In a different thread I responded to a comment by saying: “We really need to stop thinking of increment as mainly just a FIDE thing.” Increment is great for US Chess rated play as well and an increasing number of US Chess rated tournaments are using increment. How can we get past the notion that a lot of people seem to have in that increment is mainly just a FIDE thing?
The people you have to convince are the organizers. I think most players who would attend a tournament with delay would also attend one with increment – I know I would. But the organizers are the ones who decide what the TC will be. Here in Wisconsin, I know of only one organizer who routinely offers increment TCs. Most of them are still in the habit of using delay.
Personally, I’m OK with either. Increment is obviously better if you’re in time trouble, but the downside of that is that people may be more likely to procrastinate and get into time trouble. Using delay instead might give such people an incentive to manage their time better and keep the game moving. But that’s a relatively minor point, and I’m also assuming the standard lengths – 5 second delay and 30 second increment. The length may be more important than whether it’s delay or increment. The only kind of TC I absolutely wouldn’t play is sudden death that doesn’t use either delay or increment.
I’m not convinced that increment is better than delay for the G/30-G/60 tournaments that are so common in US Chess. Even with a longer time control at Nationals, comparing G/90inc30 vs G/120d5; with over 1000-2500 games in a round the increment time control is likely to get some games long enough to throw the schedule off.
The increment doesn’t have to be 30 seconds! The Portland Chess Club runs a tournament once a month with a time control of G/50;inc15 and another tournament once a month with a time control of G/60;inc5 and both of these events work very well with these time controls.
Count me as one saying that increment should be 30 seconds and delay 5, with increment for blitz 2. I feel that increment should allow chances for a game to reach its normal conclusion, while delay prevents a loss in a dead drawn position and even allows trivial wins. Delay should be for reaction time while increment should allow for rudimentary calculation. Anything in between is neither fish nor fowl, so it is just a question of what problem you’re trying to solve. It is certain that a round played under any increment setting will take longer than the same round under the “equivalent” delay.
Alex Relyea
If I’m trying to run a faster turnaround tournament (ASAP or scheduled 30 minutes between rounds), I would prefer G/60d5 to G/50inc15. It’s going to be a rare game where the latter would seem to be preferable (to the players) and that game would make it worse for everybody else.
In the Chicago area, it seems the “conversion” has already taken place. Almost all “slow” events (2 days, with main controls of at least 90 minutes) are already run using increment. For faster events (1 day, with controls like G/65 or faster), delay remains king.
The one major exception seems to be CCA, which uses delay (albeit 10 seconds instead of 5) for almost all of its events.
Bill Smythe
Under increment time controls, if two opponents are so inclined, they can really mess up the round times by making a number of random moves or several different two repetitions, and then go back to an original position while adding a number of minutes to their clock. I watched this happen in a Canadian tournament when a couple of kids who were hungry devised a plan to get food and not lose time on their clock. Each of them played around twenty random moves or so and gained 10+ minutes each to run to the snack and drink table. Then they sauntered back to their game to continue play. They did the same thing again when snacks ran low. Their game ran well over 100 moves and caused the following round, the third game of the day, to be late. As I recall, the arbiter, once aware of this subterfuge, advised them not to do it again in terms that would sear gentle ears.
As an organizer and a TD, I think running an increment style tournament with rounds tightly set with less than an hour between a normal end time and the start of a next round is only asking for trouble. Increment, if it is to be used, must be 30 seconds and used for events that have a maximum of two games per day. Any increment time variant with less than 30 seconds should not require writing down moves and should follow Quick Chess or Rapid rules. Such a variant should require publishing it in advance so that the players will have warning. They will then have only themselves to blame for playing under abominable conditions. 
Under delay rules, this type of “gaming” of the system to gain time is less likely to happen but is still possible. Under delay timing, the “gaming” players will often pause the clock and wander off to get food, go to the bathroom, or check the standings. 
It is easy for friends and/or kids to do this if they do not like playing with a clock. This used to happen in the analogue clock era, too. At that time, the players would come back to find both Kings tipped over by the TD, if he caught them doing this. They would be marked with a double forfeit on the crosstable and removed from the following round pairings. It is a pain and a bore, but you have to watch players, clocks, and spectators to see what they are up to. TDs cannot take anything for granted. There is no rest for the weary.
