Why is every non-checkmate a 0.5-0.5 draw?

Being an old fart that is already having a hell of a time learning this game of chess, I’d hate to have to learn a whole new set of paradigms. Having said that, the more I follow this thread, the more I weight I give David’s argument. I liked OBIT’s comments.

I bet changing the stalemate scoring would INCREASE the number of draws at the top level. Rather than take some risks where the worst-case scenario is defending a worse endgame, most players would probably end up playing much more timidly than risk losing ground via an otherwise drawn endgame. It probably would reduce draws at the lower levels, but chess has never needed that.

They should just toss a coin at the end of a draw for who to give 1 point to and who to give 0 to.

GloriousRising: Oh, I get, it.  Reaganomics.  Lower taxes for big corporations, and more revenue will be generated overall, resulting in the government getting more money from taxes than before.  That has never worked either.  Common sense should tell you that turning some positions from draws into something else will result in fewer draws.

I think it is also worth mentioning that, while most K+P vs K endgames will now be wins (the only exceptions being the positions where the pawn can be captured by force), getting to the K+P vs K ending won't be any easier. This means, for example, that if you are in a pawn down rook and pawn ending, usually you should avoid trading rooks, and if the endgame was drawn before the rule change, most likely it will stay drawn.  For the defender, the basic principles of keeping your rook active, posting your rook behind the passed pawn, and, whenever possible, getting your king in front of the pawn will still work most of the time.  So if you think endgame strategy will change radically, that's nonsense.  And if you think the games will become more passive out of fear that any pawn down endgame will lose automatically, that's also ridiculous. This rule change will not put gambits out of business.

I agree that stalemate should be worth 0.75 or 0.8 for the stalemating player. But factoring material differences into the scoring would drastically change endgame strategy, probably a bad idea.

Well, a 50-50 split in score does make sense, because it's a tie. And because every draw is equal, an equal score makes sense. Even a stalemate is equal because everything the stalemating player gained by getting the stalemate, he lost by allowing his opponent to get stalemated. It seems to me all draws are equal, so the scoring should be equal.

Okay, OBIT's just trolling. That would explain that. 

But seriously, any sort of structural change is going to have unintended consequences. Given that there's no logical reason for a change (chess isn't a spectator sport. Get over yourself), there's no point in risking the consequences.

And changing some positions from draws into something else only logically reduces the number of draws if you can assume no other change in the way the game is played, which is naive and absurd. There's so many incentive interactions it becomes unpredictable exactly what would happen. I'd guess it's reasonable that the number of draws would increase. You might feel otherwise, but there's no way to be remotely objective about it. 

What is the problem you are trying to solve? 

He may just feel that it isn't fair for stalemate to be a draw.

On the other hand, I am trying to solve a problem. The problem I'm trying to solve is that not enough people are interested in Chess as a spectator sport for there to be money flowing in to the game. So there aren't enough prizes and venues for tournaments, and thus there are not enough opportunities for people to become professional chess players.

So some country that supports Chess with tax money could end up controlling the world championship for propaganda purposes the way the Soviet Union did except for Fischer. Only if Chess is made interesting to the general public will the free enterprise world be able to defend itself!

I mean it it kinda odd that two knights is a draw but two bishops, a knight and a bishop, or a rook are all easily winning. Or how a rook pawn is a draw but a bishop pawn is also easily winning. If stalemate were worth at least something over 0.5, then at least you get at least something more point-wise than the defending player.

Yeah, personally, I think the problem with chess as a spectator sport is that not enough people play it seriously, you have to be reasonably strong to even have a clue what's going on in real time, the players aren't doing anything visually interesting, and the games take a long time. (The draw problems is way down the list, Iist, IMO). 

The problem with changing the ending conditions is that while those situations (e.g., having a bishop vs a king, etc) may be reflective of who played better when both players are playing for mate, they suddenly become new "targets" and the players may stop playing for mate because it's easier to try to trade into a favorable draw. It's the law of unintended consequences. 

Also, aesthetically, I'm not sure I like the idea of punishing heroic defensive efforts - finding a creative piece sacrifice to force a drawn position should be rewarded, not punished. 

