"Stalemate is not a logical rule." 

But @Monster's continual rant (remains) highly logical.

Syllogisms reign supreme, yet again.  

This thread is totally Stale, Mate.

Very punny batgirl!

No its not easy to understand. If you can capture the king to win standard games will feel like blitz games. I think if your complaining about stalemate because you keep giving stalemate, I suggest you look before you move and improve your endgame play so you wont give stalemate pretty much ever again because you have good knowledge of the endgame. You would want to keep stalemate again because it wont be affecting you when your winning. When your loosing in a million dollar game ,lets say, and the player is around 500 points higher than you in rating points; you would wish stalemate was around! Lets say you are loosing and you no legal moves left, it would have been a draw but no, stalemate is no longer here so who is the looser here not the person who is winning of course. And if you move into what was supposed to check for you, because why say check when your trying to take the king, who wins, like really now, who wins. Or lets change the rules again and make the king jump over the file or rank where a rook or queen is controlling to make the solution to it also? I am really sick of this getting rid of stalemate crap.

I might have repeated someones post, I didnt read them all btw.

Stalemate threads need to be abolished...

Then how am I supposed to spend my vacation?  This thread is the highlight of my summer.

Stalemate is the due and proper punishment of the "woulda, coulda, shoulda" winner getting sloppy.

I've done it more than once. How many times, I'm not telling...it is nobody's business. lol

It really does make you feel like a fool to lose a game that you had all but won. In fact, I think it stings more than losing. And, the loser who gets a stalemate feels better than if he had won, because he was "down for the count".

All around, it is a nifty law of nature. Chess is boring enough. Stalemate adds some spice and high drama (OK...that's a bit of a stretch) to the game.

Eggshells...we are walking on eggshells in a minefield. That's what I keep telling myself, from start to finish.

Buy a timeshare to highlight your summer.

No, it's not a stretch.  Just look at all the drama it's caused in this thread alone.  It just doesn't have as great of an influence over players that have developed a much more mature relationship with the game.

Funny like a clown.

Part of the problem is not only the "loser" but also the "winner" comtributes to a stalemate. You can almost always go back and find perfectly reasonable alternate moves that  keep the other player from ending up in a stalemate. But yeah i see your point.

Monster I admired your fierce/acerbic campaigning style ! ( Also 9000 games at 10/0 !! )

Look forward to the next one...

And here I was thinking that this thread had the potential to surpass Monster's previous stalemate thread, but it's about 250 posts short.

Saying stalemate needs to be abolished is a sign of a sore loser. No offense.

Well, I suspect someone(s) above must have already said this...but I don't have the time/inclination to tread through all the noise...and, if no one has said it...then it is high time that someone did.

Getting proficient at obtaining a stalemate from an ostensibly lost position is a skill. (Unless, of course, the supposed "winner" just screws up...which is often the case).

For years now, I have had "to do" lists. I'm almost certain that: "Practice how to turn a sow's ear into a silk purse at your chess game." is somewhere on that list. Just above: "Call the cemetary and purchase a pre-paid "final services" plan."

I actually admire people who have spent dozens, hundreds and even...in rare cases, I'm sure, thousands of hours on finessing a stalemate.

They are to be commended.

Actually e4nf3, in 559 prior posts I don't think anyone else actually praised the skill of the stalemater - you make a fair point.  The closest I think we came was saying that it could be result of sacrificial combination.  In the 2 games of Monsters that we looked at that seem to have sparked this tirade though it seems to be just a failure to win rather than a success at drawing.