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Game result (chess) S. Ligon, 2321 M. LaDuke, 2326 1/2-1/2 See game 152178 |
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Here are 12 results for Nent Alexander in the games.
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There are at least 100 results for Nent in the forum.
Ulises Pineda (2026-05-13 10:25:32)
Berlin Defense
What else is there to play, though? If black tries to play the Berlin and you try to avoid it, it would have been best to avoid it with the Italian. The Italian remains a landmine to this day, with Stockfish at Depth 30 showing a white advantage and Depth 40 switching to a black one, in some positions, I'd be happy to play the Italian and become black instead of being white in the Berlin!
Against lower rated opposition, the Berlin is a nightmare, it's as if they have found a way to force a draw against you, but you're supposed to try to win as Black to prove your superior playing strength.
This all makes me want to abandon 1.e4 entirely, but I haven't found a convincing line for 1.d4 (to me the Ragozin is d4's Berlin), though I have the most wins with Nf3, I think, against creative players (those that avoid mainlines for fun) 1.e4 remains the best option, they will not defend with the Berlin.
It's a thing about not playing the board, but the opponent, one that wants to win as black will not play the Berlin, and then the Ruy Lopez is the best option.
Thibault de Vassal (2026-03-13 23:17:02)
Post-tickets FICGS
The long answer:
FICGS story is a quite simple & classic one, the reasons why it's declining are quite obvious, and unfortunately the solutions aren't. A bit of story:
1. Luckily, FICGS.com was created when there were a demand, just after IECG stopped... It grew very quickly, and I was in a rush to code it (FICGS was the very first dynamic website I ran from A to Z), there were ideas from everywhere. FICGS.com was the shortest domain name available, but not a so good one. Quite hard to remember, hard to tell, not clear for search engines (unlike chess.com which is a perfect one). Maybe it was a mistake to choose it, I can't tell. Either it meant "Free Internet Chess Games Server" or "Free Internet Correspondence Games Server", so I added another game, Go (Weiqi), to FICGS, which is a quite heavy decision: After that, FICGS is not only a chess server anymore.
2. A few years after, there are several thousands players (a few hundreds active). The number of new players slowly decreases month after month but a few sponsors come. Obviously, the way I coded FICGS made it more and more difficult to fully update from a PHP version to another one, or to change it in deep. Even now, I'm not sure to regret it though cause I couldn't have done it differently, so it is what it is. At this time, chess.com was less interesting than FICGS (my taste), but success is already here thanks to a perfect marketing formula: best domain name & pay for options. On the contrary, I chose to keep FICGS completely free.
3. Chess engines explode, correspondence chess continues its evolution (human's thinking decreases in moves decision), finally I add another game that is in a hype: poker texas holdem. New sponsors come, I still play correspondence chess myself but now I play another game even more: Google. FICGS also extends this way and it works in some ways. At its peak, FICGS is about the 32,000th most visited website worldwide. But the number of players continues to decrease, Android & phones started to change the landscape already. Chess.com released its app and added probably its best feature: a quick Stockfish analysis with evaluation & explanation for each move (which is excellent for blitz games but quite a non-sense for a correspondence chess website).
4. The number of players suddenly declines very quickly, I react by creating FICGS apps for Android, a dozen apps... On some apps, you can play against the machine, virtual opponents, chess 960, blindfold & so on. But the way to maintain it is not easy at all for many reasons, but the main one is that Google (Playstore) constantly change technical things & rules. After a few years, I even have to completely remake it, losing what was acquired. And some apps still fail to re-appear at Playstore, that's why I just made the APK files available to direct download. But these applications confirm something clear: blitz is more fun and attracts much more players. Changing rating ranges for correspondence chess tournaments or championships formats won't be a solution for this.
5. FICGS is now 20 years old! Internet completely changed over the years but it survived longer than Messenger, Skype & many other great services. If you look at many websites, new versions of their modern interfaces are often worst (bugs or options) than previous ones. FICGS was never perfect, maybe even clear, but at least it remained coherent. Now Google (just like all major services) is mainly governed by AI, sponsors left - that does not change anything, FICGS will continue to run. I created other websites, but none so far successfully helped in a way or another to solve the problem we encounter here: how to increase the number of correspondence chess, Go or poker players again? If FICGS becomes a pure correspondence chess site again with a brand new interface, I'm quite sure that wouldn't change anything or almost. I might be wrong of course, but according to me, this is a deep problem, connected to society evolutions, computers, phones, our attention, time, even health & so on... In my personal case, I wish to play correspondence chess again, but still cannot find the time to do it. Finally I have no idea what internet will look like within 5 years, but FICGS will be there. Maybe an AI will find a solution soon ^^ Meanwhile, I received many ideas to improve FICGS and I have to thank you very much for this. Few ideas were released for reasons I explained here (but new ones are always wecome), I hope you'll better understand it by reading this.
Have good games & take care!
A. T. S. Broekhuizen (2026-01-21 10:17:50)
Ghost player
I have an opponent in a wch cycle who last connected to the server on Januari 18. But somehow his profile shows that his last move was on Januari 20. ,yesterday. I noticed this once before already against another player. Unless this is a bug, it's really shady.
Garvin Gray (2025-12-10 02:03:16)
An indication for draw offers
Sorry, deja vu again.
ICCF already handles this topic.
A player can only offer one draw every ten moves in a game, unless their opponent offers a draw in return.
I have suggested this to Thibault previously and whilst he was receptive, it was not implemented.
This solution would stop repetitive draw offers, either intentional or accidental (and accidental can happen with no equal sign applied to a draw offer in the notation) and also everyone would know when they last offered a draw in each game.
George Jempty (2025-11-27 20:40:26)
Maintaining the initiative s a matter of
Restricting your opponent's counterplay
Ulises Pineda (2025-11-10 17:06:10)
a 2300-player tried the Budapest
Because the optimal defenses by black are so boring! And they don't offer any counter-play, specially against lower-rated opponents that could easily draw as white with those. In uncommon variations they have to think, and that's the only chance they slip.
There's also the aspect of overconfidence, chess engines have gotten so strong one thinks they can defend anything. That was a mistake I made last time I played a Benoni and lost, I thought I played the strongest defense, who knows if my opponent could also have defeated someone else in the same line, but it was a problem of evaluation, not depth, the engine was showing 1.0 scores for positions that were lost, and they were so complicated I couldn't keep up. Near the end my opponent wasn't even playing the moves I predicted and cut the game like a knife through butter.
But I'll always rather lose a game like that than playing the same boring defense that draws against anything but it's a snore fest, apparently I could just play moves from 300 million nodes blindly and draw anyway.
So I continue to play dubious lines and appreciate opponents that deviate from the norm to spice things up, I could easily be over 2300 at the cost of boring games, but I'll be getting there soon anyway and finally find out how people on that tier play against me, since I've never been able to join tournaments of that caliber.
Wilhelm Schuett (2025-10-27 20:17:32)
go game 146698
In https://ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=146698&flip=1 my opponent don't resign. I think all his stones are dead.
Thibault de Vassal (2025-10-21 17:27:39)
DNS failure last week
Hello everyone...
Finally FICGS is back!
Noone should have lost any game on time, I added about 7 days to all players expected to move, and 2 days to their opponents (time for new DNS to spread all over the internet)
I still have no idea why previous DNS ns.ficgs.com didn't work anymore, but well, I had to change it after having solved another (bigger) issue with the server provider.
Sorry all for the inconvenience...
Ulises Pineda (2025-07-08 07:43:23)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
I thought it was clever of me to retire scripts on demand, but I realized I've been a fool after spending the last week being unable to find a win against the 50 million question and wondering what would I achieve after finding such a line, raising it to 100 million? 200 million?
I stand corrected and the other opponents have it right, I finally get why they don't even bother, so I'm retiring from finding lines that refute the nodes, and it's my first time since this all started where I'll be playing my moves without a winning line on my hand.
A. T. S. Broekhuizen (2025-07-05 09:48:01)
50 moves rule
''please call referee if an obvious draw is not accepted by your opponent.'' - would such a position at some point count as an ''obvious draw''?
George Jempty (2025-06-26 23:39:19)
I did not win a game since 3 years
Yeah the only reason I'm winning in one of my games right now is because of poor play by my opponent. But 12 years ago or so I had an unbeaten streak for 2 years or so, with plenty of wins along the way (even one with Black with the Siesta variation against the Ruy) from an initial rating of 1900 or so, up to 2200+. The only reason I'm playing again now is too get some fodder for a chess opening book (about a different variation for Black against the Ruy) I've begun to write.
Scott Ligon (2025-05-01 04:14:23)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
After the harsh words of my previous post, I must now give Pineda some credit. He did exactly what he said he was going to do against Stockfish 17.1 @ 10 million nodes so now I can't use that strategy in any of my future games, it is retired. Since none of my opponents in the games I have running now with this strategy are playing the same opening that Pineda used (the Italian Game), I can post a winning line for white immediately. Our game followed the first 43 moves of this line, and as black I had to deviate from this strategy on move 43 to avoid certain defeat. So here is a winning line for white against Stockfish 17.1 @ 10 million nodes. At the end of the line, Stockfish found mate in 22.
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Nf6 4. d3 Bc5 5. c3 a6 6. O-O d6 7. a4 O-O 8. b4 Ba7 9. Re1 Ne7 10. Nbd2 Be6 11. Bxe6 fxe6 12. Ra2 Ng6 13. h3 Qe8 14. Nf1 h6 15. N1h2 a5 16. b5 Bc5 17. Bd2 Rd8 18. Qb3 Qf7 19. g3 d5 20. Kg2 b6 21. Bc1 Rc8 22. exd5 Nxd5 23. h4 Bd6 24. h5 Nge7 25. Nxe5 Qxh5 26. Nef3 c5 27. c4 Nb4 28. Rd2 Ng6 29. Qd1 Nf4+ 30. Kh1 Rcd8 31. Re3 Qh3 32. Ne1 Ng6 33. Qe2 Ne7 34. Nf3 Bxg3 35. fxg3 Nf5 36. Qf2 Nxg3+ 37. Kg1 Nf5 38. Bb2 Rf7 39. Bc3 Nxe3 40. Qxe3 Qg3+ 41. Kh1 Qh3 42. Qe4 Qf5 43. Qxf5 exf5 44. Ne5 Rf6 45. Nhf3 g5 46. d4 cxd4 47. Rxd4 Rfd6 48. Rxd6 Rxd6 49. Bxb4 Rd1+ 50. Kg2 axb4 51. c5 b3 52. Nc4 bxc5 53. b6 g4 54. b7 gxf3+ 55. Kxf3
Ulises Pineda (2025-04-24 16:20:25)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
I'm going to find a winning line against it, and then I'm going to find a win against your next step, and then I'm going to find another one against the next one, so skipping steps are a way to save time.
Remember I never made a move in our games until I had found the line, I only played it out, I'm still surprised you haven't dedicated the time to find it as if you were your own opponent, unless I'm the only person in the world that knows how to find such lines.
By using Stockfish 17.1 @ 20 million of nodes you would get it retired by me already, I don't understand why you'd want me to retire 10 million or 15 million first, because this has never been about the number of nodes, this is about telling me how you're going to pick your moves so I can find a line that would make your method make a game losing blunder.
Remember you sent me a message thinking 10 million nodes would play just fine right before I made a move that would make it blunder, what I don't know is why didn't you see the move before I played it, or from the distance, and that it surprised you, have people really forgotten how to analyze games? If you build a big tree of moves and replies to them, it's going to contain a line that beats Stockfish at fixed nodes, it'll take me about 24 hours to find the one against Stockfish 17.1 @ 10 million nodes, and about 48 hours to find one against Stockfish 17.1 @ 20 million nodes, the difference is we'll save the amount of games we have to face each other.
