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Game result (chess) B. Ozen, 2269 N. Wilson, 2121 1/2-1/2 See game 152323 |
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Here are 25 results for Sed Andres in the games.
Game_30525 Game_24014 Game_24013 Game_24012 Game_24011 Game_24006 Game_24001 Game_21734 Game_21733 Game_21732 Game_21731 Game_21726 Game_21721 Game_21634 Game_21632 Game_21630 Game_21627 Game_21623 Game_21618 Game_15945 Game_15944 Game_15941 Game_15938 Game_15934 Game_15929
There are at least 100 results for Sed in the forum.
George Jempty (2026-05-28 12:36:54)
Berlin Defense
I used to play the Deferred Schliemann. I used to steer for a line in which the analog without 3...a6 had been played as Black by Lasker, a line involving ...Bd6. I tried it in a US Correspondence championship qualifying round in the 90s but didn't play accurately at all in the opening after that, this was a no-engines tournament (well it was the 90s anyway). But the game score made it's way into chessbase, and a Norwegian IM drew GM Sax with the line in 2005. So I was influencing theory way before the centaur/correspondence era ;) Also, in any case, I've been drawn to ...f5 lines for quite a while, I used to play the Latvian when I was a teenager, but now I've settled on the Modern Steinitz, with it's possibility for the Siesta, but I think overall is more sound than other lines involving ...f5, but still with plenty of winning chances; e.g. the Noah's Ark trap. As Black I play for a win, as White I try not to lose LOL
Ulises Pineda (2026-05-28 09:30:16)
Berlin Defense
OTB I like the Schliemann Defense against the Spanish, after 3...f5 black is completely fine and there's no winning line for white, but there are two other things. First, you can feel it in the air, Ruy Lopez players have spent a great deal of time studying it and they want to prove their superior knowledge aiming for lines where they win if black plays a small inaccuracy, which happens often and that's why they like playing it.
You take that away which is a psychological victory.
Second, they have two options, either they play fast and will most likely abandon the advantage because white needs accurate play to keep her edge, or they will sit to think on the best continuation, but after the position settles down it's equal and you come up with a huge advantage on the clock.
My favorite line is when you have your queen on d4 and they play Nxg6 because they're used to positions where capturing back allows white's queen to capture the rook on h8, only to find out they can't do that because it's protected by the queen! So they have to play Qxg6+ but after covering or moving the king black is already better!
It's as if I saw the Spanish die before my eyes like that, even if my wins are mostly on the clock, it has forced players to avoid playing it against me, because it's easier to go into some g3 and Bb2 stuff and beat me from there than figuring out how to play against 3...f5.
My only lament is its name, it would be so cool if it was the Schliemann Gambit, or Schliemann Counter-Attack or something that gives it justice.
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.
Garvin Gray (2026-05-12 05:10:48)
Call referee about game ...
I have also used call referee previously and not received a response. So the issue is not us emailing you. It is using call referee and not getting a reply
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!
Stanislas Gounant (2026-02-27 22:12:08)
Next thematic tournament
I amused myself by looking at the most frequently played lines at the top level, stopping at the first six moves. Then I used Stockfish to evaluate the resulting positions. I was surprised to find that Stockfish rated a Benoni line +0.91 at 40 half-moves deep. I suppose there must be a lot of theory surrounding this line, but with a rating of +0.91, there's certainly enough to work with. Here's the line in question (sorry for the Google translation):
1.d4 Nf6 2.c4 c5 3.d5 e6 4.Nc3 exd5 5.cxd5 d6 6.e4 g6
Garvin Gray (2026-02-22 07:45:14)
Is rating just a number on this site?
There are two types of tickets.
The first kind is when you win a lower class/rapid event and that qualifies you to enter the next higher rated event, but you have to wait until five players above the rating cut off have already entered.
This system was introduced to get tournaments started as each tournament would sit for months waiting for seven players who had ratings above the rating cut off to enter.
And then Thibault has extended the system to pay to enter, where you need to be 50 points lower than the rating cut off.
As has been said previously, one of the biggest issues is not either of these concepts, it is the difference in the rating bands for entering a tournament.
When a tournament is 2200 to 2600, no one who is rated 2500 is going to enter that event when 4 players who are rated between 2200 and 2300 have already entered.
I have already proposed a solution to this, but once again Thibault will not embrace change and we are stuck with what we have.
And I am going to say this directly. Those who are playing on here are growing increasing frustrated and how it is being run.
From TER, to rating bands, to tickets and many other issues, nothing changes.
And I think quite a few of us are reaching the point of walking away. I certainly am.
There is no point continuing on when the site owner will not change anything anymore. The only option left is to leave.
Garvin Gray (2026-02-13 02:36:18)
Is rating just a number on this site?
I am taking this comment from the chat to this forum for further discussion.
In my opinion, this statement is false. On this site, your rating is not just a number. Your rating dictates which tournaments you can enter and most importantly, when you enter a class/rapid group tournament, or a wch tournament, your rating dictates your chances of success.
Example: If you have made it through to the round robin final and you are the seventh seed, this means generally there is about 50 rating points between the top seed and the bottom seed.
But with TER being used as the first tie break, if you are the bottom seed, you have to win the group outright. Any ties and you are done. And so forth if you are the sixth player by rating for anyone higher.
The top seed in that group, who could only be the top seed by 1 or 2 points, in effect gets draw odds against the field. That is such an enormous advantage that it can not be understated how much of an advantage it is.
I think it is now so clear that your rating on this site is not just a number. It dictates everything about your playing experience. From which tournaments you can enter, to how you progress in the wch cycle and if you can get tickets to higher level tournaments.
Thibault de Vassal (2026-01-29 02:03:26)
Too many groups for tourneys
... but well, I'm not completely opposed to such a change for a try, even if I think that problems come from elsewhere.
Garvin Gray (2026-01-28 01:42:00)
WCH_STAGE_2_GROUP_01__000029
Why is this only single round robin?
We have discussed this previously. Five players. Double round robin.
I am asking for this tournament to be deleted and re-loaded as a double round robin.
Fabio Bonoldi (2026-01-22 11:45:42)
no engines
I wanted to know if tournaments without the use of engines are still being organised. If so, how can I participate?
Thank you.
Garvin Gray (2025-12-09 18:40:17)
Too many groups for tourneys
The issue is not so much with rating bands, it is difference in ratings of the groups.
400 points in the groups is ridiculous. A 2500 player is not going to be the first to join a group when they know that a 2150 can also join that same group.
But once again, just like a lot of issues on this site, I have brought these issues to Thibault attention, some changes have been made, but the main issue of what you see now still remains.
Just like the rest of the issues that have been discussed, if Thibault does not agree, discussing the issue is a waste of your time.
George Jempty (2025-12-04 21:54:41)
Too many groups for tourneys
Yeah I'm a little biased too. I'm probably headed to 2250+ in the next couple of cycles and therefore too might be able to get a ticket into the 2300 tourneys, though I highly doubt I'll ever reach 2300.
Scott Ligon (2025-12-04 18:31:57)
Too many groups for tourneys
I agree, though I may be biased. My rating has never been high enough to get into the 2400+ tourneys, and currently isn't high enough for 2350+, unless maybe I could get a ticket once it fills up most of the way, or however that works. Seems like there just aren't enough active players at those rating levels. Interestingly, I noticed that two of the four players currently signed up for the 2400+ Rapid have never played a game on this site.
I wonder if there were more players a long time ago when the current tournament structures were set up, so those tourneys were getting filled regularly. But over the past few years the fields have thinned.
George Jempty (2025-11-26 13:19:19)
New Tie Break System
I still like my idea of using it based on performance rating FIRST, I don't see how it gives the lowest entrant an advantage if the tournament ends in a tie between all players.
But lets say two players tie, and one of them has a higher performance rating because they beat a stronger player than the other, that ALSO does not give an advantage to the lower rated player that I can see. Rather, that player must have beaten a higher rated player than the other in order to have a higher performance rating. So if the higher rated player beat a higher rated player rated player than the lower rated player did, the higher rated player would advance.
Perhaps Garvin can weigh in a little more specifically about how being lower rated gives an advantage. But, under his idea, my proposed order would be, 1) Number of wins, 2) performance rating, 3) Sonnen-berger, etc.
George Jempty (2025-11-26 12:55:16)
New Tie Break System
Thib, couldn't some sort of change be made and be instituted (and communicated) by Jan 1 2026? Because yes, based merely on highest TER, in my opinion does NOT constitute a fair system.
Ulises Pineda (2025-11-18 10:33:59)
Clarification of Rating Groups
I demand a button that buys a ticket automatically when a player is elegible for playing a higher rated tournament and the Epoints to pay it are available, because right now, I have no idea how to do such a feat, in that case, Jempty outsmarted us all, unironically.
Not that my demands have any weight, I think people's lives have gotten better since they ignored me, and perhaps it'd be better for everyone if these rules remained hidden and nobody ever used them again (except Jempty would continue to play a tier up when able), but it's worth a try.
I don't have a bad taste but this has caused me physical pain in the lower back part of my head, is it stressful?
It's nothing personal against George, it's just that climbing the rating ladder is one of the most difficult tasks one can do in life, so when one sees a 2400 player, one respects them, because of all the time and effort they had to put to get there, which, for all players below that tier is immeasurable, if we could measure it we could have that rating too.
But someone getting there by buying tickets that allowed them to face higher rated opposition and take shortcuts to avoid dealing with lower rated players does cheapen the meaning of the number.
I guess it's all about the money, pay to win iff someone buys the Epoints for this reason, and holds a higher rating to skip a tier (note I said iff, not if, not accusing anybody of doing that.)
It's like buying a car instead of running the marathon, and the rating doesn't actually reflect chess skill anymore.
Garvin Gray (2025-11-18 02:57:20)
Clarification of Rating Groups
So, based on this, each time I have tried to enter a higher rated tournament and received a message saying, you are outside the rating range, this has been false.
The rules of this site have actually allowed me a method of getting in, but that automated message has not been updated.
That is extremely poor and has now left a very sour taste in my mouth.
George Jempty (2025-11-12 16:02:43)
Increasing the Number of Games in Progre
hmm how about a reward system, based on how many matches somebody finishes, increase the number for them by 10, or 25, e.g. I have no stake in this though -- I forfeited a lot of games in the past
Garvin Gray (2025-11-04 16:15:02)
Clarification of Rating Groups
I have just seen the chat bar exchange where George Jempty has said:
You can play up if you are within 50 points, and now I am in and my account has been debited e points.
Where has this rule come from?
On countless occasions I have enquired about being able to enter a higher division than my rating when I have just been under the rating cutoff, and been told no.
The policy as I have known it has been that a player must win a lower division, and then can only enter the higher division when the field has gotten to the last two entries.
Has this policy changed?
If it has, then it would have helped to have it publicised, but also I would spoken against the changed as it makes a mockery of any rating divisions.
If this is the case, might as well call 2200 - 2600, 2150 - 2600
Bahadir Ozen (2025-11-03 09:47:54)
Finished games - Gmail problem
Hello, I used to receive email notifications for completed games, but now I can't receive notifications for completed games. I checked the FICGS preferences, and there aren't any additional changes. Am I the only one experiencing this issue?
Regards.
Garvin Gray (2025-10-27 14:15:04)
Russian flag replaced
Before you take any action, you should actually check your facts regarding Israel. I really hate discussing this topic, but since now the site owner is considering taking similar against those who display the Israel flag as those who were from Russia and Belarus, it is extremely important to remember how we got here in both situations.
With Russia and Belarus, it was because they started a war of aggression on another correspondence chess federation.
And all sporting bodies took swift action against them in suspending their Federations and preventing their teams from competing, and players from competing and their own flag.
With the situation between Hamas/Hezbollah and Isreal, it was Hamas that was the aggressor. There was no war on July 6, 2023 and Gaza was in a state of peace. But then Hamas attacked Isreal, chopping the heads of babies and taking hostages and raping Israeli women hostages.
What did you expect the Isreali Government to do in response? Sit back and let a terrorist organisation keep the hostages and are you saying that Isreal does not have a right to defend itself?
