How many years until Chess might be so Drawish that it's not really played at tournaments anymore?

I feel that there's a chance that with increasing Opening Theory and the fact that people play more safe and take less risks (Since Defending has been become much better), practically all Chess games played around the same level (especially between Grandmasters) will be Draws.

Not everyone likes playing Blitz or Rapid Games so Perhaps some Chess 960 positions might be the New Standard.

MAYBE...and that is a big maybe, it could possibly happen at the GM level.  For the rest of us?  Never.

If it happened at the GM level it could heavily affect any level of tournament play. People wouldn't be interested in getting a higher rating if it only meant more draws. 

You're comparing apples to oranges.  The same way some beginners/club players think they need to study openings like GM's.

Eternity 

To answer the question, 2000

This is a question that never goes out of fashion. I've been hearing it for 50+ years. So my answer would be not any time soon.

It's like nuclear fusion/fuel cells/hydrogen economy/...always just a few years down the road, so close we can imagine, but so far that we never get there.

okayy

Opening Theory is deep for the classical openings, but not so much for the hypermodern ones.  The Reti Opening results in very few draws, but not many at the highest level apply it in tournament play.

The reason draws are so prevalent is because so many GMs play drawish opening lines, avoid sharp play, and are unwilling to exert themselves, but there's no reason it always has to be this way.

A hundred years ago, many of the best players favored sharp, dynamic play.  Champions like Alekhine and especially Lasker would not allow opponents to lazily work into a "safe" position, and folks just off the top tier like Marshall, Spielmann, and Reti would be bear traps to anyone who tried it, as well.  They'd force opponents to weigh one weakness against another, and stretch the position until it broke.

It may take time to break out of this drawish funk that top-level chess is in, but it will only take one or two players of similar style, playing at the top level, to force the rest of the GM community to re-think their own play.  Personally, I think programs like AlphaZero, which plays in a Romantic style, will make the next generation play more like Lasker and less like Capablanca (who was notorious for avoiding complications - this served him well against Lasker, but cost him dearly against Alekhine).

People worried about this 100 years or so ago when Capablanca only lost 35 games in his entire chess career.  And they worried about it again when Petrosian used to lose so few games.

In the 1920s, Lasker (I think it was) suggested the simple expedient of swapping the starting positions of the Bishops and Knights.  At a stoke, that would render all opening theory redundant.  A more radical suggestion was having a 10x8 or 12x8 board with extra pieces, like  Bishop plus Knight and Rook plus Knight hybrids.

But nothing ever came of these ideas, and the advent of great attacking players like Bronstein, Tal and Fischer rendered them redundant.  I'm sure that anew generation of players will find new and exciting ways to win (and lose!) games.

Even grandmasters make too many inaccuracies to make this a real danger. Kasparov blundered about once every 80 moves, although his opponents were frequently too intimidated to find the refutations. Chess tournaments are safe at least for our lifetimes.

Not so much left.. chess will soon die. Elon Musk and his Neuralink company introduced brain-computer wireless implants (they have been working on those for 3 years now). They will be used maybe in 5-10 years. After then chess will be a programming war for augmented people, and it will never be the same.

Fritz released an AI version, which is called Fat Fritz. Based on AlphaZero. So what i see is chess programming is shifting into AI zone, and those implants are also works with AI. So in future, i guess, who has the most "educated" ai in his chip, will be the best player of chess

Chess is like American Football.  There will always be those like Capablanca and Petrosian.  There will always be those like Kasparov, who lost plenty of games, especially with Black, because he took more risks.

How is it any different than Football?  Compare Alex Smith to Brett Favre.  Alex Smith throws all dinks and dunks, plays a conservative West Coast type offense.  Short passes, safe plays.  Rarely throws long passes down field.  Then you have the legendary Brett Favre.  Of course, he's been retired now for 10 years, but he would pass deep, he would throw into coverage, and not so shockingly, when he did play in the NFL, he lead the league in Interceptions!

How is chess any different?  You have the conservative players, and you have the risk takers!  The former will likely have far fewer losses, but will also have far fewer wins, and will result in a high draw ratio.  The latter will have more volatile results.

Chess Theory has been blazing for years, and there is no end in sight.

Neural Network engines is in it's infancy still. It will take years for those to catch up with Google's Alpha Zero Chess.

-Just to mention: Google's very selective release of games between it and Stockfish leave a lot of unanswered questions. No doubt Google only released games that would make the most impact from a public relations perspective.

Interesting, but were Draws less frequent back in 1970? I feel like the change between 1970 and now might not be as severe as the change between now and 2070. That's why if Computers could solve Chess that might have more cons than pros.

then we switch to 960

The biggest problem with 960 is that some (or maybe most) positions give White a bigger advantage than in regular Chess but there are some positions that are still equal with perfect play.