Stalemate is the most senseless rule ever

OP writes:

Yet for some reason, instead of the game being over and the person with more pieces is declared winner by stalemate, the game is considered a draw!!! 

With this reasoning. a player (entirely possible) who is stalemated AND has the most pieces ...Would win !! Brilliant ! So the player who is almost "checkmated" (by the OP's reasoning should lose the game) actually would win because he has more pieces   I'm speechless.

I agree that getting rid of stalemate would have little effect on draws at the GM level. That's why I think a few more rule changes would need to be made. Another rule or two to try and have clear winners in all but a King vs King endgame. Endgame theory from the last 200 years would change! People would have to learn new endgame strategies, but what's wrong with that?

There are 5 ways a chess game is drawn... stalemate being one.

Uthor... writes :

"The game has serious fundamental problems when 10 out of 12 games are draws."

And just what are these fundamental problems?

A draw is THE logical and only result of a well played game by two players.

Rule changes to insure a winner ??? It would no longer be chess in it's present form.

Changing stalemate would have an enormous affect at the top GM level. All pawn endgame theory changes. Therefore large swaths of rook endgame theory change as all transitions to pawn endgames now change. Bishop + wrong rook pawn now just a simple win. I've used that twice OTB to draw.

Gambits virtually eliminated as being up a pawn and trading down is now just a win.

Chess loses huge swathes of its interest as the margin for a win becomes so much larger so good defense just means you lose in 80 instead of 35.

Actually it may be a good thing to get chess players out of the book, they may actually have to learn to use their brains again. Plus the people that write the books will like it because they get to write new and revised books that they can sell to idiots that can't think for themselves.

Sorry, present company excluded of course.

And with less draws, almost none, chess becomes more popular! Then GMs can actually make a living playing chess! And instead of having to quit and become a tax accountant; like the brilliant GM Michael Stean, who wrote "Simple Chess" they can happily continue their chess career. What a concept!

Why would chess suddenly become more popular ???

Possibly more chess players might "tune in" and watch more games, but why would rule changes attract more players ? The general public doesn't give a hoot about chess. They suddenly won't be interested because of silly rule changes preventing draws. This is "faulty" logic with no basis in any factual studies. It is merely an assumption.

In fact... I think that Draws play a major role of a possible game result, giving the underdog chances to score 1/2 point might be an attraction for many players. The fact one could find themselves behind in a position, but by fighting on a drawing solution is found adds another quality to the game.

I played a simul vs. Vasily Smyslov. My objective was to achieve a draw from move 1. (which I was lucky enough to accomplish). It is the most rewarding game I have played.

Let's be honest getting yourself into checkmate is easy but show how much skill you've got and try and get into stalemate.  Stalemate is the hardest thing to accomplish in chess, it takes great skill to get into it.

Honestly, stalemate is easy to see, plus usually the opponent has to blunder badly not see it.

Of course it wouldn't be chess in it's current form. That's the point of changing rules!

Like:

Switching the starting placement of the King and Queen to put them on the same file.

And

Pawn Rule Changes

1. 2 squares on 1st move

2. En passant

3. Pawn promotion (this rule has changed as recently as Post Staunton)

 Bishops

1. From 2 spaces to the length of the board

Queen

1. From 1 space to the length of the entire board

King and Rook

1. Castling

Stalemate-5 variations (with only 1 logical one)

Etceterra

How has the pawn promotion changed?

en passant and pawns moving 2 squares were incorporated at the same time in the 15th century, the last rule change in chess. (pertaining to piece movement)

Why chess.com tolerates idiots\topics like that

If the first-move-advantage isn't sufficient to be a theoretical win, then a draw is the supreme or optimal outcome.  I don't understand this prejudice against draws, other than unwarranted draws. A drawn game is just as often as exciting and interesting as a win.

Okay, first of all, stalemate rarely happens at the elite level. Drawing is based off of theorectically drawn positions. Stalemate should remain the same thing it is. Btw, whoever made the analogy of the siege castle, thumbs up to you man!

The history of the pawn promotion rule is covered well in Wikipedia. There were many variations. I will cover some here, in no particular order of history. Some of it is actually quite humorous. Philidor thought having 2 Queens should never be allowed! I think the Mormons changed that rule. Pawns could only promote to a piece that you had previously lost. Pawns could only promote to the piece, that was originally on the same file, at the beginning of the game, that the pawn ends up promoting on. For example a Pawn promoting on a8 becomes a rook. A Pawn promoting on b8 becomes a knight. You couldn't have 2 Kings so no promotion for a pawn on e8! Think about that strategy for a moment. I'd better figure out how to take his d Pawn with my e Pawn! The rule finally got straightened out in the Steinitz era.

You guys are killing me!

Prejudice against draws!

LOL

You don't know that less draws will make the game more popular.

ROTFL

Only complete chess nerds (and I am one) would have to be told that it is human nature for people to like a winner.

We don't need to do a scientific study to understand this, but by all means go ahead and do one if you want, ProfesserPownall.

Other games, sports, movies, entertainment are all competing with chess for time. It's not a huge jump in logic to figure out that almost all sports made rule changes to reduce ties. They did that because humans like having a winner. It's in our DNA. After the 10 draws and 1 win each even FIDE had something in place to insure there would be a winner. One day of Rapid Chess had to be used to determine a winner since the real chess match of 12 full games failed to do so!

The point is people are getting better at chess and GMs 

People don't like ties, draws

Chess rules have evolved over time to make the game more exciting and fun since the game was invented. Now that the top GMs are so good that most of their games end in draws, new rules need to be made to stop that from happening. This is simple common sense. And the stalemate rule was never logical in the first place.