response



FICGS - Search results for response





There are 134 results for response in the forum.


Scott Ligon    (2025-01-07 18:55:30)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?

I am running an experiment where each move will be selected by Stockfish 17 in a deterministic configuration, so it will be possible to predict my response to any given move with certainty. I believe Stockfish 17 at these settings is so strong that it will be difficult if not impossible to exploit this strategy. However, if I reach a position where it looks like this strategy is going to lose, I reserve the right to deviate. If this happens, I will message my opponent to let them know that I am no longer following this system.

I'm using a python script to interact with Stockfish, but you should be able to get the same results running Stockfish 17 from the command line. I am currently running the search with the parameter nodes = 10 million (previously I tried nodes = 5 million but I found a way for white to win against Stockfish at that setting). From the command line:

go nodes 10000000

In order for Stockfish to be deterministic, it needs to be running on just 1 thread and from the command line that's the default. If for some reason Threads has a different value on your machine:

setoption name Threads value 1

I'm using the default size for the hash table, but if you run the search a second time without clearing the hash, you will get a different search result. So either close and restart Stockfish between searches or else clear the hash table:

setoption name Clear Hash

Lastly you need to be able to input the position before running the search. It is important that you enter the position via FEN string rather than by inputting the moves, because you might get different search results otherwise. Use only the first four fields of the FEN string, like this to get black's response after 1 e4:

position fen rnbqkbnr/pppppppp/8/8/4P3/8/PPPP1PPP/RNBQKBNR b KQkq -

From that position if you run Stockfish with nodes = 10 million, the last two lines of text output should say:

info depth 32 seldepth 46 multipv 1 score cp -26 lowerbound nodes 10000376 nps 462252 hashfull 999 tbhits 0 time 21634 pv c7c5
bestmove c7c5 ponder g1f3

I think only the values of "nps" and "time" will vary, everything else should be identical between runs / machines. So in this case Stockfish 17 recommends the Sicilian Defense and gives an evaluation of +0.26. (cp -26 is the evaluation in centipawns from the perspective of the side to move, but usually evals are given from white's POV).


Per Lea    (2006-04-10 01:32:41)
Games overview

Thibault: Thanks for quick and positive response. Hannes: thanks for the support (I've also had support from Håkon Anda, in a personal mail)! I hope others agree as well.


Thibault de Vassal    (2006-04-11 14:54:36)
FICGS titles

Hello to all.

I would like to have players opinion !

As you may have noticed, I already changed FICGS titles to FEM, FIM, FSM, FGM. (not titles obtained elsewhere) Do you agree with titles appearing this way ?

I thought several other ways : EFM, IFM, SFM, GFM, or only to mention norms obtained ! (not titles) At last, of course, we can suppress definitely titles from FICGS, a bad idea in my opinion. What do you think about that ?

Thank you in advance for your responses.


Glen D. Shields    (2006-04-16 12:15:33)
A Couple More Suggestions!

Thank you Thibault for your prompt response to my suggestions. Here's another one that you may not be able to do easily. Can you add an option to make the board a little bit larger? And maybe eventually give us chess piece choices or board color choice? My eyesight plays tricks on me as I get older and bt experimenting with the colors, sizes and piece choices it sometimes helps. Just a suggestion! None are big ones. Thanks!


Wayne Lowrance    (2006-05-19 00:50:31)
It is not nonsense

He resigned i believe cause of opinion of those here. It is not nonsence. The fact that this site is correspondence has nothing to do with it. absolutley nothing ! You go to any club tournament and you will not be welcome back with such over the board conduct. It is rude, spitefull and counter productive to good chess and fair play. You will change this rule my friend. There is NO justification for a player to drag out a forced mate loss if he sees it. and believe me in the case of my game 205 you must admit it is obvious. In fact he should have resigned many moves earlier, I would have 4 sure. do not like your weak argument justifying the mate implementation.... Here is to a nice cite for corresponse chess. Respexctfully Wayne


Thibault de Vassal    (2006-05-29 13:06:48)
Sorting games

Hello Trent. That's a fine suggestion, thanks.

Actually, there are several ways to sort games usefully, hard to choose. Now the games (in 'My messages') are sorted according to your time of response. Thus the first game appearing is 'most probably' the one you should consider first.

About one of your messages I forgot to respond (sorry), I'll try to offer to play on a javascript/java interface later [help welcome :)] , but I think HTML is quite ok and most compatible. On some computers it consumes less time on dial-up than other servers using Java...


Trent Parker    (2006-05-30 01:50:25)
Quoting Thibault..... My response

Feel free to tell me how you imagine this team championship ? How many players by team ?

I think only 4 per team would be needed. If there are big countries perhaps they could have multiple teams eg. France A, France B etc etc. Four seems to be the best number. It is used in the OTB Olympiad.

Should the teams have a leader (would designate players, or selected by elo ?) ?

IMHO ELO would be best.

Knockout or round-robin cycle ?

I'd prefer round robin. (although i might not have a team yet :D )


Thibault de Vassal    (2006-05-31 20:01:30)
Weiqi komi

Hello and welcome Lionel :)

That's a very... good question !

Actually I thought it was the more 'organic' (like this game) way. But it seems to be a large debate, without a clear response.

I suggest all go players to read this article : http://senseis.xmp.net/?Komi

Feel free to give me your opinion about that. Thanks in advance.


Wayne Lowrance    (2006-06-01 02:52:44)
Other chess websites

Url u asked 4, http://pacific-mall.com/chess/ sign in as guest or create a user name. very simple. I am globalpac. my e-mail address is yagi90250@yahoo.com future responses concerning that site should be addressed via e-mail. I dont wish to sound promoting here, that is not the case..thanks Wayne


Wayne Lowrance    (2006-06-22 21:11:43)
interesting question for the Gambit's a

Sir let me explain, the stats are taken from A database of 1600 GM's. the statistic is taken prior to blacks response but assuming pxp. Of course the percentages varies as you go thru the book lines. Where did your statistics come from (e-mail me, dont want to continue with troll)? Kings gambit with perfect play as you say leads to a draw. That does not impress me much. I agree the best defence against a gambit is accept, I usually do. Yes your right the thread is a troll, I apoligize for contributing but I found my self not being able to agree with where the last few topics were heading. I do not accept this mind games thing excet against a very weak player playing a much stronger player. In this case I agree. I end the troll with this...Wayne


Thibault de Vassal    (2006-06-29 10:25:55)
Ficgs correspondence chess wch 1

Easy question, easy response : Yes ! :)

A hard challenge for anyone, for sure...


Gino Figlio    (2006-07-04 04:06:08)
Symmetrical games

I meant 2 identical games played with different colours usually against different opponents, but in this case against the same person. I'm sorry for not reading the rules, but there is no way to prove in simultaneous games, who is copying who since known theory in certain openings reaches 20+ moves. However, if someone delays his response until the opponent makes a decision in a critical point of the opening, he can then play the same opening without fear knowing that once that point is reached, he will make a different move.


Thibault de Vassal    (2006-07-10 02:04:36)
Vacation and reflection time

Hi John, Glen & Heinz-Georg. Thanks for all suggestions... ;)

Some responses, particularly about vacation (towards a compromise ?) :

* 30 days + 2 days/move : Not "beautiful" (not a joke, it is design matter)

* 30 days max for one move : Not convinced it can really bring something... if a player want to last a CC game, I think no reasonable rule (without human factor) can prevent him to do so.

* 14 days + 1 day/move (rapid) : As players don't know exactly when tournaments will start, I think 30 days at start (ie. compared : email tournaments often start before the real date) is a good choice to avoid accidental forfeits during holidays !

* 2 weeks annual leave : Even for different time controls, I'm not favourable to make too many different rules.. 30 days (for all games per year) is a balanced choice IMO.

* Vacation : Ok, I make note of this. I was not favourable to any leave system, cause it's obviously a way to have days more in time trouble, even if time is frozen ! .. That's why I made it "hard" to use.. If players can stop their leave when they want, just by playing a move, it becomes easier to manage time trouble situations. The 60 days rule for 1 move was a solution avoiding vacation IMO but we discussed it already... Now I'm to decide to change the vacation rule, as John (& you) urged me. I thought it was a good thing not to prevent players to make moves during the leave... Maybe most think different, ok... However I have a problem yet with vacation as it's really a way to get more reflection time... Here is what I suggest, simply a harder rule : Players who take days leave CAN'T play during their vacation and CAN'T take days back (stopping their leave by playing a move) ! Then 2 options, players must wait their vacation end date to play again, or they can play, but provoking the cancellation of their leave (loosing the days leave taken and not used yet).. Maybe it won't be appreciated in some particular cases if players have to modify their plans, but the aim is clearly to reduce the vacation effect on the game... What do you think ?


Glen D. Shields    (2006-07-24 17:04:52)
Thanks Thibault

Thanks Thibault for the response.

I definitely concur that today's correspondence chess is different than 40 years ago. The two biggest things I miss about today's CC are the 1) blunders and 2) open tournaments. I remember the excitement of getting a postcard and rushing to check my opponent's move. Blunders weren't common, but they occured. Now they're non-existant. Blunders made for great lore!

Why no more open tournaments? Took me 40 years to get my rating where it's at. I'm not a top player, but what I've earned, I've earned mostly the "old fashioned" way. I avoid open tournaments to avoid losing to low rated players who just learned the moves, but because they have a a high powered muti-processor running Deep Fritz they can knock me down a hundred points. I miss chatting with beginners, teaching them the ins and outs of CC. Oh well :)

You mentioned the top CC players winning and then not sticking with the game because winning is too hard due to chess engines. Is the drop out rate at the WC level any different than it was in the past? Berliner won and dropped out 40 years ago. Palciauskas won 30 years ago and then he dropped out. Chess engines were not a factor when they won. I don't think top players drop out because of engines, but because it is too hard to keep a competitive edge to play at a top level for any length of time. Good results are a combination of talent, hard work and good fortune. Keeping all three together for any length of time is a HUGE endeavor.

Personally I think a bigger threat to CC burn-out is not chess engines, but chess servers. Servers make CC too easy. Today's CC today is like Bill Murray in "Ground Hog Day." You wake up to an inbox full of chess moves. You work all day/night replying. Then you wake up the following day to moves from the same people and do it all again. There are no week long breaks breaks between games like in the postcard days. Server chess is burning out everyone, not just the top players. The progressive server owners will need to address this issue someday.

Sooooo ... what's the bottomline for me? I liked the old days better, but the old days are gone. Chess engines are here to stay. Progress is part of life. I embrace progress and am determined to enjoy it. I get my thrills by learning about chess engines and their weaknesses. That gives me an edge and keeps the game fresh. But then that's me :)


Graham Wyborn    (2006-08-09 16:07:03)
Correction previous response

Second press of (download) button goes to:- http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer &...


Ron Keyston    (2006-09-07 18:57:36)
Thanks

Wow, thanks for the quick response Thibault. I was just coming back to say that I guess it fixed itself, but now I see that it was you! Thanks, Ron Keyston


Nigel Colter    (2006-09-18 12:18:48)
Comments at resignation

Hi Thibault Does the instruction make an 'updated public comment' mean go to the Forum section and type in a message. Presumably with the opponent's name in the 'Response' box? Please clarify. Many thanks Nigel


Dinesh De Silva    (2006-09-29 13:09:10)
Psycho(logical) games?...........

Silvio Danailov., Manager of the Bulgarian team says:

To all mass media

Ladies and Gentlemen,

After we got acquainted with the ruling of the Appeals Committee of the Topalov vs. Kramnik world championship match we deem it necessary to point out the following:

The ruling in its present form is not satisfactory to us since it practically does not result in any change. Mr. Kramnik will be able to visit the new bathroom an unlimited number of times without being subject to further control.

We would accept the current relaxation rooms to continue to be used provided that the presence of controllers in both rooms is ensured.

When the two players need to go to the bathroom, they should be accompanied by an assistant arbiter.

The checks carried out in the relaxation rooms were made only by experts of the Organizing Committee, whereas our experts were present as observers and only after the second game.

We find it difficult to understand why is it that the accredited journalists are denied access to the video tapes from the relaxation rooms.

The World Champion Veselin Topalov is outraged by the suspicious behavior of his opponent Mr. Vladimir Kramnik who in actual fact takes his most significant decisions in the bathroom.

Despite the above, in the name of the chess game and out of respect to FIDE, to Kalmikia and the millions of chess lovers, Veselin Topalov is willing to continue his participation in the match provided that measures to guarantee fair play are taken.

If the match were to continue, the World Champion would refrain from shaking hands with Mr. Kramnik before the games and would not take part in joint press conferences with him. Veselin Topalov will make statements for the media separately.

We look forward to receiving your response by 14.30 h hoping that it will give concrete answers to the questions that we pose.

28.09.2006
Elista Sincerely:
Silvio Danailov
Manager of the Bulgarian team


Graham Wyborn    (2006-10-11 00:13:44)
See Below

You just have to wait a few hours, the game will be adjudicated automatically. Reply given to me in a previous response to a similar question


Lawrence Nesko    (2006-11-20 01:39:51)
Thank you....

...for the timely and informative response, Thibault.


Lawrence Nesko    (2006-11-20 19:42:00)
Thanks, Thibault

I appreciate the response. In many of the books I have read (particularly Seirawan's series), I have almost always seen e.p. as the notation for an en passant capture. Perhaps my source materials are older, or perhaps they are not using tournament conventions?

Either way, I'll keep this in mind for future reference. Thanks again!


Michael Finkelstein    (2007-01-23 04:37:26)
problems with playback --

Dear Thibault, Thank you for your kind attention to my issue. I appreciate your efforts here very much. When I am at the start of a game which I wish to play back, I hit the forward button to play the next move -- when I do so the screen drops a quarter of a page. I then have to go to my screen up button to move the screen up again so I can see the move buttons. Or, when it is my turn to move, I click on the piece I want to move, and the screen again drops down a quarter of a page -- so I have to do a screen up button to get back to the board and click on the square I want to go to. I assume this is a unique problem to me since I saw no posts on it. What do you think, do I need to do a better job of explaining my situation? In regard to the light by the names of people online, I find it helpful when I logon and go to my games to see in one view which of my opponents is online, that way I can know if I will be making several moves before I log out since my opponent is online too. It is more tedious to search on my messages to see if any of my opponents is online. It would also to nice to have a buddy list so I could see stats in one view on my friends here. Thank you so much for allowing us to download all our games in progress at once. I did not mean to be critical. This is a nice site and you do a nice job here. Thank you again for your response to my question. Mike


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-01-25 11:32:27)
paragraph

Oops... You mean to begin a new line in the forum ? .. See above the response form "(please use < br > html tag to begin a new line)", without spaces in BR tag..