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.
Scott Ligon (2025-03-29 18:03:58)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
I think there's a decent chance that the 15 million node strategy is unbeatable, but I can't say what that chance is. Maybe I overestimate it. I have spent considerable time looking for a winning line for white and I haven't been able to find one. But, I had that same opinion about the 10 million node strategy before I found evidence in my games that it loses. Specifically games in the Sicilian. I haven't found any other winning lines for white.
As for my opponents, I think mostly they enter tournaments and play their usual game. I'm just another opponent. My focus is on the experiment I'm running, but I wouldn't assume everyone else is focused on it. But if anyone cares to prove that the 15 million node strategy is beatable, exploitive play is clearly the way to go about it. This most recent game shows that even a move that fails to give white an objective advantage could still merit consideration as a possible exploit against the fixed node strategy.
Ulises Pineda (2025-03-29 17:10:11)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
What I don't get is, what are your other opponents doing? I mean, it took some time, but at all points I had a line that I knew would beat the 10 million strategy if they were followed through, this is an opportunity to always get ponder hits because one always knows what move will be played in all positions.
Are those people aware that the fixed node strategy will lead to a draw, and they play it anyway? That's too weird to me.
I'm confident in a future game against the 15 million node strategy I would find another such line and play it out, just to retire it, but I wouldn't make any moves in the game until I had it, I don't know what those players that know all moves played would lead to a draw are doing.
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 (2025-01-21 23:17:17)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
And now I have found a line that defeats Stockfish 17 at 10 million nodes, so that strategy is not safe to play as black. I won't post the line yet because I don't want to give away information that might be relevant for my opponents in games that are still running, but I intend to post it later.
I will continue to use the 10 million node strategy in the tournaments I had already started, but in my upcoming tournaments I will switch to the 15 million node version of this strategy, to test whether or not there's a line that defeats it. As mentioned in the first post, if Stockfish's recommended move gets to what appears to be a losing position, I will deviate from these strategies to try to avoid losing, and I will message my opponent to let them know this has happened. In my games so far, I have not deviated from the 10 million node strategy, unless it happened by mistake. But I'm not aware of any such mistakes.
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).
Ilmars Cirulis (2024-06-05 10:11:11)
Looking for opponent in 1v1 match
I have exactly 9.96 epoints, will have to wait a bit until I reach 10.
A. T. S. Broekhuizen (2024-06-04 20:28:07)
Looking for opponent in 1v1 match
@Ilmars Cirulis, Most of my current games have run their course. If you want, I am ready for another 1v1 match.
A. T. S. Broekhuizen (2024-05-06 10:42:34)
Looking for opponent in 1v1 match
Yes I played a couple of matches against Herbert Kruse. I tried out some ideas, but all games were drawn. Maybe in the first round of current WCC, I might win a game or two.
A. T. S. Broekhuizen (2024-03-16 20:34:57)
message for Thibault regarding...
... the tournament that I withdrawed from.
Dear Thibault,
February 25. I sent you an email that I had accidentally enrolled in two standard class M tournaments, by clicking a second time before the next page loaded.
This night I saw some new games and assumed it was the new WCC cycle. But upon closer inspection, it was the second Class M tournament that I thought I had withrawn from.
Added to the imminent new WCC this will be a bit much. So is it still possible to fix this?
Thibault de Vassal (2023-11-25 23:15:04)
Referee Adjudication
The later is best :)
Do not forget that 50 moves rule does NOT apply at FICGS.
If there is a checkmate to come, according to the rules: after you ask, your opponent still gets 30 days to play a few moves more. Not everyone uses tablebases and some may want to see how it ends...
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 (2023-11-16 23:40:31)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
Herbert Kruse:
"you ignore, who is victim and who startet it"
I do not ignore anything, but it is you who ignores everything relevant:
1) You ignore the text of my Public Appeal and the arguments presented there, and I have already said that above.
2) You ignore the definitions of "war crime" and "genocide". Above, I have even inserted some links to international conventions.
3) You ignore my replies. Above, I just explained to you that war crime is a war crime, and genocide is a genocide independently of the previous history. Who started the war or whether the opponent committed some war crimes earlier is irrelevant.
4) You also ignore the history. The Israel/Palestine wars started already in 1948. On 09 April 1948, one radical Zionist group committed a massacre of Palestinians in the village of Deir Yassin.
5) You also ignore the documents concerning the current background. In the United Nations documentation, it is stated that the Gaza Strip is a territory occupied by Israel. There are other such territories. The UN documentation uses the phrase "Israel and occupied Palestinian territories".
"inhumnan war crimes by Hamas caused this"
It is more precise to say that Hamas's attack PROVOKED Israel's reaction.
"Hamas strategy is to hide after civiliens, thats so obvious and you fall for it"
I cannot speak with someone who arbitrarily ascribes to me some thoughts or attitudes I do not have.
The use of human shields by Hamas in no way justifies Israel's current massacres in the Gaza Strip.
Your argument is based on not knowing what is and what is not a war crime and what exactly is written in, e.g., the Genova Convention. It is also based on ignoring the text of my Public Appeal.
I cannot continue the discussion with you because you violate the most basic principles of meaningful discussion.
Ilmars Cirulis (2023-09-18 20:19:57)
Looking for opponent in 1v1 match
Did you find it?
A. T. S. Broekhuizen (2023-09-10 13:00:12)
Looking for opponent in 1v1 match
see: https://ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=entry_tournament&tournament=ficgs_chess_rapid_silver
Thibault de Vassal (2023-02-05 20:53:53)
Advertising a win or a draw with 7th or
You found the right way (email or any way to contact webmaster)...
As of January 2023, rule is :
"11. 5. Adjudications
In some cases, the game continues but the result is obvious.
If time control is superior to 1 day and if a player doesn't want to resign (or accept draw) and obviously last the game, his opponent may report to referee a first time. If the player takes 30 days more to finish the game, his opponent may call referee another time, then the game will be adjudicated. An analysis submitted by a player should contain sufficient information so that no doubt is possible. This may include a sequence of moves, but in some circumstances it may be sufficient to claim a win or a draw on the basis of material or positional advantage. Final decision belongs to referee."
Scott Ligon (2022-11-26 14:55:46)
I did not win a game since 3 years
I couldn't use the link but I found game number 137701. You won against the King's Gambit but your opponent played 3 d4. Which is actually the kind of position I'm talking about. Right on the edge of outright losing and I'm not sure if white is already over the edge. Anyway I haven't been brave enough to try that one. 3 Bc4 is as far as I go, at least for now.
Scott Ligon (2022-11-22 16:25:45)
I did not win a game since 3 years
Yet another amendment. From the previous post, we can eliminate the FICGS server evaluation and let the first player stipulate which side is playing for the win. If they assign the advantage incorrectly, this only helps their opponent, so the first player has no reason to lie. Example: First player picks the King's Bishop Gambit as the starting position (1. e4 e5 2. f4 exf4 3. Bc4) but erroneously claims that white has the advantage, so the second player has to choose between playing white for the win or black for the draw. Second player happily chooses to play black for the draw and should have no trouble holding the draw.
Scott Ligon (2022-11-22 15:10:32)
I did not win a game since 3 years
In that case you'd need some way to address the possibility that a player could always draw their two game match by mirroring the moves their opponent plays in one game to the other game.
Scott Ligon (2022-11-22 14:53:59)
I did not win a game since 3 years
As for ways to address this, if engines are allowed you could have tournaments from a starting position where the game theoretic value isn't clear. Where maybe it's a win for one side or the other, or maybe it's a draw, but it's right on the border and it's not obvious which side we're on. Then you play two games from that position against each opponent, once as white and once as black.
Yeturu Aahlad (2022-10-25 03:45:09)
respectful legacy
Luis is another esteemed opponent and very dear friend from a different troubled region of our world. Once again, should death be the only consideration for the restoration of a player's legacy?
https://ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=135663
Scott Ligon (2022-10-07 01:20:05)
Threefold repetition
I don't think you have to claim the draw. When threefold repetition occurs (after you submit your next move), I believe the site software will automatically declare the game a draw. In a recent game of mine, that's what happened. I got the email notification that the game was a draw almost immediately after submitting the move that resulted in the third repetition, too quickly for my opponent to have accepted my draw offer. Maybe the draw offer is necessary for the draw to happen, I don't know about that, but if it automatically recognizes the repetition I see no reason why it would matter whether there was a draw offer.
As for when / if the arbiter should act in positions that seem obviously drawn, I don't know how that's handled and I have nothing to say about that.
Jan Zidu (2022-09-19 03:37:50)
Repeated draw offers
In any case, I would introduce a rule that each player has the right to offer the opponent a draw repeatedly, but may not do so more than once every 10 moves. If the player follows this rule, he must not be sanctioned in any way. Does the introduction of such a rule present any problem?
Yeturu Aahlad (2022-08-18 22:12:06)
poker reflection time
Am I misunderstanding the math? I don't think that would make a meaningful difference. Against an opponent playing as slowly as possible, the new rule with 30-day max accumulated time would end the game 30 days sooner.
Yeturu Aahlad (2022-08-16 21:32:54)
respectful legacy
Today, an esteemed opponent, Aleksey Payzansky, a Ukrainian player, resigned all his Poker games against me. I've been wanting to start a discussion here on a FICGS policy of respectful legacy for some time now. What follows is a straw-man to start the discussion.
1. It is reasonable to require a minimum degree of prior participation before this policy applies.
2. Under appropriate circumstances, this policy may be applied retroactively.
3. If we know that a participant has died, it will trigger this policy.
4. If a participant announces that they will no longer participate or suspend their participation for an unknown length of time, it will trigger this policy. (Controversial - this is regardless of their reasons for doing so.)
5. If a participant stops participating for a prescribed length of time without any announcement, it will trigger this policy retroactively from the time the participation stopped. (Controversial - the intent is to give the participant the benefit of doubt.)
When the policy applies,
1. All of the participant's pending games (retroactively if applicable) will be adjudged. A player with a clear lead will be declared the winner. Games which are too close will be either declared a tie or removed from the record with no adjustment of ELO. (Controversial - time on the clock will not be a consideration in the adjudication.)
2. Returning participants will be welcomed. They will retain their ELO, and their degree of prior participation will be reset to zero.
I would be happy to see this policy applied retroactively to Aleksey if that is appropriate.
Juri Eintalu (2022-03-23 04:30:48)
FIDE BANS KARJAKIN
I am sure that not everyone can competently decide whether Ukrainian war is a justified war or not. My personal feeling is that this war is unjustified, however, I do not know all the facts and I have not read the Genova Convention and other such documents either. The case of the Iraq war is much easier to decide because know we do know there were no chemical weapons in Iraq. Also, Iraq posed no threat to the US whatsoever as the US is on the other side of the planet and Iraq did not have intercontinental missiles.
As for myself, I will never participate in any tournaments or events of FIDE after FIDE has chosen a side in the West/Russia controversy and has allowed to weaponized itself.
Stanislas Gounant (2022-03-21 18:33:33)
Suggestion for thematic tourny
1. g4
1. e4 c5 2. b4 cxb4 3. d4
1. e4 e5 2. Cf3 d5
1. e4 e5 2. Cf3 f5
des positions déséquilibrées qui ne donnent pas des parties nulles
Vadrya Pokshtya (2022-02-17 08:52:23)
Grand Dice Chess
Hello,
I am the author and inventor of chess variants. My chess variants are published on chessvariants.com and some of them can be played on Game Courier.
I would like to present to you a variant of chess with dice that I invented relatively recently and which can already be played on two sites on the Internet.
Grand Dice Chess
The Rules
The game uses a 12x12 board.