It is quite disgusting that there are wars all over the world at the moment, about 20 at the moment, but it is only when Jews defend themselves that people feel the need to virtue signal their sense of outrage.
The correct word for them is anti-semites. We used to say 'Never again' after the Holocaust, but it now seem perfectly acceptable to support a terrorist organisation when it attacks Israel and Israel responds by trying to eliminate the threat once and for all.
And it should also be noted as we saw over a week ago. A sixth peace offer was made and Hamas responded like all the others. With more aggression.
Decide to take action against Israel on this site and you prove your antisemitism.
Nelson Bernal Varela (2025-10-21 18:30:36)
DNS failure last week
Ficgs.com is back and with it chess with algoritms and poker without influencers. I really missed it. In this digital wasteland where everything is selfies and stupidity, a corner returns to think, bluff and lose with dignity. May it never leave again.
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.
Ulises Pineda (2025-04-23 14:49:42)
Stockfish unbeatable at modest settings?
I'll request that if you ever play against me, jump at least to Stockfish 17.1 @ 20 million nodes, because a doubling of nodes is some 50 elo boost to the model, so a lot of games can be saved by increasing the nodes, as finding a winning line against such a thing isn't more difficult in reality, it just takes more time, so I guess those people don't think winning a game is worth the extra time used, or maybe they really don't know how, but if someone offered a million dollars for the line I'm sure they'd sit down and find it.
It's a matter of strength, someone with Stockfish 20 could find the line with a relative ease, and I don't think it'll play a perfect game already either, the blind spots just switch places.
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.
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.
Garvin Gray (2024-12-30 00:05:14)
Next Ficgs World Championship Tournament
On this site, Forum topics are meant to be discussed in English
Ilmars Cirulis (2024-01-17 13:47:31)
Fried Liver analysis on rybkaforum.net?
Lichess study is for reference, yes. Also it's nice to have everything in one place, where it can be browsed through (and can be downloaded as PGN file, if necessary).
Yes, I agree that Fried Liver is bad choice for black. Not going to learn it for OTB, definitely.
Scott Ligon (2024-01-12 22:51:02)
Fried Liver analysis on rybkaforum.net?
For the 6 lines I posted, those eval depths are, in order:
46, 47, 45, 46, 45, 43.
For the line with the highest eval of +0.80, the win percentage for white is given as 27.4%, so further analysis might be warranted but that's where I left it. My understanding is that Stockfish 16 changed the semantics of the numeric evaluations. An eval of +1.0 used to mean white had a one pawn advantage (in some very abstract sense), but now +1.0 is supposed to correlate with a 50% probability that white has an objectively winning position.
Juri Eintalu (2023-11-23 23:19:53)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
Now, a question has been raised about banning Israel from the Olympic Games:
"Should Israel’s Flag Be Raised at the Paris Olympics?" <be> How the IOC is penalizing Russia provides insight into how it could treat Israel at the 2024 Games.
https://www.thenation.com/article/world/israel-russia-paris-olympics/
My position has not been changed because I have not received any reasonable arguments against my views.
I am of the opinion that:
1. Russia was banned from the Paris 2024 Olympics using demagogical arguments. The real reason for the ban was, of course, that in 2022, Russia started a war against Ukraine and annexed some Ukrainian territories starting in 2014.
2. The International Olympic Committee should publicly accept that it was a mistake to politicize sports and it should annul the sanctions imposed on Russia.
3. If the International Olympic Committee does not lift the sanctions imposed on Russia, it should impose the same sanctions on Israel because Israel is very explicitly committing genocide in the Gaza Sector since 07 October 2023.
Juri Eintalu (2023-11-19 00:58:48)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
ARGUMENTS CONCERNING THE RUSSIA/UKRAINE WAR
None of the commentators explained why it was necessary and reasonable to politicise sports and to impose sanctions on Russia and Belarus. No one answered my corresponding arguments from my Public Appeal. No one explained why the sanctions were imposed on Russia for the invasion of Ukraine, while no sanctions were imposed on the US for the occupations of Iraq and Afghanistan.
HERBERT KRUSE PRESENTED THE FOLLOWING "ARGUMENT":
"like Ukraine Israel had its "Butcha" at the music festival, so who attacked?
and there were constant rockets on Israel from Gaza, should they just allow it?
and the hostiges should just given up?
if my state can not defend me, maybe u can help?!"
This emotional and psychological manipulation completely ignored all my relevant arguments and explanations.
Now, let us take only the first phrase of this mumbo-jumbo:
"like Ukraine Israel had its 'Butcha' at the music festival, so who attacked?"
My Public Appeal was about chess sanctions. Now, the data are as follows:
2022, February 24:
Russia started its invasion of Ukraine
2022, February 27:
An extraordinary meeting of the FIDE Council was held on the current situation and the urgent measures to be taken after the military action launched by Russia in Ukraine.
https://fide.com/news/1603
Thus, it seems that they waited for the beginning of the Russian invasion and had a plan for how to react, as they responded only a few days later.
Israel had occupied Palestinian territories for 55 years, but the chess federation FIDE had never reacted.
2022, March 16:
Russia and Belarus teams suspended from FIDE competitions.
https://fide.com/news/1638
2022, March 30:
Russian troops leave Bucha (near Kyiv).
2022, April 01:
The corpses in Bucha were discovered.
Now, the first obvious problem with Herbert Kruse's "argument" is that the timeline proves that the chess sanctions on Russia were imposed BEFORE the corpses in Bucha were discovered.
The second problem is that he does not know or pretends not to know the definitions of such terms as "war crime".
The third problem is that, as a matter of fact, we do NOT know WHEN these people were executed, and we do NOT know WHO executed them.
It is so because there were actually TWO massacres in Bucha.
The shelling killed some people, "The Guardian" reported. These people were lying on the streets. The satellite images proved that they were killed before the Russian Army left the town.
However, some people were executed in the cellars. Unfortunately, the satellite images cannot prove the time of the executions in the cellars.
There is one additional problem. Ukraine has not made public the names and personal data of the victims. Therefore, we do not even know what percentage of the victims were Ukrainians and what percentage were Russians.
THIBAULT THE VASSAL PRESENTED THE FOLLOWING SEQUENCE OF ARGUMENTS:
"Ukraine is attacked mainly because Poutine (at least) argues it historically belongs to Russia with no consideration of its recent history & international treaties (and among other reasons because he obviously sees nazis in every people open on what a man/woman/family could look like, meaning many europeans & americans)."
Thibault has no evidence whatsoever for one's claim that Putin "obviously sees nazis in every people open on what a man/woman/family could look like, meaning many europeans & americans)." There is even no evidence to the claim that the Russian administration thinks that the majority of Ukrainians were Nazis. The evidence might be the public speeches of Russian leaders. But I have seen no such speech with such theses. Indeed, Putin has said something else.
I believe that Thibault presents one's prejudices as "obvious facts".
Besides, it has nothing to do with the arguments of my Public Appeal.
"There are few doubts that war crimes have been committed there."
In the Ukraine/Russia war, BOTH sides have committed a lot of war crimes, and it is well documented and proven.
However, the chess sanctions on Russia were not imposed because of the war crimes, as can be seen from the schedule above. The motivation to impose those sanctions was, initially, merely the fact that Russia started a war (not a war crime but a crime against peace).
Moreover, in the Ukraine/Donbas domestic war too, both sides committed war crimes. Ukraine committed crimes against humanity, and there were clear genocidal elements of the behaviour towards the Russian-speaking minority of Ukraine. It is also well-documented and proven. At the beginning of my Public Appeal, I mentioned that Karyakin argued from the premise that Ukrainian ultra-nationalists murdered a lot of Russians in Ukraine.
However, I see that the responses to my Public Appeal have altogether ignored all my arguments, and everyone has preferred to talk about something else.
Juri Eintalu (2023-11-18 03:24:26)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
to Thibault de Vassal:
It is beside the point whether the Russell Tribunal on Palestine was biased or not.
What is essential is that you have said nothing about the facts and statistic presented by that tribunal.
You are talking about the apartheid. But you ignore the context in which I mentioned the Russell Tribunal on Palestine. I was talking about that tribunal because it presented facts, that already in 2014, Israel's actions concerning the Gaza Strip were very close to genocide.
Thus, your remarks concerning the Russell Tribunal on Palestine are beside the point and avoiding the theme.
Moreover, independently of any Russel tribunals, it is evident and clear that there is an apartheid regime in Israel and occupied Palestine territories.
First of all, the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip are surrounded by a high wall with barbered wire.
Vadrya Pokshtya (2023-11-17 20:38:28)
Battle of Kings
Thanks, but you are wrong about the engine being able to crush this chess variant ;)
Knowledgeable people, programmers with whom I had the opportunity to talk about this chess variant, argued that not a single engine would be able to adequately evaluate positions in the Battle of Kings due to the colossal combinatorial complexity of the game.
Please note that the server bot plays very, very weakly. The program does not understand the concept of the game and makes a superficial assessment of the position based on material balance.
Playing against a bot is very different from playing against a human.
At the moment you can play by correspondence against other players here https://www.schemingmind.com/default.aspx
or here
https://games.dtco.ru/
Thank you again for your positive feedback!
Thibault de Vassal (2023-11-17 19:27:42)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
First of all, Russell Tribunal in Palestine was criticized:
"Judge Richard Goldstone, writing in The New York Times in October 2011, said of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine that "It is not a 'tribunal.' The 'evidence' is going to be one-sided and the members of the 'jury' are critics whose harsh views of Israel are well known. In Israel, there is no apartheid. Nothing there comes close to the definition of apartheid under the 1998 Rome Statute."[34]
South African journalist and human rights activist Benjamin Pogrund, now living in Israel, described the Cape Town Session of the Russell Tribunal on Palestine as "It's theatre: the actors know their parts and the result is known before they start. Israel is to be dragged into the mud."[35]
After the Cape Town session, Israeli MK Otniel Schneller filed a complaint with the Knesset's Ethics Committee against MK Hanin Zoabi, who testified at the Tribunal that "Israel is an apartheid state".[36]
A group of Jewish South Africans protested against the court, and the organiser of the protest called it a "Kangaroo Court."[37]
Daniele Archibugi and Alice Pease have argued that it is a rather common practice that those accused of international crimes challenge the impartiality of their accusers. And it may be the case that the organisers of opinion tribunals, as of any other tribunal, might be biased or produce insufficient evidence. But to further develop the rule of law, those which are unsatisfied about the outcomes of these tribunals should be able to produce further evidence and legal arguments rather than unsubstantiated criticism. Legal discourse, they argue, is necessarily based on the opposition of contrasting views.[38] "
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Tribunal
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.
Herbert Kruse (2023-11-16 08:45:42)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
you ignore, who is victim and who startet it
inhumnan war crimes by Hamas caused this
Juri Eintalu (2023-11-15 21:44:51)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
Dear Herbert Kruse
My Public Appeal is about the sports sanctions, particularly about the chess sanctions, in the context of the Ukraine/Russia war and the more recent Israel/Palestine war.
My position is that it is wrong to politicise sports and, therefore, it was wrong to impose chess sanctions on Russia and Ukraine. The chess sanctions imposed on Russia and Ukraine should be lifted.
However, if these sanctions remain in force and politicising sports is regarded as a new normal, I think similar sanctions should be imposed on all countries that have seriously violated the international conventions.
Since October 2023, Israel has committed serious war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip (and elsewhere too).
Therefore, I suggest that if the chess sanctions imposed on Russia and Belarus will not be removed, then similar sanctions should be imposed on Israel.
For example, Israel should be excluded from the International Correspondence Chess Federation membership.
I explained all these points in my Public Appeal.
In your replies, you have actually not addressed my arguments presented in the Public Appeal.
First, you started to talk about the Jews in Germany. But the word "Jew(s)" appeared only once in my Public Appeal - to declare that the sanctions should be imposed on the states or the citizens of states and not based on ethnicity:
"As far as the Jews are concerned, collective punishment must not be applied to them. No one may be accused or discriminated against based on their nationality."
