what do you like to say at the start of a match?

That is actually a very good argument against what is considered good manners. 

OK, guys, where does honesty start and good manners stop? Is wishing one's opponent 'good luck' the start of saying 'I hope you win?'

Like I said, chess is a killer game and the idea is to win. One would not be wasting time playing otherwise so why waste time with false politeness and pseudo political correctness? The damage that these false and banal 'goodygoodyisms' do in society as a whole is obvious. It might be argued that one spends time with chess to be free from these socially strangling constraints.

"Hi, pleased to mate you!"

I wonder if Excaliber4 knows that the verb 'to mate' has a meaning other than that used in chess. Does one have to spell it out?

good luck,

hope you come in second.

.

How did you manage to get a rating of 1419? One, you spelled my name wrong. Two, "to mate" is not a verb. "Mate" is a verb. Three, "mate" has only one meaning in chess. Now please take your thesaurus and go away.

Excalibr4~

I got my rating by playing chess, Sorry if I upset you.

' Mate' is actually a noun and Thesaurus has a capital 'T', it is a proper noun.

The conversation is now over, thank you.

It's over when I say it's over. You need to use "  not ' for quotes. No capital letter to start a word after a comma. Mate can be a noun or verb, depending on the context. I doubt you would be "sorry" if you upset me, since that seems to have been the primary goal of your post. However, the clumsy manner in which you decided to troll me was actually amusing, hence my reply.

Yes you did and I was just kidding. However, out of curiosity, I checked your profile and noticed your Tactical Trainer rating is 848. The Tactical Trainer is like a lie detector test here. People can easily cheat the system by using another computer, with a chess program, on slow games. Not with the Tactical Trainer though. Just saying.

If they have left their name on their profile page then I always try to say hello X. Only exception is if I am playing on my phone as it gets too complicated.

Here we have an example of perfect British politeness. Probably the best answer so far, to just say 'Hello'.

Hello Excalibr4. I don't mean to butt into an argument but I think you may have jumped to a wrong conclusion - Chse0c is probably innocent. I've just had a look at my own Tactical Trainer rating and it is also 848! Either that's a heck of a coincidence or it's the default rating that you're given if you have never used Tactical Training. I certainly have never used it. Just saying to your Just saying.

Hello Heather,

Thank you for your comment.  I am innocent of cheating for the simple reason that the only person I would be fooling is myself. I didn't mean to get into an argument but I just hate the brutilisation of the English language which is actually my second language, the first being Welsh. I wonder what the other guy's first language is.

"Hello.  My name is Inigo Montoya.  You killed my father.  Prepare to die."

Ah I see! Well that explains it! You should try it, but be warned.. very addicting (fun).

To Excalibr4 and to Chse0c

Would you boys just shake hands and move on with no hard feelings? Or better still, challenge each other to a game and let the rest of us know who wins. You both seem like decent people.

Heather has said an excellent and mature thing.

No hard feelings from me and I wish the other guy the best.

No, I'm not going to challenge him to a game because Excalibr4 (not Excaliber as in the legendary sword in the King Authur legends) only plays one minute games and that is too fast for me.

Thank you for your excellent mediation skills, Heather. The World needs more people like you.

the first being Welsh

Ooooh!  

Do you know Tom Jones?   Do you live near that poet guy's house?

(yes, I'm an American, we live by stereotype here at Chess.com) 

English is my primary, though not only, language.  I'm not familiar with the usage dictum that a 'thesaurus' is a proper noun requiring capitalization.  The most common example of that sort of rule is that the Bible is always capitalized if it's referring to Christian scripture.   

I did a cursory check and didn't come up with a similar rule for dictionary, thesaurus, or encyclopedia as generic books.   By usage, if you're using a particular publisher's thesaurus, for example, Roget's, then you'd write Roget's Thesaurus if you are citing it.

This could be an Americanization of a British rule.  

In which case, I'm okay with you holding on to a grammatical practise that, in a few short years, will seem antiquated  .  

Also, and this is a trivium, another word for 'thesaurus' is 'synonimicon' ... it's in the book with lots of synonyms and antonyms for words.  

(note:  If you could post a cite to the 'always capitalise the word Thesaurus' I would be obliged.  If it's just a rule that every British schoolboy/girl ... miscellaneous ... knows, that's okay, too.  Genuinely curious.) 

What are you? A grade school teacher wannabe? If someone trolls my post, I will snap back, which I did. You did good to uncover the default rating on the Tactical Trainer, which I acknowledged, but I can do without the patronizing tone of this last post.

OK Excalirbr4 - good point, well made. I'll shut up now and let you all keep on enjoying yourselves