Chess Etiquette
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In tournament chess a draw offer should only be made when its the turn of the player offering the draw and he should play his next move first. If he offers a draw without mnaking his next move his opponent can demand he makes his next move first before he accepts or declines the offer. I also only offer a draw once, and if declined dont offer again. Repeated draw offers are bad chess etiquette and one can even be punished for repeated draw offers since it is considered to be "disturbing" the opponent.
I think resigning losing, or lost positions has much to do with the strength of the opponents involved. I have often not resigned positions against sub 2000 players that I would resign against any IM or GM. This has saved me many half points and I have even turned a few "losses" into wins due to various factors. A great deal also depends on the time remaining to each player and the time control.
It's fairly well known that Fischer was more problematic off the board than at it.
Compensation wrote:
herbanmusic wrote:
Chess etiquette is a matter of politeness...
But one can't forget that diferent people may not conform to it... A good example are the stories of the great Fischer wanting to play drawn positions for quite a while, and a few food moves down the line.
We can never forget that not everyone thinks the same; Because if we were all thinking the same, noone would be thinking at all !!
Saying that Fischer lacked chess etiquette is a gross and completely untrue statement. Fischer defied convention by not accepting or offering grandmaster draws, but in a drawn position he would never insult his opponents by playing on if the result was clear. Fischer was always known as extremely polite to other chess players and he had a great deal of professional respect for his colleagues, and detesting draws does not show a lack of etiquette any more than playing a certain opening.
I remember reading in Chess Life about a game Fischer played against a titled player. Both Fischer and his opponent played until they had bare Kings. Nevertheless, Fischer insistently played on for three more moves from that point before finally conceding that the game was drawn.
Granted, Fischer was only about 13 years old (I think) when that game was played. But Fischer was also 13 years old when he defeated IM Byrne in the Game of the Century. This means that Fischer, at that age, was an undisputed chess genius and undoubtedly knew that the first game was a dead draw. I would call that extremely bad chess etiquette.
whirlwind2011 wrote:
Compensation wrote:
herbanmusic wrote:
Chess etiquette is a matter of politeness...
But one can't forget that diferent people may not conform to it... A good example are the stories of the great Fischer wanting to play drawn positions for quite a while, and a few food moves down the line.
We can never forget that not everyone thinks the same; Because if we were all thinking the same, noone would be thinking at all !!
Saying that Fischer lacked chess etiquette is a gross and completely untrue statement. Fischer defied convention by not accepting or offering grandmaster draws, but in a drawn position he would never insult his opponents by playing on if the result was clear. Fischer was always known as extremely polite to other chess players and he had a great deal of professional respect for his colleagues, and detesting draws does not show a lack of etiquette any more than playing a certain opening.
I remember reading in Chess Life about a game Fischer played against a titled player. Both Fischer and his opponent played until they had bare Kings. Nevertheless, Fischer insistently played on for three more moves from that point before finally conceding that the game was drawn.
Granted, Fischer was only about 13 years old (I think) when that game was played. But Fischer was also 13 years old when he defeated IM Byrne in the Game of the Century. This means that Fischer, at that age, was an undisputed chess genius and undoubtedly knew that the first game was a dead draw. I would call that extremely bad chess etiquette.
I just did a little more research on this. I just found a website (of questionable credibility) that said Fischer played on for two more moves, not three, and that he was approximately 16 years old, instead of 13. This website also identified the "titled player" as GM Barcza. Is anyone else able to corroborate any of this?
Compensation wrote:
Whirlwind, I highly doubt that. Playing on with bare kings isn't only ridiculous, it's impossible. Any game with insufficient material is automatically a draw and his opponent could simply get up and walk away and mark it into the scoresheet at that point. Fischer wouldn't need to "concede" that the game was drawn if there were nothing but kings left, and in a game between two GMs (as your second post states) I'm going to have to call that into question. With that being said, I don't want to start a flame war but it does seem questionable to say the least.
No, you're absolutely right to doubt it, because I do as well. That was why I looked for a corroborating source (that made me doubt the account even more). It's a pretty unbelievable story, but the one thing that makes it remotely credible was its presence in Chess Life. I suppose CL may have been merely telling an urban legend about Fischer... because honestly, that's what it sounds like.