Maybe I'll change that in a while.


Michael Finkelstein    (2007-01-26 05:23:20)
playback

Dear Thibault, Thank you for your response. I do indeed ask how can I start a new line in a forum post. You advise that I do the following: please use < br > html tag to begin a new line)", without spaces in BR tag.. I do not know what that is. Mike


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-01-26 09:08:24)
new line

See above the response form ;)


Ron Keyston    (2007-01-29 17:27:38)
"Major" Deep Fritz 10 Bug

I've confirmed this problem on two different computers with completely different hardware and different operating systems. I've also sent the problem off to Chessbase, but have not yet gotten much of a response. If anyone else has Deep Fritz 10, would you mind giving this a try and reporting back with your results? Also, if anyone has the non-Deep version of Fritz 10, I'd be interested in knowing if it is also affected by this problem.

Input a game into Deep Fritz 10 and get to a point in the game where it is possible for black to castle long. Now save the game into a database, close the game and then open it back up from the database. If you either turn on infinite analysis, or just try to make the move, black is not able to castle long...Fritz assumes that it is an illegal move.

Furthermore, if you castle long BEFORE saving the game into the database, then save it and re-open it, then go to the position after black has castled queenside and turn on infinite analysis, the analysis is "messed up." Either the analysis text is invisible, or it reports impossible lines, or the evaluation score is very obviously wrong. This should be enough info for anyone to give the test a try, but if you want some specific examples, please let me know.

Ron


Don Groves    (2007-03-13 06:55:09)
Login timeout is sometimes too quick.

Hi Thibault -- I was just typing a long response to a Forum article and when I tried to preview what I had written, I got the dreaded "Try again" message. My login had apparently expired and when I logged in again, all my typing was gone! Is it possible to extend the period of inactivity before we are automatically logged out so this is less likely to happen?


Elmer Valderrama    (2007-03-27 17:48:51)
the second article...

..At least we got an inmediate response after the criticism ;-)

Once I am relieved from the headache of reading the first part of this very involved article, I'll post my comments..

BTW at first glance it seems the author has the bad habit of NOT giving an assessment to his annotated lines, ..or are we supposed to look at the engine's evaluation :-) --which are illegal to use, remember?!


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-06-18 20:50:23)
Big chess theory : "Queens opening"

The first rated Big Chess tournament started a few days ago... I like this game more and more, no theory, no databases, no chess engines, many strategies & many queens captured already ;)

Every opening seems ok, we still don't know if taking pawns with the queen during the first moves is worth something or not, the value of the pieces is quite unpredictable... Many players now play 1.Nh4 to threaten 2.Qo7 then 3.Qc7 if needed, winning a pawn. What is the best response if you want to keep the same material ? .. Anyway that's very interesting to see a side with 1 or 2 pawns more, giving some rooks activity to the opponent.. Still looks like a draw theorically.

My main line is : 1.Nh4 Nh13 2.Qo7 No14 3.Qc7 Ql13

Any other suggestion ?


See Big Chess waiting list in Chess Special Tournaments.


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-06-20 22:54:33)
Internet chess

Well, the discussion with Tryfon Gavriel continues at TCCMB. As I had to explain the way I make FICGS, I copy my responses here :

http://ancients.correspondencechess.com/index.php?topic=109.15


Hello again Tryfon !

That's a very interesting discussion...

Actually I have to explain FICGS in its whole to respond :) .. To be continued for sure..

While registering a new member wrote to me a few months ago "Thanks for creating this ultimate chess challenge" or so... That's exactly what I try to do, mostly with the FICGS championship knockout & round-robin rules... Players just want challenge, that's the only assumption I start with, so I try to create interesting challenges. About the intellectual part, you're right but I'm quite sure that top level correspondence chess players still consider their game as an intellectual challenge, much more than a brute force or computer skills one. That's not the case for Advanced chess with fast time controls.

Let's take a look at the bicycle races again... The "Tour de France" is dying IMO.. because everyone understood we "don't know" if the champion is ok.. If doping was allowed (it would be a scandal for health of course), I'm sure the interest would raise again ! I think it is the same for chess & for everything else... The "Tour de France" syndrom happened in Elista with the match Kramnik vs. Topalov... It will have consequences. We need champions and we want true champions, every means are ok for this ! .. So the "engines allowed" rule is the only one possible or reasonable in my opinion.

Of course, chess & correspondence chess are changing, because these "walls" are nearer & nearer... maybe chess will die, maybe not.. The main problem is that in 1997, a super computer became World Champion... this year a "simple" computer Deep Fritz became world champion, soon Rybka on a cellular phone... :) Who is really interested to be a champion in "human category" ? FIDE world chess championship will continue to progressively lose its interest IMO...

Correspondence chess is just starting to grow in popularity and is told to be dying already. Surely correspondence chess will ask more & more time at a high level to win a few points, but it is possible to create more challenge by ie. changing the rating rules (the "design" of Elo rating system will become a problem).. Then, if it is not enough, we'll look for other challenges... It's told for years that Go (Weiqi) will replace chess in western countries... why not Big chess as the "brain only" game if there can't be doping in it.. just trying, as there's no other solution :)

A word about Poker of course, as it's probably the fastest growing game in popularity : IMO this game is at a stade like chess in year 1900, but the same problem will happen, even quicker. At a high level the game will be just more and more boring (if you wish to win real money) or chancy (in a wch tournament), or you'll have to always find weak players (well, not very challenging).

About the simultaneous exhibition against Alekhine or Capablanca, I'm not sure at all they would crush everyone at our chess servers, they are undoubtly more talented than all of us, but I feel it wouldn't be enough in all cases to win against correspondence chess style of play & knowledge accumulated for 50 years... A few players rated OTB 2000-2200 could draw against them IMO...

At last, yes I'm a fan of Sun Tzu's "The art of war" :) .. I strongly believe that correspondence chess will not die in the next few years because players will follow its principles more and more, as the only way to win ! .. Big chess follows the same principles... and Go is the most challenging game because of it too !

Tryfon, I'm not sure that we're opposite in our vision of chess ! .. Our servers have obviousy different goals, nothing more.. I do enjoy playing mad blitz games without chess engines... I just believe that the future of internet chess is "serious (engines allowed, rated) correspondence chess" on one hand and "human chess for fun (no engines, unrated)" on the other hand... The other ways look like nonsense to me.

I hope it responds.


Best wishes, Thibault


Michael Aigner    (2007-06-22 21:27:50)
Re: Rybka's strength at CC time controls

I think you are right with your Elo approximation (2200 to 2300). There is just a little problem. In the case everybody would know he/she is playing against the latest Rybka version this would be a big problem for the program. In this case Rybka should loose almost every game because everybody would know Rybkas response to any move and could build wonderful traps. Did you hear about the so called "Planetenmatch" (match of the planets) where correspondence Chess GM Arno Nickel played against several Programms of unknown identity (the alias was the name of a planet). I think the engines had 24 hours per move and no chance - a desaster for the programs. That was of course before Rybka appeared, on the other hand he won also against Hydra!


Ivan Pljusnin    (2007-08-09 18:58:05)
2 Rodolfo d Ettorre

"I van see IGame is a big happy family ..."

The forum of igame is very popular. Some topics there contain several thousands responses and more than 100000 views. Sometimes murders of igame chessplayers are discussed, it usually makes a topic very popular. Unfortunately, some moderators do not like that, and most interesting authors are banned. :-(


Christophe Czekaj    (2007-09-01 12:43:09)
Free of chess engine

Thanks Thibault for reconducing me to this past forum. Very interesting. The part about "real" elo and correspondance elo is edifying. I know correspondence players could have a huge better elo than their real life one (if they have any) : more time to think, no stress, no pressure (or less) but I believe players who play without engines have a coorespondence rating approximately equal to their over the board one. Personnaly, I play coorespondence chess to try new opening, to train generally since I cannot play over the board so often since 2 years. I often play from the office, wtih sometimes a couple of minutes on a move, or sometimes I go home with the moves to think about my response in over the board conditions (30 minutes maximum on one move). My correspondence elo is around 2000 (with a good start with a peak to 2098, but declining since ;-D) and my over the board rating is now 1990 (with a peak to 2040 last year, and a rapid elo around 2100). So I sometimes feel a bit fed up with playing against chess engines, notably, but perhaps I'm wrong I have remarked that since I got an advantage, often opponents defend very very well, like computers in fact. Ok it's part of the game, and I know t could be a good training, fight hard to win a game, display a good technique, etc. but it could be disappointing to have the impression of play with a human opponent and have to finish with an another, i.e. the computer. Perhaps could we compare over the board elo, with correspondence elo to know if there is computer help or not ? Anyway, a special category of tournament will be great, and I'm eager to play with other ficgs "OTB-correspondence" players.


Garvin Gray    (2007-09-06 07:36:52)
engine use


Jason- Thibault already spelled it out for you in pretty simple terms that he doesn't believe in human-only correspondence chess. I guess if there are enough people who don't want to deal with reality whining about it he'll cave in.

Hello Jason,

I think the better response is if someone wants to play 'human only' correspondence chess, there are plenty of other sites 'out there' to satisfy.
Rather than 'cave in' I am most likely am wrong as Thibault is of course not keen to lose members, but I can see more bitching if human only chess is specifically catered for as players will 'bitch' about other players who they suspect of using engine assistance.

I enjoy the freestyle component of play is what I enjoy here and the good nature of the site. I think a main part of this is that there are no misconceptions about what the rules are regarding engine use.



Thibault de Vassal    (2007-09-10 03:42:07)
New rule

One more response in this discussion (Garvin, Mladen or Jason) and the rule will apply, of course.


Andrew Stephenson    (2007-09-10 18:20:05)
Insults

Thibault you have been over tolerant of abusive posting in the forum already and that has contributed to the situation. Sorry to say that but it must be obvious to anyone who has read the discussions. The key problem is personal attacks on people and not provocation. It is not acceptable to respond to a point with a string of insults denigrating person. Incidentally Thibault is it not possible simply to deny someone access to the blog so there posts cannot be seen by anyone as a punishment and they receive a message to that effect? No need to deny or retrict them access to the server as a whole. This is what ICC do in the same situation. Also if someone is punished in this way there is no need for it to be broadcast it is enough they know that their posts or responses cannot be read. So the offender carries on using the server and playing chess but cannot make posts - but of course they can read them!


Andrew Stephenson    (2007-09-12 16:51:49)
Gene

ok Gene let me give you my experience as to why you should use an engine in cc. 1) I have learnt a lot about certain openings and I remember lot more effective systems 2) finding the truth about a position is fun and instructive 3) I have acquired some endgame knowledge I never would have got. 4) Generally I wil try to understand why the engines like certain moves and drill down into the position trying altrentives until I get it. Sometimes in very wild positions its tough. Most of the the time this reinforces principles of develpoment pawn structure piece dynamism and I find it rubs off on my understanding. One proviso - if you take on too many games a lot of this wont work! Facing a much lower rated player you have to do research and prepare something - trotting down the main line poisened pawn Najdorf may not be the way to go. A lot of top players go for catalan and english openings hoping to utilise their chess knowledge and research. One thing is for sure always playing the best move of your engine is going to drop 1/2 points and lose some games and that includes Rybka. Finally all this stuff is done by all the top professionals in the otb chess. One example I faced the line that Kramnik got crushed with by Topalov playing b5 and f4. I looked at the game notes and databases and couldnt find a good response 45 minutes with fritz and I cracked it and in the process gained some insight into the opening. In fact its a harmless variation if you know the antidote but over the board one slip and Kram was toasted


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-09-13 13:44:25)
Droit de réponse

Christophe, as I said to you in private, it is only due to this rules change just before your post. It was too hard to make distinction of what is justified or not in some cases, so I was too much tolerant before. Now rules should avoid this. All responses to provocation will now be censured, a "droit de réponse" in this case is useless and pollutes the forum. Of course, you may ask for previous provocation & insults to be removed also.

Of course you were not accused of immorality ! .. Rules must avoid such discussions, nothing more.


Don Groves    (2007-10-26 01:29:15)
Elections...

And here in the US, we are fighting to have fair elections instead of stolen ones, so we have a lot in common with Kasparov. One difference between the two battles: in response to a question from Bill Maher, Garry said he had hired bodyguards for himself and his family. So his fight is more dangerous than ours -- so far...


Wayne Lowrance    (2007-11-02 00:20:53)
remove me please

okey dokie, please remove me, as I posted I think it is a lousy change. The higher that class the less the response, what is suprizing about that. It is not a matter of interest. Wayne


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-11-06 15:41:01)
Go categories

In response to a french player who thinks that it could be harder to reach the 600 points mark (15 kyu) in the Kyu category :

Bonjour... A propos des catégories Kyu, je pense au contraire que ce sera encore l'une des catégories les plus jouées, sinon la plus jouée. L'écart de 500 points par catégorie est encore un peu grand mais devrait permettre l'accession assez rapidement à la catégorie au dessus car : 1. Les classements pris en compte à chaque résultat sont les classements en cours (non TER). 2. Le calcul fait en sorte que le classement des vainqueurs progresse assez rapidement. 3. J'enregistrerai plus de nouveaux joueurs à 17 ou 18 kyu au lieu de 20 kyu... 4. S'il y avait des catégories jusque 30 kyu, il y aurait moins de joueurs dans chacune... En bref, je pense que dans la pratique cela ira.


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-11-09 01:05:28)
Chess sponsorship

An interesting discussion about chess sponsorship started on ChessDiscussions.com (Susan Polgar forums)

http://www.chessdiscussion.com/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=504

Several issues : "How to bring chess to the masses ?", "How to make chess a show ?", "What kind of sponsorship is possible ?"

Susan obviously thinks that OTB chess still has a great potential and that organizations could do much better to promote it... Here's my last response in the thread (reminds some old threads here) :

<<<

In other words, you say that chess has a show-potential like any other sport that could be used and that isn't...

For sure traditional marketing methods could help to promote OTB chess, and chess organizations could do much better... but is chess "bankable", just like an actor ? .. I just saw one more comparison between chess & poker in the thread "How to bring chess to the masses", but there's a major problem in chess that doesn't exist in poker or soccer : "everything can't happen", at least at a first sight, actually the way people can see it...

FIDE tried to change some things, ie. time controls, wch cycle but that's not enough, obviously. Anyone can win a lost hand at texas hold'em against any professional player, like any 2nd division soccer team can beat the Real Madrid once... Of course long-time statistics will be always favourable to the best players, but it takes a much longer time... Everything can happen in any event in these games (poker wch, soccer world cup). The probability for a real surprise that makes buzz is much lower at chess, the same best players invariably play the best tournaments, won statistically (ie.) 20% by Anand, 19% by Topalov, 18% by Kramnik and so on... quite boring.