Finally, you started to talk about Israel's right to self-defence. Again, this distorts the content of my Public Appeal. I have nowhere and never denied Israel's right to self-defence. However, from the right to self-defence, it in no way follows that one has a right to commit war crimes and crimes against humanity.
Unnecessarily killing a large number of unarmed civilians is a war crime, and it cannot be justified by referring to self-defence or the war crimes the other side has earlier committed.
Unfortunately, I cannot continue discussing this with you, as you have systematically ignored the content of my Public Appeal.
Juri Eintalu (2023-11-15 01:32:18)
A Public Appeal to Chess Organisations
Herbert Kruse:
"jews fear for their lifes in germany now"
Collective punishment is banned by the international law.
Collective punishment during war activities is considered a war crime.
Right now, Israel is applying collective punishment towards the Palestinians living in the Gaza Strip.
It was amazingly explicit in the speech of Israel's president.
The current rise of antisemitism outside of Israel is a reaction to Israel's war crimes and crimes against humanity in the Gaza Strip, but this antisemitism is too collective punishment.
In my Public Appeal, I have explicitly said that in the case of chess sanctions, the Jews should not be targeted. No discrimination is allowed based on nationality.
My Public Appeal addresses only Israel's current administration.
Besides, there are some interesting facts about Jewish great thinkers.
After WWII, Jewish philosopher Hannah Arendt published her famous book
"The Roots of Totalitarianism"
The Stalinist regime and the Hitlerian regime were both regarded as totalitarian regimes in that book.
I have read that Arendt had conflicts with ultra-Zionists after WWII.
Albert Einstein wrote a letter on 10 April 1948. It was 1 day after the Deir Yassin massacre, committed by Israel's radical Zionists. Einstein called them "terrorists" and declared that he did not want to see them or talk to them.
Thibault de Vassal (2023-03-31 22:52:44)
RUSSIA AND BELARUS NOT SUSPENDED?
Sorry if I quoted you wrongly... Could you specify?
Yes, first you were talking about wether FIDE and ICCF decisions were justified, but our discussion went on the global case:
you said (quote):
"If country A starts a war against country B, the relevant question is whether that war is justified or unjustified, whether it is a war of aggression or, instead, the attacker has the right to do so. "
"You argue that any context should be analysed in-depth, but you fail to hint at why Russia should be punished and the US should not."
So let's separate discussions: one is about FIDE/ICCF decisions, the other one is about war & its justifications.
About ICCF, I am not aware of a process to ban the russian team just after the invasion, I'm not sure what it means as well... does this mean that the russian team should have played under a neutral banner (that could be understandable), or does this mean that the whole team (every player) was banned?
I have no problem to talk about US war crimes in these countries... if you read my post again, there is a link to a page that deals with it.
I have no problem to talk about war crimes commited by Ukraine as well. There were war crimes for sure. There are proofs of that.
Questions remain: how many, for what aim... Everything will be analyzed.
My additional questions were not provocative, these are real questions to better understand your point of view. But I did not understand your answer (or you did not answer ?!)
Feel free to continue the discussion, you're welcome.
Juri Eintalu (2023-03-31 21:13:22)
RUSSIA AND BELARUS NOT SUSPENDED?
You are quoting me wrongly. And you are doing it intentionally.
Moreover, I was talking about whether FIDE and ICCF decisions were justified. My argument was that these decisions applied some important principles discriminatively, selectively.
Suddenly, you started to talk about whether the Russian invasion of Ukraine was justified. You also started to talk about war crimes.
Let me remind that the ICCF started a process of banning the Russian team just a few days after the Russian invasion began.Thus, your arguments about what happened months later might be pretty irrelevant.
Let me also remind you that you decided to talk ONLY about Russian war crimes in Ukraine. You dismissed the US war crimes in Afghanistan and Iraq, the war crimes committed during the Donbas civil war (both Ukraine and the separatists committed war crimes there), and, finally, you also dismissed the war crimes committed by Ukraine in the present war.
And now, before I answered to your mess, you managed to attack me personally.
My answer to your provocative questions is that if the political regime will go absolutely crazy, then I will not defend that regime against anyone. But I still hope that it will not go absolutely crazy.
Anyway, I will not discuss with you anymore, because you are systematically ignoring important relevant facts and you regularly change the context of discussion.
Juri Eintalu (2023-03-31 09:09:17)
RUSSIA AND BELARUS NOT SUSPENDED?
To Thibault de Vassal:
Thank you for taking a look at my open letter on Medium.
“... isn’t it a bit short to compare Russia’s war in Ukraine to what happened in Afghanistan, Iraq or Serbia? (that are quite different cases by the way, involving different groups of countries)”
If country A starts a war against country B, the relevant question is whether that war is justified or unjustified, whether it is a war of aggression or, instead, the attacker has the right to do so.
By now, it is a piece of common knowledge that the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq were wars of aggression.
Chess organisations FIDE and ICCF have punished Russian chess organisations for the Russian invasion of Ukraine while not punishing the US chess organisations for the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq. FIDE and ICCF have not presented any comprehensive analyses about how justified or unjustified some of those wars are. You are turning the burden of proof around and accusing me of not delivering the arguments that FIDE and ICCF had to present.
“It seems that most russians in Russia still support this war (“special op”) while everyone ignored the truth about those weapons in Irak (in example). Any context should be analysed in depth IMHO.”
Excuse me, but I cannot follow what you are trying to say.
You argue that any context should be analysed in-depth, but you fail to hint at why Russia should be punished and the US should not. Your only fact mentioned, “everyone ignored the truth about those weapons in Irak”, remains mysterious. I do not understand in what context you are saying this.
We know already for ten years that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction.
Concerning your other remarks, I make only one reply. We know that there are saliently some Nazis in Ukraine.
Here, on the chess forum, I technically cannot answer in detail to your several remarks that, in my mind, are all somewhat inexact or vague.
Thibault de Vassal (2023-01-02 03:18:49)
poker reflection time
The prize is the one specified in the WCH waiting list page at the time it is awarded... it never changed so far so it will be 100 epoints.
Wow, different matter but I realize I never took the time to made the change discussed before. Thanks for the reminder.
Scott Ligon (2022-11-23 21:22:50)
I did not win a game since 3 years
Surely there are some positions where it's difficult to determine, even with engine assistance, whether the position is a game theoretic win or a draw. And then playing that position out would be interesting. That's all my proposed variant would depend on. The first player looks for a position that would be interesting to play, and if they've done their job well, the second player has a difficult task in deciding whether they want to play the side with advantage for a win or the other side for a draw. I think this would work up until the point that chess is actually solved.
The starting position could be as simple as 1. g4 (a terrible first move of course). Maybe black has a forced win and maybe with careful play white can hold the draw. If I did a lot of Stockfish analysis the answer might become clear but with a quick analysis I'm not sure. But if I knew the answer either way for 1. g4, I could always look at other positions. At least this would be a game where the outcome isn't immediately obvious.
Misha Allport (2022-10-11 01:48:33)
Rating System.....
.....which rating system(i.e Elo, Glicko, URS etc. etc.) is used by FICGS?
Patrycja Zerowska (2022-10-08 00:56:47)
Threefold repetition
Mr. Thbault de Vassal, you say that this case is treated the same way on most chess websites. This is not true. At the ICCF website, which is the standard for correspondence chess, the draw must be claimed (this in agreement with the Laws of Chess):
" ICCF:
9.2.1 The game is drawn, upon a correct claim by a player having the move, when the same position for at least the third time (not necessarily by a repetition of moves):
9.2.1.1 is about to appear, declares to the tournament director (or the server) the intention to make this move, or
9.2.1.2 has just appeared, and the player claiming the draw has the move.
At other websites, the rule is also correctly applied:
chess-mail.com
"8. To check the draw ( threefold repetition ; the fifty-move rule ) : Click on "Send and offer the draw". "
Gameknot:
"To declare the draw in a game due to the threefold repetition rule, please use "Declare draw" link located directly below the game board."
None of these sites violates the correct rule.
The FICGS way of handling this case involves several violations of the rules. First of all, the draw must be claimed. This rule exists for more than 100 years, and the advent of server chess hasn't changed it. Secondly, you require me to make a move, thereby taking back my claim and my intended move. Every beginner is told that it is forbidden to take back a move, a draw claim or a draw offer. Thirdly, you refuse to stop the clocks, allowing a player to lose on time by your inaction. This "inaction" constitutes interference in the course of the game by a third party, which is forbidden. Fourthly, your bot wants to automatically end the game when there is threefold repetition (or 50-move rule). Again this is forbidden by the rules! A bot can only act upon a claim, and never when there is no claim. With all these violations, we are no longer talking about chess, but about an undesirable chess variant.
It would be so easy to add a button under the chess board, where a player can make a draw claim. Why isn't this done?
You or your referee still hasn't taken action, and a whole week has passed since my claim.
I have always - since 1972 - played according to the rules and I refuse to violate the rules here and now. Therefore I won't make a move; it is forbidden.
Misha Allport (2022-10-03 16:58:26)
Number of moves affect the ratng result?
If I am playing a stronger player(+600 points).do the number of moves I make in a loss affect my new rating?(i.e. do I lose fewer points being defeated in 60 moves as opposed to being beaten in 10 moves)?
Christoph Schroeder (2022-07-30 23:20:26)
poker reflection time
A single stage of a poker tournament lasts 3-5 years, as discussed in this thread. Preliminaries and finals combined, we are at 6-10 years per tournament.
Is "last man standing (being alive)" really the guiding principle of these tournaments? And does this annoy nobody?
It is very sad to see that this topic is another example where discussion is encouraged, an obvious solution is possible, but nothing happens.
Juri Eintalu (2022-07-10 19:05:13)
RUSSIA AND BELARUS NOT SUSPENDED?
It seems that Russia and Belarus have not been suspended from the international chess federation ICCF.
The ICCF Extraordinary Congress tried to suspend Russian and Belarus federations.
Online voting was carried on 27 April - 09 May 2022.
https://www.iccf.com/congresses
ICCF homepage does not provide a clear result. I do not see it. The link to THAT Congress disappeared today.
The downloadable table of the voting results does not show in detail, what country made what decision.
An excerpt from the results:
***
EC 2022-003 Suspend the Russian Federation - Void if EC 2022-001 is Defeated
For 33, Against 10, Abstain 14
(I calculate that FOR: 58%)
Amendment of ICCF Statute Article 17, EC 2022-01 required 2/3 votes. The result was:
For 34, Against 10, Abstain 13.
I calculate that FOR: 60% which is less than the required 2/3 or 67%.
***
It seems that the ICCF did not succeed to change its Statute so as to allow the suspension of Russia and Belarus based on majority voting.
Unfortunately, in my homeland, there is no information available on how our representative voted (if he voted) and based on what considerations. The national federation also has not responded to my question sent officially through the ICCF server. I also do not see any relevant news on the national federation's website.
Thibault de Vassal (2022-05-11 01:41:05)
Carlos Alcaraz y el ajedrez :)
Approximative translation ^^
Q. One of the most unknown aspects of you is that you like to take a nap and play chess before games. Can you explain it to me?
A. That's right. I was caught on camera at the Next Gen in Milan and in Rio I also slept because rest is important and even more so in such an intense week in which it rained and the games were delayed. Recovery was key and naps before games are for me. And chess helps me because you are focused, your head works...
Q. How does chess specifically help you to practice tennis?
A. It helps me to be faster mentally, to observe plays, to see the movement you want to make, the strategy... To be focused all the time. In chess, like tennis, you get lost for a moment and the game is already mixed up. In this aspect they are two quite similar disciplines.
Juri Eintalu (2022-05-09 19:58:15)
FIDE BANS KARJAKIN
Karjakin's Appeal was Dismissed by FIDE
Thus, Karjakin still cannot play in the candidates tournament because he publicly approved the Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Karjakin, in turn, writes (on his Telegram channel) as a response that he is proud that his grandfather was a great soldier, also, that there are Nazis in Ukraine.
He criticises Kasparov.
Kasparov demands that Russian chess players who want to play in international tournaments should publicly disapprove Russian invasion of Ukraine.
