to resign or not to resign..??

do you guys prefer to resign when you know that you're losing or would you rather to stay in the game and prove that your the man even though you know that your going to lose..??

It really depends on several factors:

 

If I know I'm going to lose then I'll resign, out of respect for my opponent's time. 

 

If I'm in a losing position, then I'll play on until there's no reasonable chance I can get back into the game.  When that position is reached, that really depends on my opponent.  If my opponent is a lot stronger than me and played a dominant game, then I'll usually resign if I can't get any counterplay going.  If my opponent is weaker and has blundered in the game, I'll play on, hoping to exploit weak endgame skills to my advantage.  Also, there has been the rare case where I've been losing badly, but my opponent is in time trouble, and I'll try to exploit that as well.

 

To answer, it all depends.

 

Something I've noticed that may help you decide...  during play, on the left side of your screen, there is a box with tabs...  tab one is messages, where you can talk to your opponent.  Tab two is moves, which records every move you and your opponent make.  Tab three is details and tab four is notes.  Now, back up for a minute to tab three...  it'll say white, black (and list the name of the person playing each color) and underneath this "Rated - show rating adjustment." click that tab.  It will give you the number of points added to your rating if you win or draw and the number of points subtracted if you loose.  My last game I lost my last rook, did not have enough pieces to pull out a win and knew that it was just a matter of time until I lost.  Had I resigned then and there I would have been down 39 points.  I held out for twenty more moves and ended up only losing 15 points from my overall rating. 

I'll only resign if im playing a really good person who is queen up on me or if i see checkmate by the opponent in 1 or 2 moves

If you know that you are losing, then it is time to resign. Check my game history for my 8 move resign if you need proof. I personally feel that if the win is obvious, and I stress obvious, that the losing player should resign. There are some games when you might have a won game, but it is in a positional, more abstract way that an unexperienced opponent may not recognize. It is disrespectful to play out a lost game, because it communicates to the other player that you think they are too stupid to finish the game out. Since you are the one who is lost, this is really a classless move. The faceless internet has sort of cheapened chess. I would like to see a return of the behavior that makes ours 'the noble game'. The only reason to play out a lost game is to learn technique, but it would only be fitting to inform your opponent that this is your intention. Perhaps they could give a running annotation to the proceedings to further the learning experience. If you truly want to 'just see technique', then you could also just resign the game and then play it out against a computer program and see how it comes to conclusion. You are certain to see near flawless technique from your silicon pal.

My answer to this is "it depends."  if you feel that your opponent is weak enough that he is capable of making a mistake big enough to lose or draw his won game, then by all means play on.  I encourage all of the players on the high school team that I coach to play their games out, except maybe on first board.  if you are playing in some type of team situation, where your result will determine whether the team wins or loses, you kind of owe it to your team to give it a total effort, and play it out.

if, on the other hand, you are playing a strong opponent, it's kind of futile to play on, once you are down significient material without compensation.

one last thing...if you decide to play the game out, play it out to mate.  some people will get very insulted if you resign one move before mate.

I dont quit untill the fat lady sings!

I have resigned a few games, as painful as it was, however I prefer not "Quitting".  I think however that when a game reaches that point of no return, it is better to move on to my other games rather keep them waiting.  As well as to not waste anymore time of that very talented individual who just stomped my @#$. 

It appears there are two different schools of thought; those who mainly want to win at all costs (or at least try to salvage a stalemate/draw) and those who mainly want to learn and improve their game.  There is overlap, naturally, but the bottom line is the the 'point' player will (and probably should, from that perspective) keep going and hope for the best, or 'worst', as it were, from his opponent; he may get a gift he wasn't expecting and salvage something nice.  As pointed out a couple of times in this thread, however, this is unlikey to help him learn much, except possibly how to trap someone into stalemating. [An excellent thread on that yesterday, by the way . . . 'Drawing a Lost Game].  If ones only objective is to learn as much as quickly as possible, however, then resigning is probably the way to go.  For the record, I still don't like it though.  The word 'quitter' never sat well with me, and to me treating other players as mere automatons to help me improve my game, free to be discarded when I feel I've learned what I want from a particular game, well, that seems to cheapen them a bit much in my eyes.  Resigning over the board when you can sense that you both know where the game is headed and are both anxious to move on is one thing.  There can be some dignity there and one can be reasonably sure that the feeling is mutual before throwing in the towel.  Online, however, it is often pretty hard to get that intimacy and know what the other player is thinking.  Unless you both know and agree that a resignation is best, I say play on.

If the game is beginning to go quite badly and there is no counterplay , then resigning is the right thing to do. The one exception to this is that rare occurence when it is such a good and enjoyable game - with perhaps both kings threatened - and your opponent unleashes an excellent combination which will ultimately end in checkmate ; then I believe it is more honourable to NOT resign, so that the game can reach its beautiful climax and your opponent can enjoy the checkmate.     Vice versa, I wouldn't be totally enamoured if I was starting a brilliant six move forced mate and my opponent resigned prematurely.

Hope that doesn't sound too weird !

Just think of games like the Immortal game , if there had been a premature resignation... something is lost forever! 

 

When I was a kid, you pretty much had to knock my king over with your piece and thump him off the table before I would admit defeat.  That's not really the case anymore, but I will usually stick it out.  I think it is much more gratifying to actually see the checkmate there than to win with a message that says, "Your opponent has resigned."

I second porterism....though I'll add that if I feel that there is something still for me to learn I'll stick it out.

I will resign if I blunder, or the game goes bad on me, it is the right thing to do, but there are players who just keep on playing, and this is an insult to the better or wininng player.

If you pass out into coma or get a very grave sickness, will you endure the time and pains? It is worth it as long as there is a chance of you healing. But at some point keping you alive makes nonsense. Guess the same applies in chess exept that it isn't a matter of live or death. When I'm trailing I'm not scared to push for a full throw upon my opponent's castle or hold off as long as I can, like salvaging the situation (King + kninght vs king is a draw if there is nothing else). Or what do you know? he orshe can always make a mistake or underestimate your moves. But when it is clear you don't have enough pieces to fight and your opponent know how to win with the given position (and if he or she has much more time than needed), then i thin it is better to resign.

if it is extremely hopeless, i'll ask the other if they'd rather i resign or play it out. But the ;ast time somebody wanted me to resign, i played it out and won. THen again, i was only down a queen when he asked at midgame, so...

I usually wait a few moves, to see if they know how to play the position, but then I resign.

I only resign if there is no posible way for me to win. If there is a chance a mistake can be made and I can come back I will stick it out.

When I realize I am losing the game, no way to come back, I just log off. After a few hours - when I am in a happy mood, I look on the board again and if I see no hope - then resign.

But sometimes two looks are different and I have come back and win some games in this way ---

I'd preffer to play till end..

 

the statistics shows some ideas about the priciples... to win!

Players which don't resign in lost positions are not fighters,they are not serious chess players.