The only interesting chess events follow the same scheme : David vs. Goliath, the buzz-genius 12 boy vs. Kramnik, mystery-Deep Blue vs. Kasparov, Anna Kournikova vs. Fischer & so on... nowadays the man vs. machine match is no more interesting since any home computer is stronger than HAL 9000 or Kramnik and there's no clear world champion (too many FIDE wch, different cycles..)

Chess needs real events and I'm curious to see the ones "that could bring chess to the masses" in the future... Maybe I'm a bit pessimistic, at least for OTB chess, but I'm very interested to see how good marketing methods will be able to transform our chess world... Just wait, hope & see :)

Best regards, Thibault

>>>


I'm now working again on SEO (Search Engines Optimization) for FICGS, more and more players find us via Google... Of course one next step is to sponsor the FICGS WCH & freestyle tournaments but it is a hard task for sure... All comment and suggestions on this issue are welcome :)


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-11-12 04:59:04)
Limitation is now 50 running games

I just changed the number of running games limitation to 50. We'll see if it helps to decrease the number of forfeits.

Thanks all for your responses :)


Graham McGrew    (2007-11-26 22:33:50)
Wilkes-Barre Furor

Thanks for this wealth of responses, all. Thanks too for the tip on Ilmars' analysis. I will check it out. Thibault, what is the next thematic tournament for which you need five more players? Ilmars, I would love to play a game with you as white, me as black. Being new to FICGS, I'm not exactly sure how to start a game with you . . . ?


Tano-Urayoan Russi Roman    (2008-03-15 17:02:14)
Question about ICCF

I have read the ICCF rules but in no place they refer to computer assistance, is this allowed for ICCF games? Could you cite any document concerning it? Thank you for your responses.


Andrew Stephenson    (2008-05-05 12:50:53)
From here to eternity

Yes there might be some variations that are survivable especially OTB but at cc its tough to give up a pawn so early on. I think f4 is a perfectly ok first move (like b4) I just think it does not give any prospect of an opening advantage at cc because there is no surprise value and the black player has the time to research and find a response that equalises fairly quickly. That is why very few GM's have F4 as a main white weapon - it does not give enough prospects for an advantage - at the highest levels. Please note that qualification. I quite agree real chess is between people in real time and cc is a form of research competition. Getting experience for real world chess is a great reason to play a line at cc. There are exceptions OTB I often play the exchange french and have had good success (played by Kasparov Tal Morphy and others) I would not play it at cc though! In fact OTB I always play e4 but at cc gave it up because I see no way to get any adavantage against the caro kahn. Just relaying the moves the computer suggests does not, I think, give much chance of success against good players at cc. As for the From I do not believe in g5 white has to avoid the tricks and develop and is a pawn up. Not so easy otb!! - but at cc not so much of a problem. As for Nc6 yes I was talking about this move after 5 g3 and you are probably right I will try to look at the game you gave and do some analysis. As for the Mestel variation I thought black would get the pawn back unless e3 and d4 are played but again that was based on a quick look. Anyway perhaps the thematic tournament wil provide some answers.


Andrew Stephenson    (2008-05-06 12:10:33)
Strictly for the birds

Thanks for the link for the games they are nice. Obviously playing the From or the approach adopted by black in these games is not an accurate response! Better to play like Of course 1f4 does not lose or lead to a worse gane for white - it just allows black to get equality very quickly and easily. The "waste" is that white has the first move and a lead in development and chances for an advantage. 1 f4 doesnt develop any piece (except the king!) and is a bit committal and slightly weakening of the king side. I would like to show with analysis exactly what I mean. Black has many good systems here is one. 1 f4 d5 2 Nf3 g6 3 g3 (e3 is the other way to play more on that) Bg7 4 Bg2 Nf6 already black is equal IMO. GM Jakubiec (2524) played this position 3 times last year as white against Rozentalis (2581), Bartel(2608) and Kadziolka (2295) and won all 3 games! He would 0-0 play Q-h4 and g4 f5 and roll them over! In every game black got an advantage in the opening and lost but at cc thats not going to happen. In each game it was easy to see blacks mistakes and to see the right move to maintain an advantage for black. The other set up for white is to play 3 e3 (instead of g3)Bg7 4 Be2 (4 c4 is interesting)Nf6 5 0-0 0-0 6 d3 and now after c5 its level but I would rather play black. Look what happened to Evgeny Alexseev as black - a very strong 2600+ GM at the time - he continued 6 ..b6 7 h3 c5 8 Qe1 Bb7 9 g4 and lost to IM Sengupta. These Dutch reversed attacks can be scary to face otb but they are harmless at cc. Conclusion: 1 f4 is a dangerous move otb especially where the opponent is not expecting it but against an accurate cc player it does not offer any hope of an opening advantage - its a waste if the goal is to get some opening advantage - its productive if the goal is to gain experience and insight into f4 for use in real chess.


Jason Repa    (2008-05-06 21:54:09)
Bird Brain loses in 33 Moves!

"Obviously playing the From or the approach adopted by black in these games is not an accurate response!"

That's not obvious at all. What's obvious is that I beat you quite easily when you and I played cc so you're far from being any kind of authority whatsoever!

"1f4 does not lose or lead to a worse gane for white - it just allows black to get equality very quickly and easily"

I just finished trying to explain to you, in the way a young child should be able to understand, that there is more to think about in chess than trying to play what current theory considers to be the best try for an opening advantage. Yet here you are rambling on about the same nonsense you were in your previous posts. Was Fischer's 2.d3 against the French the objectively strongest move? Even against (and perhaps especially against) computers, it can sometimes be better to play sidelines or moves which may serve to confuse an opponent. Is the King's Indian Attack the best try for an opening advantage for White? Probably not. But it was used by Kasparov to defeat Deep Blue. If you still can't understand the concept I've been trying to teach you, after several posts, I don't know what more I can do for you. Just keep mindlessly playing what established theory tells you are the strongest lines,(without having even the incipience of an understanding as to why) and keep mindlessly trusting the evaluations your program gives you, and you'll keep getting CRUSHED by guys like me.

"1 f4 doesnt develop any piece (except the king!) and is a bit committal and slightly weakening of the king side."

After this statement, if I didn't know better, I would have thought you were someone who just learned how to set up the pieces. It might be one of the dumbest things I've ever heard anyone say. Does 1.e4 develop a piece? How about 1.d4? I suppose those moves are "a waste in cc" as well. We should all be playing 1.Nf3 and 1.Nc3 according to you, lol.

1.f4 grabs space. It stakes out influence both in the center and on the kingside. It effectively prevents 1...e5 (lest White goes into a dubious gambit system) as an alternative to other moves which achieve this. There are also other intangibles that are part of the picture, such as the psychological effect the move may have, the lack of preparation an opponent may have against it, etc. If you ever began to understand chess at a level beyond just plugging moves into a program, you might start to appreciate that allowing concessions (such as the slight weakening of the White kingside resulting from 1.f4) is all part of the game. Fischer's famous quote: "you gotta give squares to get squares" is a famous example. If allowing static liabilities were something to be avoided at all cost, you'd never see a Sicilian Scheveningen. It allows all sorts of weaknesses.

As for your so called "analysis". It's a complete joke! For starters, you're "analyzing" a game resulting from the Leningrad Variation of the Bird's Opening. I line I've never played in my life, let alone here on FICGS. Is this how you try to win an argument/debate? By misrepresenting the facts? An intelligent person who genuinely felt that their argument had a leg to stand on, would simply take one of the 4 games I provided to you and do some analysis from there. Showing where Black could have improved. Then finally, after trying to "score points" with examples of the Leningrad Variation of the Bird's Opening, which I have never played, you post a game where White played poorly and lost to a lower rated player. As if that's never happened before in chess, lol. You don't even know enough to post the date of the game. I couldn't find this game on any of my databases(totally over 4,000,000 games), so if you didn't just make it up out of thin air, perhaps you got more wrong, such as the actual moves that were played, in addition to incorrectly stating:

"Look what happened to Evgeny Alexseev as black - a very strong 2600+ GM at the time - he continued 6 ..b6 7 h3 c5 8 Qe1 Bb7 9 g4 and lost to IM Sengupta."

Is it Black that lost here or White?

I took a brief look at the game, and it's hardly representative of proper play by White. 7.h3 was dubious at best. I prefer 7.Ne5. White then misses another opportunity to play the knight to e5 after 7...c5. Then 9.g4? is a gross thematic mistake. The only thing this game proves is that you're completely incapable of discussing chess in an intelligent way. Real chess players look for games that illustrate the critical lines for both sides, and try to arrive at some actual insights.

There is a reason I crushed you when we played cc last year.


Pablo Schmid    (2008-05-06 23:13:38)
Jason,

"I realize that Pablo, probably a lot better than you do" What? How do you know? You know nothing about me and you say that... "We were discussing whether or not Black gets his pawn back" Is that question more important than "Does Black have a sufficient compensation for the pawn"? "For example; 10...Bf5 11.e4 Qe7 12.Bg2 0-0-0 13.Be3!+/-" Easy response when I already said that I would play 13..Bd7 here and now what?


Andrew Stephenson    (2008-05-13 09:59:15)
Provocation

Again I find myself in complete agreement with Thibault on this issue. Whatever differences there might have been in the past everyone should feel free to express their opinion. Often the best response is silence for example eg: starting a thread and getting no replies at all. That can be a message in itself.


Andrew Stephenson    (2008-05-13 13:22:56)
Provocation

I am sorry I cannot respond to a lot of what you have posted as such a response would breach the rules. I have not examined all your losses - just the French games - so I do not know how instructive they are I will try to review them later but I can't promise anything. However I am a great believer in checking lines I play with the database to see whats been learnt and how the top GM's handle the particular lines. All I learnt from my loss was not to play that particular line and to cut out all dodgy openings. In fact the line you played is not the strongest and I believe black can equalise - unfortunately I found an even stronger line for white which seems to refute the entire variation. There is however a book by an english GM from 2007 which looks at sicilian side lines and claims that there is no refutation. When I have time I will stick all the analysis up and people can make up their own minds. On correspondence taking someone's OTB chess to the next level I am a bit sceptical. It definitely has a significant effect on the accuracy of opening play and this can get some valuable wins by itself. But other progress needs separate study and training. Silmans Reassess your chess for example will increase the rating of any one below FIDE 2300 if studied intensively IMO.


Lincoln Tomlin    (2008-05-16 02:24:00)
Erm...

Interesting thread. I just spent 20 minutes composing a response, hit submit and *BAM* I got the Password Incorrect page, signed in again and all had disappeared. *sigh* :)


Mik Kris    (2008-05-27 19:51:18)
Thanks for the quick response

I am sorry I did not think my original idea it all the way And forgat my manners for a moment there I wold like to thank you for building this great site and this opportunity for me to meet many intersting people Yes I wold like to be able to challenge some one for a simple rank game without starting a tournament one more thing might be nice is to get an "are youre ready to play" message before a game in a bullet or lightning tournament


Garvin Gray    (2008-06-02 19:14:39)
response


Wayne, this is an enternal problem and while you complain about it for the rating group 2100-2300, saying that only 2100 will benefit from it.

No matter what the rating bracket, it has been shown on this site many times that very few players will enter a waiting list when their entry is just below the cut off.

So changing the rating limits to 2200-2400 will not change this behaviour, all it will do is move the 'problem'.



Jason Repa    (2008-06-04 20:22:20)
Poker

No, your ability to understand simple concepts is what is weak here groves. You keep whining that your paltry 1600 chess rating shouldn't matter because you haven't played chess in a couple of years, but what difference does that make? Are elo points easier to obtain now? And what about Go? You play that game regularly, yet you have a pathetic 1300 rating at that as well. You better open a window before you think up another lame excuse....I wouldn't want you to die from smoke inhalation.

I don't know how many times I need to keep repeating myself in order for the point to penetrate your skull, but your comment about "mastering the mechanics" of the game is pure nonsense. You speak as if the entirety of poker theory can be equated to memorizing basic strategy in blackjack. You seem to think the discussion of calculating EV is based purely on figuring out pot-odds and how that relates to the number of outs, etc, but if you had the incipience of a clue about the game you'd realize that there is much MORE involved than that. Poker is an information game and all the information you have at your disposal, such as the temperament and mood of your opponent(s), your perceived table image (or at least your interpretation of it), the history of the action that has occurred so far, the tells that you pick up and the false tells that you may be sending to your opponents, etc, goes into the calculation of the EV on any given play. The better a player is able to conduct these evaluations and convert them into value, at least intuitively....the better a poker player they are. Even online poker has some tell/false-tell action as the response time can be varied.

Re-read my previous post where I mentioned that mistakes can take various forms. I clearly state, and in simple terms such that even you should be able to grasp, that there is more to the game than straightforward arithmetic calculations.

And I realize that you don't work, but geez, can you not find something better to do with your time than try to provoke people on the internet? Why don't you use all that free time you have on your hands to learn how to play Chess or Go beyond the level of a rank beginner?


Don Groves    (2008-06-09 06:47:09)
Brackets - both Chess and Go

In response to Garvin Gray's first response in this thread: There is a way around the problem of being stuck at a certain rating because you never get to play against higher rated players (which is necessary to move up) -- allow the winner of a tournament to qualify for the next higher classification regardless of his/her rating. This is done on at least one site already (IECG, if I recall correctly). If the player in question does not improve his/her rating enough to stay at the higher level, he/she drops back into the lower classification. Thibault would have to agree to allow this of course. I think it's a good way to reward the winner of a tournament.


Don Groves    (2008-06-09 09:01:24)
Brackets - Chess and Go

Thanks for your reasoned response, Jason. I'll answer your points in order: (1) Having one lower rated player in a group of seven does not seem to me to be much of a dilution. Also, remember that this player is at or very near the top of the next lower rated group, and again, this doesn't seem like a large enough disparity to be of concern. (2) The other players in the group will have five other opponents rated within the group's normal limits and thus will have plenty of opportunity for their own advancement by winning a majority of those games. Remember also that Thibault instituted a rule that losing to a lower rated player only counts as a loss to someone a maximum of 150 ELO below. So, losing a game to this one player will not constitute a disaster to anyone's rating. (3) The new rule could easily specify that no more than one lower rated player may enter any given tournament. (4) Your point here is simply not true in general. In my own case, I'm the highest rated player in a current Go tournament. Even if I win every game, my rating will improve at most from 8 kyu to 7 kyu. The next cutoff point is 5 kyu and there's no way I can reach that level without playing against higher rated players.