Thibault de Vassal (2022-05-08 02:18:53)
FIDE BANS KARJAKIN
"A few minutes ago it was announced that the Court of Appeals of the Ethical and Disciplinary Commission (EDC) of the FIDE has rejected the appeal filed by Grand Master Sergey Karjakin against the 6 month disqualification he had been given for having embarrassed the TRUST because of his own Declarations in favor of Russian invasion into Ukraine.
“According to the FIDE Card and the Code of Ethics and Disciplinary FIDE, such a decision can be contested before the Arbitral Court of Sport (CAS) within 21 days”, the sentence reads.
The disqualification, as it is known, will prevent Karjakin from participating in the Madrid nominees Tournament, where he will most likely be replaced by Ding Liren. The Russian player, born in Crimea, said he is considering the possibility of a new International Federation in competition with FIDE."
Thibault de Vassal (2022-04-27 02:35:00)
Ukrainian players clocks during war
Thank you... and thanks Herbert for having pointed it out (I could have missed it after all).
It's all fixed now (including my poker rating & Alexey's one due to that loss that shouldn't have happened), and I'll have the right tools to do it again around June 10. I'm afraid that will be necessary.
Juri Eintalu (2022-04-13 09:54:42)
ICCF Extraordinary Congress
ICCF is about to change its Statute to be able to suspend or exclude countries from the ICCF based on other reasons than financial reasons.
Then, the ICCF is about to suspend Russia and Belarus, using this fresh Amendment.
No reasons or principles are provided, the only criteria are the majority of votes.
However, if any new principles would be introduced, they would be applied backwards-looking and selectively.
https://www.iccf.com/Proposals.aspx?id=76
Juri Eintalu (2022-03-23 17:34:51)
FIDE BANS KARJAKIN
The Telegram channel "Chess Patriot" was established on 13 March 2022. FIDE made its complaint about Karjakin to the ethics committee earlier. Probably it was based on Karjakin's two tweets on Twitter, plus Karjakin's public letter to Putin. The complaint was made only 3 days after the Ukraine war started.
After FIDE banned Karjakin for 6 months, he has started to make a war propaganda on his Telegram channel. He asks "reasonable Ukrainians" not to fight and not to defend the Kyiv regime.
Karjakin's Twitter history is fun. After 24. February, several outstanding chess players should be banned as well by FIDE due to the nature of their replies to Karjakin's tweets.
I am sure that FIDE's ethics code did not contain any demand not to support any wars. There is even not any demand not to talk about the ongoing war during the chess competition, etc.
Moreover, this ethics code was applied right before it will be outdated. Since 1 April 2022, that code used to ban Karjakin is not valid anymore.
I am sure that this code was arbitrarily interpreted to ban Karjakin.
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.
Thibault de Vassal (2022-03-07 21:08:28)
HTTPS not available on March 7th
There was a huge issue on FICGS server today, I'm glad to have been able to fix this as it was really tough and unlikely ^^ This is what happens when running an old system with recent modules...
No time was added to clocks as it lasted less than 24 hours (sorry :)), and a few players connect to HTTP (not really secure, particularly if you used the right login field).
I started to work with the most recent Linux system a few weeks ago so I should be ready to migrate FICGS to this new server at some time... There is no urge though, it will be a long and difficult operation.
Thibault de Vassal (2022-02-28 21:22:28)
Ukrainian players clocks during war
Let's do this.
Ukrainian players in activity are now in vacation for 45 days. Of course they still have 45 days of vacation remaining. Even if the war ends shortly, I think this is the least time to recover from such dramatic events. If war should last, then this special vacation could be renewed.
Consequently this topic is closed.
Thibault de Vassal (2022-02-27 14:00:58)
FICGS support to Ukraine
I must say I'm not used at all to merge politics &/or war to chess... I'm not sure if FICGS should display a ukrainian flag during these obviously very sad times. But I'll do it if the most think it's a good idea. Personally I do support civil people under bombs, probably in all cases.
Also it is quite tough to understand what happens there from 2014 & Minsk agreements... I discussed about it with russians, ukrainians, read many news & fake news, much complexity. I do not think this is the place to discuss about it though, so let's just decide about a way to support or if we should stop players clocks only.
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.
Juri Eintalu (2021-11-11 10:18:58)
How to Accept a Draw in Chess
So, now I am using the Fast Moves option. I was offered a draw. On my smartphone, I noticed "Accepted". Then, below the box for messages, I pressed "Send". No draw. I accepted again, but now I pressed the bottom "Send" which is right below the chessboard. Success. I did not have to make a move to accept a draw.
Juri Eintalu (2021-10-06 18:54:56)
How to Accept a Draw in Chess
Now, as a new user on FICGS, I have a new problem. I do not know how to block another user whose aggressive comments I really do not want to read or respond to.
The system of accepting a draw can be tested, of course, if 2 staff members of FICGS play 4 unrated games with each other, proposing a draw on the 4. move. First, whether checking the "Accept" box is sufficient; Second, whether my claim is true that it is possible to check the "Accept", make a move and send it - to achieve acceptance of a draw.
Possibly, there are some time-out problems with the promised pop-up window.
I really do not respond ever again to GG-s empty etc comments.
Juri Eintalu (2021-09-11 14:07:41)
VENEZUELA HAS BEEN DISMISSED FROM ICCF
"Juri - Quite a few of your questions contain quite a lot of accusations..." (Garvin Gray)
I just shared information about the decision of the ICCF. Garvin Gray demanded twice that I should ask some questions. Finally, I formulated some questions that can come to mind for the ordinary reader. Now, Garvin Gray declares that I have made a lot of accusations, but the questions are not accusations. Therefore, I do not participate in this conversation anymore.
Garvin Gray (2021-09-11 11:56:08)
VENEZUELA HAS BEEN DISMISSED FROM ICCF
Juri - Quite a few of your questions contain quite a lot of accusations, or at least a tone of accusations, or that those who took actions in dismissing Venezuela has some kind of hidden motives.
The decision to dismiss Venezuela was made by the National Delegates of each Federation of ICCF, after considering all the evidence before them.
This included unpaid prize money, where entry fees were charged, over at least two years, unpaid affiliated fees to the ICCF (same time period) and the National Delegate of Venezuela was offered many opportunities to pay back the money.
The National Delegate ran the tournaments, handled the money through paypal and in the end was in debt to the ICCF and the players of their tournament to the tune of roughly 7 to 10 thousand euros.
So, yes, ICCF has provided plenty of evidence that the 'organiser' took off with the entry fees of the players and did not pay out the advertised prize monies.
Multiple attempts were made by the ICCF Executive Board to reach a satisfactory compromise with the National Delegate, but in the end the National Delegate cut off all communications and went completely silent to everyone.
All Federations pay an affiliation fee to be part of ICCF. This amount is levied in part based on the number of members a Federation has, and also that countries economic position (GDP).
After reading all this, what other option was there for the other National Delegates to vote for?
In another proposal, which you have not referenced, the ICCF Executive board has promised that the prize money that was not paid out by the Venezuelan National Delegate would be covered by the ICCF, which will cost roughly 10,000 euro and will be paid out to the players.
So, to answer your questions after all this information:
1) No. This issue and your question are not related at all. It is not even certain if the Venezuelan National Delegate lived in Venezuela.
2) Yes, plenty of evidence was provided. Players had also reported that they had not received their prize money. I can report this as fact as I got burnt as a player in one of their events. So I know first hand that this occurred.
3) This has nothing to do with 'sports'.
This is a common misunderstanding about how ICCF works. ICCF is an association of Federations ie ICCF only recognises Federations. Therefore, officially ICCF can only take action formally against Federations and only works with the National Delegate from that Federation.
How the Federation conducts their business 'behind the scenes' is up to them and is none of the business of ICCF. It would be highly improper for ICCF to have a say in how any individual Federation ran their Federation.
What now occurs is that the remaining Venezuelan players are treated as isolated players. They can not represent Venezuela in team events, by they are free to play in any individual events.
Some of these players might be picked up by other Federations, if another Federation wants them.
4) Money transfers - As I already alluded to, it is not clear if the Venezuelan ND was even in Venezuela, but anyways, he had no trouble receive the entry fees, so money transfers by paypal were no issue.
If there was an issue, then they should not have run prize money tournaments
5) No political motives - This was a straight up case of whether the Venezuelan ND had taken off with the entry fees of the players and failed to pay out the prize money from many tournaments, as well as the Federation failing to pay their affiliation fees, as well as being in debt for other fees as well.
These are basic responsibilities for all Federations. Even if you want to lay all the blame of the Venezuelan ND, a case can be made as to ask what happened to any oversight from anyone else?
Or was the Venezuelan ND just a rogue operator?
This experience has left a sour taste in everyone's mouth and remedy steps have been taken to try and avoid this occurring again.
See other proposals.
Garvin Gray
Australia ICCF National Delegate
Thibault de Vassal (2021-09-09 22:58:52)
VENEZUELA HAS BEEN DISMISSED FROM ICCF
Indeed... Thanks Juri for pointing this out (and Garvin for enlightening us).
Juri Eintalu (2021-09-09 19:32:44)
VENEZUELA HAS BEEN DISMISSED FROM ICCF
Of course, there are a lot of questions.
- Whether Venezuela politicized sport when organizing the correspondence chess tournament "in support of Venezuela"?
- Whether the International Correspondence Chess Federation (ICCF) has provided any evidence that the Venezuelan chess organizer has escaped with the prize money?
- Whether the country can be punished solely because of the behaviour of one sports official?
- Whether the problem was actually about the economic sanctions on Venezuela, hindering international money transfers?
- Whether the dismissal of Venezuela from ICCF has hidden political motives?
Thus, there are many questions for chess historians.
Garvin Gray (2021-09-09 18:54:19)
VENEZUELA HAS BEEN DISMISSED FROM ICCF
A lot of statements there. No actual questions? I can not really answer statements :)
Juri Eintalu (2021-09-09 02:09:40)
Venezuela has been dismissed from ICCF
ICCF announced:
"Venezuela was dismissed from the ICCF (2021-028)."
The number is the number of the proposal accepted by Congress.
In the proposal, it was said that the Venezuelan organizer of several correspondence chess tournaments had vanished with the prize money:
"presumably absconded with the promised prize money".
(https://www.iccf.com/Proposal.aspx?id=1341 )
I know that Venezuela organized several correspondence chess tournaments "in support of Venezuela". There are also rumours that because of the US sanctions, Cuba and Venezuela have difficulties with international money transfers.
Don Groves (2021-07-09 21:29:37)
Confused
Yes, it looks fine now. Strangeness...
Thibault de Vassal (2021-07-09 12:33:43)
Confused
Hi Don,
Quite strange, I just checked: moves 38 and 46 are both Re4 in both PGN & game viewer.
Do you confirm it is ok?
Don Groves (2021-07-09 04:42:13)
Confused
In Game 129751, the last move was Re4 but the pgn shows Ne4. What happened?
Thibault de Vassal (2021-06-21 13:42:20)
Fat Fritz 2 vs. Stockfish 13
Chess engines still evolve, now we have Stock... err, Fat Fritz 2 (based on Stockfish 12) on Fritz 17 GUI, and the famous free chess engine Stockfish 13, both using neural networks on CPU and not GPU anymore (if I understood well).
Did anyone try both of them to compare it, or to compare to former versions like Stockfish 11 ? What learnings?
Garvin Gray (2021-06-13 11:22:28)
Wch 22 Stage 2 ended
Now that my ficgs cup group has finished, I feel I can reply without feeling like I am pushing my own barrow.
When I highlighting the issue of when there is a group of 5, I was not intending it to be related to either championship.
This is because, in my view, the issue is the same, regardless of whether the group of view occurs in the WCH, the ficgs cup or a general group game.
I am aware that some people probably have read my replies as being rather strong on this topic, and in some cases, unhelpful, but if you look at it from the viewpoint of having engaged in genuine dialogue, exchanged viewpoints, debated back and forth, and gone over many topics again and again and finally after all that time, have gotten in writing and published rules that changes will be made, and then as soon as the situations come up again, the old rules are enforced again and nothing changes, then it becomes quite a bit more understandable why a negative tone and suspicion is underlaid in the discussions.