Each player has:
4 Kings
24 Pawns
8 Knights
8 Bishops
8 Rooks
4 Queens
White and black occupy the 1st-6th and 7th-12th ranks, respectively, as shown in the diagram.
Unfortunately I can't post an image here, but you can always find it here:
https://granddicechess.blogspot.com/2022/01/grand-dice-chess.html
https://www.chess.com/blog/Pokshtya/grand-dice-chess-battle
https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-variants/grand-dice-chess
White starts the game first.
The game uses four dice.
Opponents make moves alternately, throwing 4 dice. The piece to move is determined by a die:
1 = pawn, 2 = knight, 3 = bishop, 4 = rook, 5 = queen and 6 = king.
The player makes four moves at the same time based on the indications of the dice and has the right to refuse (pass) any move that does not suit him, unless it is a pawn move. Unlike in regular dice chess it's allowable to pass moves. And this rule was already applied about a thousand years ago in old variant of Shatranj (Shatranj al-Mustatîla or Oblong Chess), the Arabic pre-decessor of modern chess. However it's not allowed to pass on pawn-moves, except when they are blocked.
Chess pieces move across the board as they do in ordinary chess - according to the standard rules of move and capture.
The only minor exception is for a pawn that is not allowed to move forward two squares from its starting position.
Upon reaching the last rank, the pawn can be promoted to any piece except the king and itself.
There is no castling, check and checkmate in the game.
The goal of the game is to capture four enemy kings.
The first test tournament was held on the site http://abstractgames.ru/index.php
The tournament is attended by 10 people and I received the most positive feedback from them.
The game has proven itself so well that regular tournaments have already been launched.
Yesterday the game was added to Dagaz server https://games.dtco.ru/map
And it's a great place to test the game in person, as registering on the site is very easy and doesn't require any personal information.
The game turned out to be extremely interesting and exciting, replete with puzzling combinations. Surprisingly, with this size of the board and the number of pieces, the average game lasts no more than 30 turns.
Thibault de Vassal (2021-12-01 02:12:36)
Repeated draw offers
I just updated the process and rules... let's give a try to this new version (without any human intervention on the result of the game):
"Also, no player will make draw offers repeatedly, particularly several times in a row. Doing so may lead to get blocked by your opponents, finally to get a limited access to the server (until to solve the problem)."
It is now possible to report then block draw offers (at least the main message & popup) just like it is possible with private messages in games. Then it shouldn't be annoying anymore.
Juri Eintalu (2021-11-29 11:18:31)
Repeated draw offers
First, what you can do, is to make changes to the server program so that the game log or the notation of the game will show, when and who has made draw offers. Sometimes, when the game is finished, the player later wants to know, when did the opponent offer a draw.
Garvin Gray (2021-11-29 09:20:46)
Repeated draw offers
My first post on this matter already contained a very good solution for this issue that would never result in any bans:
ICCF has a different solution to this matter and I believe it should be incorporated here:
If a player offers a draw in a single game, and that draw offer is declined by the opponent, the server will incapacitate the player's ability to make a second draw offer until at least 10 more moves have been made, with one exception.
If the opponent offers a draw during a player's 10-move count (that is, within 10 moves subsequent to the player's having made a draw offer), then the player's 10-move count is terminated at that time such that the player can again offer a draw with any move. This "10-move" rule does not include claims of a draw related to 3-position repetition, 7-piece tablebase claims, 50-move rule claims, or adjudication-related claims.
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.
Christoph Schroeder (2021-07-18 02:23:21)
3 times repetition not recognized ??
Game 131349 is a 3 times repetition. My opponent still declines my draw offer.
Why isn't there an automatic end of a game when a position is repeated for the third time?
Thibault de Vassal (2021-06-19 11:19:01)
What is the longest game of Big Chess?
Yes, checkmate is the goal (in some way) of the game, but it doesn't say it automatically ends the game. Of course I can specify it.
Finally your opponent did resign... new players do not always get immediately how the site works.
And yes, the ratio may evolve, it happened once only since FICGS started.
Herbert Kruse (2021-06-15 17:15:38)
What is the longest game of Big Chess?
Your own rules say:
"Big chess
Introduction
The object of the game is to checkmate the opponent. This occurs when no further move can prevent the king from being captured.
Rules are the same than in western chess, except castling is not possible"
Herbert Kruse (2021-06-13 23:03:42)
What is the longest game of Big Chess?
FIDE Laws of Chess:
5.1 The game is won by the player who has checkmated his opponent's king. This immediately ends the game, provided that the move producing the checkmate position was legal.
Don Groves (2021-04-14 05:38:21)
Poker Rating
I recently had a Go tournament in which all six of my opponents failed to make even one move. Shouldn't this affect their ratings?
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)
Christoph Schroeder (2021-04-06 08:53:31)
Poker Rating
In OTB chess I once lost a tournament game in 10 moves, blundering a winning combination by my opponent. Was my resignation at move 10 non-sportsmanlike?
The reason for losing quickly is most probably a lack of skill or an oversight by one player. Both things happen every day and are part of the game. No reason not to rate the game.
The consequence of this rule is outright ridiculous: a player who has the chance to mate his opponent before move 10, would have to refrain from mating and intentially play weaker moves, hoping that his opponent will resign only after move 10. I think noone really wants to see games like that.
Tim Harding (2021-04-02 23:02:25)
Pointless To Play The Kings Gambit ?
But you said yourself you are not stopping anyone cheating, so I won't be entering another of these events I think. (Also because 90% of my games with Black I win very easily against weak opponents.) It's possible for White to avoid defeat in the KG if he chooses the safest lines but Black has a wide choice of playable defences. In some of these if White wants to have a real chance to win then he also increases the prospect of losing. I had some failed experiments in these tournaments.
Ewald Gossmann (2021-01-04 14:27:01)
K+B vs. K
I think all chessplayers know that this position is a draw. But in the game 125428 my oponent continues making move after move. I have already offered a draw, but no reaction.
Thibault de Vassal (2020-12-24 00:45:57)
FAIR PLAY
Well, if your opponent does not use engines (and thinks you're not using engines as well) there is some hope yet after a certain move :)
Rotom Monotua (2020-12-13 08:54:24)
What happened to all the players?
I am with Heinz- Georg when he says it's not the servers job to end a game.
Opponents who are delaying might be annoying but on the other hand have every right to use there time.
Dariusz Fraczek (2020-12-12 16:57:21)
Cannot make a move
After selecting a game I am on move, blank page is displayed (only menu bar) - no board, no game data. Games where my opponents are on move are displayed correctly and I can change game id and go to a game I am on move, but it is in read only mode. Checked on different browsers (Chrome and Opera) and different PCs. Some hours ago there was no problem.
Thibault de Vassal (2020-12-11 20:57:43)
Repeated draw offers
Well, I took some time to think (again) about this problem. Not an obvious one.
Of course, the best option seem to be to let players to tell the server (and their opponent, or not) what they want to read / receive [draw offers], whenever they want. All other solutions seem to be a part of this solution.
By the way, players could tell the server (and their opponent, or not) what they want to read / receive [private messages], whenever they want.
I must say that all choices [any change, or no change at all] seem not satisfying to me for now... It is a real and complex ethical question to me.
Garvin Gray (2020-12-06 13:57:56)
Repeated draw offers
I have noted over quite a period of time where players complain that their opponents keep offering draw after draw after draw.
At this point in time, the only avenue to try and get this stopped is to press 'call referee' and complain to Thibault.
ICCF has a different solution to this matter and I believe it should be incorporated here:
If a player offers a draw in a single game, and that draw offer is declined by the opponent, the server will incapacitate the player's ability to make a second draw offer until at least 10 more moves have been made, with one exception.
If the opponent offers a draw during a player's 10-move count (that is, within 10 moves subsequent to the player's having made a draw offer), then the player's 10-move count is terminated at that time such that the player can again offer a draw with any move. This "10-move" rule does not include claims of a draw related to 3-position repetition, 7-piece tablebase claims, 50-move rule claims, or adjudication-related claims.
Steven DuCharme (2020-08-29 05:03:41)
I have left here...
permanently...may yours improve incrementally :)
Thibault de Vassal (2020-05-22 23:26:59)
Pointless To Play The Kings Gambit ?
Hello Tim,
From FICGS start, I always had the same politics for "no engines" tournaments:
- It is possible to punish obvious cheating, but it will not be possible to prevent intelligent cheating... There's always a way to round the system.
- There are no prizes or "titles" in these tournaments, only the dishonor that other players think that one can play with engines.
Knowing that, I think that honest players can play for fun anyway, I tried it and enjoyed to lose :)
As a conclusion and to make it clearer, no action is taken in any case of using an engine in no engines tournaments. Allowing obvious cheating will help players to make their opinion on their opponents.
Daniel Parmet (2020-04-28 22:59:06)
The State of correspondence chess
I have played correspondence chess now for 13 years. During that time, I have played 983 correspondence games. These days I mostly play at ICCF and some of these issues may be ICCF specific... but since ICCF has no forum and I want to get a sense of the health of correspondence chess in general... I posit my thoughts here.
First of all, I think the number of correspondence players and the number of correspondence games are decreasing across the board on all correspondence websites due to the things I want to talk about.
Second, I primarily shifted my playing to ICCF years ago for two reasons: 1) The higher level of competition available; 2) The norms available. Although I was concerned with their fees which are usually minor but, in many cases, certain organizers do construct outlandish tournaments that you need to be wary of (looking at you Venezuela).
On the first point, I think ICCF is a little more open to high caliber players competing up until a point (they really try to prevent you from playing a 2450+ player until you are 2450+ yourself). And the rating protections get tougher and tougher the further you go but they make it easy to play 2300 players. While most websites outside of ICCF, usually have one annual Cup / WCH or Thematics, these other websites usually make it impossible to play anyone more than a few hundred points above you no matter your rating outside of these few events.
On the second point, I think ICCF norms are somewhat of an illusion. They’ve always been hard and much harder to achieve than OTB norms which received a watering down of requirements of decades ago. In fact, ICCF norms are so much harder than FIDE norms that one actually needs to achieve two norms to receive the prerequisite title in ICCF vs the standard three norms required by FIDE. In the US, for example, there are 116 ICCF Titled players in history (13 GMs, 25 SIM, 78 IMs) vs 828 FIDE Titled players in present (101 GMs 166 IM 561 FMs) [https://ratings.fide.com/topfed.phtml]. Now however, there is a proposal, for the ICCF GM Title only, proposed by Dennis Doren, ICCF Rules Commissioner who really does a lot for correspondence chess, and SIM Uwe Staroske, ICCF Qualifications and Ratings Commissioner, to remove the requirement to have to play GMs to get the GM Title [leaving IM and SIM untouched] [https://www.iccf.com/Proposal.aspx?id=1280]. This proposal states, “A search of the ICCF data indicates that 21 players obtained at least 2 GM norms across 24 games but failed to get the GM title because of the requirement of "5 GM" opponents. (Only 5 of those players are currently active).” Leaving aside the fact that this proposal violates the very definition of the GM Title, one must beat the club in order to join it, the proposal further outlines the real problems without addressing them, “The GM Title has already become far harder to earn than it used to be, due to the rating suppression caused by the increase in draws.” Wow, let’s unpack that one line because it is a doozy!
