If you take the silly scholastic blitz rules literally, then yes.
Scholastic blitz rule: Neither player may play king takes king.
Corollary: If two kings are next to each other, neither is in check.
Corollary: Therefore, the prohibition against moving the king next to your opponent’s king must be a special rule of its own, not born of the prohibition against moving into check.
Bill Smythe
I’m sorry. I meant that I don’t understand this in relation to the first sentence of 14H1.
Alex Relyea
Maybe I did not phrase this well. I mean "only in games played in events where the time control includes a standard delay or increment—even though some games might be played with analog clocks."
It still happens. With the clock substitution rule/variation in effect, the only time a player can be forced to play with a non-delay clock in a SD event is if he/she does not have a delay clock to use. For that matter, you could try to borrow one on the way to the board, I guess…
Ah, now I understand. So how would you handle dead drawn positions when the player with more time just tries to run out the opponent’s clock?
Alex Relyea
With a delay or increment in effect there is nothing to handle. The player with less time should be able to hold the draw, using the delay or increment time to prove it. Sometimes that is not enough time, the player blunders and loses, or thinks too long and flags. Been there myself. In those cases: Tough beans.
This is the exact argument I used when delay became standard and old-time players moaned about how it gave an “unfair advantage” to the player who burned too much time. That player will still be a disadvantage in such cases—as it should be—but the opponent cannot win based only on the clock…also as it should be.
But with a game played under no delay, such as G/5, d/0 Blitz…that’s where we need some form of ILC to handle at least the deadest of dead draws. Did you see the game from the FIDE Women’s Candidates Tournament a few years ago? K+minor piece won against K+minor piece, on appeal, since a mating position is possible via a series of legal moves.
That can’t happen under USCF rules, but what about K+RP+B of the wrong color vs. K on the queening square? As I read USCF Blitz rules, if the player with lone K flags, he loses. (Defaults of no delay and no ILC.) That’s where the problem comes in. Such a farce should not be rated under any system.
When you play informal G/5 blitz at the club and your opponent refuses to agree to a draw in that case, you can just put him down as too competitive, to be polite, and play someone else the next time.
But I think I made my point, and enough players feel otherwise to justify this new Blitz system. We shall see how it goes.
Many, many , many, many, many, many years ago, Tim Just and I were running a (standard) tournament. A player named Otokar Uhlir (who had been a top junior in Yugoslavia years prior to that – along with Dr. Eugene Martinovsky) came out of retirement to play in our event.
One round, he was playing a “part-time expert” and after 39 moves had reached a position where he had to complete one move to the time control - and two moves to mate.
He moved the piece, and then sat for a moment with his hand on the button of the clock. His flag dropped. His opponent claimed. Tim verified and ruled a loss.
Otokar’s response (best heard with the wonderful accent) was: “Well, I guess I should have moved a little faster.”
There are times that yes, grinding out B+(wrong)RP + time advantage may not be the most sporting thing to do. But I never complain about that, irrespective of which side I am on. You know why?
Because it’s BLITZ.
And if I lose on time, irrespective of the position, I can always remind myself:
“Well, I guess I should have moved a little faster.”
The best way to handle it, of course, is just to have delay or increment to begin with.
At this point, 14H should be replaced by a simple clock substitution rule. Something along the lines of:
Bill Smythe
No, no, no, no, no … dear Caissa, no … I can easily imagine the fights that would break out when one or the other player is displeased with the director’s decision. I can easily imagine the “gamesmanship” of someone intentionally starting the game with an analog clock and then “demanding” to switch to a digital clock in time pressure. I can even imagine someone bringing both an analog and a digital clock for exactly that purpose and then making a scene when the director says “h*ll no.”
Ken, do you think such a player with two clocks would wait until under 30 seconds (preferably under 10) and then ask for a clock switch (gaining time to calculate the position and also gaining time to actually play)? Do you think such a player would play down to the last seconds with the opponent making fast, crazy moves trying to flag him, knowing that the clock switch was always available (even though his opponent might not know a clock was available)?
In quick and regular games, the availability of 14H helps short-circuit long attempts to win on time with Q+K+P vs Q+K (with five-second delay it added about 15 minutes to the end of the round in the class A section of the Chicago Class before one player finally asked if a draw could be claimed - which was treated as a fifty-move draw request after at least 150 moves by each player with the pawn not moving, and there are additional examples among experts and masters). Resolving a 14H claim can sometimes be difficult, but not having 14H because of delay can also sometimes be difficult.
I remember hearing of one case where a player with an analog clock tried to make a 14H claim but still had 10 minutes. He questioned the refusal and the logic of the rule until the director made multiple time penalties that got him down to two minutes, at which point the director was able to grant the claim.
Some TDs have been known, in situations like this, to tell the player to wait until he is down to 2 minutes, then claim again. Then the TD adds, “If you like, I can set your clock down to 2 minutes right away, just to save time. That way, you can re-claim immediately.”
Bill Smythe
Of course, the arbiter could post his grant / deny criteria at the start of the tournament. For example, he could post:
Alternatively:
Or the above could be combined with:
Such arbiter policies could turn off the chicanery, while still allowing a clock substitution whenever the arbiter feels it is appropriate.
Bill Smythe
I will require that the player be able to provide a suitable water clock, with delay.