And as for why not walk away?
Had I been told that the entire format for the FICGS cup was going to be disbanded, that groups of 5 were going to be used and only single round robin was going to be used and three or four stages were going to be used, then YES, I probably would not have entered, and I would have made my feelings known as to why I was not entering.
And, I would have been looking to not enter any further World Championships as well. I have a Round Robin group coming up, as well as a Stage 2. These I will complete and do my best to advance, but if the old rules are maintained, then I will not be entering any future cycles.
Garvin Gray (2021-05-10 11:44:13)
Wch 22 Stage 2 ended
Groups with less than 7 players: https://ficgs.com/user_page.php?page=forum_read&id=13002
FICGS__CHESS__CUP_CHAMPIONSHIP__000004
FICGS chess cup championship is a 2 stages round-robin tournament.
My wording: The two stage tournament is the basic design of the event and is hard wired into the event. The whole event was designed to be a two stage event, with large groups in the first stage, to ensure that the first round groups are competitive and also that no players received byes through to a second round based on rating.
I had to plead for years for this format and garner support from other players before you would agree to even run it as a trial in it's first year. And then in its first year, it received over 100 entries, a lot of top players entered and was a complete success.
So, I believe I have every right to be pissed off at you directly that it really does seem like you are attempting to unwind the format of this event.
The format is clearly described in the published rules, so for the site owner to so flagrantly ignore them can only be described as one of two actions:
1) Negligent
2) Deliberant
Thibault de Vassal (2021-05-07 01:34:51)
Wch 22 Stage 2 ended
I understand your frustration Garvin, thanks for explaining your views once again and I'll try to answer each point (even if you do not answer anymore):
a) You were right on the Cup format Garvin, obviously. Probably on (many) other ideas... I just can't say.
b) I always thought & said that stable rules were important in many ways (that I explained), which is frustrating, I understand that.
c) As far as I remember, I added the possibility of double round-robin for 5-players groups after that discussion but indeed it was (probably) never used. Maybe the rule should be changed to "always double-robin for 5-players groups", that would be easy to do. A fact is that it is difficult to gather more than 3 or 4 opinions in this forum these times :/ By the way, if anyone can find this discussion where I agreeded something else than a possibility, then (my bad) I'll change it immediately.
d) I do think that a multi-stages tournament should have a pre-determined number of stages... (players should know what kind of engagement it represents) Maybe I just missed that point and a rule specifying that stage 1 groups will be built so that x to y players (no less, no more) will play round 2 could be added. Why not.
Garvin Gray (2021-05-04 12:14:16)
Wch 22 Stage 2 ended
I decided to leave this discussion for a while for two reasons. 1) I genuinely believed that whatever would be agreed to in this discussions would be unwound at a later date and
2) That my involvement in the discussions was not a helpful factor for others to become involved in the discussions
I will now explain what issues made me go public with my frustrations with this site and with the site owner in particular.
Over a long period of time, I had a to beg, plead and convince that the FICGS World Cup was an event that would be supported, despite Thibault's regular protests to the contrary.
Once the event and the format was finally decided to 'give it a go', the numbers was huge for this site and the general format had two primary goals:
1) No preferential treatment for high rated players. Everyone started from round one and the groups for round one would be divided up to make sure that each group would be of roughly equal strength
2) In previous discussions with the WCH, I had regularly protested that when there were groups of 5, that these groups should be double round robin, ensuring that all players got eight games and that colour allocation for the top two seeds would not play a role in the final results.
Then the latest groupings for the World Cup were released and everything that had been previously agreed had been violated:
1) Groups of 5 were used and all groups were only single round robin (breaking of a previous agreement)
2) The entire purpose of the World Cup was to have large first round groups and a small number of groups, ensuring that only about 9 or so players made it through to the final round. As it stands now, about 19 players will make it to the final round. The entire format has been advertised as a two round event. Therefore, there can not be a third stage. This is a clear condition of entry and it can not be violated. (breaking of another previous agreement).
I can go on and on, but I think this is sufficient as to highlight why I come to the conclusion that the site owner has no issue at all with breaking previous agreements.
I busted my ass for a number of years to convince everyone that the World Cup was a good event worth supporting. And when it was first run, it was well supported.
To now see it so corrupted makes me just think, why bother. Another deal broken. Time to move on from this site.
Garvin Gray (2021-04-18 17:28:11)
Wch 22 Stage 2 ended
I do not disagree with your general sentiment, but as someone who has been on this site a long time, I have experienced a lot of negotiations and discussions like this, where the discussions end up going nowhere, or some kind of 'change' is promised , and then after a while, those format changes are walked back.
Therefore, I have become rather jaded by this entire process and I am now of the opinion that Thibault just offers these discussions in an attempt to make it look like he is entertaining differing opinions, when really he TRULY can not bring himself to make the changes that some of these discussions are asking for as he already believes that the site is perfect as it is.
So, you are then treating the forum posters like mugs if you are saying, lets discuss the topic and come up with new ideas, if you have no genuine intention of embracing any of the ideas proposed.
I have now said my last post on this matter for quite a while.
I have made it clear what I think of these forum discussions and their purpose, so there is now no further requirement for me to reply.
Heinz-Georg Lehnhoff (2020-12-13 18:44:07)
What happened to all the players?
In LSS, the server only terminates games if a player does not respond for a longer time and the engine used by the server evaluates the position of this player as lost. Furthermore, the ELO numbers of the two players are important. However, Ortwin does not publish the exact algorithm. He only published some examples in advance.
By the way, obvious draw positions are not finished.
Daniel Parmet (2020-12-12 18:01:32)
What happened to all the players?
Here I quote LSS rule:
"Dear Chessfriends,
in the past there have been many complaints about games where one player started moving slowly esp in a lost position, partially using the 30-day-per-individual-move rule to its extreme. To my opinion, this is not a good attitude of sportsmanship.
I have therefore developed a measure against this. Depending on the position, the used time of reflection and the ratings of both players, the server can detect such games with a high probability. Actually, the delay of games is already part of the LSS Rules, but was not in effect so far.
Effective 1st October, 2020, such games will now be stopped by the server and the delaying player will be suspended for 3 weeks to start new tournaments. Further penalties might be introduced, if required.
The algorithm will not be revealed to avoid misuse and it might be due to change without notice.
Best wishes
Ortwin Pätzold"
Daniel Parmet (2020-12-04 01:39:36)
What happened to all the players?
Thibault,
You maybe misunderstand me or perhaps I am not being clear by conflating so many issues at once.
1) 1st issue, I did not mention Queens Gambit at all as this show has done very little for chess. The numbers were already skyrocketing on lichess, chess.com and other places due to lockdowns, lack of socialization and spending more times indoors. If anything, it is the SHOW that piggy backed on THIS trend in order to achieve its own popularity (not the other way around).
2) I mean to refer to the fact that many more players used to play here that no longer do which were very strong SIMs and GMs in 09-12 but they're gone now. Why?
3) The growth. Yes, I currently have two otb IMs I am playing against their first games on ICCF and I have already played against 3 GMs whose first games it was on ICCF. Look at the recently started USA/A It has 3 otb GMs that have no corr games. Or how about GM Sam Sevian? https://www.iccf.com/event?id=80817 GM Elshan Moriadiabadi https://www.iccf.com/player?id=517491 And on and on I could go.
4) Separate entirely is how hard it has become to find players of your own level to play, maintain one's rating and the DMD issues which caused LSS to announce their own special DMD rules.
Daniel Parmet (2020-12-03 19:09:01)
What happened to all the players?
What happened to all the players? I see we used to have dozens of GMs and SIMs not to mention just a huge quantity of players here in years past. How do we get them back? It has become so hard to play on ICCF. Online chess is seeing this huge surge and even now more FIDE IMs and GMs seem to be trying correspondence for lack of other places to play. Why hasn't FICGS enjoyed some of this uptick as well as DMD, rating deflation and lack of events hurt ICCF.
Garvin Gray (2020-09-18 07:07:35)
bullet corrospondence
Whilst 'correspondence' might be confusing, in the section for Advanced chess, where this time control and games are located, 'correspondence' is not used.
It is clearly marked 'Advanced' and then the time control and stake options are listed.
If someone was looking for a description, or term, Centaur, would be more accurate.
Graham Kerr (2020-08-02 00:34:05)
Chess engines levels from 1985 to 2020
would have been a whole lot better if it used a
rating based on performance rather than just someone's estimate...
Tim Harding (2020-05-22 23:08:37)
Pointless To Play The Kings Gambit ?
The King Supertournament is supposed to be strictly no engines. What are you doing to prevent cheating?
Thibault de Vassal (2020-05-05 17:54:22)
AlphaGo, the movie (Deepmind)
For all Go lovers, the film about the victories of AlphaGo over professional players, european champion Fan Hui 2 dan then Lee Sedol 9p and Ke Jie 9p.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXuK6gekU1Y
Of course, AlphaGo was the start of the "AI" adventures in the Go game when it played Fan Hui... AlphaZero was even much stronger not long after that.
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.
Thibault de Vassal (2020-03-07 22:53:49)
Wch groups, less than 7 players
Well, I can't remember it has been discussed before, but I agree anyway... Unless other players think & argue that it is not a good idea, rules will be updated.
Thanks Garvin!
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.
Garvin Gray (2020-02-15 13:57:31)
Game decided by tablebase
This topic is referring to game 119111. Over 24 hours ago, I pressed the call referee button and claimed a draw for a six man tablebase position.
I have also referred to this game in the chat section.
Whilst I have plenty of time on my clock, this whole process and lack of action, which in my opinion should not take much effort, is really making me nervous that nothing is going to be done and I should waste my time playing out the position.
All I want is the position declared drawn as per the rules.
It should not be this difficult.
What would occur if I only had two days or so on my clock? Would I have to use vacation time to prevent my clock reaching zero.
Ty Bowen (2020-01-23 15:14:53)
Go needs to be an auto-victory.
The loser beings expected to resign is expecting too much and caused unneeded difficulties. Scoring should be calculated by the client, and a winner declared.
Ty Bowen (2020-01-23 15:12:37)
Lee Sedol quits Go because of A.I.
This isn't accurate. His retirement date was set long before AlphaGo.
Thibault de Vassal (2019-12-05 21:32:38)
IECG chess-server.net
Does anyone know how things are going at (IECG) chess-server.net ?
For those who don't know, this correspondence chess server was born at about the same time as FICGS (for about the same reasons) as an evolution for IECG where I used to play correspondence chess by email until 2006, so it's kind of "big brother" by history and "little brother" by chronology... and quite different on many points AFAIK.
As far as I know many of the IECG players continued to play there, after that many joined us here (FICGS started maybe few weeks before). As for me of course I concentrated to play at FICGS all these years so I'm not really aware about Ortwin's server. Now I can see that its traffic recently went badly down (like many chess servers actually and even very impressive ones)... that's the reason for this post: any news about it?
Thibault de Vassal (2019-11-28 12:08:42)
Lee Sedol quits Go because of A.I.
Finally, is it time for Go players to play "advanced Go"? Would it make sense like it used to be at chess?
Meanwhile, Go champion Lee Sedol resigns (it seems for several reasons actually, now ranked #54 at GoRatings.org - by the way the full rating list is worth to watch until rank 800)
So, we human will not probably beat what will replace AlphaZero in the future, but as in chess we could learn a lot from it, if not build great centaur teams.
https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50573071
Thibault de Vassal (2019-11-11 20:29:20)
Komodo 13
I guess that it is very hard to answer as many of us have very subjective preferences (like the old times with the quatuor Shredder, Hiarcs, Fritz & Junior, at least before Rybka took it all)... As for me, I can't even answer for now but I always used to consider CEGT rating lists to bias my opinion ^^
Garvin Gray (2019-11-10 12:08:50)
Fat Fritz vs. Stockfish
Interesting this post has been made. I was about to ask what people think of Komodo 13 and how many cpu's do they think it requires to get the full value of Komodo 13.
