winning on time....ethical. ..??

Why bother playing in tournaments or skittles at all if you think it is unethical to win on time?  A lot of us would like to get on with the rest of the tournament, not to mention the rest of our lives, so the clock helps regulate that. I think it is more unethical to sit staring at a losing position and then trying to sneak in a win by hoping your opponent has to leave before you do. 

5 hours ago · Quote · #75

bobbyDK

the ethical question I have related to time is if your opponent forget to punch the clock and you sit as if it was your turn.

The opponent may sit 5-15 minutes before he realize that he forgot to punch the clock he may even lose on time time because of that later in the game.

I always remind my opponents to punch the clock, except in blitz/bughouse. In those two games, the clock is everything, but in Standard Chess, the rationale for having a clock is such that an opponent should not spend too much time thinking, not as a second way to win. I don't believe my opponent should be penalized for forgetting to hit the clock, so I will remind him/her to hit the clock.

I am not responsible for my opponent's time management . If he forgets his clock I am in the habit of reminding them , only once , and will not remind anyone more than once . Depending on who my opponent is and the tourney/game situation I may not remind them even once .  Their clock is NOT my responsibility .  There are situations however , such as K+p v K that are dead " book draws " and the player with only K has proven on the board he knows the drawing procedure and yet some will try to run them out of time when they have a time advantage . Now ... we can argue all day if this is about ethics/rules  / etiquett , whatever but people who win in this manner/situation are questionable . In fide classic ( slow ) play this is stopped by summoning the arbiter or by increments , if they are in use . 

Insufficient losing chances, unfortunately no such provision exists here.

In the USCF there is an objectionable rule, saying if the arbiter believes a Class C player (1400) can draw to a master, it is a draw, but there is a clock penalty for falsely calling the arbiter over, and the arbiter gives benefit of doubt to the player up on time, so it is rarely used.

In 2011, the USCF did away with this rule for any game that uses either increment or time delay, which is most tournaments.It is a great change, especially since so many TDs are barely 1300 and lack the chess knowledge to make these judgements.

http://www.uschess.org/docs/gov/reports/RulebookChanges.pdf

I have never heard of that. Are you sure? Can you cite the rule?

It's called insufficient losing chances.

http://archive.uschess.org/tds/clockrules.php

yes, that is an archived, older page. See my post #94 that updated and changed the "insufficient losing chances" rule. It is going away, fast.

Yes, but in the National Elementary Championship, a couple of kids claimed that in pawnless endings.

Like a boxer complaining that he was winning on the scorecards if it wasn't for the knockout, a chess player that complains that you only won because of time is being equally absurd.

Hello schachfan1,

I did mean "correspondence" games (the older terminology), which chess.com refers to as "online" games (a useless label since all games here, fast or slow, are "online").  Anyway, I agree with your point that those of us who have many chronologically overlapping correspondence games would never be able to take a vacation if we wanted to avoid making our opponents wait.  This is one of the major reasons to patiently accept opponents' vacation.

Of course some people take a long vacation to delay facing defeat, but it seems to me that these people hurt themseles by exhausting their vacation prematurely, instead of saving it for when they really need it.  And what's the point of prolonging the "agony" of an "embarassing" defeat?  Spite?  I feel sorry for people who hurt themseles merely to spite another over a game of chess.

Reb, 

With great respect to you as an NM, nevertheless I feel differently about the ethical stance you took with the K+P vs. K example.  Would you mind elaborating on this?  Do you feel it is unethical to win on time in a clearly lost position in bullet?  Or blitz?  How about a 30-minute game?  In which situations do you feel it fails to become a player's responsibility to manage their clock so that they have sufficient time to complete an obvious path to a draw or victory?

Sorry if I havent been clear . In blitz and bullet pretty much anything goes , especially online .  I am referring more to OTB chess with classic/standard time controls . I prefer to see games decided on the board and not decided by who can shuffle pieces faster in a mad time scramble which often happens with SD time controls . FIDE often uses 30 sec increments and this avoids people trying to flag their opponents in obviously drawn positions . I just played in my first event in the US in which increment was used, but it was only a 10 sec increment .  I prefer increment to delay , having used both . 

It's about the shift from working to advance your position and win, and playing the clock exclusively.  At a certain point in the latter case the game changes from chess to hot-potato, that's when the abiter needs to be called over.

But shouldn't the use of an increment or delay largely avoid the "hot-potato" aspect of time pressure?  I thought that was why the delay/increment was implemented once digital clocks became widely available.

I had an ending of K+R v K+R in a G/2 hr game in Portugal and it was a draw but I had about 15 min left on the clock to my opponents 1 minute ... he offered me a draw .  I could have easily ran him out of time but I gave him the draw as it was a draw on the board . It was interesting the comments I got after this game from many of the players but imo I did the honorable thing .  

I'm supportive of 30-second increments for OTB chess in tournaments for the same reason.  I wouldn't want to see a chess match among top-ranked players decided on time, especially when the position favored the opposite player.  So I think I agree with you.

I do feel that anyone who couldn't close out a position with 30-seconds/move didn't manage the game and their clock well enough to deserve a better result.  So I would not feel too badly for a player that flagged with a 30-second increment in a winning or drawing position.

Yes, hence the comment from JimmyKay about the rule change reflecting exactly that.

Another huge plus for the 30 sec increment is that neither player can ever stop keeping score . I have so many incomplete scoresheets due  to not keeping score when either player gets below 5 minutes and prefer complete/accurate scoresheets .