Jason Repa    (2008-06-09 11:05:13)
Brackets - Chess and Go

"Thanks for your reasoned response"

Somehow I don't think you know the meaning of the word "reason", groves.

"(1) Having one lower rated player in a group of seven does not seem to me to be much of a dilution"

It is very much a dilution. As I just finished explaining to you, it will not only make it more difficult for the other players in the tournament who legitimately qualify to be there by rating, to acquire the rating points necessary to get to the next level, but it will lower the overall rating average and effect the awarding of norms.

"Also, remember that this player is at or very near the top of the next lower rated group"

Total rubbish. You just finished saying, in your previous post, that you propose to allow the winner of a tournament to qualify for the next higher classification REGARDLESS of his/her rating. There is no certainty that the winner of the tournament will be near the top of the next lower rated group. They could very well be at the bottom of the next lower rated group, as I often was, as were many others, when I won tournaments.

"and again, this doesn't seem like a large enough disparity to be of concern."

And AGAIN, As I just finished explaining to you, it will not only make it more difficult for the other players in the tournament who legitimately qualify to be there by rating, to acquire the rating points necessary to get to the next level, but it will lower the overall rating average and effect the awarding of norms.

"Thibault instituted a rule that losing to a lower rated player only counts as a loss to someone a maximum of 150 ELO below"

Where did you get the 150 ELO figure from? I was under the impression it was a 200 ELO ceiling. Not that this has any relevance in terms of supporting your position anyway.

"The new rule could easily specify that no more than one lower rated player may enter any given tournament."

I just finished explaining to you that there is no guarantee that the "M" class tournaments will end at the same time as the "A" class tournaments. Not only do "M" class players tend to take the game more seriously and move slower, but there are more "A" class players than "M" so it takes longer to fill an "M" class list, hence less "M" class tournaments are played. If you propose to have only one "A" class player sent to an "M" class tournament at a time, then you'll quickly accumulate a waiting list backlog of "A" class players waiting to be seeded into a tournament they don't legitimately qualify for, stretching for decades. The other reasons I mentioned are MORE than enough reason to ditch this suggestion. This is just gravy.

Additionally, and once again, as I just finished explaining to you, if someone is winning tournaments, they're gaining rating points and will soon be able to qualify for the new rating category through legitimate means. So there is no reason at all to provide such "handouts".

I hope I don't have to repeat myself a third time here. It seems quite silly that you don't yet understand the simple and logical truth of what has been explained to you.


Normajean Yates    (2008-07-11 01:08:02)
response to TLP's last sentence is relev

Last proposition and last sentence Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-Philosophicus [english translation:] Whereof cannot speak; we must remain silent. Someone's response [mentioned in a book by Karl Popper - Popper didn't remember who gave this response] - But it only then that breaking the silence is most important!


Normajean Yates    (2008-07-11 02:12:26)
Derida - something missing!

We had text, subtext, pretext;) [my post], context, hypertext :) [thibalt's post] - yet all that is only post-post-structuralism. Something essential to Derrida is missing... - deconstruction!

Mark Hailes, I am disappointed you made a conventional response to my post; rather than deconstructing it!


Normajean Yates    (2008-08-13 13:08:12)
the faded red is not agressive enough..

but the other crimsonish red is agressive. I am psychiatrically advised to avoid crimson-red bedsheets etc - so if crimsonish-red comes I'll logout and login again... I had in fact put it there first but it disturbed me --- the blood responses on my Rorschach tests have been huge in number always - even one blood-response on Rorschach is supposed to be 'abnormal'. ;)


Andrew Stephenson    (2008-08-24 11:52:22)
separate criticism from suggestion

Whatever decisions Thibault made are past and I never doubted his good intentions. However I made a suggestion for the future which is in itelf not a criticism but a response to his invitation to comment on his proposed rule ammendments. I suggested a system for adding to numbers based on the best losers (those tied for 1st place, those placed 2nd etc) and if necessary to rank the best losers by tournament entry rating so if there were 2 slots to be filled and 3 persons who tied for first place in the groups (ie they were 2nd in their group because of lower TER than the winner) the top 2 by TER would qualify. I would also like to suggest an Ajuducations process 1) having indicative finish dates in WCC 2)if the Tournament director feels a game needs to be adjuducated (ie finish date reached)requesting both players to submit their views with analysis 3)having an adjudication commitee who will agree on the result within a set time period. These are just thoughts for possible improvement perhaps they are unnecessary. Anyway they are not intended as criticism scathing or otherwise!


Tano-Urayoan Russi Roman    (2008-10-04 09:03:00)
In response to Don

That is nosense you have a time limit being 30 days for the whole game or 40 days for 10 moves, if a players forfeits by time let it be. Why create more time time controls or impose faster timings controls . I have made moves after more than 10 days of analysis why should I be penalized?


Thibault de Vassal    (2008-10-04 19:35:26)
re : In response to Don

You wouldn't be penalized in that case. All this is about 8 games match, as Andrew said "The idea is that it is too distorting to have a rating that shows a 6-0 win over a similer high level opponent". The whole problem is just to know where to put the limit.

Well, as it is possible to win elo points this way (loss on time in equal or winning position) in round-robin tournaments, it should be possible in 8 games matches too, but 8 wins this way shouldn't be taken in consideration.

Consequently, I propose a new rule, quite reasonable, that could satisfy everyone (finally even my rating :)), here is :

"11.6 "Games are not rated for the winner if less than 10 moves have been played by his opponent (most probably forfeit, silent withdrawal or obvious cheating) or in global forfeit cases, including losses on time whatever the context in a 2 players tournament, ie. chess championship's 8-games matches, except games where an advantage is obvious, in this case at most 2 of these games will be rated."


Don Groves    (2008-10-30 20:19:24)
Response to Scott

Hi, Scott -- How about specifying a minimum number of moves per day rather than a time increment? Four hours per move would interfere with my sleep pattern ;-)


Scott Nichols    (2008-10-30 22:37:09)
Norma :)

Nice response, some players I think do rely on their opponents health failing because that is the ONLY way they can salvage a lost cause. One game I heard of was the guy was playing his friend. He lived in Alaska, he waited six months for a reply, when the sled dogs pulled up the mailman gave him his letter. He anxiously opened the envelope to discover it said "J'adoube"


Normajean Yates    (2008-11-07 20:38:47)
coorection.. I meant type 1.e4 c5 -

of course. Please read what I mean, not what I type :) [adapted from a classroom response attributed to Richard Feynman]


Normajean Yates    (2008-12-11 01:46:47)
my response...

Excellent, thought provoking article.

About subconscious thinking - I am in two minds: as an existentialist I am uncomfortable with the concept: yet there are memory/thought acts which bear no other explanation yet. The famous existentialist psychiatrist R.D.Laing who applied Sartre's work to psychiatry, also did not dwell on this issue, really..

I believe it is partly volition, partly innate - the innate part being proneness to 'subconscious', involuntary and in particular obsessive-compulsive thought patterns in OCD or in certain bipolar depressive states [I am bipolar depressive type 2], which responds to high-dose fluoxetine...

I am more comfortable with the part of the article I quote in the next paragraph, although there no reason we should have a specifically '*chess* pattern-recogniser organ' [1] - more likely we have an innate but more general 'chessy' pattern-recogniser-faculty ('organ') which takes in chess too. [our music-hearing faculty i.e. the ear can hear music, but not only music..] *This* is what the author Rune Vik-Hansen means, I am certain.

[from the article:] 'Playing on Noam Chomsky’s LAD, or Language Acquisition Device, we might say that chess players are guided and supported by a, perhaps slightly Kantian sounding, CAD; “Chess Acquisition Device, making is possible to display sound chess judgment which foundation is the subtle interplay between knowing what to keep and what to discard among triggered moves and in the final part of this article, we will have a closer look as how to increase and improve our chess judgment to form better decisions over the board.'

I will only add that subsequent investigations and deeper questioning of de Groot's subjects (experimented chessplayers? ;-) ) has shown that this faculty/device/organ is less important to chess ability than de Groot thought...



[1] I am calling this presumed faculty/device an 'organ', just like Noam Chomsky occasionally does [in his *linguistics* output, not in his *political* output! :)] - even if you choose to think of it as just a metaphor, it is a very hepful and suggestive metaphor.


Tom Smith    (2009-01-14 18:49:58)
Reply

Thank you all for your comments. I will reiterate again that I am not pointing the finger at anyone, I just asked about this as I do not wish to play against people who just let a computer play their moves, that is all. I do not think that all people who use engines are cheaters, and I apologize to all those who do not blindly let a computer play their games for them. I am astonished now at normajeans hostility, I dont believe I have been offensive to anyone, if I have then it is unintentional. To Normajean, I can only assume that your hostility is due to someone mentioning about selling some software, I can only say, not only have I not heard of any software of this type, but I am in no way involved at any such goings on. I came on the site to join up for some chess and had one issue I wanted to ask about before I started playing, I am beginning to regret this as I did not expect quite such a response! I can maybe understand some suspicion at a new person asking a question of this nature, and understand that some may not like me asking, so again I am sorry for the offense I have caused those players who play a fair game. "Care to confess to the libel under oath in the U.K. and get a taste of the receiving end of libel law?" This comment is ridiculously over the top and again that particular post was unecessarily hostile imo, if you read my posts to this point normajean and still dont see what I am trying to find out about then I shant try any further to answer you as you and some others have obviously found me guilty of a plot of some form against you. I thank the people who answered me honestly and calmly for their comments and I shall try the site out as I said to give it a fair shot.


Wayne Lowrance    (2009-02-03 18:59:13)
octal vs single core in CC

I am using a Octal computer now for perhaps 6 months, before that a very old single core slow comp. came across a inheritance so I splurged. Prior to purchasing for this octal I had many talks with the experienced folks on the "Rybka forum". I inquired would an octal computer provide better play in CC. The typical response was the main advantage is the octal is faster, but my older slower comp given little more time would play close to identical, (but not 100 % identical). I have found this to be the case. I have compared single core with octal core using my octal computer and find the single core lagged the octal on average only one ply, but got the same answers on the whole. I like my MacPro (2.8 gihz) very much don't get me wrong but the most important chess playing feature is the program. I thought some of you would be interested in my little tidbit....... Wayne


Don Groves    (2009-04-19 08:21:09)
Ending abandoned games

This requires more programming for our already overworked director, but how about having the system send an email to anyone who has not played a move in a certain (to be determined) time period asking if that player intends to continue the game and requesting that s/he resign if the answer is no?

The message could also request an RSVP and, if no response is forthcoming, the game is ended. This handles a common situation in Internet games where a player enters some games, then after a short time never returns to the site.

This seems like a reasonable thing to do and it doesn't change any existing rules or time controls.


William Taylor    (2009-04-25 21:01:49)
39 responses

...and this will be the 40th. There's obviously lots of interest but we don't seem to be nearing a consensus. Perhaps it's time to make a decision, Thibault?


Normajean Yates    (2009-05-12 00:33:50)
response to Thib's post:

But that is true of 8x8-chess also (about value of knights) - there, 'P=1, B=N=3,R=5,Q=9' is a very rough guideline. Ditto for bigchess piece values.

What is it that Reti (or was it Breyer said) - about move depending on particular position, *not* general principles? ;)


Normajean Yates    (2009-06-04 08:40:10)
another suggestion: draw offer+timeout

another suggestion: suppose *I* make a draw offer and then *opponent* runs out of time; in such a case *my* draw offer is automatically deemed accepted by *opponent*: the result is recorded as a draw.

Or maybe this: giving a disadavtage only to repeated-draw-offerers:

Above rule, but only applied if it is *not* my *first* draw-offer in the game: i.e.:

In a game between player A and player B; if player A make a draw offer and in response player B runs out of time; and further, if there have been two draw offers in the game by player A such that player B has *not* made a draw offer between the said two draw offers by player B; then the draw offer of player A is automatically deemed accepted by player B: the result is recorded as a draw (instead of player B losing on time).


Philip Roe    (2009-06-04 17:35:08)
Hypothetical case

Suppose that my opponent has a tricky move coming up, but I know that I can defend against it. Because I assume that they have seen both the move and the defense , I offer a draw.

They play the move anyway, thinking that I might not find the defense. But I defend correctly and offer the draw again.

Nothing evil has happened, but this sequence of events would be forbidden by some proposals. It seems to be an over-reaction to make elaborate rule changes in response to an isolated incident.


Tano-Urayoan Russi Roman    (2009-07-06 17:32:38)
Response

You could be a more specific with the anything. Are you interested in chess, go, poker? In the waiting lists there are special tournaments where you could play against single persons


Thibault de Vassal    (2009-09-02 02:06:53)
Response

The rationale for the 400 points bands in class tournaments and 200 bands in rapid tournaments is to reduce the number of opportunities to play rapid tournaments (that are much more time consuming and may lead to general forfeits)... I still do not understand why 400 points bands are a problem as most players play the tournaments that may help to increase their rating (as Michael said, by the way the Rapid M seems quite dedicated for 2100-2199 rated players, actually a future improvement may be 100 points bands).

Anyway, I see no strong reason not to try this change... let's do it unless someone sees this strong reason.


Wayne Lowrance    (2009-09-07 23:52:52)
A Big Mouth on Rybka Forum

Howdy Thibault & all.
There is a poster on the Rybka forum who has sort of a big mouth. He claims that Rybka IA feature is not best for CC games, claims it is too time consuming and at any rate he blubbers and brags that those who use IA are not able to defeat him. I am using my own language here in a jist of the conversation of his. He further says that he never spends more that a matter of hours cogitating his move using a 3 tear "long game" approach to working his moves. Timers such at 60' 40 moves @ 1st tier etc (don't remember his 2nd tier timer. In any case he claims he can get to depth 40 in mid game situations using a "long game" three tier mode. and finds moves that are superior to IA running a day or more (he doesn't seem to understand that most CC players use IA in a special Centaur way and the Program is a tool. He gives little respect for 2500 CC rated Centaur players using the feature IA. He beats such players all of the time, he say's with his Rybka usage with his very modest hardware against 2500 players using IA. I am skeptical. I asked where he plays CC (out of courosity) and he will not tell where. a Poster in response to his post believe he plays CC where computers are not allowed, I have no idea in this regard. I told him that I play at FICGS where computers are welcome and a 2500 rating on this server is very high. There are many well known players held in high regard playing at FICGS that would "clean his clock" with him playing as he say's he does. So what is my point. I am wondering if I can invite this guy to join FICGS and that his lofty rating can be accepted. I shall invite him to Join our SM #11 tourney. Wayne


Wayne Lowrance    (2009-09-14 17:11:09)
sorry my response misleadingg

Oppps just looked at my query response. It sounded disrespectful, which I did not intend it to say, also a typo that made it sound worse. Sorry.
Wayne


Thibault de Vassal    (2009-09-14 21:22:36)
Rating cutoffs change

Hi Wayne, no problem :) .. The responses are in this discussion, right ?

