Hello To All,

What a great site for chess! I haven't played the game in years but, with retirement, I have free time and decided to resume this game of kings!

My question is this: when starting a game I am assumming both players play without the use of assistance such as a computer or software, and that analysis by moving the pieces between turns is not permitted. Is that correct?  I was not able to find any posts on protocol.

Thanks

Computer programs, that provide analysis, used during the game is NOT permitted and is considered cheating. Cheating can result in getting your account banned, the website might even ban your IP adress so you cannot access chess.com (but only in extreme cases I think). You are correct

PS: Welcome to chess.com!

It is my belief that if you play "Online Chess" that one may set up a board and pieces and anlayze on their own so long as no one else is helping and no electronic devices are used.  I know of many people that do not like to look at the screen to analyse.  They prefer to have real 3 dimensional pieces to move and help create engrams in the brain.  I am one of these folks.

I fully suspect and hope my opponents are doing everything legally possible to find the very best moves to challenge and beat me with. 

There are sites such as ICCF (Correspondance Chess) that do allow use of engine for analysis, yet even there I run "naked" and still manage to find more nuts than your run-of-the-mill blind squirrel.

But, no computers here, legally.  And, that is a good thing.

But you ARE allowed to move the pieces around on a board between moves.  The 'Analysis board' feature can help with that.

Thanks all for the clarifications.

This Guide for the Perplexed may clarify the rules for you.

http://support.chess.com/index.php?_m=knowledgebase&_a=viewarticle&kbarticleid=17&nav=0,6

ARTREF: WHAT IS ALLOWED

http://www.chess.com/forum/view/tournaments/games-explorer

http://www.chess.com/forum/view/general/what-are-chess-engines

Please also consult the article i posted a while ago entitled:  "Can we use an Ouija Board when playing online chess?"

One more question by the perplexed seeking enlightment: I'm not clear about the difference between turn based and live chess. In my first game online my friend and I play for 4, 5 or 6 moves 'live' and then stop to do other things. I usually log off so my friend is not waiting for a move from me. Later, or the next day, I'll log on and respond. Is this live or turn based ?

Thanks

Here's a quick summary of the various labels used for the two forms of chess - and how the two forms differ:

 Sounds like it is turn-based. The way to check is, at the top of this page if you select Play and then On-line chess for turn-based chess and Live Chess for live chess. In live chess you normally have to make a move every so many seconds or mimutes or you have to make all your moves in a fixed number of minutes. In turn-based chess you have much longer per move (e.g. 1 day per move or 1 week per move) - of course, when playing turn-based chess it doesn't stop you moving quicker (almost instantly) if you wish - this sounds as if what you were doing.

so you cant use a chess engine to figure out the best moves calculated , but you can use the analysis board to figure out the best calculation?whats the difference? the only thing i do is set up a board at home and go through different moves , it seems like using any kind of analysis program to calculate the best move is cheating.

The analysis board doesn't calculate anything for you. It just automatically sets up a board on your computer screen with your current position on it so you don't have to set and reset your board at home.  You move the pieces around with your mouse.

To access the analysis board on your games, you click on the "move" tab over the chat dialog box. That tab will tell you what moves have been made so far.  At the bottom of the move box, you'll see a link to "analysis board."  Click that and it'll open up a new window with the pieces in their current position.  Move them around with your mouse, just like you'd move the pieces around on a board on your kitchen table.

aha that sounds better for me than setting up at home because my daughter keeps trying to move the pieces

Well, then that means it's time to teach her how to play!

If your daughter is assisting you by moving the pieces, you are contravening the site rules. 

Artfizz, I notice that your Guide for the Perplexed (very cool, BTW) talks about calculation of the best move or best outcome. Does that mean that tools which do other calculations, but don't rate moves at all, would be OK? Like a tool which calculated all the possible moves.

I was just going to refer you back to the engine discussion (http://www.chess.com/forum/view/community/define-quotchess-enginequot) - but I see you initiated that topic!

This is certainly a borderline case. In the sense that such a projection gives you information about the future, I suppose it should be disallowed. When using the Analysis Board (or a physical alternative board), it is quite easy to overlook possible moves.

There have been discussions in the past about the situation where there is only a single move possible: should the system make it automatically for you? One counterargument was that you might not be able to discover that sole possible move - and in a real game, you would therefore, timeout.

 right now she only knows the pieces name s and says check on every move. she would be better assisting me with some otb games because she would take my opponents pieces and hide them in the closet .

My wife just looked over my shoulder and told me my horsey was going to be eaten. Have I cheated?

Your daughter would do that... I know 16 year olds that do that... stupid immature idiots...