Really, this one line, that is easily overlooked, is two huge problems that correspondence is facing: 1) death by one thousand draw paper cuts and 2) rating deflation. I will argue later that there is a third huge problem but let’s start with the ones acknowledged by ICCF itself. Every correspondence player knows the draw rate is going up. As engines and hardware get stronger, players are able to save positions that in the past would have been lost and we are finding ever easier ways to head straight towards 0.00 as Black. I would love to see a detailed analysis that describes how much harder it has become to win as Black against a decent correspondence player (let’s say someone 2300+). In the last five years, I have beaten three 2300+ players as Black without counting mouseslips (one in 2015, one in 2016 and one any day now in 2020) despite playing extremely aggressive openings like the KID (for the record that’s three Black wins out 103 Black draws or 2.91% Win rate). That may be part of the draw problem, but I have witnessed my own draw rate skyrocket 2014: 82.4% 2015: 86.7% 2016: 90.2% 2017: 90.6% 2018: 91% 2019 is still in progress. Often for these norms, you need to score +2, +3, +4 or +5 despite the fact that +1 usually wins the event… and with the draw rate North of 90% in a 12-13 game event that means you are likely to win 1 game on average… but in many events the entire cross table often sees one to three entire wins (look at a recently completed tournament here where I scored my first IM norm that required +0 and I scored +1). My win was one of five wins in the entire tournament 100/105 = 95.2% draw rate! [https://www.iccf.com/event?id=73482]. People love to tell me that’s fine because we are talking about such a weak event as Category 8 [2449 was the rating average]. Fine, I do not accept your argument but let’s look at the World Championship then shall we? Let’s look at the most recently concluded World Championship 30 which finished on 10/2/2019, Category 13 [2562 was the rating average]. This event was won by the new World Champion SIM Kochemasov, Andrey Leonidovich 2540 [https://www.iccf.com/event?id=66745]. Congrats to the new World Champion on his two wins! The event had 8 decisive games out 136 or a draw rate of 91.2% (not far off my own). But wait did I say SIM? I did. In fact, congratulations to the World Champion on scoring his final GM norm as well! This World Championship saw 5 SIMs compete in a field with 12 GMs. While 3 of the SIMs finished 1st 2nd and 3rd, only our new World Champion scored a GM norm. The problem is with all the draws that norms are not just becoming hard, but maintaining or increasing one’s rating is becoming hard. And one’s rating is how one receives any decent invites to have a chance at a norm in the first place.
The draws are a death by one thousand cuts as I recently played one of the ICCF’s proposal’s outlined “21 players that could have obtained a GM norm.” My rating is 2389 and his rating is 2504 (although SIM, he is recognized by all his peers as a GM caliber player). As Black, I obtained an easy draw without ever being in any trouble at all. The player had a rather angry initial discussion with me post mortem about how he felt it was wrong that a 2504 should have to play a player as weak as 2389 where the draw would kill his rating. He felt that his rating was being destroyed by these draws with weaker players and that ICCF should protect him from us. He felt I have it easier as a lower rated player because I can gain rating from these draws. Let’s look at his argument that one is causing the other and it is only happening to those 2500+. At the time that draw occurred, I gained exactly 1.17915 rating points from it (and he lost the same); however, this was the first draw in over 40 games in which I *gained* rating points (this statement is no longer true as a few higher rated players have since given me draws but at the time of the game’s conclusion this was the case). Yes, that’s right, ICCF already does such a good job of protecting higher rated players that it actively hands out advice to new players to be very particular about what invites and events they play because the draws could kill their initial rating. I too have experienced a net negative loss of rating points from draws and still seen my rating going up only due to the fact that wins are easier and ever so slightly more common to come by at my level. However, it means I am not exempt from the draw problem. It is patently false that this problem is limited to those 2500+ as in my last 43 draws, I lost rating in 42 of them and gained rating from 1 of them. Therefore, it appears draws are causing rating deflation and this is the real problem in both norms and correspondence in general. With the exception of matches, perhaps there is a way to have draws not count against one’s rating since there are so many of them? It kind of blends the Chess rating concept with that of Bridge where one cannot lose rating points once earned. What we can see is that the player’s argument that draws are causing rating deflation is probably true. One problem is at least partly causing the other one.
There is a third more devious problem worse than the two outlined above in my opinion. While rating deflation, draws, less players and norms are real issues… they are dwarfed by the change in behavior caused by these issues. I know it is a bit overdramatic to talk about such issues in a time of COVID, but there has been a great increase in the number of players playing Dead Man Defense (often shortened by correspondence players to DMD+ and DMD=). It is important to note that the death rate in COVID for those in the elderly category is markedly higher and the correspondence community in general is also markedly higher. I have heard estimates of the average age of correspondence player being 70-75 range though I haven’t seen any data. Back to DMD, what is DMD and why is it such awful behavior? The players are hoping you die before you win so they can claim either a win on time or if it goes to adjudication then at least claim a draw. The other hope is that you might mouse slip by being forced to play more moves which while that would never happen over the board does surprisingly account for a large portion of wins in ICCF correspondence high-level play. One of the main problems this issue causes is that if someone takes an early draw against a player who then goes on to die, the entire rest of the field gets a free half point and you are punished for playing your game quicker than your peers. Often, players over the board resign once mate is unstoppable or a simple endgame is reached in which the result is known to players of all levels. In correspondence, often even sooner than these players will resign or offer draws, knowing that perpetual check is unavoidable should we play another 10 moves past the piece sac against a bare king? How about when the engine reads +25 +30 or +40? So, for the most, correspondence players draw or resign much earlier than one might over the board due to engine and tablebase assistance. On that note, depending on the tournament, players can outright claim wins and draws either on the 6-piece tablebase (always allowed) or the sometimes allowed on an event by event basis the 7-piece tablebase. It is considered out right rude to make a player play all the way to the 6-piece tablebase to claim. I recently claimed one win in a six piece tablebase up an entire piece where my jolly opponent wanted to discuss the game in a post mortem (rarely done in correspondence in general anyways). I declined to even respond to him even though I was already having a very lively and fun post mortem with a Venezuelan on our extremely interesting draw. A worse example is the 92 move game I played with opposite colored bishops where I had two extra pawns. I offered a draw as white and the higher rated player to my lower rated opponent who declined it, forcing me to play to a 7-piece tablebase claim to end the game. This kind of behavior used to be quite rare. In the past, I would say it happened in 1 out of every 100 games… these days it seems to happen in every other game (1/2!). I have seven different opponents right now that are DMD+ against me where the engine reads +148 (or in some cases even sees mate! The 2504 player that complained about my rating earlier also complained someone was DMD+ him… I remarked that I have no less than 7 players DMD+ me and if they would resign? My rating would be about 2450 right which sort of eliminates his claim about our “giant” rating difference). The issue is that due to rating deflation these players need to artificially keep their rating high as long as they can because that’s how they will get their next invite. With the new terrible time control that is not yet Official (although there is a proposal to make it Official: https://www.iccf.com/Proposal.aspx?id=1282), players only need to make a move once every 50 days to pointlessly extend the game. I have a DMD= draw currently going on 16 months now where the player is just moving Kg1 Kf1 Kg1 every 50 days. This time control exasperates the DMD problem. When I contacted ICCF Officials to point out the severity of this problem, I was told that I should report it to the TD on a case by case basis only if it is DMD+ as they will not look at DMD= at all. However, it is usually the TDs that are the biggest offenders (6 of the 7 players described above were TDs). In fact, it is usually the same general casts of characters which allows for an easy black list to be created that bars these players from play until they can fix their atrocious behavior. This behavior needs to be punished. These players need to be reprimanded. In the end, lack of norms, rating deflation and the draw death will not make me quit correspondence chess. It is DMD+/DMD= that will make me quit. This experience is my personal experience with high level correspondence over thirteen years and I would love to hear from other correspondence players concerning these problems.
Garvin Gray (2020-03-04 05:29:14)
Wch groups, less than 7 players
I have asked Thibault a long time ago about this topic, but it has occurred again.
The rules for the WCH is that if a group has less than 7 players, it may be played as a double round robin.
I think this rule should be changed to: If any groups have less than 7 players, then each of those groups will be a double round robin.
I propose this for discussion, and hopefully agreement as I think it is not helpful for the event to hold groups of 5 and only have 4 games for each player.
If one player times out a game in that group, then that result counts for 25% percent of their opponents total score, whilst the rest of the opponents have to battle against that opponent for the full point.
So, I believe with groups less than 7, double round robin should be used. This will make the winner more meaningful and also reduce the impact of any time outs.
Christoph Schroeder (2020-02-21 14:28:01)
Game decided by tablebase
Nowadays, all players are supposed to have access to 7 men tablebases. Therefore I propose to extend the rules to 7 men positions - IMHO the ICCF rules (referred to by Charles) make perfect sense.
That means: When a 7 men position is reached and the opponent refuses to resign resp. to accept a draw, the arbiter can be called and adjudicate the game immediately.
Thibault de Vassal (2020-02-20 18:55:28)
Game decided by tablebase
...as per the rules indeed, here rule 11.5 specifies "If time control is superior to 1 day and if a player doesn't want to resign (or accept draw) and obviously last the game, his opponent may report to referee a first time. If the player takes 30 days more to finish the game, his opponent may call referee another time, then the game will be adjudicated."
I understand that this rule may be annoying but it brought some peace since it has been added: either it gives some time to end the game or it helps to make the referee's decision easier (and more acceptable by both players).
Christoph Schroeder (2020-01-28 23:00:27)
Waiting lists
Enabling to remove oneself from a waiting list should be given a higher priority.
Recently, I "played" a go tournament where all 6 opponents were non-starters. The high percentage of non-starters (not only in go but also in poker and chess) could AND SHOULD drastically be reduced by creating a possibility to step down before the tornament starts.
Thibault de Vassal (2019-01-24 18:58:12)
James Romig
Hi all,
Well, it seems to me that a website administrator shouldn't intervene in players private life / ask for or discuss players private life if it does not come from players or players families (as it happens regularly, most often for bad news).
Of course general forfeits happen quite/too often, sometimes there are expressed concerns from other players, sometimes unexpressed concerns or nothing at all, whatever... so IMO the website administrator/referee shouldn't have to act according to such criteria.
Finally, it seems to me that we have to wait for news (but of course friends can contact each other).
As Garvin said, sometimes players make some choices (e.g. if not taking vacation days for any reason is considered as a choice) and there may be unfortunate consequences for themselves & for their opponents. That's what can happen on chess websites... more than in real tournaments, of course.
Christoph Schroeder (2018-12-25 17:00:44)
poker: not enough chips to pay BB
When a player has not enough chips left to pay his blinds for the next hand, the round should be lost for him.
But this is not the case. Example (just happened in one of my games):
My opponent has only 1 chip left. In the next hand, he ist the Big Blind which requires him to pay 2 chips. But instead of counting the round as lost for him, he gets a "discount" on his BB and has to pay only 1 chip, and the game goes on - but in a very strange way since my opponent has zero chips left, and there is no raising possible for neither side.
I cannot imagine that this behaviour of the poker software is intentional. Or is it?
Thibault de Vassal (2018-10-23 17:58:03)
Resigning in poker
Well, let's see how this discussion evolves (any other opinion?).
My first idea would be to let it like in other games for more coherence... but I'm not really opposed to remove it (maybe when there's no message from the opponent at least) if the most agrees with that.
Thibault de Vassal (2018-09-24 00:15:43)
Some questions to H. Kruse, WCH finalist
After that the last FICGS chess WCH final match finished, the choice was made again to ask a few questions to Eros Riccio's challenger: Herbert Kruse, for the 2nd time. He kindly accepted to answer it so let's learn a bit more on our top-ranked correspondence chess player.
______________________________
Hello Herbert, you're not really a player to introduce as you're very active here and at several chess websites for years, with outstanding ratings in each one (as far as I know), you're the 1st FICGS CUP winner & several times FICGS WCH challenger, each time facing "the wall" Eros Riccio, what could you tell us about yourself particularly as a chess & correspondence chess player?