The adjournment procedure remains in the rulebook for several reasons. This is prime among them. On the facts described, I order the players to seal without batting an eyelash.
I’ve moved this topic from US Chess Issues to Running Chess Tournaments.
See bolded text. I assume you mean this to apply to time pressure, with less than 5 minutes main time on a player’s clock. As I recall you have posted about this before.
It has always been true under USCF/US Chess rules that with an increment of less than 30 seconds, a player with less than 5 minutes left is excused from keeping score. It has never been otherwise. Not sure why anyone would think players in time pressure in games played with less than 30 seconds of increment per move are required to keep score. That has never been the rule.
As for “should follow Quick Chess or Rapid rules”: Not sure why a game played at G/120, inc-15, for example, should not follow Regular time control rules. I once played a friendly match with a chess friend at G/60, inc-15, back when that was the slowest control that could be Dual-rated. It felt like “real” rated chess, even without quotes attached.
This statement is not accurate.
So you’re saying a time control such as G/120;inc10 should follow quick chess or rapid rules?
+1
Both increment and delay were designed to eliminate adjournments. With present technology and programs, an adjournment would find one or both players running to their computers to access algorithms and endgame pods. That is an unacceptable situation for all of the players.
When, may I ask are you to complete these adjourned games? In a normal weekend Swiss System tournament, with its rushed round times, there is little time to find to run an adjournment. If the event is 5 rounds, an adjourned game from round 1 will be played off when? After the third round late in the evening, or on Sunday morning at 7 am? In the mean time, pairings have been affected by this unplayed game. If the game is a Round 4 game, it cannot be played off after Round 5. It has been standard that all adjournments must be finished before the last round can be paired. Otherwise, you have a mess on your hands as far as standings and prizes. Adjournments were from an era of one game a day round robin tournaments with off days to play off unfinished games. Even then, players complained about adjournments as upsetting their rhythm and giving players with an entourage of endgame fiends an advantage. There are horror stories of players having to play off 3 or more adjournments in the morning and then having to play the regular round in the afternoon minutes after completing the their last adjournment. The modern open Swiss System events, with or without tiebreaks, has dispensed with adjournments to avoid the chaos of dealing with a number of adjournments pending.
I used to deal with adjournments in Swiss System events when the time controls were long and repeating (50 moves in two hours, followed by 25 in one hour, 25 in one hour, etc.). Adjourned games were played off on Sunday morning at 7 am. That meant the TD, moi, had to show up at 6 am to set up for the games and have the adjourned move card in the envelope ready to be opened. Of course, that meant I usually had gone to bed at 2 am after adjourning a late third round game at move 50 at 1 am. The nightmare scenario was to have several adjournments with one or more going past 9 am which was the time for Round 4 to start. That would mean a further adjournment to just before the last round. All adjournments were required to be done so that the final round could be paired. Delays would push the last round back and put us up against the time the site would close. It is all good to say that you can adjourn the game, but there are many other factors to consider.
Games with delay finish up faster. Games with increment may finish on time, but they also may not and we can end up with a lingering game. Games that continue with one or more adjournments have too negative of an impact on a tournament. When I, as a player, see an event with three rounds on a day with increment time, that is an event to avoid. As an organizer, I would not do this to the players as the physical effects of playing 12 hours or more of chess on one day is too demanding and potentially dangerous for older players. Even oldsters have a normal bedtime.
One comment I heard about the effect of increment time controls was that it reduces the time in games that may well have needed it and it increases the time in games where the tournament may be adversely affected by the increase. If 40/120;d10, SD/30;d10 is converted to 40/90;inc30, SD/30;inc30 then a complex opening/middle game that used to need most of the entire two hours (per player) for the first twenty moves is limited to at most 100 minutes for those first 20 moves. while a 120 move game has its time increased by 30 minutes per player.
One thing to remember about adjournments is that if players finish a round early (might be more likely with increment) then they don’t have to wait until the next morning to play out a previous adjournment.
Then you have the “Greg Small simul” where expert Greg had a (fairly straightforward) round two adjournment against a master and a long-running round three straightforward ending against another master. The first master finished round 3 early and Greg was willing to play out the adjournment while his round 3 game was still going on. There were a number of times where Greg was simply sitting with both of the masters on move (he drew both).