Garvin, it seems to me that this is a minor change (only for chess class tournaments) that does not change anything to most players, I did not want to annoy all members with such an email.


Wayne Lowrance    (2009-09-23 02:50:06)
after review

After further consideration and reviewing the responses, I change my vote to #3. After OTB touch-move !no take backs. 2 is the polite thing to do and that influenced me. But there are other considerations. Thibault, keep it simple, no take backs. I have miss moved here but accepted it as the rule !
Wayne


John Smith    (2009-11-13 18:19:12)
thanks for your responses

I see, it is a quite unexplored area.

Have engines advanced really that much though? Surely, there has been progress, but I did an experiment, I annotated some of my games using Fritz6 and Fritz 11. What caught me off guard was the fact that their 1st recommendation was the same everywhere, and in fact, oddly, Fritz 6 converged first to the "correct" reply.

They still sometimes fail to find some critical moves made by positional masters like Karpov or Kramnik. Of course they have also found many moves of their own (Bxh2!? vs Kasparov) which were not even considered by human masters.

Since my initial questions are probably on too abstract grounds, I'd like to ask a purchase question. I will buy Rybka soonish, however I was wondering if it is worth purchasing other engines as well.

- Is Shredder 12 worth it? are there some parts of the game where it does better than Rybka?

- Are they planning to release a new Deep Junior?

- Is the old Deep Junior 11 worth it, or because it hasn't been updated, even in positions where its strengths lie it has been surpasses by other engines?


Philip Roe    (2009-12-09 04:14:10)
William

I already tried that and got the response "The page you are looking for could not be found" Do you know something that gets past that?


Hannes Rada    (2009-12-23 22:37:34)
Christmas Thread Bug ?

This topic is closed, as no response has been made for more than 365 days.

I mean the Merry Christmas thread ??!!


Pablo Schmid    (2009-12-27 02:02:01)
rules of 10 moves

Thanks for the quick response, my proposition would be no limit of move at all to win points, as in OTB chess. Maybe an idea could be to not make winning points in a game where the player did not connect for a long time before the tournament begin as it is clear that it is a "forfeit", as in OTB when someone don't come.

But maybe you will convince me that your idea is better than mine?


Wayne Lowrance    (2009-12-29 19:58:13)
RobbaLito

Wow, I cannot keep up with all the improved downloadable engines. LobboLite I do not have and was not aware of it, before it was mentioned in response to my earlier post. gracious :) CC chess is the better for it. It gives latitude for Centaur personality/engine team work. So maybe CC chess will not be so determinate in the near future.
Wayne


Thibault de Vassal    (2010-03-16 10:37:01)
Interview with E. Kotlyanskiy

Congrats again to Edward Kotlyanskiy, new FICGS chess champion after beating Xavier Pichelin (2577) in the 12 games final match of the 3rd cycle.

Edward kindly accepted to answer a few questions on his match and correspondence chess in general :

_________________________


> Hi Edward, first of all congratulations for winning this 12 games match against the former FICGS chess champion, Xavier Pichelin. You had to score at least one point more than your opponent, what was your strategy when the games started?

Knowing that I had to score at least +1 against Xavier, I had to try to get the games into complex positions where there are many options to play for both sides. At the point when the games started, I was the underdog to Xavier (mainly due to the face that I was rated about 200 points lower). In part, I think that one of the reasons why Xavier allowed the games to reach such complex positions is due to the fact that his rating was undoubtedly higher than mine and therefore he probably assumed that he could “outplay” me. Although this was simultaneously a brave and admirable choice, I think an option that many other players would have pursued would have been to play “drawish” lines with the hope of having all of the games ending in draws. I have great respect for Xavier due to the fact that he didn't choose such a path and allowed us to put on a hard fought show that was worth watching.

> What could you say on the hot moments of the match?

The first game in which I thought I had very good chances to win was game 34739. In this game (particularly on move 18) Xavier played the move Nb8?? Looking back at the move, I realized that the game was lost for him. I assumed that Xavier probably underestimated the threat of f5. There were no good responses and/or countermeasures for the move f5. For example, if 19) gxf5, I have 20) Nxh5 Nc6 21) Rc3! Bxh4 (Qd8 was also possible) 22) Qf4 Be7 23) g4! His king is just clearly caught in the attack! 19) exf5 also fails to 20) e6 f6 (trying to keep the king safe) 21) Bxh5!! gxh5 22) Nc6 Rc3 and therefore it’s easy to see that it is just a matter of time. Xavier did try something better although even that failed due to some nice moves. I believe that 21) g7 came as a surprise to Xavier (or that at least he hadn't seen this move when playing Nb8). After Nxh5 (another neat move), another line that I thought Xavier would enter (which is also losing) is 22) Qxc2 23) Qxc2 Rxc2 24) Nf6+! Bxf6 25) exf6. Clearly my pawns are just too strong! Knowing that I am winning after the mentioned alternatives, the other games (although I won three others) were just necessary to hold without falling for any tactics/tricks.

A second game I want to briefly comment on is game 34729. I played a very nice (although I am not sure if it is winning just yet) move known as 17.a4! It was a very nice way to open the position on both of our kings. In all honesty, the move that I think was winning in this situation 25) Rd3, I did not even consider too highly until the position reached that very move. After a relatively short analysis, I was indeed pleasantly surprised to see that; overall, it was completely winning for me.

> What could you say on the advantages and inconveniences of this 12 games match format played at a quite fast time control?

From the days when I first starting playing correspondence chess, I have always been accustomed to making moves rather quickly. In fact, when I first started playing, in some games I made moves within 10 minutes of looking at the position. Although I take a lot more time to analyze now-a-days, I still consider the speed of my play to be relatively faster compared to most other correspondence players. Playing 12 games simultaneously can have drawbacks as not having enough time to properly analyze; however, I didn't have such a problem. With the exception of a few games that I was playing on IECG at the start of the FICGS Championship, the 12 game series was my main concern.

> Without revealing your secrets, how would you define modern correspondence chess as a centaur (playing with chess engines)?

These days, it is impossible to play correspondence chess on a high level without consulting the engine. It is also unlikely that one can achieve a lot of success just by following the engine blindly (even after a long analysis). Personally, I know that some of my friends believe that in correspondence chess you are just following the engine but I believe that most “high level” correspondence players know that it just doesn't work that way.

In my opinion, one of the most important skills that a correspondence player should have is having some sense of where the engine he is analyzing with is faulty. To give a well known example, many people know that there are certain endgame positions that an engine alone can't be trusted in (a simple case is the wrong color bishop). In essence, knowing the strengths and weaknesses of whatever engine you are analyzing with is critical to playing correspondence chess at a “high level”.

> Why did you choose to play correspondence chess, do you play OTB (over the board) chess as well?

Before starting correspondence chess, I played OTB chess for quite a few years. When my schedule became busy, I realized that I wouldn't have much time to play OTB in clubs. I came across correspondence chess and got hooked on it very quickly. Also, I began to enjoy more of the subtleties of the game; something that is just lacking in OTB blitz games. I imagine that some people prefer to play practical chess (OTB) in which a move order wouldn't make much of a difference; however, I guess I am a perfectionist and believe the game should be played on as high of a level as possible.

> How many correspondence games do you usually play at the same time (on different chess servers or by email)? Would you say that it is an addiction?

Usually, I played about 5 to 10 games on average on all different sites. I did play via email on IECC but wasn't fond of playing by email therefore I went back to server only sites (IECG, FICGS, Schemingmind).

I can definitely say that correspondence chess is an addiction. All too often, I catch myself analyzing games when I really should be doing something much more time sensitive. Well, at least I can say that this addiction paid off in that I am the new FICGS champion!

> Are you interested in other games?

As far as board games go, chess is primarily the only game I play. At times I do play games like monopoly and scrabble with my friends. Another interest that I have is billiards.

> The next challenger for the FICGS chess champion title is SM Eros Riccio (winner of several PlayChess PAL freestyle tournaments). Do you think that you'll play him? What does this perspective inspire in you?

I can't wait to play Eros! I believe that he would be my toughest opponent yet (although I have played GM Leitão, Rafael (fide elo: 2619) and managed to draw). Eros is like an unstoppable juggernaut in corr chess. That said, I look forward to our games and I am certain that they will simultaneously be challenging and entertaining.

> Thanks and best of luck in your future games!


Daniel Parmet    (2010-05-09 03:36:39)
How many games at once?

If you lower the time limit for response on games to 7 days then I will ask for you to delete my account. This little time defeats the entire point of correspondence. You have no right to dictate how I can and where I should spend my time. The reason I play correspondence is because I can spend 10 days on juicy positions or sit on draw offers or if my real life gets too busy ignore my games all together. If you take this away from me then correspondence is dead to me or at least this site is.


Garvin Gray    (2010-05-10 15:27:10)
Careful wht you do with our loved F

It is the thread title that I am wanting changed, not just the title for my responses ;)


Wayne Lowrance    (2010-06-28 18:40:50)
Save/Reload hash in Rybka

Howdy. I had all sorts of trouble with it too. I finally posted it on Rybka forum. But first, I am not sure your going about it correct. You just need to go to select new engine, then set engine parameters, and there you find save/load hash. Sounds like your getting to this point anyways.
Ok, I paste what was told me at the forum.

This is msg I get when ticking Save Hash (Save hash failed). I created a folder R4.rsh
but apparently it is not found the path is:
C:\users\administration\documents\ChessBase\nogames\EngineParameters\Deep Rybka 4x64\R4.rsh
What am I doing wrong. R4 manual no help.
Fritz12 GUI & Vsta

That was question post:

I think you need to create a file not a folder. :grin:
Nothing ventured, nothing gained...
Reply Report

this is 1 of 2 responses. Other is from Vas himself as follows.

You need to create a dummy file - you can just do that with notepad or something.

This last was from Vas.
Ok, summary :) All you have to do is create a file.rsh: (By the way, My Son stopped bye and he said "dad I will do it for you)" So he created the dummy file "file.rsh". works fine :)
Hope this helps, Wayne


Wayne Lowrance    (2010-08-02 05:06:18)
Match vs. ICCF

Howdy. I think this would be fun. I would suggest some sort of mechanism that will prevent more than 2 to 3 days response with normal TC of 1 move/day. Maybe no increment.
I would be very pleased to represent FICGS team. Lastly I think the players should play tables starting at table 1 highest rank and so forth.
Just my view point. I am really overloaded with games but would add this to my list.
Wayne


Thibault de Vassal    (2010-08-18 18:29:28)
Newest/oldest posts first

So an option to display the forum posts in a reversed way ?!

Not so usual (?), it seems to me that posts are displayed this way only under the response form to keep an eye on the message we're to reply to.


Thibault de Vassal    (2010-08-27 17:08:50)
Newest/oldest posts first

Thinking about it, actually I should change many things in this forum (e.g. response form at the bottom for the way messages are displayed right now...) I'm not sure if top posting is best but an option would do it of course, I'll do it as soon as possible (not so urgent anyway).


Daniel Parmet    (2010-10-02 00:06:39)
WCH Stage 1 groups (new players)

In response, I don't mind a stage 2 being 11 players if 2000+ was seeded into it.


Scott Nichols    (2011-02-17 15:21:36)
request again tour

Gee, the response is better than I expected. After giving it a little more thought, an increment of maybe 4 to 8 hours could be added to accomodate people with commitments other than Chess, :) It would also take into account connection problems, etc. The E-point entry fee could be varied like the Bronze, Silver and Gold formats. Also, since it is unrated, anybody could enter if they dared, :)


Thibault de Vassal    (2011-03-24 15:36:57)
5th Go WCH, analysis by SC. von Erichsen

Svante Carl von Erichsen is FICGS Go champion... for the 5th time! After his win in the match that opposed him to Olivier Drouot, here are his analysis on the games:

_______________________


- Congratulations for this 5th win in the FICGS Go championship! By seeing the score you give less and less chances to your opponents who seem stronger each time though... Several games may look quite mysterious to weaker players. What happened during these games?

- Svante Carl von Erichsen:

Hi!

I do not have the impression that my opponents have less and less
chances. I also make many mistakes, and was in a clearly bad position
in at least one game. Olivier made many very unusual moves in the
opening, which were difficult to handle in a calm manner.

http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=47578

In game 3 (47578), this is apparent at move 18. White has gone for a
very centre-oriented game, while Black has made more direct profit.
It is difficult to say who got the better deal. Move 18 itself is
very unusual, and I am not sure whether the result was satisfactory
for me. I think that moves 41 and 43 were important, as stabilizing
the group in the centre takes priority when the centre is dominated by
White like this. At move 53, it is clear that Black needs to stabilize
the top group, but D18 seems more important in retrospect. Move 62 is
a bit odd---I think that living with S16 instead would be better. I
think that Black got a territorial advantage here. Since White got
additional central strength, Black turned to make his central group
safe again, which should be enough to win now. White 94 tries to
shake up things again, but getting separated on the lower side makes
it very hard for him.

http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=47580

In game 5 (47580), Olivier chose a very unusual move again at move 8.
I think that the outcome until move 17 favours Black, however. At
move 36, it looks like Black will have to live in the corner, but the
white enclosure does have its holes. Alas, White's response to the
forcing move at P10 was a severe blunder, as Black can take back the
right side. Move 55 was big, but I had not anticipated that the fight
after move 56 would be so hard for me. I think that after move 93,
White put too much emphasis on hollowing out what once seemed like
prospective black territory. The ponnuki in the centre was worth much
more than what White made on the second line. With that strength,
reducing the white framework on the left was no question. I think
that White then tried too hard in the centre.

http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=47576

Game 1 (47576) was characterized by a big fight starting from the
joseki in the lower right corner. I guess that a stronger player
could point out several mistakes by both sides. It resulted in a big
exchange, where quite some aji remained in both positions. Move 90 is
an unusual idea, it would be more normal to extend on the side. 91
and 95 were intended as forcing moves to give some support to the top
side. I think that Black has good prospects after move 99 and
especially after 113. White started an interesting invasion on the
left then, which was however stopped by the blunder at 138.

http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=47579

Game 4 (47579) again featured some unusual moves in the opening,
namely moves 7 and 9. I think that immediately plunging through at 10
was not good. It was quite difficult for me to keep territorial
balance afterwards. I think that my invasion at the top was
premature, but it seemed like I could not keep up without it. The
attack at L13 was severe. I got lucky that Black kept back a bit, so
that I could get the cut at E7, which was more important than the six
stones around N13. It would have been possible to save them at move
98, but at the cost of letting Black break through L10. Sacrificing
them allowed me to cement the centre to put me comfortably ahead. L9
was then the start of a desperate attempt to reduce the centre. I was
quite sure that I could capture it, even though simply connecting
would most likely have been enough. I then made a big blunder again
with move 130 (I had to double hane), allowing a game-deciding ko.
Black had a lot of threats against the lower right corner, and I think
that this exchange would have put him ahead. However, he thought he
had an internal threat at D10, which I think was not one, as there was
no additional eye in the centre yet.

http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=47577

In game 2 (47577), he got me in the opening with another of his
experiments (move 7). I think that I could have been satisfied if I
simply played the keima to P2 at move 14. However, I activated the
central stone instead, which led to Black getting solid positions on
both sides, while I lived small in the corner and struggled in the
centre. I then succeeded in making him overconcentrated on the lower
side, but at the expense of a quite large corner and not making many
points myself. Move 80 tries to stir things up more. I think that if
Black had secured O13 with move 97, the game would have been over.
However, things only began to look good for White after move 127,
which had to be played at R8 (it is sente against the middle group
then, so Black can live with S5). It is still not over, however, as
White has two weak groups to take care of. The lower side group can
live locally with a ko at G1, but the other group has to struggle---it
would be nice to find a clean sacrifice plan here, because it is hard
for the two groups not to compete for eye space. This was the last
game to end, and my opponent seems to have chosen to resign all when
he did not see a way to win the overall match anymore.