When AlphaZero 'won' against Stockfish, I think I was one of the first posters that I saw who criticised the conditions and that Stockfish was almost handicapped out of the match.
This match between Fat Fritz and Stockfish seems to have had more even conditions, but I do wonder if the Stockfish 10 engine, was just the one straight off the download, or whether the Stockfish designers were consulted and allowed to tune their engine for the match, just like Fat Fritz would have been.
Those items I think are most important in making any conclusions about how much better Fat Fritz is in front of Stockfish.
And I am always left to wonder about two items when I hear about the results of these matches:
1) Stockfish feels like a very good engine to analyse your correspondence chess games with, but when it is put against some of the other top engines in head to head competitions, it competes well, but loses by a small amount.
So it feels to me like Stockfish has been designed for a purpose, to assist people with their correspondence chess analysis, rather than just being a brute force engine killer.
I would like to see Komodo and Houdini against Fat Fritz or any other contender, with equal conditions and both of those engines having being tuned for the match before hand.
Thibault de Vassal (2019-11-09 00:57:30)
Fat Fritz vs. Stockfish
Few months ago, Chessbase announced "Fat Fritz", then few days ago it was alive with a finished 100 games match against Stockfish 8 and another one with the engine playing Stockfish 10. It won both matches by a quite good score... but just like the event AlphaZero-Stockfish, conditions may be discussed.
Any thoughts on the event and Fat Fritz qualities & strength?
https://en.chessbase.com/post/fat-fritz-defeats-stockfish-match
https://en.chessbase.com/post/fat-fritz-defeats-stockfish-match-2
https://en.chessbase.com/post/fat-fritz-what-on-earth-is-that
Thibault de Vassal (2019-06-27 00:16:57)
Android App not working
The FICGS website did not change, but the apps were updated (maybe something wrong there). Do you know what browser is used by default when you open the app? A browser by Xiaomi or Chrome/Firefox?
There are 74 results for Sed in wikichess.
William Taylor (2110)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5 a6 Ba4 Nf6 O-O b5 Bb3 Bb7 Re1 Bc5 c3 d6 d4 Bb6 Bg5 h6 Bh4 g5
Once this idea was found, the Bg5 line decreased in popularity. The point is that a sacrifice on g5 has little value because the black king has not yet castled. Black gets out of the pin and is ready to castle afterwards.
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Contributors : William Taylor
Lauri Lahnasalo (1600)
c4 e5 Nf3 e4 Nd4 Nc6 Nc2
This is good spot for white knight. One could look at the position as being sicilian defence reversed where "black" had played "Nf6" after "Nc3". Of course in reversed positiont white always has extra tempo.
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Contributors : Lauri Lahnasalo
Lauri Lahnasalo (1600)
c4 e5 Nf3 e4
This is called King's english: Nimzowitsch-Flohr variation.
This is Alekhine defense reversed where position differs in that white has played c5.
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Contributors : Lauri Lahnasalo
Lauri Lahnasalo (1600)
c4 e5 Nf3
Gives yet another twist to this position which was english - sicilian reversed and now has the flavour of Alekhine defense reversed.
Maybe not white's best move but very interesting.There is lot of a chess game ahead.
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Contributors : Lauri Lahnasalo
Sophie Leclerc (1573)
e4 e5 f4 exf4 Nf3 Be7 Bc4 Bh4+ g3 fxg3 Kf1 Qe7 Kg2 Qg5 Rf1 Qd8 Kg1 gxh2+ Kh1
The three pawns gambit, white take enermous risk and hide behind the black pawn.
White king would really exposed if he would take that pawn.
There is no real raison to play that.
I could not enter 0-0, sorry.
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Contributors : Sophie Leclerc
Sophie Leclerc (1242)
e4 f5 exf5 Nf6 g4 g6 g5 Ne4 d3 Nd6 fxg6 hxg6 Bg2 Nc6 Nc3 Nf5 Nf3 d6 Bd2 Bg7 h4 Qd7 Qe2
An error, since she'll ba chased away, and black will be able to castle anyway, now black's position is the best.
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Contributors : Sophie Leclerc
Kostis Megalios (1400)
e4 c6 d4 d5 Nc3 b5
A somewhat strange looking move which is usually used only as a surprise weapon.
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Contributors : Kostis Megalios
Normajean Yates (1946)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 a6 Bg5 e6 Qf3 h6 Bxf6 Qxf6 Qxf6 gxf6
black has equalised. =.
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Contributors : Normajean Yates
Normajean Yates (1946)
e4 e5 f4 Qh4+ g3 Qe7 fxe5 d6 exd6 Qxe4+ Qe2 Qxe2+ Nxe2 Bxd6
Black has equalised, and obtained a quiet position - the main purposes of the KGD Keene defence.
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Contributors : Normajean Yates
Normajean Yates (1858)
e4 g5
The Borg or the Grob reversed. The idea is the Grob idea - pressure along the a1-h8 diagonal and K-side pawn storm; but it is even worse than the Grob is for white.
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Contributors : Normajean Yates
Normajean Yates (1858)
e4 e5 Nf3 f5 Nxe5 Nc6 Qh5+ g6 Nxg6 Nf6 Qh3 hxg6 Qxh8 Qe7 Nc3
Any thoughts on this line? Someone played this [8. Nc3] against me at another correspondence-chess site, and I am ie Black is already in serious trouble after 8. Nc3 fxe4 9. Be2 Nd4 10. O-O. I don't see any counterattack by black!
I mean latvian-fraser is supposed to be in crisis, but is the old main line [ie until black's 7th move] so bad? Or did I blunder? No, I didn't blunder - except by choosing this line [or, except by playing the latvian ;) ]
PS: I (black) managed to win that game because it was no-engines and white got overconfident, but that's another story :) ] For the curious, here is *that* story:
NN v Normajeanyates
chess.com corr no-engines 2008
1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 f5 3. Nxe5 Nc6 4. Qh5+ g6 5. Nxg6 Nf6 6. Qh3 hxg6 7. Qxh8 Qe7 8. Nc3 fxe4 9. Be2 Nd4 10. O-O Nxc2 11. Rb1 Nd4 12. d3 Nxe2+ 13. Nxe2 exd3 14. Nf4 Kf7 15. Nxd3 Bg7 16. Qh4 Qe4 17. Qxe4 Nxe4 18. Be3 d6 19. Rfe1 Bf5 20. Red1 Re8 21. Rbc1 c5 22. b3 Nc3 23. Rd2 Bxd3 24. Rxd3 Ne2+ 25. Kf1 Nxc1 26. Rxd6 Nxa2 27. Bxc5 Bf8 28. Rd7+ Ke6 29. Rc7 Bxc5 30. Rxc5 Rd8 31. Ke2 Rd5 32. Rc7 Rb5 33. Rg7 Kf6 34. Rd7 Rxb3 35. Rd2 Nc3+ 0-1
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Contributors : Normajean Yates
Telmo Escobar (2043)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 g6 Be3 Bg7 Bc4 Ng4 Bb5+ Kf8 O-O Nxe3 fxe3 Nc6 Bc4 Ne5 Ne6+ Bxe6 Bxe6 Kg8
As simple as that! With his excellently placed minor pieces, Black is little impressed and plan to "castle" by means -in due time- of h7-h6 and Kf8-g7. Let us see a posible continuation.
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Telmo Escobar (2043)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 g6 Be3 Bg7 Bc4 Ng4 Bb5+ Kf8 O-O Nxe3 fxe3
Black is positionally brilliant as he has two bishops and his adversary has weakened his pawn structure. Yet now Black has to stand alert, as his next move, if based only upon "general considerations", could be his last move as well...
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Telmo Escobar (2076)
d4 d5 c4 c6 Nf3 Nf6 Nc3 e6 Bg5 h6 Bh4 dxc4 e4 g5 Bg3 b5 Be2 Bb7 O-O Nbd7 Ne5 Bg7 Nxf7
Reportedly analysed by Ivan Cheparinov
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Julien Coll (1672)
c4 e5 Nc3 Nf6 Nf3 Nc6 g3 Bb4
A popular move, and not only an inversed Sicilian Rossolimo. Because of the reversed colours and the tempo up for White, it leads to particular and typical positions of the English Opening, some of its most important tabyias.
To permit Bxc3 or not to permit Bxc3, that is the big question for White here.
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Contributors : Julien Coll
Terry Godat (2088)
e4 f5
This is Inving gambit. this gambit is the most dengerous weapon to use for black, as it can turn on the face because of Qh5+ the inving Gambit accepted have only four variant possible, After Fxe5. 2... g6, 2... h5 2... Nf6 and 2.. Kf7
the gambit can also be refused with , Nc3, Nf3, d3, f3, g3... or white can play the Advence Inving Gambit Variant (AIGV).
This gambit is not a bad move tough it's is -0.37 for Rybka. ( This opening has no name, i just name it like that for fun) it can also be an inversed From gambit.
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This gambit, the Fred, is completely unjustified, except as a joke.
Contributors : Yugi Inving, Terry Godat
Yugi Inving (0914)
d4 e5 d5
This the refused version of the gambit, it is really way too scary for me.
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Contributors : Yugi Inving
Telmo Escobar (2055)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 e6 Be2 a6 O-O Nbd7 f4 b5 Bf3 Bb7 e5 Bxf3 Nxf3 b4 exf6 bxc3 f5 Qb6+ Kh1 cxb2 Bxb2 Qxb2 fxe6 fxe6 f7+ Kd8 Nd4 Nc5 Rb1 Qxa2 Qf3 d5 c4 Qxc4 Qe3 Rc8 Rbc1 Qb4 Nxe6+ Kd7 Nf4 Qe4 Qh3+ Kc7 Ne6+ Kb8 Rb1+ Nb7 Qb3 d4 Rf4 Qc6 Rxd4 Be7 Rc4 Qd7 Qg3+ Ka7 Qe3+ Kb8 Qf4+ Ka7 Qf2+ Kb8 Rxc8+ Rxc8 f8 Bf8 Nf8 Qd3 Qb2 Qb5 Qa1
Better than 41.Qxb5 axb5 42.Nxh7 after which White still has to neutralize the dangerous "b" passsed pawn.
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Mike Hoogland (1760)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5 a6 Bxc6 dxc6 d4 exd4 Qxd4 Qxd4 Nxd4 Bd7
A very useful move. Black prepares castling long and retains the possibility of playing c5. The immidiate c5 chases away the white knight, but weakens the d5 square. White can then develop accordingly and try to take advantage of this weakness.
They say develop knights before bishops, because the bishop often does not know yet where to go. In this case the bishop knows better where to go than the knight. It only has one good square, because on g4 it can be chased away by the useful move f3. The knight on the other hand could go to d7, f6 or even h6.
Black's bishop pair, his control over d5, the fact that his pawn structure has no weaknesses and the weakness of the white pawn on e4 give black an edge.
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Contributors : Mike Hoogland
Sebastiano Paulesu (1969)
e4 d5 exd5 Nf6 c4 e6 dxe6 Nc6 exf7+ Kxf7
Black position seem very unhappy: the king exposed, two pawns less, but the lead in developement can give some important chances to attack...
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Contributors : Sebastiano Paulesu
Graham Cridland (1406)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 a6 Bg5 e6 f4 Be7 Qf3
Introducing the standard Qf3 based attacking plan with 0-0-0, g4-g5, etc.
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Contributors : Graham Cridland
Telmo Escobar (2048)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bc4 Nf6 Ng5 Bc5 Bxf7 Ke7 Bb3 Qe8 O-O Rf8 Nc3 d6 Nd5+ Kd8 c3 h6 d4 exd4 Nxf6 Rxf6 e5 Rf5 Nf3 Nxe5 Nh4 Rh5 cxd4 Rxh4 dxc5 Qh5 h3 Rxh3 Qxh5 Rxh5 cxd6 cxd6
With equality. White has full compensation for the pawn minus, as he has two bishops and the passed pawn at d6 is weak.
