You should only be allowed to promote a pawn with a piece that has been captured

I think none of my opponents ever had two queens. I resent two queens on the board. Once in history somebody was against this idea because he resented the idea of polygamy. I do not have problems with that. I am against two queens on the board because in most cases, this means that one player did not pay attention. 

If you'd prefer your opponent or yourself to have added incentive for paying attention, I think the threat of two queens should suffice...

Also, you help me state my case by saying that if one knows how to play well enough, two queens is rare. If two queens occur, it is usually good practice for teaching someone when to resign. Hopefully they will start to see it coming and either resign then, so no one is offended by two queens on the board, or to do something about it the game before it could happen, so that we don't have people complaining in threads like this one, as well as, playing better quality chess also.

Would you prefer that people play worse chess, simply because the best their opponent will gain is a two pawn advantage over what they had, but still may be down a pawn after promoting , because only knights and bishops are off the board ? I prefer that people have an added incentive to try their best, instead of playing hum drum, whimsical chess, as if they are some bad reincarnation of Mikhail Tal...

I want kids to checkmate with a queen and a king instead of trying to get ever more queens just because they can. In the cases were two queens occur, it is pretty much game over anyway. I want the better kid to improve his/her checkmating skill which will be needed in the next game against a better opponent. The loser of this contest will get a lesson of what to look out for and will play a lesser opponent next game.

Certainly, encouraging them to learn how to do more with less is a good thing in some situations, but, if you also still have other pieces or pawns on the boards, you force them into a mode of calculation that is prone to error, when there is an error free way.

A good player doesn't risk a sure simple win, even if it is less flashy or less brilliant looking. Knowing they could still win, and succeed the hard way, they will only be regarded to been showing off, by some. It is true, others may look at their play as brilliant, but also not without it's fault, as no one plays perfectly anyway.

This brings to light one of my arguments with the way the tactics trainer assess's our skills. Does is take more or less skill to recognize and not pass up a sure easy win ?

I agree with your point about the tactics trainer. Once I did a TT exercise on some other page and got punished for using a path that would take me more moves to checkmate. I realised that it would not have benefited me in a real game to spend time to look for the more elegant solution. Going for the easy one is often more efficient as you know what you are doing which will take you less time and less nerves. 

But the point of a TT is not to win a game, it is to train you to become a better player by seeing the more elegant ways.  

In this sense, the kids need to learn how to do the mate with just a Queen. Arbiting their games at an interschool tournament, I was disappointed at how many stalemates I saw resulting from Queen + King vs King situations. Kids need to be prepared for the tougher situations. 

As for the weaker kids, they need more practice against weaker kids so they improve without losing interest in the game. Just read that Josh Waitzkin's father said that it is not a good idea to thrash the kids if you want to keep them interested in the game. Maybe I should take that to heart. 

 I also wanted to thank you for actually reading and considering my ideas thoroughly and then commenting intelligibly.

I think not rewarding their hard work, with a victory they can enjoy coasting to sometimes and making them all grinding, can be a discouragement. If you have to always work so hard and can barely win, it takes the fun out of it for a beginner, whether they win but, perhaps even more so, when they lose.

 I could be snide and say that the tactics trainer's point is to help you win and that using it is the time and place to learn tactics but, I will acquiesce, since you were polite and no matter what, I can't escape the idea that there is no better place than to learn in your games, with necessity being the mother of invention.

Agreed. However, the unobserved game is not worth playing! 

I think actually part of the point of post game analysis is to see the unobserved game because, it very well and usually is worth playing...

There are Queen pawn vs. queen endgames. True, they are hard to win but that is why high level players study them. There are classical games in history between chess giants with more than one queen for each side: I know there is one Alekhine vs. Capablanca but can't bother to pull it up here, and definitely others. 

Let the kids play as they see fit--it is part of the learning process. They'll either lose interest in chess or outgrow such behaviour.

Ok, I guess my attempt to hijack a Socrates quote did not work very well. What I was getting at is that the unanalysed game is not worth playing. So playing a thousand games without analysing them will not get you as far as you would want. Unfortunately, many people and especially kids do not bother to write down the notations and look at their games later. Most of the time, they do not even remember their last move. 

In some respects I think it is noteworthy then for both of us to reconsider the intentions of the player, who is choosing to play in the first place. I think if the player has nothing more than the desire to be a casual player and do so for fun, putting the restrictions on him, one would as a coach of a future champion, is a bit near sighted in my opinion.

As a player, if you don't care who is watching, how you play and could care less about who and how they attempt to critique you, other's opinions mean practically nothing. This can become a debate over whether house rules in monopoly are "good", all the same really.

phinneas wrote:

My proposes: when the pawn get promoted he becomes a butterfly.

Loved this one.

come on guys. the rules of chess are fine the way they are. if you are so worried about extra queens then get creative. they don't always have to be official chess pieces to play. the game play can be the same as it always has been.

all that would do is make white black and black white and white would still have the first move 

Check out Shogi, this is pretty much exactly how it works.

hi

I 've always considered pawns to be male. In my language pawns are also called soldiers (male). Promoting them to queens would require surgery to put it politely.

Introducing pieces out of thin air may cause brain damage to some people. We hate these asymmetrical abnormalities. I beg you to spare us.

A pawn cannot be promoted, but it can be traded for a captured piece or remain in the last rank till one becomes available. It reaches the enemy camp and there it sacrifices itself to free a captured piece. Logical. Extra-terrestrials cloning pieces is ridiculous.

I think in Shogi captured enemy pieces turn sides and join your army

I think assigning gender without regard to chromosomes is pretty stupid.  So in chess there is no gender to pieces.