All in all, these were very interesting games where I think I learnt a
lot. I wish to thank my opponent, who played very well.

Thanks!

Svante


Daniel Parmet    (2011-04-04 07:33:36)
Conditional moves

if I may play devil's advocate... I believe it is precisely BECAUSE conditional moves are more fair that is why players want them. Now when a person is low on time or trying to extend the game into the next rating period they purposefully wait until the BEST hour in which to make a move to clip the most time off their opponent's clock. If conditional moves were in place, a person could sleep knowing that their forced response is already in the system for their sneaky opponent that just wants to flag them.


Garvin Gray    (2011-12-29 15:59:17)
5 player double round robins

Off topic response- In my opinion if ratings are based on a decent system, then they do not need to be protected.

If someone loses a person 600 points below them and vice versa wins, they deserve the points result that those results indicate.

The issue, and I know you already know my opinion on this, is players who are put on some arbitary rating ie 1800, when their playing standard could be any number at all.

If unknown players had to earn their rating through a provisional rating system, then there would not have to be as many concerns.


Garvin Gray    (2012-03-04 23:47:06)
FICGS poker ratings

I am more alarmed than anything that a person's selfish actions, regardless of who they are, are not only tolerated, but are encouraged by statements like this:

However, following the current rules on general forfeits I think that Nelson should continue his experiment so that we can learn from all this. In my opinion he'll reach the top rankings within a few months (particularly if he plays bullet games) which is quite short compared to correspondence chess.

His actions now affect many players, which includes denying a place to someone in a tournament that he otherwise should not be allowed to enter ie class B tournaments where by all reports he is too good for.

How about we all do this to see how the rating system goes? I find his actions appalling and he deserves to be banned.

If this was done in chess, would the response be the same? If so and someone did it and the same response was given, I would be looking for another site to play at.

I believe people who act like this deserve to have their rating re-set and then spend quite a lot of time on the sidelines. They should forfeit all their games, but not lose any rating points.

What does this site stand for, I think that is one of the main questions? I play poker on here for something to do in the middle of my chess games, even though I am not particularly interested.
My playing of poker will stop if it is treated with such contempt.


Daniel Parmet    (2012-04-22 06:50:06)
LSS is the worst Corr server

I was not discussing with my opponent. I feel like corr issues in general are something the corr community should be aware of so I do not share Garvin or Don's opinion. I obviously can't post this on lss forums as I have been banned there. Clearly, posting on forums of a site that is so wildly out of control is a waste of one's time and breath anyways.
Frankly, I am most ashamed of Scott's response above all else. His only problem with 20 games being forfeited is that it wasn't 21 so he could claim an illegitimate win as well - disgusting. Frankly the more I see of the correspondence chess world the more inclined I am to leave it permanently behind.


Thibault de Vassal    (2012-04-22 18:49:49)
Answer from Ortwin

Well, here is the answer from Dr. Ortwin Paetzold (LSS/IECG) that he asked me to post here. I'm glad to do it of course so that we can hear from both sides and make our own opinion with:

>>>>>>>>>>

Daniel Parmet is twisting the reality a bit. I take the right to quote my full answers, however as I do not have the permission to do so, I will not post the notes from Daniel to me, unless he quoted it here himself already.

Fact 1 is that Daniel has not read the rules of LSS or forgot about them. There is a function in LSS which lets the webmaster check this esp. in case of rule questions. Therefore he might not have known about the rule, however, when registering on LSS each player is asked to study the rules and to play according to them. I am sure, the same holds for FICGS and any other server.

Fact 2 is that on 4th April Daniel Parmet has lost a game on time by violating the 30-days-rule. The server automatically stopped the game and awarded the point to the opponent, independent from the position. The server also imposed the two week suspension to start a new tournament. The 30-days-rule was installed at IECG more than 10 years ago and I had included it into LSS right from the beginning. Daniel Parmet asked politely why the admin has cancelled his game (which I had not).

Fact 3 is that in my answer about the query why the game was finished, I have answered with reference to the rules:

“Your game was forfeited, because you did not move for 30 days. This is the maximum number of days to be used per individual move, independent of the total amount of time you have left. See the Rules and Usage Section under "Violation of Time Control". This is also the reason of your two-week-suspension. “

In his response Daniel Parmet called the LSS “a joke of a site”.

Fact 4 is that I answered to this insultation:

“Well, it is not my fault that you have not read the rules during the past five years you have played here! To be honest, this is impressing!”

I do not think this is more rude than insulting me/LSS because one has made a mistake!

Fact 5 is that I did not remove him from the waiting list of the LSS Anniversary 2012 as requested, because I thought that – once Daniel thinks reasonably about the case – he might want to continue, esp. as he wanted to continue all other games. Furthermore LSS has a feature where each player can remove himself from the waitinglist of this tournament. This all happened on 5th April! I then forgot about the matter.

Fact 6 is that on 19th April the LSS Anniverary groups were created including Daniel Parmet to one of the groups. As he was no longer suspended that time I missed that he still was on the waitinglist. I would otherwise have tried to get a replacement, which I did in other cases . When he claimed not to play in the anniversary on 20th April, I decided to remove him from all tournaments he was playing. As the tournaments were in an early stage (start date 15th Feb, Parmet finished only 3/10 and 1/12 games in them), I believe it makes less impact to withdraw a player then letting him influence the outcome, esp. as e.g. he would not use a potential qualification to the LSS WC Semi-Final or the Consolation Finals. I commented that action with the following message:

‘I have withdrawn you from this "joke of a site" (your own - wrong - words. It is not my fault that you have not read the rules!)

Thanks for playing here.’

The answer was unfriendly so I decided to cancel the membership permanently.

I would like to thank Thibault for the opportunity to express my view. I do not intend to comment anyfurther in this matter, as I think the two different versions are speaking for themselves.


Daniel Parmet    (2012-04-22 19:59:50)
LSS is the worst Corr server

In general, I could make many points to Ortwin's diminutive response. However, his lying aside - he has admitted to his disgusting actions and given specious reasoning for it. At this point, I think its best to let the topic drop. Others know LSS is not a safe place to play now and that was my only point. It is clear there can never be any proper resolution in my case personally.

On to the topic of the 60 day rule which is the real reason for my response. I think many people are forgetting that not everyone is retired with little to do with their time but chess. Many of us work and/or go to school. And when you have a complicated position, it is very very unreasonable to expect a response in 10 days time out of someone that works 80 hour weeks. I recognize that most of my opponents these days respond within 24 hours or less no matter what the move or how complicated the position... but this is because I am playing in general a lower caliber of player that just blindly follows the computer. I have the privilege of knowing GM Tansel Turgut and he tells me he never plays more than 10 games at once and generally doesn't make a move before 25 days of thought. I would others to stop for a moment and consider that not *everyone* is like you. They have other demands on their time and other analysis methods.


Nick Burrows    (2012-11-26 23:23:16)
How do I stop the pop-up message boxes?

Hi Don, thanks for the response. I get a seperate tab that opens spontaneously entitled 'message box' which contains a random tip...


Wayne Lowrance    (2012-12-05 20:07:58)
Problem with new groups for the chess WC

Okey Dokey. You have examined the topic carefully and have experienced the task of grouping players. I have not. But looking out of the jail cell of my thoughts I do not agree. It just seems like it s/b possible to just have a cut off date and no exceptions.
I guess your problem is in your opinion too large a grouping or too small a grouping, keeping rating gradient to less that 100 . I would rather play in a group even if only 2 or 3 players qualified in my rating group. Thinking hard as I generate this response I begin to appreciate more of your problem. Hey what the heck do I know anyhow. ::) Wayne


Neel Basant    (2013-01-10 14:40:30)
Chess Server Team Tournament

Confirmed( Interested) Players according to replies.


1.Daniel Parmet
2.Alvin Alcala
3.Bogoljub Teverovski
4.Nick Burrows
5.Wayne Lowrance
6.Neel Basant
7.Ostap Hladky
8.Niklas Hallqvist
9.Arkadiusz Wosch
10.Daniel Blike
11.Josef Zmolil
12.Jiri Mach
13.Jose Moreira
14.Om Prakash
15.John Worthington
16.Garvin Gray
17.Arnab Sengupta
18.Ray Downs
19.Valery Nemchenko
20.Dinesh Bhandarkar
21.Shih-Chu Liao
22.Frits Bleker
23.Thomas Hasyn
24.Sergey Demchenko
25.Maxim Genchev
26.Mathaios Vardoulakis
27.Claudio Cabrera
28.Kieran Moore
29.
30.

Wow..
What a response!!!!!
sure Within 2/3 days will be more than 100 players.
Thib will have a headache while selecting 30 players..


Daniel Parmet    (2013-01-10 20:51:37)
Chess Server Team Tournament

right now the top 30 responses by ficgs rating average to 1998. 10 of those 30 have ICCF ratings which average to 2166.

I'd like to us have a 2100 FICGS rating average so we can be a competitive team...


Thibault de Vassal    (2013-01-16 18:46:32)
FICGS admin scam me

Just do what you feel...

You already know what I'll do in response.

Regards,
Thibault


Horatiu Adrian Petrescu    (2013-01-16 19:40:55)
FICGS admin scam me

Q :"You already know what I'll do in response. "

What you will do? tell me.


Attila Ba    (2013-05-15 17:41:52)
Deep analysis - can it be improved?

The idea behind deep analysis is to store engine evaluations of chess positions in a permanent way and build an analysis tree out of them. Deep analysis is an improvement over simple engine analysis in two ways:

1) Permanent storage of analysis results makes them reusable. You don't have to analyse the same position from scratch over and over again (which is a waste of valuable CPU resources) rather you can build and improve upon your earlier results.

2) The search is configurable. You have control over which positions are examined and in what way. This gives you freedom to tailor the analyis to your own needs not having to rely on the defaults provided by your engine.

This idea is presented in a revolutionary way in the Deep Rybka Aquarium GUI. However using this framework I have encountered some problems. The lesser one and non lethal one is that draws by repetition are not handled correctly. This is for a reason: moves in the transposition table should be valued in an absolute way (regardless of the line which lead to them) in order to preserve the integrity of the tree. Since Aquarium has no means to incorporate lines, it simply ignores them

My other problem is that though the search is configurable I'm not absolutely certain about what is going on. It is not entirely clear to me exactly which nodes are selected for analysis.

These problems made me to try to come up with a deep analyis program of my own. After several failed attempts finally I have on my hand a solution which is not only capable of performing deep analysis but overcomes some of the difficulties of Interactive Deep Analyis (IDeA) provided by the Aquarium framework.

First I introduced a mechanism that can handle repetitions. In order to achieve this I attribute not one but two scores to each move and re-define the concept of root position already present in IdeA. The first score which I call 'idea' score is the same as presented in IdeA. The second is what I call 'alpha' score is calculated by minimaxing the tree from the root position taking into account repetitions.

Consider the following game:

1. Nf3 Nf6 2. Ng1 Nf8

The value of move 2. ... Nf8 at depth 18 by Houdini 3.0 is -19 centipawns. So the idea score of this move at depth 0 should be -19. Yet 2. ... Nf8 repeats the starting position. Therefore its alpha score with respect to a root equaling the starting position should be 0 centipawn which is exactly what my program calculates for it. ( For the sake of simplicity I don't require threefold repetition, since you would never allow your opponent to repeat a position if you have better ideas. )

So when my programs lists the tree it will present both scores for every move (which in most of the cases are equal of course - therefore this is mostly an aesthetic improvement rather than being a substantial one).

The improvement which I'm most interested in is that having full control of node selection now I have freedom to shape the tree search.

In order to keeps things simple I have only three parameters characterising the search:

1) engine depth
2) move distance (centipawns)
3) search depth

Engine depth means a fixed depth at which each move is analyzed. After long experimenting I have arrived at depth 18 as a good default for Houdini 3.0.

Move distance is a tolerance up to which moves are allowed into the analyis. For each position first the best move is determined. The search for alternative moves is continued until a move is found that has a valuation less than the valuation of the best move by 'move distance' centipawns (it is this 'distance' away from being the best move). The tree is then expanded for moves within 'move distance'.

To compensate for exponential growth of analyzed nodes I use a simple technique: at each ply after ply 1 the move distance is halved. So if the move distance at ply 0 and ply 1 is 20 centipawns, it will be 10 centipawns for ply 2, 5 centipawns for ply 3 and so on. This means that at greater depth less and less moves are allowed per position. So the analysis with greater depth slowly evolves into 'autoplay' rather than 'tree search'.

The other method to reduce exponential growth is the well known beta cut provided by alphabeta search. In order that all candidate moves in the root position and all candidate responses to them get proper values, I only allow beta cuts with ply 2 and deeper.

Once an alphabeta search of certain depth is carried out, the whole tree is mimimaxed out for the root. Now the initial evaluations of the root moves may change. This may make moves which initially fall out of the 'move distance' to become viable. So the search has to be repeated for those moves as well. This has to be done at every ply level.

My iterative search at a certain depth only ends when no new nodes are added by the alphabeta search (the tree is 'settled' for this depth). Only then the program is allowed to deepen the search (this I call 'refined' search).

