Why not use FIDE rules?

Running Chess Tournaments
1

Why not just use FIDE rules? Why does US Chess waste all this effort (and money) maintaining their own set of (different!) rules?

BTW, all the pairing problems and appeals mentioned would not be an issue if FIDE pairings are used as well. There’s only one way to pair any given round using FIDE pairing rules, and no one can appeal them!

I know everybody here hates FIDE, but why shouldn’t we leverage their rules and save all the hassle US Chess goes through trying to keep their own set of rules. It’s just dumb!

IMHO,
-Matt

2

FIDE Rules are for the most part designed for professional chess players in serious events, not amateur/casual player events like the great majority of US Chess rated events. Many of the differences, especially in pairing, are for the convenience of the players. For example, would you like to travel 1000 miles to play in an event only to be paired against your brother in an early round?

And would you want your city to only use traffic rules developed by the EU?

I don’t think most people hate FIDE, I think they realize FIDE has a much different role in chess than the US Chess Federation.

You are perfectly free to use FIDE rules in any events you organize, though.

3

“FIDE Rules are for the most part designed for professional chess players in serious events.”

This misconception is continually perpetuated, but is simply not true. FIDE rules, and pairings, are already in use at any FIDE rated section in dozens of big Swiss events across the country (and the world). Almost every other country uses them in all their tournaments, amateur or professional. There’s no reason we can’t also.

Your pairing example is so rare, and if the players were just told, “Sorry, that’s the rules.” (especially ahead of time) they would play.

And your traffic analogy is moot. There are big weekend swisses, and amateur club tournaments all over the world, and they seem to be doing just fine with FIDE rules.

We’re not that special.

-Matt

4

Then lets consider other differences and see if American chess would really be better served by FIDE rules. Do you really want tournament directors calling flags (especially when there are too few tournament directors to do so fairly)? Do you really want all electronic notation systems to be banned? Do you really want players to lose the game because they moved with both hands twice? Do you really want the possibility of correcting an illegal move on move three after fifty moves have been played? Do you really want to abolish online tournaments for all practicable purposes because FIDE rules require players to be physically supervised by arbiters?

I could go on but you probably have the point by now. Simply using FIDE rules for all US Chess events would be utterly intolerable and impracticable. You can a list of differences between FIDE and US Chess rules at: https://new.uschess.org/sites/default/files/media/documents/uschess-fide-rules-comparison.pdf

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If you go on then you add:
K+2R can lose on time to K+N
Promoting to an upside down rook is promoting to a rook, not a queen
If you make your move and then claim three-fold repetition before hitting the clock then the claim will be denied
There have been husband-wife and father-son pairings that could not be changed because of the pairing rules
Once the pairings are posted they cannot be changed if it turns out that a game was reported incorrectly
Avoiding intra-team pairings could not be done for the extremely common individual/team scholastic tournaments
In a multiple time control if you are keeping score while your opponent is not, and you flag in the first time control, then your own scoresheet can be used by the arbiter to prove that you lost on time

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These two are the ones that really bother me just from a practicality standpoint.

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All these differences are being called at every FIDE rated event in the US already.

And yes, I do want TDs calling flags! It’s a rules violation and the referees should call it. Players can also call flags in FIDE rules; it’s not required that only arbiters call them. I’ll never understand why people think it’s OK for US TDs to not call out rules violations if they see them. Why is it only OK for the players to call violations? Most of them don’t know the rules!

FIDE has approved electronic scorekeeping devices.

And sure, if an illegal move occurred on move 3, the game can go back to that position and the game restarted. The clocks don’t have to be adjusted! The round will still end on time.

And what’s wrong with a player with K+R+R losing on time to a K+N? HE LOST ON TIME! Checkmate is possible, so he loses. This one is really bad in my view since the result of the game can be different in the US than the rest of the world! That is not good.

The pairing restrictions @jwiewel mentioned are only actually forbidden in norm tournaments. It’s common for players to not play each other in FIDE tournaments for political reasons.

In general, there are tournaments all over the US being run with FIDE rules with no problems. Why not teach all of our players to use them? It’s ridiculous that some tournaments have different rules for different sections. Talk about inconsistency!

And it will save countless hours of us arguing over US-only rules, and the expense of maintaining them.

And if a US rule is better, let’s get FIDE to change theirs!

-Matt

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Let’s rephrase Chess Entrepreneur’s question. Do you really want to hire enough TDs that there will always be one to call flags?

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I’ve been to a FIDE Meeting and served on a FIDE technical committee. Getting FIDE to make rule changes is a VERY political process (and perhaps some money changes hands, too.) And let’s face it, when it comes to Americans and international politics, we muck it up almost every time, whether that’s with FIDE, the UN, the World Bank, NATO, etc.