- i began late with 16 to play my first tournament game, but with 18 i already was kicked out of a night club in company with tony miles ;) (dresscode) had vlastimil hort as trainer for a short time and played in teams with gutman, michalchisin, klovans, gipslis and some other GMs. corr chess i began, because i love to find the truth and because of freestyle, where i began to build very strong computers
What kind of computers do you build? Is it all dedicated to chess?
- i have several dual xeon e5 computers with 64gb ddr3 and 16 to 20 real cores and they all play chess ;)
Once again, GM Eros Riccio managed to draw the 12 games of the match. What are your feelings on these games? How did you estimate your chances to destabilize your opponent in the openings and to create complications enough with White (or Black)?
- this time my feelings were neutral. 1% chances to win, but i hoped he would lose his concentration if i began more games with him (we played 6 other games at the same time)
Doesn't "1% chances to win (the match)" mean about 0.17% to win only one game with White, even when losing one with Black? Isn't it a bit pessimistic after all, or is it the new so called Riccio-effect? :)
- if the strongest players face each other there is no win possible, except some has a mouse slep or forgot something during human interfacing
When did you start playing correspondence chess and what changed since that time? What attracted you most in the game?
- 2004 and evaluation of the position is the key point of improvement since then. attractive was to be better than actual world class players :)
Could you tell us anything on the way you work chess and play your correspondence games? Any tip or secret? (nothing to lose to ask :))
- with black i play for fastest way to 0.00 and with white i try every promising way to make a game for a longer time complicated
Do you use several ones at the same time when analyzing a game? (still grabbing some tips)
- i only use the newest stockfish versions of brainfish and corchess because the other engines are not so good. because i have many games i decide which one gets the most cores and time and let them run in infinity mode until i am happy that can be after 1 week or more sometimes.
You're not far to rank 2nd as a poker player at FICGS, you obviously started to take on Big Chess as well. What other games do you play? Did you consider to play Go already?
- i played go against the german champion and lost so i quit :)) played backgammon money game and internet (in fibs with kit woolsey i played over 100 matches) in bridge i was best bidder in germany 1994 to 1995, but dont play much nowadays
Do you have specific goals to achieve as a player?
- 2 goals, since a long time: be ficgs world champion and win one german bridge championship
How do you imagine correspondence chess evolution within a decade? What kind of engines/computers do you expect to use and what will look like centaur chess according to you? (in other words, what part will remain to the human player in the decision?)
- i think the engines today are already unbeatable, so in 20 years the would still not lose and chess is dead since about 4 years
What did you think about Google Deepmind's Alpha Zero performance vs. Stockfish?
- it was a joke because they let a bad version of stockfish play. i would not have lost one game against az0 and maybe won 2 til 5 out of 100
Conditions of this AlphaZero vs. Stockfish match were very specific (opening books, unbalanced hardware...) What weaknesses did you detect in AlphaZero play?
- it was the lack of precision, what would let it lose against stockfish in its tuned newest version but i look from a view of a player who is used to play with deep 60 :)
It seems that computers did not completely take on Bridge yet, what do you expect within a decade?
- i have not seen bridge programms, but the game is so easy that it must be already mastered by computers
Garvin Gray (2018-09-09 02:43:30)
Netiquette reinforcement
4, 5 and 6 need to be read together.
4 and 5 are where the arbiter declared the game lost for the player who breached the rules. The arbiter then needs to decide what score to award the opponent.
So 4 is to increase the points scored in the game to the maximum available for that game. This usually is 1 point.
5 is reducing the offenders score to zero.
What these two provisions also cover is where an offence is found out later in the tournament. So for here on ficgs, the arbiter found out that late in a tournament that one player had been abusing opponents regularly.
4 and 5 allows you to adjusts the scores of those completed games.
6 declares lost the game by the offending player. But the reason for the provision of 'deciding the opponents score' is that a position on the board might arise where the non-offender might not be able to construct a checkmate position with the material they have (lets say just a bare king). Then the score would be (0 - 0.5). The offender scores zero and the non offender, who can not win the game because they can not checkmate their opponent, receives 0.5
7 and 8 should be 'self explanatory'.
Garvin Gray (2018-09-08 04:28:48)
Netiquette reinforcement
If a player clicks on call referee to make a complaint and that stops the clock and you determine that the claim is pointless, or worse, that you believe the player has 'stopped the clocks' to try and gain an advantage, then you are free to determine what penalty is applied from the range of penalties that are available to you:
1) Warning,
2) Increasing the remaining time of the opponent,
3) Reducing the remaining time of the offending player,
4) Increasing the points scored in the game by the opponent to the maximum available for that game,
5) Reducing the points scored in the game by the offending person,
6) Declaring the game to be lost by the offending player (the arbiter shall also decide the opponent’s score),
7) Exclusion from one or more rounds,
8) Expulsion from the competition.
Garvin Gray (2018-09-08 02:29:41)
Netiquette reinforcement
I have a couple of revisions to the rules that I would like to see. Some of these do come from otb practices, but they also apply here.
In otb, when a player wants to make a claim to the arbiter, or wants to make a complaint to the arbiter about their opponent (for any reason), they stop the clock and call for the arbiter (or find the arbiter themselves in a large hall).
Then the arbiter will rule on the claim, make any decisions about the game, adjust the times on the clocks if necessary, and then start the clocks again.
So for FICGS, I think there should be a change here. When a player presses call referee, the clocks should be stopped/frozen. Currently, the clocks keep running.
This is wrong. The player has called for the arbiter, but the clocks keep running.
If the arbiter (Thibault in this case) rules that the player had no grounds to call the referee, then he can apply a time penalty and take time off the clocks of the person who stopped the clocks.
Thibault de Vassal (2018-09-07 16:57:06)
Netiquette reinforcement
Hi all,
Following a few problems of provocation and repeated draw offers, I propose to reinforce and specify the netiquette to help players finding the right things to do according to the situation...
http://www.ficgs.com/membership.html#general
Particularly this paragraph:
"It is possible to leave public comments for your games and to send private messages to other members. No player may post in forums or send to another member any voluntary message that contains abusive, insulting, provocating, advertising, vulgar, foul, racist, sexist or other discriminatory or politically sensitive content. 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.
If a player receives such a message, he may use the "report" link and accepts to use the "block" link that appears then (when playing a move) rather than replying to it. Responding to a provocative message is strictly forbidden and may lead to get a limited access to the server during a few weeks, at the moderator's discretion. In this case, please just warn the moderator or webmaster in private.
To maintain a friendly community, any cheating complaint should be addressed to the referee and should not be made publicly in games comments or in the forum, otherwise with the same consequences. Please note that no time will be added to any clock in any case, the game will continue in all cases, in example arguing to wait for the referee's decision will not be accepted. Finally, you agree that the webmaster, administrator and moderators have the right to remove, edit, move or close any topic, comment or message at any time should they see fit.
Publication of a private message without the authors expressed permission is strictly forbidden."
A big difference (I hope) is in the small add "Doing so may lead to instantly lose the game (...)". Better or worst? Any opinions or ideas?
Gabriele D Agostino (2018-07-29 15:11:21)
On (almost) global forfeits in WCH
In my opinion if a player lost on time more than 50% of their games in a round robin tournament, all game against him are considered as a win for the opponent.
Thibault de Vassal (2018-06-30 20:22:16)
Interview with 15th chess WCH finalist
For once, as Eros & I couldn't find much more to say after all his consecutive wins, I asked Ramil Germanes these few questions around his match & correspondence chess (with what may look like a quite surprising conclusion).
_______________________
- Hello Ramil, many thanks for answering those few questions! This is a first time with the WCH finalist, as the winner (Eros again) agreeded this could be an interesting experiment for a change, so we'll probably have a quite different point of view this time! You just finished your games to score 6-6 (12 draws), Eros retaining the title again. I guess this was the first time you played such a correspondence chess match, what are your impressions on this knockout format?
Yes this is the first time I've played a world championship match although I played before in earlier editions of this world championship but not reaching the challenger level. My impression? Its great playing for the world championship but I know its nearly impossible to beat the world champion.
- Let's rewind a few months backward, would you make other choices, in openings or anything?
I don't know. Tbh, I'm not very good on chess theory and not very updated as well. So I'm just playing basic moves hoping for opportunities to come up.
- So, is Eros beatable in this final match according to you? (please give us some hope) ^^
With how quickly you can search information and the strength of chess engines nowadays, its almost impossible to beat him unless you have access to alpha zero (haha). Though maybe Herbert Kruse can pull it off.
- What can you tell us about yourself and your relation to chess & correspondence chess?
I'm just an ordinary guy from the Philipines who happens to love playing chess. But my love of computers is what brought me to correspondence chess and to ficgs.
- Do you play other games, e.g. Go, Shogi, cards games?
No I don't know how to play those games.
- Could you tell us how these 12 games went from your own point of view?
For me, the games went through their normal course. Both of us didn't made any major mistakes so all games were drawn. That's just how it went. Though there were new moves on some the games it doesn't really changes result of the older games played before.
- Would you share a few tips to play good correspondence chess in 2018, or at least to beat the best chess engines? :)
Sorry but i dont know. I will be the new world champion by now if i know, hehehe.
- You told me that your computer configuration was basically a quad-core i5 3570 / 4gb on Fritz GUI (about 10,500 kn/s) / Windows 10, and we know that many of us (Eros included) still use such configs or even dual-core, would an octa-core have brought a significant advantage to you to win this match according to you?
Oh I don't know they still have those configurations. But I've already encountered opponents in Infinity Chess with 18-22 cores configs. Anyways, an octa-core or faster cpu would definitely be going to speed up my analysis and will let me analyze more lines and variations which may improves my overall play.
Honestly, I don't have that much time these days for correspondence chess. In my match against Eros, I had only about 1 hour of analysis time before work and about another 1 hour after work. Since I already have a family and 2 kids, they have to be my priority first. And I think somebody also can relate to this. So a faster cpu would be very helpful in the match and maybe will give a better chance than a slower cpu.
- As far as I know, you love to build computers, did you use or think about using several ones at the same time for analysis?
No. I only used one computer in my match against Eros. I have 2 other computers but both are slower.
- How much time you've been playing correspondence chess & how do you feel the way the game changed over the years?
I've been playing correspondence chess since 2010 and I have observed that its easier to win games in the past when chess engines were still weaker. Because you notice some players depend only on engine moves and engines still commit mistakes and you can exploit those mistakes if you "investigate" further.
Unlike now, engines are very strong that even players who rely solely on engines moves will be very hard to beat. It lessens the gap of players that know how to "use" the engines and the ones who do not.
- Finally, what makes you love correspondence chess in 2018?
I will always love chess and correspondence chess but what makes it exciting now is the rise of the new kind of engines.
Engines like Leela chess zero that has a different approach in playing chess. Maybe more of these kind of chess engines will be seen in the future. Because of its use of monte carlo analysis and neural networks, we are starting to see moves that we have never seen before. Very aggressive attacks and moves defying opening principles can now be seen. Correspondence chess is getting exciting again!
Thibault de Vassal (2018-04-12 22:24:54)
Design
Hello John,
You are right, many things are not easy for new players, particularly not used to the "correspondence chess style".
Tournaments are the main thing here by far for the moment... maybe this will evolve with some time but it is still difficult to find opponents for advanced chess games for a few years (but from time to time).
Just to know, did you read the Help section? I'll try to add some things there... to start.
Many thanks for the feedback!
Thibault de Vassal (2018-04-07 20:01:26)
unable to play my move!
Hello Aniruddha, well that's the first time I see that strange bug. I don't understand yet how it happened but you probably entered it (meaning Ng4 I guess) in the text field rather than clicking the pieces.
I'll investigate to avoid this in the future. Meanwhile & unfortunately, according to the rules, this game must be declared as a win for your opponent. Very sorry about that.
