moving a pawn backwards, promoting to a king, capturing your own piece, etc – as long as the player fixes everything and makes a legal move before pressing the clock.
What needs to be guarded against is the possibility that a completed illegal move by player A – whether deliberate or accidental, and whether leaving the king in check or something else – will disrupt player B’s thought process and possibly cause player B to himself make an illegal move. In this case, IMHO, player B should not lose the game based on his illegal move.
Perhaps the following simplified version would do the trick:
A player who completes an illegal move shall lose the game, provided that no illegal positions have arisen, and no illegal moves have been completed by the opponent, during the 4 plies (2 move-pairs) immediately prior to the player’s completed illegal move. If, however, such illegal positions or illegal moves have occurred, the game shall revert to the most recent legal position and continue from there.
Just as I’d hate to see player B lose because of an illegal move following player A’s illegal move, I’d also hate to see player B lose because of running out of time following player A’s illegal move. Perhaps the condition of B’s time should be defined as what it was at the moment player A had pressed her clock.
I don’t see what is improper about B stopping the clock to summon an arbiter due to A’s illegal move. In fact, that’s the way it’s supposed to be done, isn’t it? (Granted, it should have been done that way instead of taking the king, rather than in addition to taking the king, but still …)
That seems OK to me too. Any time an illegal move has occurred, and an arbiter is likely to be needed, it should be appropriate for either player to pause the clock to summon the arbiter.
FIDE needs to figure out the purpose behind its “capture-the-king-loses” rule. If it’s to preserve justice (e.g. to not tolerate GM Browne’s KxK), then my suggestion above in blue should suffice. If, however, it’s to punish childish behavior, then the punishment should be milder, to fit the crime, such as simply disallowing both illegal move claims and continuing the game from the last legal position.
Perhaps FIDE may someday decide it doesn’t really need “anti-KxK” at all, and will accept capturing the king (but not KxK) as a legitimate method of claiming a win when the opponent has left herself in check. I’m not sure which is better.
Bill Smythe
FIDE arbiters should note that the illegal move laws are changing, effective January 1, 2018. More details can be found at rules.fide.com/ but the short version is that the illegal move penalties will be the same for unsupervised rapid and blitz as the regular competition rules meaning a player will no longer lose upon completing their first illegal move.
Wow. FIDE has just turned this entire thread upside down. Beginning January 2018, apparently (if I am reading the link correctly), a first illegal move – in regular, rapid, and blitz – no longer loses the game. Instead, the game reverts to the position just before the illegality, and continues from there. (Touch-move applies, i.e. the player who made the illegal move must move this same piece legally, if it has a legal move.) In addition, the opponent gets 2 minutes added, in all forms of the game (regular, rapid, blitz).
A second illegal move by the same player in the same game results in a loss – in all forms (regular, rapid, blitz).
I must say, I think I like these changes a lot, but it moots almost this entire thread, beginning in January. The question of whether capturing the king is considered illegal becomes moot, because even if it were, it would be just another illegal move, and the rule then says you would revert to the point just before the original illegal move. Example: Player A hangs her king. Player B takes the king. Regardless of whether player B’s action is considered legal or illegal, the game reverts to the position right before white’s illegal hang, and continues from there (with touch-move and a 2-minute penalty).
This is marvelously clean! And it even handles GM Browne’s triple-whammy appropriately: Player X deliberately moves his king next to his opponent’s king, player Y doesn’t notice and moves a different piece, then player X plays king takes king. Talk about “This cheap shot will not be tolerated!” – player X has just made his second illegal move, and loses instantly.
I’ve felt uncomfortable for a long time about the blitz rule that says an illegal move loses immediately. I always thought a time penalty was more appropriate, even in blitz. But I sort of gave up the ghost on that idea, after just about everybody else on the planet seemed to favor illegal-move-loses. Does this mean I finally won an (old) argument? YIPPEE!!
Bill Smythe
There are some parents who put their kids in a scholastic tournament before they fully know the moves, often resulting in making (unintentionally) multiple illegal moves in a game. This would be a clear-cut rule to end those games much more quickly.
How many parents of such kids put them in FIDE rated tournaments?
I would hope the thought was that if we adopted similar language we would address a multitude of problems too.
Correct.
+1
+2
Does this mean I’m finding support here for my ADM on the fora that was resoundingly lacking at the Rules workshop and the Delegates Meeting?
Alex Relyea
Liking one rule isn’t enough to automatically accept all of them.
I dunno. For those of us too lazy to review the top of the thread(s), please tell us again what that ADM was. 
Bill Smythe
That US Chess would only rate games played under FIDE Laws of Chess.