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Contributors : Telmo Escobar
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
Gavin Wilson (1400)
e4 e6 d4 f5 exf5 exf5 Nc3 d5 Qh5+ g6 Qe2+ Be7 Bg5 Kf7 Qe5 Nf6 Bxf6 Bxf6 Qxd5+ Kg7 O-O-O c6 Qf3 Be6
Fritz rates this as +0.75 for White, so Black still has work to do from this position. However in an Internet game (March 2007), Black actually played ...Bxd4, and after White's Qf4 (+1.06), Black quickly collapsed after a string of inaccurate moves.
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Contributors : Gavin Wilson
Gavin Wilson (1400)
e4 e6 d4 f5 e5 Ne7 g4 fxg4 Qxg4 c5 Be3 cxd4 Bxd4 Nbc6 Bc3 Nd5
Enables the dark-squared bishop to develop. If Qh5+, then the natural ..g6 is best, resulting in a position valued by Fritz at -1.03.
Sadly, in the Internet game on which this analysis is based (March 2007), Black played ..Ng6 instead of ..Nd5, and should have been punished by a natural Nf3.
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Contributors : Gavin Wilson
Thibault de Vassal (2514)
d4 Nf6 c4 g6 Nc3 Bg7 e4 d6 Nf3 O-O Be2 e5 O-O Nc6 d5 Ne7 Ne1
The variation Christophe Léotard used to become the ICCF correspondence chess world champion in 2007.
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Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Kieran Child (1600)
e4 e5 d4 Qh4 Nc3 exd4
Black ignores the fact that his moves should always mean that an attack on his exposed queen isn't possible. This doesn't.
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Contributors : Kieran Child
Toon Pepermans (1992)
d4 e5
Englund gambit (/Charlick gambit)
Black's aim is to avoid closed systems and castle early, though nowadays this move is rarely seen without the follow up trap. In case the multiple follow up traps appeal to anyone reading this, remember that this opening is never seen at grandmaster level, emphasising its hideous unsoundness.
-K.Child
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1. d4 e5
{The Seccond best first move gambit in Chess. The authority is GM Stefan Bücker, who wrote one of the bibles of unorthodox openings, with his book "Englund Gambit" (1988). He has touched upon the opening in later collumns both at chesscafe.com and in his magazine; Kaissiber. The conclusion seems to be that White is better with acurate play, but OTB White usually avoids those main lines.}
2. dxe5 Nc6
(2... d6 "Hartlaub-Gambit")
3. Nf3 Qe7
(3... f6 "Soller Gambit")
(3... Nge7 "Zilbermints Gambit")
{Now White can chose between several playable lines:}
A) 4. Bf4 {Grob Variation}
B) 4. Qd5 {Stockholm Variation}
C) 4. Nc3
D) 4. e4
-P.Valle, 5th Nov 2010
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Contributors : Kieran Child, Paul Valle, Toon Pepermans
Kieran Child (1600)
h4 d5 h5 e5 h6 gxh6 d4 exd4 Qxd4 f6
The most common move, and yet another blunder. Often played by those who were confused by white's opening, and think they can hog the pawn advantage.
============
Contributors : Kieran Child
Mark Hailes (1800)
d4 Nf6 c4 e6 Nc3 Bb4 e3 b6
The fight in the Nimzo often revolves around controlling the square e4. If white manages to force through e3-e4 unhindered, the b1 bishop will be released and white will have a dominating position in the centre, often with the threat of playing e5 gaining space and a kingside initiative. So Black plans Bb7 controlling the long diagonal and in particular the square e4.
============
Contributors : Wladyslaw Makosiej, Mark Hailes
Gavin Wilson (1400)
e4 e6 d4 f5 exf5 exf5 Bd3 Nc6 Bxf5 Qf6 Qd3 Nxd4 Bxh7 Ne7 Be3 Ne6 Be4 Qxb2 Qc3 Qxc3+
If Black retreated with Qb5, the Queen could continue to be chased around the board.
============
Contributors : Gavin Wilson
Thibault de Vassal (2522)
e4 e6 d4 f5
The 'Kingston Defence' is characterised by the opening moves:
1.e4 e6
2.d4 f5
It can also be reached after the transposition of moves 1.d4 f5 2.e4 e6 — a form of Staunton Gambit Declined.
The first record of the defence being played is Schiffers-Chigorin, 1880. The first record of a win by Black is the 1892 victory of Elson over Emanuel Lasker. It remains obscure, but has considerable surprise value.
The Kingston Defence shares a weakness with the French Defence — in the form of the constrained queen's bishop -- and a strength with the Dutch Defence — namely the early thrust of the f-pawn, which often supports a knight on e4. (These French and Dutch similarities led to the first, uncomfortable name for the defence: Frutch.) White's decision at move three tends to define the nature of the game that follows.
============
Contributors : Gavin Wilson
Telmo Escobar (2107)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5 a6 Ba4 Nf6 O-O Be7 Re1 b5 Bb3 O-O c3 d5 exd5 Nxd5 Nxe5 Nxe5 Rxe5 c6 d4 Bd6 Re1 Qh4 g3 Qh3 Be3 Bg4 Qd3 Rae8 Nd2 Re6 a4 f5 axb5 f4 Bxf4 Bxf4 Rxe6 Bxe6 bxa6
This passed pawn gives more than enough compensation for the sacrificed piece.
============
Contributors : Telmo Escobar
Erik Varend (1400)
Nf3 c5 c4 Nc6 d4
After 3. ... cd 4. Nxd4 Nxd4 5. Qxd4 white's Queen is well placed and it cannot be easily chased away. White is ahead in development.
============
Contributors : Erik Varend
Kostis Megalios (1400)
f4 d5
This is the basic position of the Bird, it actually looks like a Dutch reversed, but with a tempo more. Though the dutch is considered to be quite sound the problem of playing it with white is that with black you go for the equality, but with white you have to go for the for advantage.
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Contributors : Gregory Kohut, Kostis Megalios
Dirk Ghysens (2245)
a3
Not very impressing, but it was played by Adolf Anderssen against Paul Morphy in their 1859 match. Anderssen subsequently used the variation, with more success, against other adversaries.
Anderssen scored 1.5/3 with it against Morphy (DG).
============
Contributors : Telmo Escobar, Don Burden, Dirk Ghysens
Telmo Escobar (2043)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5 a6 Ba4 Nf6 O-O Be7 Re1 b5 Bb3 O-O c3 d5 exd5 Nxd5 Nxe5 Nxe5 Rxe5 c6
Analysed by Marshall in 1942, as an improvement on 11...Nf6 that gave Marshall a lose to Capablanca in 1918.
============
Contributors : Benjamin Aldag, Telmo Escobar
Peter Marriott (1816)
g4
Grob's Attack named after Swiss IM Henri Grob (1904-74).
White intends to put pressure along the h1-a8 diagonal while also threatening to launch a Kingside pawn storm.
The opening is considered inferior for White (-0.32 at this stage of analysis 29/06/2008), but it avoids endless theoretical discussions and cannot be avoided by Black. The positions are often highly tactical and natural play by Black may lead him into several traps.
Evaluation notes from Kjetil Prestesaeter:
I have added all known named lines plus other lines favored by Rybka (Rybka 2.3 mp 32-bit, 17ply). Many of the named lines seem to be more romantic than strong. Please extend the analysis if you have spare time and computer power.
Notes by Peter Marriott:
I used to use the Grob in many blitz games I have played against humans. I actually had good success, not because it is a good move, but because it confused many players. On a chess server, I actually achieved a rating from 16-1700 by playing it. Many, many players simply responded by ...d5 and after I played Bg2, they took the g4 pawn, which led me to win a whole bunch of games by playing 3.c4, with an eye on b7. Maybe the right way to play this for black is simply to play 1.g4 d5 2.Bg2 then c6. Then white wonders what he's gonna do (At least I did!)
============
Contributors : Benjamin Aldag, Gary Gruwé, Kjetil Prestesaeter, Peter Marriott
Bruno Bragato (1500)
e4 e6 d4 d5 Nd2
The Tarrasch Variation is named after Siegbert Tarrasch. This move was particularly popular during the late 1970s and early 1980s when Anatoly Karpov used it to great effect. It is still played today by players seeking a small, safe advantage.
The move differs from 3.Nc3 in several respects: it doesn't block the path of White's c pawn, which means he can play c3 at some stage to support the d4 pawn; and it avoids the Winawer Variation because 3...Bb4 can be met with 4.c3 when Black has wasted a move (he has to retreat his bishop).
============
Contributors : Dirk Jan Van Dijl, Bruno Bragato
Adam Goodwin (1365)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5 a6 Ba4 Nf6 O-O Be7
Going into the Closed Ruy Lopez.
============
Contributors : Dirk Jan Van Dijl, Adam Goodwin
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 Nf3 f5
The Latvian Gambit is an aggressive but dubious chess opening, which often leads to wild complications. This opening is almost never seen at the top levels, but some correspondence chess players are devoted to it.
It was formerly known as the Greco Counter Gambit. The name is a tribute to the Latvian players, notably Karlis Betins, who analyzed it in the early part of the 20th century.
It looks like a King's Gambit with the colours reversed.
============
Contributors : Benjamin Aldag, Thibault de Vassal
Benjamin Aldag (1822)
e4 c5 Nc3 e6 f4
Closed Sicilian position.
============
Contributors : Florian Cafiero
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
d4 f5
The dutch defense.
Black's ...f5 stakes a serious claim to the e4 square and looks towards an attack on White's kingside in the middlegame. However, it weakens Black's own kingside somewhat, and does nothing to contribute to Black's development. As of 2005, the defence is unpopular in top-level play. The Dutch has never been one of the main lines against 1.d4, though in the past a number of top players, including Alexander Alekhine, Bent Larsen and Paul Morphy, have used it with success. Perhaps its high-water mark occurred in 1951, when both world champion Mikhail Botvinnik and his challenger, David Bronstein, played it in their championship match.
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Normajean Yates (1858)
f4 e6 g4 Qh4
The fastest possible checkmate in chess.
Logically, but not idiomatically, *one* of the fastest checkmates in chess; because this is only *one* of the four mates on black's second move:
1. f(3/4) e(6/5) 2.g4 Qh4#, and the same with white's two moves transposed i.e. 1.g4 e(6/5) 2.f(3/4) Qh4#; making for 8 shortest mates :)
============
Contributors : Tim Bredernitz, Normajean Yates
Tim Bredernitz (1100)
e4 e5 Qh5
This is called the Parham Attack. It's used commonly in lower scholastic tournaments. If used against a player who has the ability to see multiple moves ahead, however, the early over-development of the Queen will result in either the loss of the white Queen, or the loss of a tempo. The move is deceiving, because white is actually putting the e5 pawn under attack. If black counters by attacking the queen with 2. ... g6?, they lose a rook a rook to 3.Qxe5+. The most effective way to counter against this attack is to protect the e5 pawn. After the King pawn is protected, white's queen is left overdeveloped and subject to attack. Overall, the Parham Attack is only effective against beginning chess players.
============
Contributors : Tim Bredernitz
Rémi Marois (1500)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 a6 Bc4
This move as been popularised by the world chess champion Bobby Fischer. Before Fischer, we use to think that the Bishop was misplaced on the a2-g8 diagonal after 6... e6. This variation introduces many sacrifical themes.
============
Contributors : Rémi Marois
Premraj Natarajan (1800)
e4 c5 Nf3 d6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nf6 Nc3 a6 Bg5 e6 f4 Qb6 Qd2 Qxb2
When black captures b2 pawn with the queen its called the poisoned pawn and hence white is supposed to win because of this early sacrifice.
This stage its still I believe is unclear.
============
Contributors : Rémi Marois, Premraj Natarajan
Thibault de Vassal (2425)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bb5 Nf6
The Berlin Defence is logical and solid, although it can be hard for Black to generate winning chances. Arthur Bisguier played this line for decades, and it was later taken up by Alexei Shirov and other young grandmasters. Vladimir Kramnik used the Berlin Defence as a drawing variation against Garry Kasparov in their 2000 World Championship match.