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Again, PLAYERS CAN CALL FLAGS under FIDE rules. The only difference is that arbiters can also if they witness it. This fallacy that FIDE requires dozens of more arbiters is just not true. There are huge swisses run under FIDE rules with just a few arbiters. INCLUDING IN THE USA!

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Personally, I wouldn’t object to being able to call flags as a TD, though you can’t just do so casually when walking past the board. Similarly, pointing out illegal moves IF YOU SEE THEM seems OK to me.

I understand the counter-argument, that it can lead to claims of selective rule enforcement, but I have not seen this become a factor in FIDE rated events I’ve observed.

The laissez-faire approach US Chess uses can be carried to extremes, I was at one event where the chief TD announced: If you want to make a claim, we’re in the TD room.

12

This is true, though my impression is things are better in the Arbiters and rules committees. We used to have more influence there with the likes of Sevan :frowning:

It happened in golf many decades ago, the USGA and the Royal and Ancient golf club got together and made the rules the same worldwide. Is it folly to hope for the same in chess? (Probably :slight_smile: )

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Yes, and in practice most standard rate games that get into a time scramble are witnessed by TDs.

Also, in US rules a TD is already supposed to call illegal moves, but only if it’s not a sudden-death time control. THAT doesn’t seem fair. Referees should be able to referee!

-Matt

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11H. Director corrects illegal move outside of time pressure.
Except in a time pressure situation (11D1), a director who witnesses an illegal move being made shall require the
player to replace that move with a legal one in accordance with 10B, Touch-move rule. The time on the clocks shall
not be adjusted; however, move counters on clocks that have them may be readjusted. See also 11J, Deliberate
illegal moves and 21D, Intervening in games.

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I’m less concerned with “selective” so much as “random”, in that at a club level event the TD is likely playing and so can’t see more than about 1 game, and that at a slightly bigger event you still may only have 2 TDs for 50-100 players. With that ratio, if a TD happens to spot a flag or an illegal move or not is just a matter of luck.

Only if it’s not a time-pressure situation, as you noted later, which is not defined in terms of sudden death.

11D1. Illegal move in time pressure.
Time pressure is defined 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.

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Even if the TDs aren’t playing, I’m not sure which games get a TD’s possibly brief attention are random, they’re likely to be the top boards and the ones closest to the aisles.

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You are ignoring one of the most important objections: “Do you really want to abolish online tournaments for all practicable purposes because FIDE rules require players to be physically supervised by arbiters?”

Also, the cost of arguing over American rules at Delegates meetings is surely less than the cost of persuading (or perhaps bribing) FIDE to change its rules.

18

I agree strongly with Mr. Phelps, and, in fact, once submitted an ADM to that effect.

I find it extremely odd that there is the presumption here that a childrens’ tournament in India has enough arbiters, and licensed arbiters at that, to watch every game all the time. As Mr. Phelps says, every other country is able to abide by the Laws of Chess. No country has non-Championship events with ten times as many arbiters as we do.

The real issue is that we, likely parents of scholastic players, don’t trust TDs to be objective, Many TDs at scholastic events have some sort of coaching relationship with some of the players, and presumably parents fear that if their kid plays one of the TD’s kids, then the TD will ignore his kid’s illegal behaviors but enforce everything their kid does wrong. Or at least be involved in his kids’ games and ignore the others. So if one of the TD’s students gets up to wander the hall, the TD is going to enforce Touch Move on his opponent, but he’s not likely to see someone else make a Touch.

So do we accept the neutrality of TDs or not? Well, we have sanctions for TDs who act on any biases, and most TDs I’ve played for or worked with bend over backwards not to show any favoritism.

So, yes, TDs should be able to enforce the rules based on what happened, not what the opponent can prove. All the rules. If someone moves twice with two hands and loses the game (immediately), then he will have learned not to do it again.

And as far as online tournaments go, we don’t rate them, at least not in our “real” systems. There is no market for online tournaments being rated in the OTB system, so I don’t see the issue, but there are many strong events conducted online, so there must be some accommodation with tthe Laws of Chess.

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Top boards may be slightly better but “closest to the aisles” might as well be random round by round.

Sure. I mean, chess.com and lichess.org already have online tournaments locked down.

I do not believe that said childrens’ tournament, or similar tournaments, are run by the Laws of Chess as written by FIDE. But I think I’d rather have rules variants that acknowledge and accept the differences rather than essentially lie about it.

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They are. All the recent FIDE ratings adjustments are because of a huge influx of FIDE rated kids from India. All FIDE rated tournaments must use FIDE rules.