If you have to use a program to play chess then you are missing the point of chess. Chess is the ability to solve complex problems and while computer use brute force to win a human used even more complex brain functions and many times can't even explain why a move was made when a better appearing move was ignored but yet they still won.
Chess is for your brain not theirs. IF someone is cheating it's not you that's actually being cheated. It's them.
I am being cheated too. As stated, I come here to play humans, not a computer.
LIFE IS HARD AND THEN YOU DIE.
IF I STEPPED INTO A BOXING-RING FOR A FRIENDLY BOUT OF FISTICUFFS AND MY OPPONENT SUDDENLY PRODUCED A VERY LARGE PLANK FROM HIS BACK-POCKET AND PROCEEDED TO WHACK THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS OUT OF ME , I WOULD BE PRETTY CHEESED OFF. IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE SPORT NOT A PRECURSOR TO WW3.
CHEERS !
LIFE IS HARD AND THEN YOU DIE.
IF I STEPPED INTO A BOXING-RING FOR A FRIENDLY BOUT OF FISTICUFFS AND MY OPPONENT SUDDENLY PRODUCED A VERY LARGE PLANK FROM HIS BACK-POCKET AND PROCEEDED TO WHACK THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS OUT OF ME , I WOULD BE PRETTY CHEESED OFF. IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE SPORT NOT A PRECURSOR TO WW3.
CHEERS !
If someone pulled a plank out of their back pocket, you should run instead of getting the daylights beat out of you!! LOL
Know when to retreat(resign)
would still have the win loss record to play towards rather than just getting better and learning.
If you're suggesting aboloshing ratings just because of a very small minority of cheaters, I don't think that idea will fly...
sorry, but people is responsible for cheating not ratings...
I have to agree that using a chess engine is extreme, and I am sure if I had a feeling someone that I was playing was using one it would bother me a little. Lucky for me, I concentrate on improving. It only hurts my rating if someone of a lesser strength wins a game with me because they use a chess engine. Not only that, I still will learn a little something from the game I hope.
A rating will usually take care of itself. If you play at a certain strength consistantly, your rating will reflect that. Even with an unusual loss for whatever reason, your rating will return after future games. From this standpoint I don't see what they get out of it. I agree with brokenman: Cheaters are only hurting themselves, right?
Ratings may be responsible in some cases. I am not sure how many, but it is an interesting point gumpty. Even if there were not any 'rating cheaters' I am sure there would be people cheating for other reasons ... although for what? I don't know. Sooner or later it will catch up with them I think.
i agree that ratings aren't everything (or the only thing). however, like i have stated in other threads, i am interested in improving my game constantly. one of the best ways to know how well you are playing and if you're improving is by your rating (vs. your various opponents). therefore, ratings do matter to a certain extent.
sorry, but people is responsible for cheating not ratings...
I agree! Character and priorities tie into ones actions
Yahoo! like ICCF does not have any rules against engine use, so in what sense are you calling these people "cheaters"? As Eastendboy said, they are members of the freestyle community.
No, Eastendboy was talking about a community where people admittedly use chess programs to help them decide moves. On Yahoo!, people do not say, "I may be using a chess program to decide moves." They hide amidst people who do not use chess programs, and play without revealing that they use chess programs."
Wikipedia.org says, "Cheaters violate the spirit and/or the letter of the rules of competition."
I think that the spirit of chess competition is that if you encounter someone behaving like a human being and you sit down for a game with them, that you would be playing THAT PERSON, and not another intelligence.
If you search Yahoo! Chess forum, you will find a similar sentiment.
And if you DO want to get picky about rules, please consider that Yahoo! Chess is supposed to be the game of chess played on Yahoo! I think the rules of chess have always explicitly or implicitly included that a player not get outside help except as specified for a particular competition. I think the official FIDE rules cover that question: "During play the players are forbidden to make use of any ... advice..."
In conclusion, I and many others regard people on Yahoo! who use chess programs to help decide their moves and who do not warn opponents ahead of time about that are cheaters.
I have mentioned this before on this thread (which seems to be getting longer and longer - I don't know why we are all so focused on this cheating matter.) let's have two kind of matches:
(1) between those of us who want to learn chess and enjoying playing each other and striving to do better. Not cheating but loving the game with all the vulnerablities it may cause to our "ratings." Win or lose, that is chess, isn't it? Using our brains and trying to get outselves into a better situation.
(2) let's have matches between those who love to play with their computers and try to match skills with their computer program ( be it Rybka, Shredder, Fritz) with someone elses skills with whatever computer program they use.