Kym Farnik (2018-04-06 16:36:42)
New style? Please revert
No. The old 'My Games' used to show both my time remaining and my opponents.
Now it looks like the App version.
My Tournaments has gone missing as well.
Thibault de Vassal (2018-03-14 23:12:38)
A few questions to Nelson Bernal Varela
Nelson Bernal Varela is an early FICGS correspondence chess player, now rated 2277 but also rated 2359 at ICCF (Correspondence Chess Master - CCM).
Last but not least, and as all poker holdem players here probably noticed, he is also our ranked #1 for years, who just reached an outstanding poker rating of 2382, while number two is now rated "only" 2212. A good occasion to ask him a few questions, that he kindly accepted to answer.
-----------------------
- Hello Nelson! You are the 2nd most active player at FICGS for years now. Everyone here probably noticed your incredible results in poker tournaments. "Correspondence poker holdem" was probably a strange idea as it is very unusual and very different from "Internet poker". What's your opinion on this and on the presence of a card game (played without money) at FICGS?
NBV: There are more important things than money and one of those is HONOR; It is honorable to be a chess master, international master, grandmaster, world chess champion at ICCF and at FICGS and to be number one in the ranking. It is honorable to be a FICGS world champion at Go and to be first in the ranking, it is honorable to be poker world champion at FICGS poker and in my case, it is an honor to be number one at poker here at FICGS during the last years, understanding that our general level of play has improved remarkably. None of these activities produces money, but to achieve any of the mentioned titles, it is necessary to have extraordinary abilities.
When I was about 18 years old, I had the opportunity to meet a person with immense material wealth, we spent whole evenings playing chess and then I told him my perceptions about each movement of the game. He thanked me for my chess explanations and paid me with good money. That wealthy man in his turn told me about life and recommended that I should always be proud of the gifts I had, since he knew, with all the money he had and being able to hire the best grandmasters in the world, that it could hardly come at the level of chess master. That person told me that the intellect can be turned into money whenever you want.
Now, by playing poker without money at FICGS, I understood that it was my extraordinary and wonderful opportunity to study-learn-perfect and test my poker theories without costing me a single dollar. In FICGS there is no money, but thanks to the knowledge I gained playing poker in FICGS, today I can go after the money in online poker rooms and probably in OTB poker tournaments. I am studying the possibility of becoming a professional poker player.
- The understanding of your opponent's behaviour is usually quite important at Poker. Do you manage to establish some profiles while playing so many simultaneous hands & games? Did you build any method?
NBV: Today I am sure that the most important thing to raise, and keep raising my level in poker, has been to build a psychological profile of mine, to get to know Nelson Bernal Varela in depth and above all to understand me, accept me, love me and be work every day eliminating my technical errors, strategic, psychological that make me play badly. I am aware that in poker I can play perfectly and still lose, what I can not forgive me is playing badly, which is why I work hard correcting my wrong decisions.
Of course, there is a space in my brain where I have built a psychological profile of each contender, that profile I have been able to elaborate with all the information that is provided to me in each hand we play. The way each of us plays, gives reliable information about our personality.
About my method I can write the following: A few years ago, I created a table in excel, where I had all the games with each contender, I identified them with the FICGS numeration and each movement in each hand (preflop, flop, turn, river ) it I was writing and studying; I started to add technical-psychological variables that seemed important to me, resulting in 20 variables that I had to qualify in each movement. With the passage of time and my effort, I no longer needed the excel table and I did not use it again (it was exhausting and time consuming) because I was assimilating things faster and with greater depth. Today I can say that I evaluate these 20 variables in a natural way, as if I was breathing and that when I am at a poker table, online or real, after a few minutes I get the psychological profile of the table and each of my opponents. In the pocket of my shirt I keep a small paper with the list of variables, periodically reread it and I wonder if I should modify, remove or add something.
- You won 1007 poker games, and lost only 380, with a ratio usually going from 57% to 80% according to your best opponents. Undoubtly you know the mathematics hidden behind poker but that may not explain everything. How did you learn to play?
NBV: Mathematics is an ingredient in poker, in the same way that my psychological aspects and of my opponents (I recommend reading-studying about four times the book “The Poker mindset” of Ian Taylor and Matthew Hilger), it is vital to understand the Law of Large Numbers. Next I make a list of topics that I consider important to raise the level of poker; compete with EV+ cards, you have to know the small ball theory of Negreanu (but not apply it, hahaha) you have to always look at the texture of the board, you have to evaluate your reality and your future, also that of your opponents (act and power), the position to talk is important, the stack, the personality of the table, know who has the panic button on. All these and other variables must be evaluated in the few seconds they have to make a move and the only important thing is to make the right decision according to the circumstances. There is a good list of poker books to read... it is mandatory to have read about 15 poker books.
- As for me, I may be wrong but I can't imagine that you reached such a rating without special techniques & maybe by optimizing it in some ways... Of course, "rating management" is not a problem, and it is only one thing with a limited impact, but maybe you have some other secrets? What about this "+1" technique that I noticed in many of our games, if this is not a secret? :)
NBV: In these years I have used different techniques that I had to read, study, learn, repeat, modify, invent and sometimes eliminate. Poker is a sport that seems easy, with time one manages to understand that it has an amazing complexity, today I consider poker to be as complex as chess and I study them in a "similar" way. As an example, I have tried to create "openings in poker"; based only on probabilities I invented something that I called mirror theory and another "opening" that I called opposite outs. I am fascinated by mathematics and from the mathematical perspective they are perfect "theories-openings", but I have lost tournaments and a lot of money for applying such theories in mistaken emotional moments. In poker it is important to never lose sight of the Law of Large Numbers and be aware that this LAW likes to make fun of each one of us... I am working on giving an emotional nuance to my theories "mirror" and "opposite outs". There are moments when perfect mathematics becomes an unforgivable psychological error...
For the last few months I have modified my way of playing and my results have improved; Today it must be much more difficult to win a game me, thanks to small and imperceptible adjustments that of course only I know, because I have followed my mistakes-successes-evolution in the game over several years.
- Isn't it too frustrating for you to play heads up only (here at least) ? Of course it is a way to improve this important technical case but we know that many complexities come with 3 to 8 players on the table, which is the most common case in professional poker tournaments.
NBV: Currently I spend little time every day playing heads-up in FICGS, thanks to the fact that I have the profile of each contender. The 4-5 hours that I study poker daily, include practice in micro limits in cash tables of 6 players and tournaments in tables of 8-9 players. I think I'm covering the whole range of possibilities, experiencing game situations between 1 and 8 contenders.
- What do you think about computer analysis in poker? Do you think it could make a difference here just like the way we play advanced chess?
NBV: I think the algorithms are ready to be written in machine language and the question is where are those algorithms? Well, in the brains of the best players in the world and in their games compiled in huge databases. But programming language can be accelerated with artificial intelligence brains, making A.I. studying databases of the best professionals, playing with itself millions of games and building an invincible TACTIC-STRATEGIC SYSTEM, similar to chess software and GO... I think preflop and flop play would be very similar between humans and artificial intelligence, but on the turn and on the river artificial intelligence would take considerable advantage, but in the short time the level of human poker would rise because artificial intelligence would teach us to play poker, this event that would diminish the profits of the professionals. It will always be said in favor of poker that because it is an incomplete game of information, to make computer algorithms are quite complicated, but despite that, I am sure that artificial intelligence will far surpass the best human poker player. It is possible that an artificial intelligence that plays a perfect poker already exists, but unlike GO and chess, poker does produce a lot of money. Due to the money factor, in today's world, it is very difficult that there is a Prometheus willing to steal fire from the gods and give it to mankind...
- How would you describe your relation to games in general?
NBV: I can summarize it in one of the first chess books I had the fortune to read, by the great Danish master Bent Larsen, "I play to win"
- When did you start to play chess & poker? Do you play other games?
NBV: My first contact with chess was at the age of nine, it was love at first sight and until death separates us; I must confess that for some years we have been separated, due to my stupidity and my erroneous decisions. I have always been self-taught in any subject, my method is to buy about 10 to 15 books of the subject that interests me and I read them thoroughly, sometimes 3 or 4 times; already with that information in my head and thanks to the constant practice, I build MY SYSTEM (Nimzowitch) according to my personality, my dreams, my desires, my anguish, my fears... I was youth champion of Bogotá, for 4 years , my OTB level was strong, but I had to abandon chess because I had to work and survive; Being an athlete in Colombia is an absolutely difficult thing, but being a chess player is extremely complicated since there is no support or respect from society and you can not live by chess, because it does not produce money.
I met poker in 2009 in FICGS, at that time I was in a terrible emotional situation, trying to get away from a relationship with a woman that I should never approach and where I wasted valuable time and energy. In that context, looking for my thoughts to be occupied, I ended up playing the FICGS C-24 poker tournament and tied the first place with three more players; I kept playing, without understanding what was happening with the cards and obviously, losing, until in 2010 I won the FICGS D-21 tournament with perfect score, 6 out of 6. I had already bought-read my first beginner book: Poker for Dummies of Harroch and Krieger, but my poker was coarse, wild, street, intuitive, amateur, without dedication or study. In the background of this paragraph, the affection and gratitude that I have for FICGS is condensed, a place where I have been able to build-practice-study-test MY SYSTEM in poker.
I play Backgammon, I do not care that it may sound pretentious-petulant, but I have a very strong level and I have not read my first book yet. Hahaha. Any year I register as a participant in the world championship and I will cause disgust to more than one professional. Hahaha. Unlike chess and poker, backgammon does not cause me stress, on the contrary, I feel a lot of joy and pleasure when I play backgammon. I feel something similar with math, reading and music. It's true and I'm proud, I've always been a NERD.
- We all know how difficult it is to reach a number 1 rank but it is even more difficult to keep it during a long time. What is your motivation? Do you have more goals to achieve (chess & other games included) ?
NBV: My motivation in any activity I undertake in my life is to do it with absolute passion (passion is everything you would do to get a breath of air, in the second before dying by drowning or suffocation).
I have several goals to accomplish before December 2021; In the ICCF correspondence chess I must reach the 2400 elo and get the titles of International Master, SIM and Grand Master, also perform outstanding performances in world championships. In FICGS Chess I must complete my Master and International Master titles and overcome the 2450 elo, also snatch the title from our eternal champion Eros Riccio. You're warned Eros, hahaha. On the LSS site where I also play, www.chess-server.net I want to be a world champion.
In POKER I find myself playing micro limits bets in several online sites; in June 2018 I hope I have built some bankroll. In July of 2018 I must be evaluating my poker to know if my immediate goal is to become a professional poker player, that would completely change my chess goals and I would have to dedicate myself to OTB poker. At the moment I study and practice poker every day, about 4-5 hours a day. At this moment my poker is full of errors that I am eliminating one by one. MY SYSTEM needs to win and raise money in the micro limits, so that it can succeed in professional poker.
In chess OTB I should become a great master, but that topic should be left as a goal for after 2021. I could achieve the record of being the oldest human in getting the title of Grand Master OTB. Hahaha.
In backgammon I would like to play some important tournaments in USA and Europe and maybe to be OTB world champion, but at the moment I do not have clarity on how to do it. I must mature that idea.
I hope they invent immortality before I die and that I have enough money to buy it, because time is what I need to realize all these and other dreams...
- Finally, playing so many games on several websites (obviously with serious ambitions in each game & place) may look quite inhuman and exhausting, does your body or brain say "stop" sometimes? Do you train by melting sports and brain games just like Kasparov did in the past?
