So something else weird happened. I was watching their game. One guy moved his pawn to the 8th rank, and then HIT HIS CLOCK. THEN, he got his Queen and replaced his pawn with it.
My thought, when he hit his clock, didn't that mean it was over? He didn't promote BEFORE hitting his clock. What's the ruling on this?
If the promotion is part of his move, which it is, then that was illegal as he completed his move prematurely by pressing his clock. If it is deemed to be promoted then he has illegally touched the pieces I would have thought by doing so during his opponent's time. I could be wrong.
Absolutely. His opponent couldn't play a move until the Queen was on the board despite it being his time. However obvious it is that someone would promote to a Queen it has to be done surely before the clock is pressed.
perhaps an exception is if their next move is forced and they for whatever reason don't play it immediately.
Yeah, then I would calculate on their time too. :) Actually, it's a pretty common phenomenon that people try to calculate far ahead when their own next move is forced. That's a mistake though. Better just move and have the opponent figure out their next move on their time.
in a long time control tournament as in this one, I don't think it matters that much that you study on your opponent's time. Now obviously if you are in time control difficultly you gotta do it. In my case I have a bad habit of walking around after pretty much every move, unless of course I am in time control problems.
I am also a nervous player in competition and tend to walk around between moves. I may glance at other games, but I'm usually still thinking about my own, even away from the board.
One difference from the "old days" is that the older clocks were easy to tell who was on move from across the playing room because the buttons stood up on top. These newer digital clocks are impossible to read from afar.
The ones with the red LED lights make it really easy :p
Well, to start, it is probably not wise to make your move first, no matter what the circumstance. When your opponent moves, your first matter of business is to evaluate the position. I would suggest then coming up with about three candidate moves, and then, and only then, calculating them individually.
Not using all of your time is a waste. Even if you try to calculate on your opponent's time, you still need to use up your own time to reach your "maximum potential." On the other hand, many masters suggest using your opponent's time to take a short rest: get up and walk around, observe some other games, or have a drink of coffee. However, you must always remember never to leave your game.
Now, I do not mean you should not get up and walk around. That is perfectly fine. However, if you leave the game for such a period of time that you are no longer absorbed in the position, you will lose time trying to remember all of the imbalances, patterns, plans, and threats involved. This is not a concern for all players, but it certainly happens to some.
I would suggest using your opponent's time to do what you feel like. If the position is interesting and requires deep analysis, go for it! (Notice I said "analysis," not calculation.) If you would rather buy a drink (Non-alcoholic is probably best!), then that is what you should do. Simply be prepared to return to the position when it is your move.
On another matter, if I see that my opponent has not moved, I will not say anything until I have determined my own next move. I think it is a good practice to follow.
So maybe I'm confused, but still learning. Strategic thinking is the same as planning? Then what's the diff. between planning and calculations?
Thanks again Waffle, Estragon and Pellik.
That's a good question, and maybe someone can answer it better than me, but maybe a good way to think of a player trying to utilize strategy is he's accessing his long term memory (patterns from good games he's seen) and making logical observations, there's no calculation involved, it's much more abstract, for example:
Let's say your opponent challenges the center, you can either keep the tension, capture, or advance your pawn and lock it up.
You notice if you're given 3-4 moves you can be ready to bring 4 attackers to his king and currently he only has 1 defender on that side of the board. Given 3-4 moves he can only bring 1 more defender. Strategically You recall that a locked center is useful during an attack as it limits counterplay. Therefore your strategic idea is to go ahead and lock the center (instead of say, capture) and attack his castled king. Now your candidate moves will have to be both tactically sound, but also they will have something to do with this attack. Shifting your queen to an open diagonal (or one that will open) or simply working to eliminate an important defender of his.
Now you can calculate and see if the concrete variations work out. Not all the way to the attack and checkmate of course, this is where long term memory comes in... you may calculate 3-4 moves that are tactically sound, and in the end position you recognize this formation favors an attack... or at least it doesn't make the idea wrong.
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Let's say you're a bit cramped and/or your opponent is going to seek play on the queenside... you decide you must capture (not lock the center as above) because you'll use that half open or open file in the center to balance his pressure on the wing. This is also a common and reasonable idea. Next you would calculate.
So back to strategic thinking vs planning... strategic thinking may be something like "I need play in the center to balance his pressure on the wing, so I wont lock the center" while a plan would be something a bit more long winded as outlined above "I'll lock the center, bring over attackers / exchange defenders, and finally open the h file to attack his king"
When you find the right plan (or even just an OK plan), your moves will seem to cause your opponent a lot of problems (compared to moves with no general plan) when you're still playing people U2000 (IMO)
I always use my opponent's time to go through his possible moves and how I could react to them ... I wouldn't call this "calculating" (I doubt a player at my level can "calculate", that's something players from FM upwards do :)). But I almost never play my reply move immediately, as I could still have overlooked something in my less-than-perfect board visualization - I always at least have to blunder-check my move on the board with the actual position and the pieces physically in place.
The advice in Play like a Grandmaster was do your strategic thinking on your opponents time and your tactical calculations on your own time.
I actually only found out a couple of weeks ago what the actual FIDE rules were when someone doesnt press his clock - he counts as not having completed his move and you are not supposed to move till he does. I have always told opponents straight away, with gesture or word, and still will. What I had thought for over 20 years was that "as soon as you were sure of your move in that situation you were supposed to play it, thats the rules" - I had been told this at my first chess club and believed it. I felt a bit dumb with hindsight lol.