Claim Draws in Drawn Endgame

i completely agree. and i completely disagree that using time to win a game in a drawn position is unsportsmanlike.

I've said from the first post that I think time management is an important aspect of the game. I did say "actual lead in time", not just "actual lead" so absolutely I think a lead in time is a legitimate lead.  I'm not sure where you got the idea that I didn't.

Fundamentally, and as an example, I think that a 60 minute game in which the K+R vs K+R position were reached with an even 20 minutes of each side's clock would best be declared drawn even if one player wants to try to run down the 40 minutes on the other player's clock faster than the other player can do the same to him.  At this point I think it's clear that the last 40 (80, really) minutes of the game are not being played in the spirit of the game of chess -- with or without time limits, and can be declared to have degenerated into something else altogether.  I'll concede that in a 1 minute or 5 minute game this is not so clear, but surely above a certain threshold this is nothing more than an exercise in futile tedium.

It's easier to detect it programmatically.  It doesn't solve the issue 100%, but it certainly improves it for those scenarios that can be detected.  It's not something that would be beneficial for draws but not for other positions, but rather is a limitation of the complexity of the other positions in which similar behaviour might be observed (i.e. a lower rated player who has a higher rated player tied up but doesn't know where to go with his attack and so plays for the win on time by similarly running down the clock rather than playing the position)

Sounds like you and I should get along just fine so long as we continue to disagree.

Fair enough. Sounds like we're on the same page with regard to everything except where to place the arbitrary lines of sportsmanship.

Some food for thought:  could probably substitute "obviously drawn game" for "completely winning game." (from USCF site discussing chess rules)

3d. Insufficient winning chances
When a player is low on time, but has a completely winning game, she can try to claim a draw by asserting that her opponent has insufficient winning chances. Nowadays, most Tournament Directors refrain from making such high stake decisions and instead give the players a digital clock and allow them to decide the result by using an increment or time-delay, usually five seconds. As long as the player completes each move within five seconds, she can't lose on time. The player who wanted a draw because she was low on time can win if her opponent refuses the draw and insists on playing it out with the digital clock.

This is based on an understanding that a player who has a significant time advantage versus a significant material (or positional) advantage should not be allowed to win. It's not unreasonable to make this decision, but you should be conscious that you are determining the nature of the game by making rules like this.

It's already in the rule book.  It's titled "Insufficient Losing Chances" rather than "insufficient winning chances."

IMO, once you start putting time controls in, then the clock is part of the game.  The reason the other guy has "slightly more time" is because he's better managed the time he had. Good time management in games with short time limits is an advantage.  Bad time management will lose you games.

Personally, I don't like games with low time limits.  20 minutes + 20 seconds a move is about the fastest game I'm interested in, and I still don't consider that enough time.  And because I don't like games with low time limits, I play more "online chess" where you have a day or more to make a move instead of "Live Chess" that usually has low time limits.

It seems silly to me to choose to play a game with fast time controls and then complain that the other guy did a better job of managing his clock.

If you don't  like the "sudden death" time systems, then play with a time control that gives you an additional 5 or 10 seconds a move.  That way, in the end-game as described, you can still make a move every 5 to 10 seconds and never run out of time.

This is why playing zero increment is silly. You'll lose to dead drawn or even won positions because you had 0.5 sec less time. Pure luck in many cases.

holy resurrection batman!

trying to flag people  in drawn situations is always unsportsmanlike. i dont care if i have 5 mins left to the opponents 5 secs i will offer him a draw every time. if you play to a draw then you deserve a draw and i think it shows alot about a person if they mindlessly move pieces for 15 seconds to get a "win". the point is to beat the other in chess having less time per move not to try to hide until your opponent runs out of time. if you view "winning" on time as equal to winning a game of chess then you are missing the point of the game entirely.

When you have a siginificant time advantage, especially if your opponent is actually in time trouble, it can hardly be considered a drawn position so there's nothing wrong with flagging them.

If you and your opponent both have quite a bit of time left, event if you have a slight advantage, I would agree that trying to flag them in that situation is unsportsmanlike.

i see it as he effectively used his time and i did not if he has 5 secs and i have 5 mins left. theres a reason why winning by time is called flagging and not victory. maybe if i wouldve taken more time i could have utilized my time advantage. the advantage of having more time is you should make better moves. i dont start the victory dance in drawn positions.

yeah i really don't get the argument that winning on time is unsportsmanlike (as one can see in my posts in this old thread).

how can one just decide that one of the factors in the game just doesn't matter all of a sudden?  after all, in a timed game, time is a factor obviously. but for some reason, people have no problem saying that time should just not matter under certain circumstances. i'll never understand it i don't think.

i honestly can't think of any other game (or sport) that one of the factors of the game is just completely disregarded simply because using it as an advantage is considered unsportsmanlike only under certain conditions. if it's so unsportsmanlike to try to win by working within the game factors made for the game, then something is wrong with the rules of the game, and not the competitors who simply work within the rules to win it.

that is, if you have an issue with people using time to win the game, don't play timed games because that's in the nature of timed games. or play games with increments (such as 5+1) - an 'alteration' of the rules in a sense. but whatever you do, don't blame the player because it's not his/her fault, it's the game itself.

I agree with that absolutely.

It's like claiming your opponent is unsporstmanlike for using his extra Rook to mate you.

What if he won your rook because you were in time trouble?  Wouldn't that make it unsportsmanlike?

i dont think anyone thinks time management is unimportant. there are unwritten rules in every game. i can name them if u wish. "winning" on time isnt unsportsmanlike- because its your opponents fault. Playing to and only to "win" on time is not the nature of the game. Basically i feel if you cant "win" except for on time, then you are being unsportsmanlike. 

lol

please list all of the unwritten rules which stipulate when and how a specific factor of the game should be disregarded. like i mentioned, i don't know of any in any other game where that happens. apparently, according to you, there are some in chess. i'd like to know them for future reference for sure.

You can't list them or they'll cease to be unwritten.  It's an unwritten rule.

Or at least it was.

they should probably be unspoken also.