Agree with everything except for OP, who is stupid with a good heart. But you still have an IQ lower than the number of chess pieces on the board at any time.

No, GR, there is a logical reason for the change.  As quadibloc and others have already stated several times in this thread, right now the big problem with top level chess is the excessively high percentage of draws.  I feel the general public would tolerate a draw percentage of perhaps 30%, but when it gets over 50% only the hardcore chess fanatics aren't heading for the exits.  It's no surprise that the general public regards the Carlsen-Caruana match, with its ten games to date all ending in draws, as a snooze-fest.

Now, I realize the hardcore fans are going to react to that last statement with a haughty wave of their hands and a contemptuous retort, something like, "So what if there have been ten draws?  This is chess of highest caliber being played by the two best players in the World."  Of course, this response completely misses the point.  The games may be interesting while in progress, but the end result of so many draws is unsatisfying to the general public.  You may think you don't have to cater to the masses, but the fact is you do.  You need casual fans to make chess viable as a spectator sport.

Finally, what is the big deal with tweaking one or two rules, really?  Other sports do it all the time.  In other sports, when the defense starts to dominate, some rule gets modified to allow more scoring.  When the public says they don't like ties, some artificial tiebreaker is concocted that infuriates the purists but makes John Q Public happy.  Changing the scoring for a stalemate would have minimal impact on chess strategy.  That makes it an ideal rule change to give chess greater mainstream appeal.

Good Question

Thanks everyone for the lively discussion! Sorry I was away and didn't get to everyone's points. It's a holiday weekend here and I'm not online much right now.

It seems like most of you are understanding the gist of my proposal. (If not, be sure to read my essay here.)

I am surprised at how many players seem to passionately prefer 0.5-0.5 draws... and how many think that the "emergency brakes" are a feature of chess, not a bug. But I guess in a discussion like this, I should have expected the opponents would be the most vociferous. 

A change like the one I proposed doesn't happen overnight, and I certainly wouldn't want a system-wide change without some experimental tournaments first. So if any of you are in a position to run an online or over-the-board tournament, let's try something like this and see what happens. If you just want to make the stalemate adjustment, and not the material one, I'm still very interested in the results.  Is 0.8 better than 0.75 or 0.51?  Let's discuss after we've accumulated some data.

Also, if you program chess engines or endgame tablebases... how about giving users an option to adjust the value of stalemate, etc.  It defaults to 0.5, but lets guys like me run calculations on hypotheticals.

With this World Championship, I see Capablanca' fear of draw-death becoming real. It's time to breathe new life into our tournaments.

Kind regards,

David

+10

The 3-1-0 system is interesting to me and I'd like to see stats of it in practice. But it won't have any impact in a match like Carlsen-Caruana... that's still draw-death.

Kind regards,

David

PS It also doesn't solve the "emergency brakes" bug.

Chess is not a spectator sport. Full stop. Top-level players owe nothing to anyone. There's no logical change because there's no reason except trying to change the game into something it's not. Chess would not benefit as a game from increased spectator interest. It's always been a highbrow pursuit. There's nothing to be gained by dragging it down to the level where the oblivious public can "appreciate" it on some superficial level. If the aesthetic difference between a win and a draw is going to substantially impact your enjoyment of watching a game, then you shouldn't be watching in the first place.

And let's not pretend these proposals would be little changes on the order of, say, pushing the extra point back in the NFL. This would fundamentally redefine how the game is played and have massive unintended consequences. We'd have to rewrite a huge amount of endgame theory--king and pawn endgames would become way more decisive, for just one example. Clearly equal endgames would become anything but, and I can't see that artificially changing the balance accomplishes anything but change for change's sake.

And to what end? To try to force the game to be something it never has been and never will? That sounds irrational to me, as well as openly hostile to anyone who's spent substantial time on the game. If your ridiculous proposal went through, I'd feel forced out of a game I no longer recognize, mutilated for the sake of ignorant casual fans. In what bizarre, twisted world does that make sense?

Except themselves. And it's precisely the top-level players who stand to gain from an increase in the popularity of chess.