The 50 move rule shouldn't exist!

There's still time control on the clocks. The time limit would have been in addition to the time CONTROL

According to your info, a game could take up to 4 hours, WITHOUT the increments. Increments of that magnitude just INCREASE the time control. I can make a move every 30 seconds and the time will never decrease.

My answer depends on the situation. If it's one game per day, then just say it has to end by a certain time, like 5pm, or something.

In fact they should have good vending machines in the playing hall in case players get hungry

I think it would still need to be different for different numbers of men. Probably 49½  would do for all 5 man endings, but if you made it 99½ for 6 and 7 man endings you'ld still have unfair terminations of winning play. It would always be possible, with perfect play, to win any won endgame, but  the lower you make the move limit the more accuracy you may be forcing on the players.

A typical situation would be in KNNKP. If as, White, you miss a mate in 18, you can finish up having to play the full monte. If your opponent claimed under the rule at the point you missed your mate, then with a 39½ move period you could well find yourself more than 18 moves away from mate at his next claim even if missing the mate were the only b*llock you dropped in the whole endgame. Changing the number of moves to 49½ would probably fix this for KNNKP, but not if you dropped a similar one later.

In fact, in the second case, the player need not be playing 49½ times sub-optimally as I said earlier. It could be only 4 or 5 times sub-optimal. The problem is that he isn't dropping his moves evenly across his whole endgame. 

I would expect this problem to need even more moves to fix for endgames with more men, but I can't play any pawnless endgames with more than 5 men with any sort of accuracy, so I'm stuck to say what the numbers should be in these endgames. You can't get the answers from EGTBs. 

Certainly zeroing the move count on irreversible moves would go some way to fixing the problem because a claim for a particular endgame could only first occur n moves into the endgame. This would fix KNNKP even with a 39½ move rule.  

THX, lilboat

1. FIDE have already eliminated the 50 move rule as a basic rule of chess. It's now only retained for competitions.

2. I think EndgameStudy has eventually abandoned his time limit ideas.

No I haven't. Juts figuring out what was best. Still on the table

Belay that. I was writing as you were posting. I see EndgameStudy has not in fact abandoned his time limit ideas.

In fact I've just notice that ES has confirmed that.

LOL

FIDE don't have a very good track record with this rule (see e.g. #489). They have just removed the 50 move rule fom the basic rules of chess without any replacement, so the casual player now has no way of terminating a pointless game against a stubborn opponent who will not agree a draw (e.g. Rybka) other than resigning. 

The repetition rule will not help, because they've removed that as well. Don't bother trying perpetual check any more.

How could they remove perpetual check? That IS a draw, theoretically! That's a solid draw

Not any more it aint. If your opponent refuses to agree a draw you have to either find something different or resign.

(If it's a tournament arranged under FIDE rules you're still OK because the rules are retained in the COMPETITION RULES section of the handbook.) 

What if u just continue checking

Then one of you eventually dies. But the withdrawal rules apply only to tournaments, so I think in that case the result is undefined.

That's messed up. FIDE should be decommissioned completely, after hearing this

Perpetual check is a forced draw. What is wrong with them?

Well, you've got the e-mail address.

I think I email them. Repetition is a forced draw, and nothing else.