After 4.0-0, Black can play either the solid 4...Nxe4 or the more combative 4...Bc5. After 4...Nxe4 5.d4 (5.Re1 Nd6 6.Nxe5 is also reasonable) Nd6 6.Bxc6 dxc6 7.dxe5 Nf5 8.Qxd8+ (8.Qe2?! Nd4! 9.Nxd4 Qxd4 favors Black. After 10.Rd1, Bg4!? 11.Rxd4 Bxe2 gives Black a pleasant endgame.) Kxd8 White is usually considered to have a small advantage in light of his somewhat better pawn structure and Black's awkwardly placed king, but Black, with a solid position and the bishop pair, has excellent drawing chances.
============
Contributors : Julien Baudement, Tim Bredernitz, Thibault de Vassal
Graham Cridland (1692)
e4 c5 Nf3 e6 d4 cxd4 Nxd4 Nc6 Nc3 Qc7 Ndb5 Qb8 Be3 a6 Bb6 axb5 Nxb5 Bb4+
This is the move approved by theory, although there are a couple of other possibilities, based on removing the Rook from view of the fork:
10 ...Ra5, 10...Ra4.
============
Contributors : Graham Cridland
Ilmars Cirulis (2261)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bc4 Nf6 Ng5
This was known as a "Duffer's move" by Tarrash but has been used throughout history by several notable chess personalities.
============
Contributors : Pablo Schmid, Bradley Gooding, Roger Whitman
Steinitz, Fischer, and I consider this to be White's best chance to get an advantage.
David Grosdemange (1912)
d4 Nf6 c4 c5 d5 b5 cxb5 a6 Nc3 axb5 Nb5 Ba6 Nc3
this transposed into an accepted benko .
============
Contributors : David Grosdemange
David Grosdemange (1912)
c4 c5
the symmetrical english .
if blacks plays too long symmetrical , white can keep a little advantage with the advance to play first . but black can isn't forced to continue playing symmetrical .
this move is sometimes used by sicilian players , because it can transpose into a maroczy bind .
============
Contributors : David Grosdemange
Yeturu Aahlad (2017)
c4 e5
Normal move which fights for the center. In practice this is a reversed Sicilian. Black eyes d4-square and takes on the kingside. White plans queenside attack while black has play on the kingside.
============
Contributors : Larry Wolfley, Kostis Megalios, Lauri Lahnasalo, Yeturu Aahlad
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
d4 Nf6 c4 g6 Nc3 d5
The Grünfeld Defence is named after Ernst Grünfeld, 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.
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 c5 d4 cxd4
The most common move. Players who fear Morra gambit (particularly in rapid play) could have transposed in another variant with 2. ... e6
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Julien Coll (1400)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nf6 Nxe5 d6 Nxf7
The Cochrane Gambit, an old rare and very crude way of fighting against the Petrov, based on the establishment of a firm grip on the center and the long-term exploitment of Black's slightly exposed King.
============
Contributors : Julien Coll
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bc4 Bc5 b4
The gambit is named after Captain William Davies Evans, the first player known to have employed it. The first game with the opening is considered to be Evans - McDonnell, London 1827, although in that game a slightly different move order was tried (1. e4 e5 2. Nf3 Nc6 3. Bc4 Bc5 4. O-O d6 and only now 5. b4). The gambit became very popular shortly after that, being employed a number of times in the series of games between McDonnell and Louis de la Bourdonnais in 1834. Players such as Adolf Anderssen, Paul Morphy and Mikhail Chigorin subsequently took it up. It was out of favour for much of the 20th century, although John Nunn and Jan Timman played some games with it in the late 1970s and early 1980s, and in the 1990s Garry Kasparov used it in a few of his games (notably a famous 25-move win against Viswanathan Anand in Riga, 1995), which prompted a brief revival of interest in it.
The Evans Gambit is basically an aggressive variant of the Giuoco Piano, which normally continues with the positional moves 4. c3 or 4. d3. The idea behind the move 4. b4 is to give up a pawn in order to secure a strong centre and bear down on Black's weak-point, f7. Ideas based on Ba3, preventing black from castling, are also often in the air. The most obvious and most usual way for Black to meet the gambit is to accept it with 4... Bxb4, after which White plays 5. c3 and Black usually follows up with 5... Ba5 (5... Be7 and, less often 5... Bc5 and 5... Bd6 are also played). White usually follows up with 6. d4.
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 Bc4 Bc5
The Giuoco Piano (Italian: "quiet game"), is the oldest recorded opening. The Portuguese Damiano played it at the beginning of the 15th century and the Italian Greco played it at the beginning of the 16th century. Because of Greco's work on the opening, it is sometimes called the Italian Game, although that term is also used more generally to describe the position after 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bc4. The Giuoco Piano was popular through the 19th century, but modern refinements in defensive play have led most chess masters towards openings like the Ruy Lopez that offer White greater chances for long term initiative.
White's "Italian bishop" at c4 prevents Black from advancing in the center with ...d5 and attacks the vulnerable f7 square. White plans to dominate the center with d2-d4 and to attack the Black king. Black aims to free his game by exchanging pieces and playing the pawn break ...d5, or to hold his center pawn at e5.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 46%
============
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%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 Nf3 Nc6 d4
The Scotch Game received its name from a correspondence match in 1824 between Edinburgh and London. Popular in the 19th century, by 1900 the Scotch had lost favor among top players because it was thought to release the central tension too early and allow Black to equalize without difficulty. More recently the Scotch has regained some popularity and it has been used by grandmasters Kasparov and Timman as a surprise weapon to avoid the well-analyzed Ruy Lopez.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 57%
============
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 Sämisch (which he drew). Another early exponent of the defence was Ernst Grünfeld. 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%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
c4
The English Opening is the fourth most popular opening move in chess. White begins the fight for the center by staking a claim to the d5 square. Common responses are 1...e5 (which can lead to positions similar to the Sicilian Defence but with opposite colors), 1...c5 (the Symmetrical Variation), and 1...Nf6. Also perfectly playable are 1...e6 (often leading to a Queen's Gambit Declined after 2.d4 d5) and 1...c6 (often leading to a Slav Defence after 2.d4 d5, a Caro-Kann Defence after 2.e4 d5, or a Reti Opening after 2.Nf3 d5 3.b3).
The English is a very flexible opening. Although many lines of the English have a distinct character, it often transposes into other openings. If White plays an early d4, the game will usually transpose into either the Queen's Gambit or an Indian defence.
The English derives its name from the English (unofficial) world champion, Howard Staunton, who played it during his 1843 match with Amant. It fell out of favor (the opening was notably disdained by Morphy), but is now recognized as a solid opening that may be used to reach both classical and hypermodern positions. Botvinnik, Karpov, and Kasparov all employed it during their world championship matches. Bobby Fischer created a stir when he switched to it from the King's Pawn against Boris Spassky in 1972.
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
d4 d5 c4
The Queen's Gambit is one of the oldest known chess openings, as Lucena wrote about it in 1497 and it is mentioned in an earlier manuscript in Göttingen. During the early period of modern chess queen pawn openings were not in fashion, and the Queen's Gambit did not become common until the 1873 tournament in Vienna.
As Steinitz and Tarrasch developed chess theory and increased the appreciation of positional play, the Queen's Gambit grew more popular. It reached its peak popularity in the 1920s and 1930s, and was played in 32 out of 34 games in the 1934 World Chess Championship.
Since then Black has increasingly moved away from symmetrical openings, tending to use the Indian defences to combat queen pawn openings. The Queen's Gambit is still frequently played, however, and it remains an important part of many grandmasters' opening repertoires.
With 2.c4, White threatens to exchange a wing pawn (the c-pawn) for a center pawn (Black's d-pawn) and dominate the center with e2-e4. This is not a true gambit since if Black accepts the pawn he cannot expect to keep it.
============
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 Rúy López 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 Göttingen 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%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 e5 Bc4
The Bishop's Opening is one of the oldest openings to be analyzed; it was studied by Lucena and Ruy Lopez. Later it was played by Philidor. Larsen was one of the few grandmasters to play it often, after first using it at the 1964 Interzonal Tournament. Although the Bishop's Opening is uncommon today, it has been used occasionally as a surprise by players such as Kasparov and Nunn.
White attacks Black's f7-square and prevents Black from advancing his d-pawn to d5. By ignoring the beginner's rule, "develop knights before bishops", White leaves his f-pawn unblocked allowing the possibility of playing f4. This gives the Bishop's Opening an affinity to the King's Gambit and the Vienna Game, two openings that share this characteristic. In fact, the Bishop's Opening can transpose into the King's Gambit or the Vienna Game, and transpositions into Giuoco Piano and Two Knights Defense and other openings are also possible. In particular, White should remain alert for any chance to transpose into a favorable variation of the King's Gambit, but with careful play Black can avoid this danger.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 55%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 c5 Nc3
Closed sicilian is a strategical opening that often leads to a slow white kingside attack. Black usually fights for counterplay on the queenside. Much less played than the main line 2.Nf3, this opening is a good alternative against sicilian experts.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 53%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
e4 c5 Nf3
The main line, which leads to all popular variants such as Najdorf, Dragon, Sveshnikov, Scheveningen, Richter-Rauzer... The aim is to support d4 pawn advance as a third move. After 3. ... cxd4 white could play 4.Nxd4, giving a good square to the knight and avoiding to the queen to be exposed too early at the center of the board.
According to Chessbase, 2.Nf3 is played at nearly 85% cases, giving 57% white chances.
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2407)
Nf3
The Réti Opening (also called the King's Knight Opening) is a chess opening characterized by the opening move 1.Nf3
It is named after Richard Réti, a Czechoslovakian chess player who used it to defeat the world champion José Raúl Capablanca in 1924.
According to ChessBase, out of the twenty possible opening moves, 1.Nf3 ranks third in popularity. It develops the knight to a good square and prepares for a quick castling. White maintains flexibility by not committing to a particular central pawn structure, while waiting to see what Black will do. The slight drawback to the move is that it blocks the f-pawn. This is not a problem if White does not intend to move it in the near future, but it rules out the possibility of playing systems with f3 and Nge2, which is a fairly popular setup against the King's Indian.
Usually 1.Nf3 will transpose into an opening with 1.d4, such as the King's Indian or the Queen's Gambit. If White follows up with an early c4 a transposition to the English Opening may be reached. Even the Sicilian Defense may be reached if the game opens 1.Nf3 c5 2.e4.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 57%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Thibault de Vassal (2522)
d4
Queen's Pawn Game refer to any chess opening which starts with 1.d4, the second most popular opening move, but is now usually used to describe openings where White opens with 1.d4 but does not follow through with an early pawn advance to c4. Some of these openings have individual names as well.
In the 1800s and early 1900s, 1.e4 was by far the most common opening move by White, while the different openings starting with 1.d4 were considered somewhat unusual and therefore classed together as "Queen's Pawn Game".
As the merits of 1.d4 started to be explored it was the Queen's Gambit which was played most often; more popular than all other 1.d4 openings combined. The term "Queen's Pawn Game" was then narrowed down to any opening with 1.d4 which was not a Queen's Gambit. Eventually, through the efforts of the hypermodernists, the various Indian Defences, such as the King's Indian, Nimzo-Indian and Queen's Indian, became more popular, and as these openings were named, the term "Queen's Pawn Game" narrowed further.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 58%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal
Francisco Pessoa (2528)
e4
King's Pawn Game refers to any chess opening where White opens with 1.e4, the most popular of the twenty possible opening moves. Since nearly all of these openings have names of their own, the term "King's Pawn Game", unlike Queen's Pawn Game is rarely used to describe the opening of the game.
King's Pawn Games are further classified by whether Black responds with 1...e5 or not.
Openings beginning with 1.e4 e5 are called Double King's Pawn Games (or Openings), Symmetrical King's Pawn Games (or Openings), or Open Games—these terms are equivalent. Openings where Black responds to 1.e4 with a move other than 1...e5 are called Asymmetrical King's Pawn Games (or Openings) or Semi-open Games.
According to Chessbase, white chances are about 57%
============
Contributors : Thibault de Vassal, Mark Noble, Francisco Pessoa
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