Might be enlightening to see which computer software wins - or whoever is using the software is more skilled. Using another kind of skill, but not the skill our "forefathers" thought about when they played chess against each other sitting down at a board on a table by a lamp.
Please, let us put aside cheating on each other. Let us play for the joy of the game - win or lose. And be proud that we are putting our real selves on the line, our intellect, our blunders, our hopes, our disappointments, just who we really are. Being who we really are - win or lose- is what counts, don't you think?
stwils
I suspect you of 'cheating' (I don't bother, because i want to improve my chess, i see my games on this server not at all as a competitive achievement or failure. For the 'thrill and joy' of competition, I play occasionally in open or team tournaments, face-to-face chess, where cheating is impossible).
The above statement is not very believable since earlier in this thread you stated you maxed out at 2100, got frustrated because you felt you should be rated higher and then started using a program. So I'm not sure that qualifies as "not seeing games here at this site as competitive achievements or failures." You cared enough when disappointed in your achieved rating to enlist the assistance of artificial intelligence to hand-hold you through your moves and boost your "performance". Lets face it your primary objective was to have people see you as better than you really were, or else you would have just played games honestly and received the same benefits that you speak of by analyzing your games AFTER they were completed with your best buddy Fritz. No... your goal was to fulfill your arrogance in having people see you with a higher rating. Sure I bet you got some learning benefits from the program but that came secondary.
You said to me that you do not have a rating in real chess. It is then impossible that you won almost all of your many games since last summer, and have now a rating more than 2100 . Also your rating jumped once about 250 points in a game against a low-rated player. HOW IS THAT POSSIBLE ?
You are right I don't have a rating in real chess. No that doesn't make it impossible for me to reach 2100. The 250 point rating jump can be explained by the glicko rating system used here at this site. What, you think I hacked into the chess.com ratings system to manipulate my rating??? Paranoid much? As for me winning all of my games since last summer... well I agree that was a pretty neat trick of me especially since I only started player here a month ago. Excellent research you have compiled here! See how much you can get done without requiring the assistance of artificial intelligence? 
cheating is bad. They should be banned, if they cheat multiple times. The first time, they get a warning. The second they get another one. The third, they're gone.
cheating is bad. They should be banned, if they cheat multiple times. The first time, they get a warning. The second they get another one. The third, they're gone.
You are saying it is acceptable to cheat until you get caught twice.
I think warnings should be reserved for people who genuinely did not know the rules, or where the rules are not perfectly clear (as in chat room "abuse").
If people cheat, they should be banned.
Much_Afraid wrote:
Yea but the thing about these "advanced players" is that they absolutely suck at chess if they don't have a computer to help them. Not in all cases of course, but in most of them. This security blanket of assistance is what attracts a majority of players to "advanced" chess.
A few players who have played Advanced or Freestyle chess: Kasparov, Anand, Kramnik, Topalov, Shirov, former Correspondence World Champion Mikhail Umansky, GM Hikaru Nakamura, CCGM Arno Nickel, GM Vladimir Dobrov, GM Tony Kosten, GM Konstantin Landa and GM Yuri Solodovnichenko. So you think these people "suck at chess"?
I have of course met engine users (on Yahoo!) who don't even know the names of common openings, but I think in general, it's only after a player learns to analyze their games, and hone their opening repertoire in a database that they start to make real progress.
Yea I was kind of anticipating a comment like this which is exactly why I said in my initial statement " Not in all cases of course, but in most of them."
I agree that programs allow for real progress in one's game but there is a reason that in most forms of chess the rules state that you can only use them post-game and pre-game, not during.
The only reason the ICCF doesn't ban program use is that there is absolutely no way to do it. They have to go with the lesser of two evils since if they banned it correspondence chess would crumble under the weight of paranoia and unfounded/well-founded accusations. If it were possible to ban programs in correspondence chess I believe they would. That's not to say "freestyle advanced" chess wouldn't or shouldn't exist separately.
I see you are a computer programmer and probably have a deeper respect than most for the utilization of chess programs, but even you must admit that a majority of people we come across on internet sites using programs are not trying to "benefit their chess". They are trying to destroy their competition under the guise of being a "great player." Nothing interests most internet program users less then playing someone else who has a program. They want the easy kill or at the very least the guaranteed kill. My guess would be that a very high percentage of players that secretly use programs in their games now wouldn't even be slightly interested in joining an "advanced freestyle" chess section if it were created on this site. That's not what they are here for.
Who is that person?