With engine depth of 18 and move distance of 10 centipawns an average position can be analyzed to depth 10 within a matter of hours. This means a couple of hundred (possibly a couple of thousand) positions are analyzed to depth 18. Depth 10 deep analyis means an ultimate depth of 28 if you take into account that the engine depth is 18.

Whether this method has added ELO value over simple engine search is yet to be tested.


Daniel Parmet    (2013-06-15 04:38:44)
Playing activity top 20 players

Typical trash response there Don.

I have *already* moved on to ICCF because it fit MY NEEDS. Did you even read this thread? This thread was something Garvin started to make players more active. I responded as player who chose to become INACTIVE to explain that decision. If this site does not change one bit, then fine by me... I have already discovered a site that fulfills my needs. On the other hand, if this site wants to IMPROVE - I want Thib to know I will come support him.


Don Groves    (2013-07-17 01:42:20)
Interview with new FICGS Go champion

Thanks for your quick response!


Jonathan Gresham    (2013-10-13 21:47:10)
Communism

I'll Google that. Thanks for the response. :)


Garvin Gray    (2014-02-28 17:15:22)
Standard time control abusers

ICCF code of conduct 2: Extremely slow play in a clearly lost position is not proper behaviour in CC play, and is subject to a warning from the TD, and will result in disciplinary action if it continuous or is repeated in other games

Playing Rules- Server

3) Failure to Reply- a. The ICCF Webserver system will automatically generate an Email reminder when a player has not
made a move for 14 days and another, after 28 generated after 35 days of silence by a player.
b. When a player is sent a final reminder after 35 days of response time, he/she must either move or report to the Tournament Director and to his/her opponent, the intention to continue the game, within 5 days of that
reminder. If a player does not move or otherwise report his/her intention to continue, during the 40 days of response
time for the same move, the game may be scored as lost by the Tournament Director.

My own words- The number of days set above are based on 10 moves in 50 days, so for our site we would use a much shorter time period.

I can not answer what happens in practice on iccf as I do not play there.


Garvin Gray    (2014-03-01 03:29:31)
Standard time control abusers

And once again your response is to sit on your hands and do nothing. That is your clear response all the time to this major issue.

You ask for solutions, some of us attempt to offer solutions, you reject them. You ask for other sites rules, we offer them, you reject them saying they won't work. It is clear that you have no intention of doing anything about this and that you really believe that allowing my life to be wasted is acceptable, well I don't and I am sure the others who are trapped in this same situation do not.

I really do not understand how you can think it is acceptable to allow your members to have their lives wasted by players who are clearly just acting out of spite?

Your actions are really against the best interests of this site. I know as the site administrator that is a big call, but I really do feel it is the right call to make.

When you side with the abusers and not the victims, that is what happens.


Garvin Gray    (2014-03-02 04:03:47)
Standard time control abusers

I see the idea of a vote as ridiculous and a waste of time. What it could lead to is people voting to keep the class A, M and SM tournaments open because they do not want to deprive the opportunity of someone to play in them, but the status quo remains that no one is joining them.

And what happens if you only get a couple of responses, which is exactly what could happen because of general site apathy?

If you want knowledge of how people feel about these matters, but do not want to publicly speak about the matter because they are afraid to offend the site administrator because they are afraid.

I have given you the absolute 'rounds of the kitchen' repeatedly and often on this issue and have not let up over a number of weeks.

It is natural on the internet that when someone is pushing that hard against the efforts of a volunteer site admin that there will be blowback and the 'pusher (me)' will cop criticism in return.

So far there has been little to none. In fact some of the regulars have been stating that there is an issue as well.

Instead of calling for votes that could just leave all of us in the same ridiculous situation, take the feedback I have provided, and also the inactivity of the groups as the votes that really count ie the marketplace has decided that they do not want those groups, and close the class SM, class M and class A groups immediately.


Garvin Gray    (2014-03-04 01:15:06)
Standard time control abusers

FWIW, seems like at least one person thinks I 'got my way'. This is incorrect, I did not 'get my way'.

I wanted Thibault to take action against standard time control abusers, which he has not done.

Btw, in one of my games I am now on move 70 and have mate 13 and I think my opponent is going to make another move and then try and sit on the position for another 35 days.

Will Thibault step in then?

The closing of the three standard class divisions was a response to this issue and the fact that they have not started for a long time and that something needed to be done.

It is only after a decision had been made one way or another that some comments have started to come. I gave, some days, between replies, for others to comment, so others had an opportunity to cast their opinion, disagree, give alternative opinion and also to add new rules if they wish.

Then as nothing was happening with the discussions and my opponents were continuing with their actions, the need become more pressing. I have never said for a second that there is anything wrong at all with a person who moves at a rate of one move every five days.

It is with players who are so arrogant they believe it is their right to waste their opponents lives when they clearly can play at a faster rate. If they can not move at a faster rate, how come they can make 9 moves in 3 days, then not move for 35 days?

A person who is legitimately time poor will make one move every few days to make the time control.


Garvin Gray    (2014-07-05 04:33:02)
Call referee button, response time

This comes from the chat bar.

Currently a player has thirty days to make a move when their opponent has used the call referee button.

An opponent will usually only hit the button in situations of forced mate (DMD) and are seeking that the game be adjudicated in their favour.

I stated that the time period is too long.

Thibault responded that not all players play at the same rhythm.

This is irrelevant in my opinion. The issue is quite simple. One player in the game has hit the call referee button.

In these situations, the rules can quite easily be changed to state that after the call referee button has been hit and the other player contacted, the other player has a maximum seven days to make a move.


Thibault de Vassal    (2014-07-11 01:06:42)
Call referee button, response time

30 days was chosen because it was the initial number of vacation days (as far as I remember). What if a player takes successive days of vacation? What if a player cannot play during this short period? We had many discussions that concluded into the idea that the human (referee) factor should be reduced at minimum. This clearly goes the other way.


Garvin Gray    (2014-08-31 10:53:40)
Ficgs is a money trap * BEWARE *

From what I have read here from your response Thibault- I see no grounds AT ALL to not pay the prize.

The rating rule is there for the best interest of the site, because ratings are meant to be the way we all judge what standard of play we are and what divisions we can enter.

So comparing a rating argument with this argument is drawing a rather long bow indeed.

Just like the rating rule, why a player should get a money prize by winning games without fighting?

Already answered about ratings. About winning games without fighting (or playing), Nick entered under the conditions believing the match would take place.

If he entered the match believing it to not take place and David did play, then Nick has taken a risk that has backfired.

The point is that it is not Nick's fault the match did not take place. From my reading of the rules, there is nothing clear that says you can not pay out the prize.

Remember, you are making an absolute ruling here that applies FOREVER. This means that in effect you have taken 100 epoints at least out of Nick's account, his original stake, for just entering a match.

I would ask as site admin. Why would ANY player on this site want to support paid matches after this event and circumstances?

When the site admin can in effect, I was not happy with your match conditions that it was played under, I don't really have anything to point towards, but I did keep your cash anyways.

I for one will not be supporting any matches or tournaments from now on whilst this practice remains in place. I do not want to enter a match, have it not take place and then the site admin say, tough luck, not your fault the match did not take place, but I am keeping your cash.

The more I look at this and type, I am finding it hard to not say that Nick Burrows has been robbed of his cash. These events are real.


Kym Farnik    (2018-01-17 04:44:57)
Conditional chess moves (again)

Messages to the opponent.

On a technical note, I would envision a JavaScript too that would allow:
1. The move
2. Conditional Move Line 1 and response Moves ...
Maybe more than one conditional lines

The whole web transaction, Move + Conditionals + messages are validated client side via the JS.
Then the transaction is re-validated on the server (to stop hacking).
The whole transaction is accepted or not.


Graham Kerr    (2019-03-16 22:17:51)
World Championship Groups

No worries, when it didn't get a response here a started a new thread, you answered there ;-)


Garvin Gray    (2021-04-10 03:20:05)
Wch 22 Stage 2 ended

As noted by Stanislas Gounant, all three groups have now ended.

Looking at the qualifying structure for the World Championship, are we waiting for the winners of the two Semi Finals to be completed?

That would then mean the Knockout final and the Round Robin Final start at the same time.

In response to that, I would think that a round robin group of 28 games would take longer than a knockout final of 8 games, so the round robin group should start earlier, if possible


Yeturu Aahlad    (2021-04-12 19:10:42)
Poker Rating

At big chess, it is fairly common for one side - typically Black - to be down a pawn early in the game. I have had at least one opponent immediately resign. At Go, a player may blunder in a corner and immediately resign.

On the other hand, I have won many games on time and in many of those cases, the opponent didn't make any moves at all.

Perhaps a subjective challenge deserves a subjective response - I am seeing sound arguments on both sides. Suggestion - if a game concludes under 10 moves, and the winner thinks she has a genuine grievance, she can appeal for the ELO grant and a referee will adjudicate. Herbert's case is very strong. If the losing side didn't make any moves, adjudication need not be allowed, or may be automatically denied. Too many frivolous appeals from a player can lead to disciplinary action including a loss of this privilege. (I don't expect that to happen in this community)


Thibault de Vassal    (2021-11-29 02:09:11)
Repeated draw offers

After a case a repeated draw offers, I thought that the rule should evolve from:

"Also, no player will make draw offers repeatedly, particularly serveral times in a row. Doing so may lead to instantly lose the game, and/or being immediately and permanently banned."

... to ...

"Also, no player will make draw offers repeatedly, particularly serveral times in a row. Doing so may lead to get a limited access to the server (until to get a response if necessary) then to lose the game, finally to get permanently banned if this behaviour does not stop."

Reason is that it seems not so obvious for certain players to remember all draw offers while playing quite slowly many many games. Also, they may not receive some warning messages.


Juri Eintalu    (2022-05-09 19:58:15)
FIDE BANS KARJAKIN

Karjakin's Appeal was Dismissed by FIDE

Thus, Karjakin still cannot play in the candidates tournament because he publicly approved the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

Karjakin, in turn, writes (on his Telegram channel) as a response that he is proud that his grandfather was a great soldier, also, that there are Nazis in Ukraine.

He criticises Kasparov.

Kasparov demands that Russian chess players who want to play in international tournaments should publicly disapprove Russian invasion of Ukraine.


Thibault de Vassal    (2023-11-18 19:42:16)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations

Juri, when you say << For example, I am not sure that Hamas "chose" to kill civilians. >>, I'm not sure if your topic is determinism or something else but obviously you cannot be sure of anything. Did you watch the videos? Anyway, any army killing or kidnapping civilians is a war crime for sure and that's most probably terrorism in this case.

On Israel response, many experts say different things, so it remains unclear yet to me. (it is important not to listen what one want to hear only)

About your text, you seem to neglict all contextual elements to compare Russia, Thaïland, Congo, North Korea, China or whatever situation in any country... No chess organization reacted much when Peng Shuai (chinese tennis star) disappeared, but tennis world reacted! For Rohingya, Karabakh or about war in Irak or Afghanisatan. How many chess players in these countries? That is not the same. Russia & Ukraine are among the most influential chess nations in the world. Russia is the biggest country, has the most nuclear weapons. That's why it seems pertinent that chess players and organizations take position towards not just peace (undermeaning "do what Russia wants"), but a fair and right peace.

You say : "Concerning your political views about the real intentions of Russia when starting a war against Ukraine, what you present dogmatically and without evidence"

The evidence is in Putin's speeches, "Russia defends its interests", obviously Ukraine (another country for a while) should not be free of his choices, in example to join an alliance to protect itself just like Finland or other countries... Obviously Ukraine is Russia's interest and should not join OTAN. Did ever OTAN attack Russia?

https://www.youtube.com/shorts/Dgy4vYTp_Jo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxS9YIBeJbY

Watching full speeches is even more instructive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=akzr0K0CE0M

Putin's rhetoric remains both crude and manipulative, appealing to people's conservative reflexes. And it works on most people who get outraged at the slightest conspiracy theory, it's no coincidence.

Finally, the argument saying that there shouldn't be politics in chess or sports has no foundations other than a subjective point of view.

You say that these bans by FIDE were out of international laws and that the same restrictions should apply to israeli playesrs... well, so just prove it and make appeal I guess. Karjakin probably thought about that already!?

Meanwhile, these discussions are only point of views.


Juri Eintalu    (2023-11-19 00:58:48)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations

ARGUMENTS CONCERNING THE RUSSIA/UKRAINE WAR

None of the commentators explained why it was necessary and reasonable to politicise sports and to impose sanctions on Russia and Belarus. No one answered my corresponding arguments from my Public Appeal. No one explained why the sanctions were imposed on Russia for the invasion of Ukraine, while no sanctions were imposed on the US for the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.

HERBERT KRUSE PRESENTED THE FOLLOWING "ARGUMENT":

"like Ukraine Israel had its "Butcha" at the music festival, so who attacked?

and there were constant rockets on Israel from Gaza, should they just allow it?

and the hostiges should just given up?

if my state can not defend me, maybe u can help?!"

This emotional and psychological manipulation completely ignored all my relevant arguments and explanations.

Now, let us take only the first phrase of this mumbo-jumbo:

"like Ukraine Israel had its 'Butcha' at the music festival, so who attacked?"

My Public Appeal was about chess sanctions. Now, the data are as follows:

2022, February 24:
Russia started its invasion of Ukraine

2022, February 27:
An extraordinary meeting of the FIDE Council was held on the current situation and the urgent measures to be taken after the military action launched by Russia in Ukraine.
https://fide.com/news/1603

Thus, it seems that they waited for the beginning of the Russian invasion and had a plan for how to react, as they responded only a few days later.

Israel had occupied Palestinian territories for 55 years, but the chess federation FIDE had never reacted.

2022, March 16:
Russia and Belarus teams suspended from FIDE competitions.
https://fide.com/news/1638

2022, March 30:
Russian troops leave Bucha (near Kyiv).

2022, April 01:
The corpses in Bucha were discovered.

Now, the first obvious problem with Herbert Kruse's "argument" is that the timeline proves that the chess sanctions on Russia were imposed BEFORE the corpses in Bucha were discovered.

The second problem is that he does not know or pretends not to know the definitions of such terms as "war crime".

The third problem is that, as a matter of fact, we do NOT know WHEN these people were executed, and we do NOT know WHO executed them.

It is so because there were actually TWO massacres in Bucha.
The shelling killed some people, "The Guardian" reported. These people were lying on the streets. The satellite images proved that they were killed before the Russian Army left the town.
However, some people were executed in the cellars. Unfortunately, the satellite images cannot prove the time of the executions in the cellars.
There is one additional problem. Ukraine has not made public the names and personal data of the victims. Therefore, we do not even know what percentage of the victims were Ukrainians and what percentage were Russians.

