List of Insufficient Material Combinations

 Those in red are drawn, not won.

I can!

no, forced win!!

I love chain quotes!

Don't be a fool:

 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pawnless_chess_endgames

K+R+B vs. K+R is a draw. I could draw it with the K+R anytime!

as you guys can see my measely rating, but on chess.com I once ran into a Q+K Vs R+K endgame and I managed in fairly short time frame to catch a king on the end file, not sure whether its a simple win or my opponent cooperated a lot.

I hate the insufficient material rule & idk why it ever came out. Obv K vs K we get but the other scenarios, I wish they'd just let it play out. It's dumb to ASSume that you're opponents are gonna be competent enough to not give a helpmate. Obv if opponent has some more pieces on board, they could potentially help a successful mate by blocking an escape route. Forget bout cornering the king. Again, K vs King, draw it I guess. But to me, timed games should not even be drawn in that scenario. Sure timed games are to help enforce pace of play so games can finish in a set amount of time. But there's also pressure that's added to playing the clock. At least in 3 min games & sometimes 5. I don't like the CPU or anyone ASSuming anything. You never know if something can happen, especially with cornering or some help mate. As long as it's mathmatically possible, idc if it's 1/100000000 chance to get it right. Someone will eventually. And the satisfaction of being one of those who pull it off. But we get robbed of that opportunity. If we are playing a timed game, the insufficient rule is much more maddening. Other than K vs K, let peeps play it out. Those who don't wanna can resign. But no1 should have to take a draw on a game that could theoretically be won-no matter how unlikely & it's still not impossible. The fact it happens In timed games is bananas tho. And I hate the typical Marxist snide retort, "well if ya have a prob with it, play better & don't put self in that situation". And they obv don't care bout facts, logic, truth & are epitomes of irony & hypocrisy. So they just would obv say something like that. If there's gonna be timed games in chess where peeps are playing the clock, then the pieces left shouldn't matter. You're winning due to opponents clock running out. They say, well you're prob not gonna win with K +Kn + Kn vs K. They ASSuming in that scenario. But in plenty others, someone could have a smorgasbord board of pieces left vs opponent having almost nothing and yet if the person with the smorgasbord runs outta time in that scenario there is no ASSuming. The Win goes to the person with time still on clock. Just let it play out man, and if 50 moves pass, then call it. And if time runs outta give it to the smarter player who realized it was a timed game & played accordingly

K+R+N/B K+R is draw, but it is easy to mess up.

The FIDE-laws on awarding draws after flagging are logical, consistent and correct. They are not based on insufficient material but only on the proof that the opponent cannot ever checkmate the flagged player with help-play (sometimes incorrectly referred to as insufficient mating material). Zero chance. It is in line with the dead position rule 2.5.2. which says that any position is immediately drawn when both players cannot possibly checkmate the other player. That's why I call the "draw after flagging" exception the one-sided dead position rule. 

The problem is that the analyses for the one- and double side dead position rule may be complicated. Probably hard for you to imagine but clever chess composers can come up with compositions you will scratch your head about and which require extensive analysis. An example is when a position is automatically running towards a stalemate and one side needs to conjure up a plan to create a pathway to the future. Likely the other side only has inevitable pawn moves to play.

To us humans 99.9999% of the helpmate cases are simple but not for computers as they are not programmed to do this type of helpmate analysis. One day they will and probably all insufficient material rules will disappear. By then we only play computer chess anyway and we rely on computer arbitration for as many things as possible. Until we are there, clubs such as chess.com and USCF have replaced the double- and one-side FIDE dead position rule with a concoction of their own - one mainly based on material distribution, very simple to determine by engine. Note there is one USCF case which replaces the helpmate strategy with a forced mate. That of course is already doable for engines today as that is what they were built for in the first place. And these forced mates are almost always obvious!

So, whatever your issue, it is probably not with the actual FIDE laws.

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I'm white. I'm on move. My opponents flag just fell. I live in USCF country. Score?

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2 Knights are not insufficient mating material so it is not automatically a draw, but they can't force the mate. Unless there's a pawn on the board to give white an extra knight move. Here's an interesting forced checkmate sequence:

By USCF rule two knights are considered insufficient mating material - unless the opponent has a pawn. Which implies that white is handed a win here without needing a forced win.

Assuming blacks flag fell. The rules are different for just continuing play without flag issues!

FIDE flagging rules should always be used. If checkmate is possible in any way flagging should lose.

K+B+N is possible to win only if you know the method, otherwise it would be draw by 50 move rule.

Of course they should but in post #31 I explained why they are currently not!

Got any examples of these? Here's one I just made up (hopefully it's correct), but I'm sure some composers could do much better than this.

Yes I had at least two of those - but where? I don't keep personal archives and I often have to redo the research when looking for material. I'll let you know when I find them.

Btw, yours is incorrect. Since both sides help each other, it is extremely simple to construct a checkmate here. For instance white plays Q-b8-f8-g7# while black fiddles its queen. For a chessplayer it is always hard to play "bad moves" but that is precisely what you have to do in a helpmate.

I meant that the position is dead only if black plays 1...Qxb4+. So white doesn't get to recapture since the game is already terminated. Obviously there are lots of ways to mate if the queens stay on.