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Hello everybody - and a warm welcome to the newest members of Chess Athenians. It might be an idea if we introduced ourselves. Here is a table of (us) members. You may choose (or not!) to reveal some facet of your personality so that the rest of the group can get a glimpse of the Athenian behind the mask. I'll edit any comments into this table for quick reference! Don't be shy. Username Name Little (or well) known snippet aabbccdd Chess and hockey are my two interests. andyvai andy vai artfizz Art Fizz I’m having a shed built to house the trophies won by Chess Athenians callmeaspade Vladimir Lopatka clbcrosby Caleb Crosby I do American Civil War re-enacting as a member of the 16th LA infantry." You can check out our website at diammich1 Michael D. "All I know is that I know nothing!" (Socrates) Duffer1965 Karl ExtraBold Joe Otten guitardog JG27Pyth JG27 Pyth jpd303 Jesse hobbies include D & D, chess (obviously), learning, hacky-sack, guitar, lovin my wife, playing with dogs, video games, work (yes work is a hobby when you love your job), brooding, pondering, smoking, reading, listening to music, cooking, watching movies, and taking care of people. favorite philosophers/scientists include J.S. Mill, Freud, Marx, Neitzche, Plato, Darwin, Sagan, Schroedinger, Einstein, Hawking, Guth, Spinoza, Kant, and Aristotle. Favorite players include Tal, Alekhine, Nimzo, Bogo, Shabolov, Kasparov, Tarrasch, Anderseen, Nakamura, and Lasker. jubilousfire kosmeg Kostis Marinho Mário Pimenta Melanerz Mark Melaney NotAgain Ralph Bennett Percyval Abdiel Lozada other hobbies besides chess: debating, reading, going to the movies, listening to different kinds of music etc. rhoskins Richard Hoskins He was a wise man who invented beer. --Plato samtheman405 samuel foster Skeptikill Stephen Forde SofaKing David Davis waiit Deiniol Cardz-Coodor weir96 weir kong

Apparently. Despite this group having slumbered for a couple of years, along come not 1, not 2 not even 3, but fully 4 Spartans rumbling for a showdown. Shall we let their challenge go unheeded? Or shall we meet in open conflict? (And afterwards, switch off the Team Match option so we don't get any more of these!) Who's with me?

The recent spate of resignation threads seems to have jogged the chess-spartans' memory that that is their raison d'etre (pardon my French!). There's talk in the wind of a Vote Chess game between chess-spartans and chess-athenians - probably on a 3 days per move setting. Any takers?

Hello everybody - and a warm welcome to the newest members of Chess Athenians. It might be an idea if we introduced ourselves. Here is a table of (us) members. You may choose (or not!) to reveal some facet of your personality so that the rest of the group can get a glimpse of the Athenian behind the mask. I'll edit any comments into this table for quick reference! Don't be shy. 64tattva D Scott Prestbury whosnextt craig dalton padeliso Pantelis Orfanidis Fantasista Marco Flaconi Salmi Kirill Trishkin callmeaspade Melanerz Mark Melaney SofaKing David Davis Percyval Abdiel Lozada jubilousfire andyvai andy vai NotAgain Ralph Bennett clbcrosby Caleb Crosby waiit Deiniol Cardz-CoCo guitardog weir96 weir kong kosmeg Kostis rhoskins Richard Hoskins kid_of_chess Ennud Semaj Ocsecnarf samtheman405 Samuel Foster JG27Pyth JG27 Pyth Duffer1965 Karl artfizz Art Fizz I started this group. Can anybody still remember why?

I'm richardhoskins on twitter, in case you were dying to know. http://twitter.com/RichardHoskins Anybody else?

callmeaspade wrote: Hi everyone, I wonder, when are we going to smite those pesky Spartans in a team match? Hasn't the time come to destroy them in a bloody fashion... I mean, to shed the light of democracy upon those poor beings? Given that there are currently 133 Spartans and 22 Athenians, we should select the battleground carefully! Let's make a list of who's in - and then issue a specific challenge.

How much demand is there for a Vote Chess match? Would it make our Team Match results worse? (Is that even possible!)

Percyval mentioned his interest in music. Lists of artists and songs are all very well, but unless you're already familiar with them, it doesn't get you very far. YouTube contains a wealth of music videos. It should be possible to find a link to a favourite song and post it here.

Michael Marcovici's art ends the autocratic rule of the player over the pieces: http://sites.google.com/site/artmarcovici/democratic-chess Perhaps this is why I lose so much. Who am I to decide where my knights should sit?

We have been challenged by The Power of Chess for a team match. Is anyone interested?