THIBAULT THE VASSAL PRESENTED THE FOLLOWING SEQUENCE OF ARGUMENTS:

"Ukraine is attacked mainly because Poutine (at least) argues it historically belongs to Russia with no consideration of its recent history & international treaties (and among other reasons because he obviously sees nazis in every people open on what a man/woman/family could look like, meaning many europeans & americans)."

Thibault has no evidence whatsoever for one's claim that Putin "obviously sees nazis in every people open on what a man/woman/family could look like, meaning many europeans & americans)." There is even no evidence to the claim that the Russian administration thinks that the majority of Ukrainians were Nazis. The evidence might be the public speeches of Russian leaders. But I have seen no such speech with such theses. Indeed, Putin has said something else.

I believe that Thibault presents one's prejudices as "obvious facts".

Besides, it has nothing to do with the arguments of my Public Appeal.

"There are few doubts that war crimes have been committed there."

In the Ukraine/Russia war, BOTH sides have committed a lot of war crimes, and it is well documented and proven.

However, the chess sanctions on Russia were not imposed because of the war crimes, as can be seen from the schedule above. The motivation to impose those sanctions was, initially, merely the fact that Russia started a war (not a war crime but a crime against peace).

Moreover, in the Ukraine/Donbas domestic war too, both sides committed war crimes. Ukraine committed crimes against humanity, and there were clear genocidal elements of the behaviour towards the Russian-speaking minority of Ukraine. It is also well-documented and proven. At the beginning of my Public Appeal, I mentioned that Karyakin argued from the premise that Ukrainian ultra-nationalists murdered a lot of Russians in Ukraine.

However, I see that the responses to my Public Appeal have altogether ignored all my arguments, and everyone has preferred to talk about something else.


Scott Ligon    (2025-02-15 22:20:35)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?

What I'm calling the winning line is only winning if black is restricted to the strategy of Stockfish 17 using 10 million node searches, though by the end of the line it is also objectively winning. Some of black's responses when using this strategy are mistakes, otherwise white wouldn't have a winning line. 21... g5 might not be black's best response but the position should still be defensible at that point. It starts to get very bad after 27 Rba1 Nf7 which I think is black's fatal error or close to it. Prior to that black should still have some defense.


Scott Ligon    (2025-03-29 15:42:08)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?

I played one last game using the 10 million node strategy against Pineda. The game ended in a draw, but I had to deviate from the 10 million node strategy at the end to avoid losing. I thought the finish was interesting.

https://ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=147951

The key position came after black's 56th move, and up to that point with black I am just following the 10 million node strategy. These are the moves:

1. e4 c5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bb5 g6 4. O-O Bg7 5. Bxc6 dxc6 6. d3 a5 7. h3 b6 8. a3 Nf6 9. Qe2 O-O 10. Nc3 Ne8 11. e5 Nc7 12. Qe4 Ne6 13. Re1 Qd7 14. Qh4 f6 15. Be3 h6 16. Qg3 g5 17. h4 Qd8 18. Bd2 b5 19. b3 Kh7 20. Rac1 Kg8 21. Rcd1 Ra7 22. Rb1 Ra8 23. Rbc1 Ra7 24. Rcd1 Rb7 25. Bc1 Ra7 26. a4 b4 27. Ne2 Qe8 28. Bb2 Qf7 29. Nd2 Qh5 30. hxg5 fxg5 31. Qe3 Rd7 32. Nc4 Rdd8 33. Ng3 Qg6 34. Nxa5 h5 35. Qe4 Qe8 36. Ne2 h4 37. Rf1 Nf4 38. f3 Be6 39. Nxf4 Rxf4 40. Qe2 g4 41. Bc1 gxf3 42. Rxf3 Rg4 43. Rdf1 Rg6 44. Nc4 Bg4 45. Be3 Rd5 46. a5 Bxf3 47. Rxf3 Bxe5 48. Nb6 Rd8 49. a6 Re6 50. a7 Bc7 51. a8=Q Rxa8 52. Nxa8 Qxa8 53. Rf1 Qe8 54. Qf3 Bd6 55. Bg5 Kg7 56. Bxh4 Be5

I ran a width 6 / depth 55 search with Stockfish 17 on the position after black's 56th move, and the top 5 moves for white along with their eval scores were:

57. Re1
+ (0.39)

57. Qf5
+ (0.37)

57. Qg4+
+ (0.32)

57. Bg3
+ (0.25)

57. Qh3
+ (0.01)

Based on that, you might think white should only consider the top 4 moves. But if we look at this from the point of view of exploiting the 10 million node strategy, here are the evaluations of those top 5 moves after the 10 million node strategy response:

57. Re1 Bd4+
+ (0.52)

57. Qf5 Bd4+
+ (0.54)

57. Qg4+ Qg6
+ (0.42)

57. Bg3 Bc3
+ (0.27)

57. Qh3 Rg6
+ (1.65)

So presumably using that logic, my opponent played Qh3 where the 10 million node strategy would require me to respond with Rg6, which loses the game. Qh3 doesn't stand out at all unless you're trying to exploit the 10 million node strategy. The actual game ended with 57. Qh3 Bd4+ and we agreed to a draw.


Scott Ligon    (2025-04-23 15:21:53)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?

My goal is to find the minimal setting where Stockfish can't be beaten, or close to the minimal setting anyway. The title of the thread shows my point of view on this issue. I think currently available versions of Stockfish with relatively modest computing power are already good enough to be unbeatable, regardless of how much money an opponent is being offered or how many supercomputers and grandmasters they have at their disposal when devising a strategy. From the starting position of a game of chess, it simply isn't that hard for modern engines to hold the draw with black. The draw rate on this very site is evidence.

I could make the task easier by generating a small opening book to keep Stockfish out of trouble in the opening, so in the case of Stockfish 17 @ 15 million nodes it might be good enough to simply dictate that it play e5 in response to e4 (I don't know if that specific example is true but it might be - I never found any trouble spots for that strategy with black outside of the Sicilian). But I want to do this with no opening book and also no access to endgame tablebases, just the engine's recommendation using a set number of nodes for the search. The settings I've tried so far fell short, but I think they weren't far off, so I'm taking only small steps forward. Stockfish 17.1 @ 10 million nodes seems like a good next step to me. If somebody finds a winning line against it, then I'll take the next step, either increasing the node count or if enough time has passed I'll move on to the next version of Stockfish.


Garvin Gray    (2025-10-27 14:15:04)
Russian flag replaced

Before you take any action, you should actually check your facts regarding Israel. I really hate discussing this topic, but since now the site owner is considering taking similar against those who display the Israel flag as those who were from Russia and Belarus, it is extremely important to remember how we got here in both situations.

With Russia and Belarus, it was because they started a war of aggression on another correspondence chess federation.

And all sporting bodies took swift action against them in suspending their Federations and preventing their teams from competing, and players from competing and their own flag.

With the situation between Hamas/Hezbollah and Isreal, it was Hamas that was the aggressor. There was no war on July 6, 2023 and Gaza was in a state of peace. But then Hamas attacked Isreal, chopping the heads of babies and taking hostages and raping Israeli women hostages.

What did you expect the Isreali Government to do in response? Sit back and let a terrorist organisation keep the hostages and are you saying that Isreal does not have a right to defend itself?

It is quite disgusting that there are wars all over the world at the moment, about 20 at the moment, but it is only when Jews defend themselves that people feel the need to virtue signal their sense of outrage.

The correct word for them is anti-semites. We used to say 'Never again' after the Holocaust, but it now seem perfectly acceptable to support a terrorist organisation when it attacks Israel and Israel responds by trying to eliminate the threat once and for all.

And it should also be noted as we saw over a week ago. A sixth peace offer was made and Hamas responded like all the others. With more aggression.

Decide to take action against Israel on this site and you prove your antisemitism.


George Jempty    (2025-12-10 21:00:22)
An indication for draw offers

I do appreciate your responses Garvin as I'm not as experienced on the site, more "on and off", and mostly off, at that ;)


Garvin Gray    (2026-05-12 05:10:48)
Call referee about game ...

I have also used call referee previously and not received a response. So the issue is not us emailing you. It is using call referee and not getting a reply


George Jempty    (2026-05-28 12:45:46)
Cheating / Forfeiting

See, this is the sort of response that has led to my disillusionment with this site. These players, Pech, Pechova, Mach, etc. SHOULD BE BANNED. I have hated playing against them this several months.




There are 16 results for response in wikichess.


Thibault de Vassal    (2522)
e4 c5

The Sicilian Defence is a chess opening which begins with 1.e4 c5

This is the most popular response to 1.e4 at the master level. Black immediately fights for the centre, but by attacking from the c-file (instead of mirroring White's move) he creates an asymmetrical position that leads to complicated situations. Typically, White has the initiative on the kingside while Black obtains counterplay on the queenside, particularly on the c-file after the exchange of Black's c-pawn for White's d-pawn.

According to Chessbase, black chances are about 43%

============

Contributors : Thibault de Vassal


Thibault de Vassal    (2512)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6

2. ... Nc6 is by far the most common and logical response to 2.Nf3, played at about 85% cases. The knight protects black's e5 pawn and controls center squares.

According to Chessbase, black chances are about 43%

============

Contributors : Thibault de Vassal


Thibault de Vassal    (2407)
d4 d5

Queen's pawn opening is the symmetrical response to 1.d4, leading to a more passive play than 1. ... Nf6, particularly after second white move 2.c4 named as Queen's gambit.

According to Chessbase, black chances are about 42%

============

Contributors : Thibault de Vassal


Thibault de Vassal    (2407)
c4

The English Opening is the fourth most popular opening move in chess. White begins the fight for the center by staking a claim to the d5 square. Common responses are 1...e5 (which can lead to positions similar to the Sicilian Defence but with opposite colors), 1...c5 (the Symmetrical Variation), and 1...Nf6. Also perfectly playable are 1...e6 (often leading to a Queen's Gambit Declined after 2.d4 d5) and 1...c6 (often leading to a Slav Defence after 2.d4 d5, a Caro-Kann Defence after 2.e4 d5, or a Reti Opening after 2.Nf3 d5 3.b3).

The English is a very flexible opening. Although many lines of the English have a distinct character, it often transposes into other openings. If White plays an early d4, the game will usually transpose into either the Queen's Gambit or an Indian defence.

The English derives its name from the English (unofficial) world champion, Howard Staunton, who played it during his 1843 match with Amant. It fell out of favor (the opening was notably disdained by Morphy), but is now recognized as a solid opening that may be used to reach both classical and hypermodern positions. Botvinnik, Karpov, and Kasparov all employed it during their world championship matches. Bobby Fischer created a stir when he switched to it from the King's Pawn against Boris Spassky in 1972.

============

Contributors : Thibault de Vassal


Adrian Tan    (1700)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bc4 Bc5 c3 Nf6

A logical response, black strikes back at the center, now that the natural Nc3 isn't available to defend the e pawn.

============

Contributors : Adrian Tan


Bradley Gooding    (1700)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bc4 Nf6 Ng5 d5

This is the most common response. Bc5!? leads to the Wilkes-Barre Variation, also known as the Traxler Counter-Attack, which can lead to hair-splitting complications.
============

Contributors : Adrian Tan, Bradley Gooding


Ilmars Cirulis    (1866)
b4 e5

============

Contributors : David Grosdemange, Attila Nagy

1... e5 on a first look appears to be the best tactical way to open up the position, but recent experience suggests that it is not so good..., the response 2. b5! seems to show excellent results, but it is little tested to date. 2. Bb2 is much more tested, in fact it should be said that so far it is the main line... - Normajean Yates, Ulrich Imbeck, Thigorin Sergej, Ilmars Cirulis


Thibault de Vassal    (2522)
e4 e6 d4 f5 exf5 exf5 Bd3

This aggressive but natural developing move elicits a very sharp response from Black.

============

Contributors : Gavin Wilson, Thibault de Vassal


Kieran Child    (1600)
e4 e5 f4 Qf6

Norwald variation

An uncommon response as it brings out the queen (much too early) and blocks the g8 knight, but it does put black clear material up and with no obvious tactical flaws.

Chessbase considers this a 38% win for black, but it should be noted that it mostly just gets played experimentally by players expecting a loss.

============

Contributors : Kieran Child


Kieran Child    (1600)
e4 e5 f4 Qf6 d4

Norwald variation - Electric eel attack

Possibly the least played opening to still have a name. On bigbase9, only 4 games played d4 in response to the Norwald and thus it is hard to analyse. Black doesn't have any immediete wins though, and after the pawn takes on d or e, white will play e5 and Nf3 for an OK game.

============

Contributors : Kieran Child


Kieran Child    (1600)
e4 e5 f4 exf4 Nf3 g5 h4 g4 Ne5 Nc6

Probably the most "correct" move. Depending on white's response, black either clutches on to his pawn advantage or gains a good position.

============

Contributors : Kieran Child


Gavin Wilson    (1400)
e4 e6 d4 f5 e5 Ne7 c4 c5 Be3 cxd4 Bxd4 Nbc6 Nf3 Ng6 a3 Qc7 Nc3 Ngxe5 Nxe5 Nxe5 Nb5 Qb8 Qh5+ g6 Qe2 Bg7 f4 a6 Nc3

Looks natural, but overlooks Black's response.

============

Contributors : Gavin Wilson


Graham Cridland    (1406)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 a6 Bg5 e6 f4 Be7 Qf3 Qc7

To play Nbd7 without allowing the response Bf1-c4.

============

Contributors : Graham Cridland


Terry Godat    (2036)
e4 e5 f4 exf4 Nc3



============

Contributors : Terry Godat

Because of Black's response, this move is not very popular, but I believe it may be as good as 3.Nf3.


Lauri Lahnasalo    (1600)
c4 e5 Nf3 e4 Nd4 Nc6 Nc2 d5 cxd5 Qxd5 Nc3 Qe5 d3

Results in the same positions as after d4 as black has same response.

============

Contributors : Lauri Lahnasalo


Lauri Lahnasalo    (1600)
c4 e5 Nf3 e4 Nd4 Nc6 Nc2 d5 cxd5 Qxd5 Nc3 Qe5 d4

Results in same positions as d3 as blak response is the same.

============

Contributors : Lauri Lahnasalo






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In complicated positions, Bobby Fischer hardly had to be afraid of anybody. (Paul Keres)

Bobby is the finest Chess player this country ever produced. His memory for the moves, his brilliance in dreaming up combinations, and his fierce determination to win are uncanny. (John Collins)

If a ruler does not understand Chess, how can he rule over a kingdom ? (King Khusros II)




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