Chess Etiquette, a proper title. Maybe Fischer was polite to polite people; that is when he wasn't having his "race" issues, or dealing with the mob. Can anyone confirm this?
I heard that ETs took his brain to create some kind of super soldier, rumor has it he couldn't play chess after he was reassembled. Crap... I think the Men in Black are knocking at my door. Time to go.
This is a sore subject for me as I love this game and I have great respect for it and have had a few opponents that just don't get it. Here is how I see things and would love to hear your comments.
Chess is a game of class, manners, dignity and mutual respect.
If your opponent has played you well and has a sizable and clear (winning) advantage, late in the game, then respectfully resign and request a rematch.
If you don't do this then you are disrespecting your opponent and doing a disservice to the game of chess. What was a good game is now a bad game as your opponent will now have to chase you around the board and when the game is over there mostly likely will not be rematch.
Possible exceptions to this are:
1. player (with winning position) is rated lower than 1300
2. player (with winning position) is rated 200 + points lower than you
3. you are playing a live game and want to play out a series of moves and it's not going to take a lot of time as it does with correspondance chess.
My goal when I play is to win, to learn, improve my rating and find compatable opponents which want to play many games. When I lose then the benefit is to learn from it and then go at it again with rematch.
I wish this site had a rating system like Ebay so we can make an informed decision based on prospective opponents reputation created by their past opponents.
Thanks for listening and chiming in... 
@johnnyolbc: I disagree with one thing: the rematch provision. Some players simply may not have enough time to play another game (in Live Chess). Some may have decided ahead of time (again in Live Chess) that they want to play only one game--for whatever reason.
Finally, some players may desire to play games against many different opponents before considering rematches with previous opponents. (This is commonly the reason I give for declining rematches in Online Chess.)
Legitimate, sporting reasons for declining rematches are too numerous to encapsulate fully.
I agree with you. My point regarding rematch is that after a good and respectful game this is the type of opponent you would be open to rematching verses the one one plays out a pathetic positon...
Hi everyone. I have recently gotten back into chess via this web site. I mostly enjoy 5-minute games in live chess. My rating in live chess is only 900+. Recently I have had clearly losing positions a couple of times, but decided to play the game out anyway. Why not? In the first, I was ahead in time so thought I might win on those grounds. I had a king only, and the opponent had a queen, king, and perhaps a couple of pawns. After a few moves it appeared he didn't know how to mate me, and resigned.
In the most recent game my I was down to a king only whereas my opponent still had several pawns close to being queened. He had over a minute left. I was way down in time. He resigned the game with over a minute on his clock and 4 seconds left on mine. This is puzzling to me. Surely, in a 5 miniute game against a low ranking opponent it is not unreasonable to let him show that he knows the moves? I guess if it's not worth his time he can always resign. Oh, wait... :) (but surely he could have stuck it out for 4 more seconds).
Most of us have been around chess and chess players long enough to learn the ropes, but some newer players can be confused about what is acceptable practise and what is not. This was brought home to me big-time recently when a very polite, younger opponent said, "i don't know what to do anymore, mind if i forfeit?"
I realised then that he didn't know that resigning is not only acceptable, but is the end result of most chess games.
There must be a lot of other things that crop up during a game that may confuse less experienced players.
Like draw offers. When do you offer a draw? When you're a queen and two rooks behind and faced with mate-on-the-move? If your opponent rejects a draw offer, when do you offer again? And if you receive a draw offer should you accept it? Well, it depends on the position, doesn't it? But a lot of this is subjective and varies from player to player. My personal rule of thumb is that I offer a draw once; after that we play it out till my opponent makes the offer.
(I had a comical result against bazzman recently. I refused a draw when a pawn up in a rook-and-pawn ending. He was right, of course, and I finally offered a draw myself but he ignored me, walked my king into the corner in front of my h-pawn and forced me to stalemate myself. They've got a helluva sense of humour, those Queenslanders!)
The other point that stands out has been dealt with in another thread about refusals to resign lost positions or slowing down play to postpone the loss.
So these are a few things that seem to be worth discussion. Doubtless you can think of others. Let's have some opinions.