NBV: It's true, it takes willpower and a lot of resistance to sustain the pace that I carry. To take care of my body, I am doing daily exercise for 60 to 90 minutes, including routines of strength, elasticity, speed and endurance. I also practice table tennis to preserve the agility of my body. I'm also divorced and I do not have a girlfriend... Hahaha
- By curiosity, do you consider playing Go in the future, even after... 2021? (which would surely be an enormous charge more, but the game is really interesting)
I have a kind of commitment with the best Colombian GO player, exchange of classes, he makes me a competitive player of GO and I turn him into a competitive player of backgammon. But the truth is that I do not have time... it could be after 2021...
- Do you confirm that you are not (entirely or partly) AlphaZero or any kind of A.I. (yet) ? :-)
NBV: Hahaha, of course I would like to be a real centaur, human with machine power, I do not care what physical form I should adopt. I offer myself publicly as a guinea pig in projects of technological singularity. Hahaha
- Many thanks for your detailed and instructive (impressive as well) answers! My best wishes of luck in all your games and future tournaments.
Garvin Gray (2018-02-22 11:22:43)
Norm qualification criteria, incorrect?
In looking at the current group/event that I am playing in, which is Rapid SM 15, according to the current way FICGS sets the scores for norms, to get a FIM norm for that event, FEM is at 4 and FIM as at 4.5 for all players.
It has occurred to me that this is different to how fide works out norm opportunities in round robin and swiss events.
In those events, each players average rating of their opponents is worked out and then that is plugged into the system and then that expected score is used to work out what score they need to get a FEM or FIM norm or higher.
To explain further as that might be unclear.
In the group I am talking about, PoulErik Jorgensen has an equal chance of getting an FEM or FIM norm than someone who is rated lower than him, even though that other player is playing a field who is stronger.
So using the FIDE way and the percentages for FEM and FIM norm, I play and average rating field of 2337.8, round up to 2338. This means that in a category 4 event, I need to score 56 percent, or 3.5 for an FEM and 67 percent or 4 points, not 4.5 for a FIM norm.
Now also doing some further calculating, Alex Wosch is able to score a FSM norm as his average rating of opponents is 2,329 and would then need to score 4.5. Under the current arrangement, he is deprived of this opportunity.
Therefore, I could give a rundown of all players, but I am of the conclusion that the current method of calculating Norm qualifications is inadequate and needs to be refined.
My thoughts were triggered to this from the FICGS world cup when any player to reach a FEM norm needed to score 12/16, which was clearly an outlandish score given the field.
Kym Farnik (2018-01-24 12:39:21)
Laws of Chess - new version
https://www.fide.com/component/handbook/?id=208&view=article
FIDE have news rulz effective 1/1/208.
Enjoy! Also: Here are the changes... http://rules.fide.com/images/stories/Laws_of_Chess_2018_-_approved_amendments_-_correction_highlighted_version.pdf
Thibault de Vassal (2018-01-23 00:08:33)
Conditional chess moves (again)
The exact rule is "The 50 moves rule is not implemented, please call referee if an obvious draw is not accepted by your opponent. Please note that a forced checkmate in more than 50 moves won't be considered as a draw."
Consequently, if tablebases say there is a draw, it is not always a draw here, e.g. if this is a draw because of the 50/60 moves FIDE rule.
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.
Thibault de Vassal (2018-01-16 16:43:40)
Conditional chess moves (again)
Hi all,
Before everything, let's make it clear: Absolute priority (for years actually, but particularly since the launch of the Android apps) right now is to increase the popularity of the server, that slowly went down for more than 5 years. Now it's going better for the first time since, but I'm still working on and have much to do there.
Well, let's say this would be the right thing to do after all (which is another debate, with questions like what if a player does not want his opponent to use this option that by the way he cannot or does not want to use himself because it goes too fast and/or gains time on clock - case that I saw at another server).
Don't misunderstand me: I already used conditional moves at other servers and I liked it too, but I did not find it essential. Also, we all know that all opinions are in nature. And as a reminder, one goal of this server was to offer the simpliest & lightest (HTML or HTML & few javascript) interface.
Kim, one question to think about the work to do in your step 1:
How do you imagine the communication between a Javascript interface & php server? Well, I know how to implement Ajax (which I chose not to use at FICGS), this is not the point here. But it is not enough that moves are verified by javascript - that is a big work if you do it from zero - , it must be validated by the server itself, then confirmed or not to the player, meaning casually one more step. Means more php jobs from the server (which is not a big deal) so new codes that would be compatible between that Javascript UI (that must fit to site's design) & FICGS (that is not obvious if you know the small possible differences in terms of PGN format), a new field in database, the way to handle it after few conditional moves & so on.
Once more, it is feasible, of course. But there are obvious difficulties: it is not possible to add such code without being completely in FICGS codes, that are not object-oriented.
Anyway, if the number of active players grows again, I'm quite sure we'll have a good occasion to discuss it (with some more pressure ^^).
Thibault de Vassal (2018-01-11 03:13:36)
1st King Supertournament
Hi Christoph,
I agree that engines may be there anyway (I added a permanent warning in the "move_express" page), and also that King's Gambit needs to be analyzed again and again :)
There are several reasons for this choice for this particular tournament...
1. The tournament's format: The number of games may be huge and practically impossible to manage with databases & engines analysis. At least, it could be dissuasive! By the way, there are regularly King's gambit thematic in the Special Chess Tournaments category.
2. The "applications friendly" idea: Unlike most other tournaments, this one will be particulary playable just for fun from anywhere with a phone.
And before everything, this is just an experiment...
Let's try something new :)
Ilmars Cirulis (2017-12-14 12:09:18)
AlphaZero stronger than Stockfish
Conspiracy theories and not understanding of Deepmind motivation.
They tested if the concept works. It was success. They are satisfied and start working on other interesting/useful stuff, as they mostly don't care about chess.
The only training of AlphaZero happened when it played against itself. Stockfish was just an opponent to play against - to check how strong has AlphaZero became.
AlphaZero too had no opening book or endgame tablebases, so that's not relevant. Etc. etc., basically too much conspiracy theories and too much caring about which is the most strongest engine (at least in comparison to Deepmind, as they are totally chill about it, imho :D). :)
Ilmars Cirulis (2017-12-09 11:24:21)
AlphaZero stronger than Stockfish
Tuning against specific opponent = 100% cheating, in this context. In that case Deepmind simply lied in their own article.
Garvin Gray (2017-12-09 09:09:47)
AlphaZero stronger than Stockfish
Just to be clear, or a clarification for those who need it. I never stated that anyone from AlphaZero cheated, or did anything of the kind.
All I stated was that because Stockfish is an open source program, they had the opportunity to study how the program works and tune AlphaZero to take advantage of that.
Any opponent should take advantage of any small advantage they can gain.
I also made clear mention of the processing speed differences. This presented AlphaZero a clear advantage. The issue of same hardware being used is not a new topic. It is brought up in almost every tournament when chess engine tournaments are being played. That for a fair and level competition, the engines need to compete on similar strong hardware.
Reading some of the other replies and thinking further about my first post, I wonder how AlphaZero would go if a four engine event was held, with one game per day between Houdini, Komodo, Stockfish and AlphaZero with equal hardware being used?
Little opportunity then to tune AlphaZero to one specific engine and it would be more a test of the overall strength of the engine in long time control play.
Thibault de Vassal (2017-10-09 02:21:20)
Ficgs is a money trap * BEWARE *
Hello Sergey,
First of all, my congratulations for this score in such a tough match. I understand your concern, but FICGS cannot be a bank and/or a casino, there's no refund or "epoint conversion/cashout"... FICGS organizes chess games with entry fee & money prizes, but players have to win a tournament/match to justify and get a money prize.
My suggestion is to find an advanced chess opponent so that the games do not last days/weeks/months. Surely a few ones would play you!
Daniel Parmet (2017-07-05 21:00:10)
FICGS chess cup : proposal
It doesn't help that there are so many massively underrated players. I haven't played here in 4 years. My rating here is 2135 while I am 2379 on ICCF.
I will imminently draw an 1852 rated player here which seems like a big upset and my rating will take a big hit. But on ICCF this IM player is 2352. I would lose about 1 rating point. So here I out rate him by 283 points while on ICCF I outrate him by 27 points.
Daniel Parmet (2017-07-01 07:48:12)
FICGS chess cup : proposal
I know this thread is old but I feel Garvin made an amazing point that got lost:
"It was to give players who were in the 2100 to 2200 and below more opportunities against players rated 2300 and above, whilst still also giving the top players something to play for ie the tournament win."
I haven't played actively since 2010 for exactly this reason. I did play over 470 games though but found that I was permanently locked into this rating band despite being far beyond the skill level of this rating band solely because I was never allowed to play stronger players. So I moved on to ICCF where I easily was able to compete against 2370+ players all the time.
Aniruddha Duttagupta (2017-05-06 19:55:27)
adjudication of FICGS Games
Can any game of FICGS send for adjudication? If so, to whom the game will be send? Who is thw adjudicator? If my opponent wants to continue a dead drawn game with opposite color Bishops and one pawn in the board only, can I send the game for adjudication ?
Roger Llull (2017-01-20 19:00:04)
GM Eros Riccio 12th WCH & chess
My point is that your chances are not the same, so Elo mixing is not appropriate. And you can't count on your game with the opposite color because it may be against a different oponent depending on the tournament format.
We have separate Elo for freestyle, so what's the problem with having separate Elo for thematic?
Thibault de Vassal (2017-01-18 03:32:56)
GM Eros Riccio 12th WCH & chess
Finally, here is a new interview with FICGS correspondence chess champion GM Eros Riccio, who gives us his (surprising?) impressions on his latest win in the championship, his current match and correspondence chess nowadays... A good matter to think about!
http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=tournament&tournament=FICGS__CHESS__WORLD_CHAMPIONSHIP__000012
____________
- Hi again Eros... Once more, congratulations for winning this final match in the 12th FICGS correspondence chess championship. This time, it seems that things went quite differently than in your previous matches (you scored 9 out of 12, which is a huge performance at this level), could you tell us what happened in these games?
--> Hi, yes, finally we have seen some wins after a very long series of draws. I was surprised too, I didn't risk to lose any game and I could even win one as Black... What to say, my opponent was simply not as challenging as the previous ones.
- It's a long time since you won the previous match, would you like to tell us about your other results this year, particularly at ICCF where you now rank #9 with an outstanding 2643 rating?
--> My latest final on FICGS were my only games of 2016. On ICCF I have taken some rest, the too high draw rate didn't incentive me to start new tournaments, also because drawing all games with a high rating means losing points.
- In the next final match (13th cycle), you play Peter W. Anderson for the 3rd time... so you probably know each other's opening book quite well. What do you expect for in this match?
--> Anderson is a very tough opponent, it's not a coincidence that he reached the final for the third time. I tried to win at least one game as White, but he's incredibly hard to beat. I experimented with almost anything possible against his modern defence, but I could never find a single weakness in his repertoire. I will see what to invent this time against his terrific 1...g6.
- As you probably know, another Go champion (Lee Sedol) lost a 5-games match to AlphaGo this year, while chess engines (now Stockfish 8, Houdini 5 Komodo 10...) slowly but surely continue to improve... Still waiting for the quantum computers. How do you feel things should go in the next years? Did your way of playing advanced chess or correspondence chess change these last years?
--> I have said a lot already about the very high draw rate of the recent years... I am surprised that some changes haven't been done already, like switching to chess 960, even modifying some chess rules, or at least giving 1,5 points for one win. Otherwise a lot of players will lose interest in seeing a series of all draws in the tournaments they play. I am one of those players who lost interest in correspondence chess, and even in blitz chess, engine vs engine, as we can see the extremely high draw rate situation there too.
- Finally, what can we wish for you for the next year? :)
--> Wish me to lose the match with Anderson :-) even I got bored of seeing myself there over and over in the final! That will bring some new air and that way I can take some total rest in corr. chess.
