"Mark Houlsby" wrote in message
ps.com...
On 23 Mar, 16:11, "David Kane" wrote:
"Inconnux" wrote in message

news:u5GMh.1394$__3.614@edtnps90...







Larry Tapper hit on the answer exactly. He noted
that "high-level players are canny utility maximizers".
They aren't maximizing good chess, they are maximizing
"highest tournament score". They aren't really
playing chess, they are engaging in a competition
which has chess as a component. They've
concluded that playing the best move is a
sub-optimal strategy and that it is better to
play a number of uncontested or partially
contested games.

"Just moments before I played this
move, the game Gerzhoy-Bluvshtein
ended in a draw. It meant I did not
have to win this game anymore. Following
my last move I immediately ofered
a draw to Pascal. He had no better
choice but to accept"

Yet his notes after 47.Bh5

"This wins too but I missed a pretty
checkmate 47.Rh5 Rh6 48.Rh6 Kh6
49.Rc2!! and black does not have a
good way to preventing checkmate"

So In a Zonal Final an IM admits to
having a won game but offers a draw

The real question is to what
quantitative degree are draw
rates inflated by these external
factors, and what can be done
about them.

In some sense I think it is a mistake
to focus on special cases like this
one, or the usual target of the
obviously uncontested GM draw,
because it leads people to overlook
that the same factors behind
those events have an insidious
influence throughout chess.

I posted this because it was an example
of an IM admitting publicly that he
offered a draw prematurely. How does
this affect the overall draw rate? I have
no idea. There are many examples
of fighting chess that end in a draw.
I doubt anyone has a problem with these
games.

A point worth considering:
Subjectively, everyone has seen, or played,
hard fought draws which seem to embody
the best of chess.

Best? Not sure. Most enjoyable/appreciable? Certainly.


Objectively, when
chess fans of the Corus tournament voted
for "the most elegant or most interesting
game", decisive games were 22 times as
likely to receive a vote as drawn games.


So, in other words, it was subjective, rather than objective.


How does this affect the local chess
tournaments? In the last tournament
I was in, in the last round the leader
found out that all he needed was a draw
and proceeded to offer his opponent a
draw before the game was started.
The TD immediately told him that that
was illegal to do. The game did end
up as a draw, but one has to wonder if
all he was playing for was a draw.
Since he was a young junior player, he
wasn't penalized for his draw offer.

Just as it is impossible to eliminate
all draws without radically changing
the underlying game, it would also be
impossible to completely eliminate
the external incentives to draw. But
they can certainly be reduced.


How, pray? All you'll do is chase away the better players who (as a
consequence of their being better players) understand that chess is a
draw, and use that fact in their tournament and match praxis.

The better players these days are machines. They do not
"believe" that chess is a draw, and they draw far
less frequently than humans. The machines are designed
to play chess, whereas humans are driven by *non-chess*
factors.

The inabilty of your limited intellect to imagine
possibilities is evidence of absolutely nothing.


I think giving the BAP system a try
would be an interesting experiment.
This might reduce the amount of draws
but then again it might produce its own
set of problems.

True.

Right... like discouraging the best players from competing. Great idea!