Team Philippines - have challenged us to a Team Match. Here's some initial 'gen' that may give us an edge. The Philippines is an archipelago made up of 7,107 islands (volcanic in origin) in the Pacific Ocean. Other bodies of water that surround the archipelago are the South China Sea on the west and north and the Celebes Sea on the south. Most of the larger islands feature mountain ranges. The highest peak is Mt. Apo (9,690 ft/2,954 m), on the island of Mindanao. The rest of the islands include coastal plains, valleys, volcanoes, forests springs (mineral and hot). p.s. They have 350+ members to our 20 or so!

I believe it was customary for victors in ancient warfare to hold enemy hostages for ransom. I propose we institute something like that in our next match against the Sp**t*ns. A side bet, if you will.

We have been challenged by the team match titans

Well, I've been campaigning for "Best Group Manager of the Year" for many months now, but since Chesskween has thrown her hat into the mix, I haven't been able to post a single comment anywhere. I'd feel too guilty competing against her. So I'm switching my campaign to "Member of the Year" since it's the only other one that I'm in contention for (although I was a lot closer in the other one). Good Luck Jane. I'll tell people to vote for you. I hope you do the same for me. Click here to vote on Chess.com Site Trophies go to page 3 Please vote: Best Group Manager of the Year - Chesskween Most Enthusiastic Beginner of the Year - Melanerz Chess.com Member of the Year - Billium248 Thank You.

Maybe a 5 player team match.

The Smiling Assassins : A small group (currently 7) formed to play team based chess. objective: To earn a reputation for strong play,honesty and reliability. We are not interested in numerical strength only strength of character to give your best in team games. Membership will be by invite only. This TEAM MATCH is set at one move per day. Do all members of our group receive automatic invitations to Team Matches? Team size: 4 - 7 players. Rating restriction: 1300 - 1850. Who is available and itching for a scrap?

The Dark Knight Opens (on DVD) (Dec. 9th) As many of you know, I started my first ever Chess.com tournament, The Dark Knight Opens, all the way back on July 18th when the movie was released. Now it's 5 months later, the DVD is coming out just in time for Christmas, and 2 out of the 3 groups are still in the First Round (I confess, I'm one of the 7 people still playing games in Round 1 - sorry)!! There have been a lot of learning experiences along the way, which should help make this tournament run a littler smoother and little quicker. Because of the high volume of drop outs in the first tournament, standard minimum requirements will now apply. The one thing to remember about this tournament: YOU MUST OPEN WITH YOUR DARK KNIGHT!!!! In your games as black, your 1st move MUST BE either Na6, Nc6, Nf6, or Nh6!!!! As white you may open however you like (The Joker's got no rules ). Since the time controls are a little faster for this than the first one, hopefully, this group will reach the end at close to the same time as the other 3 and can be the 4th group in The Dark Knight Finals. If you were not in the first Tournament, here's your chance to get in on it. If you were in it, here's your second chance. Here are the Custom Trophies up for grabs this time: 1st Place: 2nd Place: 3rd Place: The tournament will begin when the movie goes on sale (December 9th). http://www.chess.com/tournament/the-dark-knight-opens-on-dvd http://blog.chess.com/Billium248/the-dark-knight-tournament-blog http://www.chess.com/groups/view/the-dark-knights

What kind of movie would that be? It could be an epic movie like Alexander, or The Departed. I personally prefer a movie in the style of Johnny English. Any ideas for the storyline?

My fellow Athenians: Are you interested in participating in a group tournament? We must keep in shape in order to beat the Spartans in future combats. (No Spartan ambassadors will be allowed in this tournament. Sorry, Billium )

Here's a potted history of how this group came to be formed ... 1 Resignation Etiquette Started by cheater_1. Acrimonious exchanges mainly between Acephalic & mandelshtam – though kosmeg, duffer1965, guitardog & artfizz also featured. Mention of 'kobayashi maru' 2 Kobayashi Maru (Hopeless Situations) Battle of Thermopylae in 480BC by 300 Spartans 3 Who is player X? Genesis of the Chess Spartans. Chess Athenians (“Cheese-Eating Surrender Monkeys”) created as an antidote to the insanity. 4 We don't need no stinking "Resign" button!! Rallying call for Chess Spartans – thread got locked! 5 Athens & Sparta Good-natured ribbing & historical background to the original Athens-Sparta conflict 6 Is it rude not to resign when you're beaten? Shameless promotion of Chess Spartans ‘values’ 7 Resigning or checkmating? Further sneakily pragmatic promotion of Chess Spartans ‘values’ 8 group + group idea Hint at rapprochement Other recollections?