- Many thanks for your time, have a great match!
--> Welcome, and thanks.
Thibault de Vassal (2016-12-03 21:15:23)
Future penalties for games lost on time
According to the rule in such cases, there must be an adjudication 30 days at most after the first call to the referee. I must say that it is very rare that I have to act after this period (actually, when a player calls the referee, his opponent usually resigns a few hours/days after that, which is a good sign that this system works well IMO).
David Fierry Fraillon (2016-12-03 09:12:28)
Future penalties for games lost on time
Well .... how long takes a referee decision ?
If it is less than a few days it could be better than using banishement.
You may just have to fix the level of difference in rules : + 10 .... +15 ....Just have to keep in mind that in our game an oponent mistakes can happen
Herbert Kruse (2016-11-30 15:53:22)
Future penalties for games lost on time
11. 5. Adjudications
In some cases, the game continues but the result is obvious.
If time control is superior to 1 day and if a player doesn't want to resign (or accept draw) and obviously last the game, his opponent may report to referee a first time. If the player takes 30 days more to finish the game, his opponent may call referee another time, then the game will be adjudicated. An analysis submitted by a player should contain sufficient information so that no doubt is possible. This may include a sequence of moves, but in some circumstances it may be sufficient to claim a win or a draw on the basis of material or positional advantage. Final decision belongs to referee.
George Jempty (2016-09-09 17:56:01)
Player of the Year
The game I am the most proud of the past 12 months is http://www.ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=viewer&game=89124 a draw against Ortiz in the first tournament mentioned above. I got a poor position with a poor opening and around move 30 was down around 0.6 to 0.7.
I took all 45 days of my vacation before December 31st and devoted almost all my analysis to this one game, with a new 8-core, 32 GB RAM machine, as well as buying Komodo 9.3 (I'm now up to 10.1). Ortiz did not play so accurately and by move 45 the engine evaluated me as completely even in a few lines but they were complicated and I was much lower on time than my opponent.
However I found a forcing line of about a dozen moves that the engine thought was inferior, but I knew was a dead drawn ending: R+2P vs. R+3P all on the same side of the board, with me also having a sufficiently active rook. So I went for this simpler solution which also let me gain time on the clock as I'd analyzed everything out beforehand. Finally after about a dozen moves in the ending Ortiz offered the draw.
Thibault de Vassal (2016-07-03 00:12:14)
Rating calculation gain/loss
Hello Aniruddha,
Your current rating and your opponent's TER (Tournament Entry Rating) are taken in account. It's all explained here:
http://www.ficgs.com/membership.html#rating
There are 18 results for Nent in wikichess.
Telmo Escobar (2043)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 g6 f3 Qb6 Be3 Qxb2 Ndb5 Qb4 Nc7+
Anyway! Not as good is 9.Bd2? Qc5 and White has -at most- some hope of outplaying the opponent in tactical complications: a poor result when playing White.
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Telmo Escobar (2055)
d4 Nf6 c4 c5 e3
{after 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5} Another way of avoiding the Indo-Benoni. Not adviced when you are a strong grandmaster playing another strong grandmaster, as this move goes into a variation of the Tarrasch (or Semi-Tarrasch) defence where Black has little trouble to equalise.
But, for you or me, this move is psychologically good as if prevents the opponent to reach the kind of position he's looking for.
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Yugi Inving (0980)
h4 h6 h5
So you got first to start and you refuse to play?. you got, have a pawn into the opponent zone is an advantage and a disavantage.
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Contributors : Yugi Inving
Thibault de Vassal (2522)
h4 e5 a4 d5 g3
Why not a slow developement ? The aim of hypermodern is not to attack at any price h4-h5-h6? but to wait for what opponent will do (most probably in the center)
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Gavin Wilson (1400)
e4 e6 d4 f5 e5 Ne7 Nh3
Slightly mysterious, but does create the option of putting the knight on f4, which might put useful pressure on g6 if the White queen comes out to h5+.
One reason why we are advised not to develop knights onto rook-3 is in case they are captured by an enemy bishop and you have to re-capture with the pawn. But in this opening, there are currently three of the opponent's own pawns preventing this capture.
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Contributors : Gavin Wilson
Benjamin Aldag (1822)
e4 e5 Nf3 f5 Nxe5 Qf6 Nc4 fxe4 Nc3 Qf7 Ne3 c6 Nxe4 d5 Ng5
How can i describe the past moves of this game with one word ? Hmmm....it's GAMING ! White is playing with his opponent like a cat with a mice. Just count the queenmoves of black, and you will understand me. Let us remember some opening rules:
1. Don't move to early the queen.
2. Don't move with the same figure in the opening twice or more times.
3. Don't open the pawnshield of your king (f-pawn etc.).
4. Develope your figures fast and with one move.
Now......we can see,- Black did in the opening all wrong, what a chessplayer can do wrong in the opening. In the Latvian Gambit, White will kill Black with a headshot !
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal, Benjamin Aldag
Marc Lacrosse (2233)
e4 c5 Nf3 e6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Bc5
The Basman-Sale sicilian.
If white plays Nb3, Black intends to go for some original play with Bb6, Ne7 and often f5.
If Be3, than Qb6 with pressure along the a7-g1 diagonal. Some lines lead to extremely confuse highly tactical positions.
Originally played by british IM Michael Basman in the seventies and eighties. More recently IM Srdjan Sale has been the main exponent of the variation with some fair results including a win against the then young Peter Leko.
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Contributors : Marc Lacrosse
Sophie Leclerc (1200)
e4 e5 Nf3 f6
This poor looking defense is know as damiano defense. It is far from being refuted, if played correctly, hoverer, this defense is very sharp and lack attacking chance, black doesn't have very good compensation for a pawn.
If played to perfection, it is know as draw, but player avoids it as it is very sharp, one mistake for black and it is over.
2 F6 as many disvatage, is open the a2-68 diagonal, it breaks black short castle. It takes ways the f6 square for the knight and the queen. It also open the very dengerous h5-e8 diagonal, all this to protect a pawn, this is a very dangerous opening. It should called Damiano Gambit. Should be a draw, even if your opponent take the e5 pawn, as 2... f6 isn't an instant protection.
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Contributors : Benjamin Aldag, Sophie Leclerc
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
d4 Nf6 c4 g6 Nc3 Bg7
The King's Indian defense is a "hypermodern" opening, where Black lets White take the center with the view to later ruining White's "wonderful" position, often by an attack on White's king. It is a risky opening, which has been a favourite of players such as former world champions Garry Kasparov, Bobby Fischer and Tigran Petrosian. Prominent grandmasters John Nunn, Svetozar Gligoric, Wolfgang Uhlmann, and Larry Christiansen have also played this opening frequently.
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
d4 Nf6 c4 g6 Nc3 d5
The Grnfeld Defence is named after Ernst Grnfeld, the player who first employed the defence in the 1920s. The defence was later adopted by a number of prominent players, including Vasily Smyslov, Viktor Korchnoi and Bobby Fischer. Garry Kasparov has often used the defence, including in his World Championship matches against Anatoly Karpov in 1986, 1987 and 1990, and Vladimir Kramnik in 2000. In more recent years it has been regularly employed by Loek Van Wely, Peter Svidler and Luke McShane among others.
The opening relies on one of the main principles of the hypermodern school, which was coming to the fore in the 1920s - that a large pawn centre could be a liability rather than an asset. This idea is seen most clearly in the Exchange Variation of the defence: 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 3.Nc3 d5 4.cxd5 Nxd5 5.e4. Now White has an imposing looking centre - and the main continuation 5...Nxc3 bxc3 strengthens it still further. Black generally attack's White's centre with ...c5 and ...Bg7, often followed by moves like ...cxd4, ...Bg4, and ...Nc6. White often uses his big centre to launch an attack against Black's king, which generally ends up on g8 after Black castles king-side.
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 f4 exf4 Nf3 Be7
The Cunningham Defense is black's most aggressive option; it can permanently prevent white from castling after 4.Bc4 Bh4+ 5.Kf1 (else the wild Bertin Gambit, or Three Pawns' Gambit 5.g3 fxg3 6.0-0 gxh2+ 7.Kh1.) However, nowadays it is more common for black to simply play 4. ..Nf6 5.e5 Ng4, the Modern Cunningham.
The first "best game" (Game 156 : Hrubaru [1400] - Berthelot [1420]) voted by FICGS players, followed this opening, not played anymore at a master level.
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
g3
The King's Indian Attack (KIA) can be reached by different routes (usually by 1.e4, 1.Nf3 or 1.g3). Often the KIA is reached via 1.e4 followed by d3, Nd2, Ngf3, g3, Bg2, and 0-0, an example being 1.e4 e6 2.d3 (this is possible against almost any opening move -- 1...c6, 1...c5, etc.) d5 3.Nd2 followed by Ngf3, etc.
Since the KIA is a closed, strategic opening choice, many 1.e4 players prefer to play sharper, more open variations. When played after 1.e4, the KIA is most often used against the semi-open defences where Black responds asymmetrically to e4, such as the French Defence, Sicilian Defence, Caro-Kann Defence, etc. The KIA is less often played against 1.e4 e5, where most White players prefer to play more aggressive lines such as the Ruy Lopez.
The King's Indian attack is considered to be one of the most solid opening choices for White, but not very aggressive. It is similar to the King's Indian Defense with colors reversed. White's plan is usually to either push the d and e pawns up a rank as the game progresses in order to bind the opponent. If Black castles king-side, White often follows up with h4 and a king-side pawn storm, placing his king at h1 if needed. If Black castles queen-side, White can move his knight to c4 and attack on the queen-side.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 55%
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
d4 Nf6 c4 g6
The King's Indian Defence is a chess opening that begins 1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 g6 followed by ...Bg7 and ...d6. The King's Indian is a "hypermodern" opening, where Black lets White take the center with the view to later ruining White's "wonderful" position, often by an attack on White's king. It is a risky opening, which has been a favourite of players such as former world champions Garry Kasparov, Bobby Fischer and Tigran Petrosian. Prominent grandmasters John Nunn, Svetozar Gligoric, Wolfgang Uhlmann, and Larry Christiansen have also played this opening frequently.
According to Chessbase, black chances are about 42%
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 Nf6
Alekhine's Defence is named after Alexander Alekhine who first used it in two games in the 1921 Budapest tournament: one against Andre Steiner (which he won) and the other against Fritz Smisch (which he drew). Another early exponent of the defence was Ernst Grnfeld. The opening is considered hypermodern because Black provokes White to attack Black's knight and occupy the centre with his pawns, hoping to prove that White's imposing mass of pawns in the centre (which often includes pawns on c4, d4, e5, and f4) is in fact weak.
According to Chessbase, black chances are about 39%
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5
The Ruy Lopez, generally called the Spanish Game outside of English speaking countries, is named after the 16th century Spanish priest Ry Lpez de Segura. He made a systematic study of this and other openings in the 150-page book on chess Libro del Ajedrez written in 1561 (which also included some more esoteric and what some would consider unfair suggestions, such as setting up the board so the sun shines in one's opponent's eyes).
However, although it is named after him, this particular opening was known earlier; it is included in the Gttingen manuscript, which dates from 1490. Popular use of the Ruy Lopez opening did not develop, however, until the mid-1800s when Jaenisch, a Russian theoretician, "rediscovered" its potential.
The opening is still in active use as the double king's pawn opening most commonly used in master play; it has been adopted by almost all players at some point in their careers and many play it from both the white and black sides.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 58%
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
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Ortiz, Clodomiro (DOM) [member # 9683] Correspondence chess : 2438 FSM Ranked # 61 in the rating list. Rating history : No change this year. Advanced chess : 2350 This member has no profile in the social network. |
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