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MatPlus.Net Forum General What is a "line pin" and are there undefined pins?
 
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(161) Posted by Nikola Predrag [Tuesday, Oct 21, 2014 16:45]

I apologize for an imprecision in post 159, it should be "...perfectly clear and sufficient to everyone but Kevin."
Or to anyone else with specific logic of the class and sub-set, of the contradiction, of the scientific terms etc.
 
   
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(162) Posted by Per Olin [Tuesday, Oct 21, 2014 17:21]

All chess problems can be grouped into one of the following: A. Twomovers B. Threemovers C. Moremovers D. Endgame studies E. Helpmates F. Selfmates G. Retros & Proof games H. Other problems (Seriesmovers, Stalemates, Constructional problems, Mathematical problems etc). These groups have two subgroups: 1) orthodox when based on normal chess rules, otherwise 2) unorthodox/fairy. Comments: In group G, for some reason, generally no division into subgroups is performed, orthodox and fairies go side by side. Group H is mostly considered to be unorthodox, but also here should be decisive are the problems based on normal chess rules or not. Fairy chess competitions are generally open for A2, B2, C2, D2, E2, F2 and parts of H.
 
 
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(163) Posted by Kevin Begley [Tuesday, Oct 21, 2014 17:43]; edited by Kevin Begley [14-10-21]

Neal,

You are wrong again, but this time, it is no minor mistake.

>Almost all these FIDE rule changes Kevin refers to are concerning tournament play rather than the Game itself.

FALSE.
Note this carefully: FIDE writes the rule book for the GAME -- and, nobody else (certainly not problem chess).

I have argued that wFCC needs its own base-rules (because the rules of the GAME does evolve, and FIDE has complete control of them).

For any reader who does not already know...
The FIDE rule book has experienced numerous changes -- including since I started composing...
And, even those relatively "minor" changes (which FIDE recently made to the ONE RULE BOOK of the game) has impacted problems which might once have been considered FIDE-ORTHODOX.
...this even includes studies!
And, nobody bothered to notice (or care) -- I pointed this out (along with one other problemist, who was making a very similar point) -- nobody bothered to correct those old studies!
What they did do was downplay it... keep it quiet... they refused to even answer questions concerning a proper correction (thus, in effect, they prevented correction).

In lieu of what? They are determined to preserve the illusion that "orthodox chess problems" are a legitimately distinct category (but refuse to provide a fair/honest definition).

I can show you studies which were intended to end with multiple pin-stalemates... they no longer end with stalemates, because of changes to the GAME.
I can show you formal problems, which might be "heterodox," if they were not rendered ILLEGAL, by the FIDE RULE BOOK (read: the rules of THE GAME).

It is unfortunate that you were not aware of this... but, of course, you are kept unaware -- by people who continually offer you a set of completely childish definitions.

If you accept their careless standards, you are one of them.


>In fact the only rule change affecting the Game in recent times that I'm aware of was the modification of the castling rule ...
>... excluded Krabbe Castling ...

An absurd reference to a joke problem (which resulted in a petty change to the rule book -- really? That is all you know of the rule book?
Your statement is completely wrong -- a presumption based entirely upon ignorance (whether you were careless, or deceived).
It is exactly what many would like you to believe.
Wait until I get back... I will show you the changes which have impacted problems.

>So in the modern era the Rules of the Game have in fact remained quite stable,

You are making false statements about something, from a position of sheer ignorance.
This is not a new conversation in this forum.

>enabling us to enjoy the problems of Loveday, Loyd, Loschinsky, Linss all under the same rules!

WRONG -- please understand this carefully: there are numerous problems which were composed according to the rules of the GAME (as defined by the FIDE Rule Book).
Since then -- in fact, less than 20 years ago -- changes were made to GAME (the FIDE rule book).
Those changes have resulted in an inability to show the intended solutions of these problems, by a legitimate viewer of chess problems (which follows every rule in the book).

I asked this forum to DEFINE ORTHODOX, in order to explain whether ALL such problems might require correction.
In other words, are they now orthodox? are they now fairy? Is orthodox chess not defined by the rules of the GAME? Does FIDE not make the rules of the game (and if so, says who)?
Crickets chirped, ignorance reigned, and deceits were spread.

This term must be defined, if it is to be considered a legitimate division -- otherwise, you undermine the status of problems of the past (relegating them to a place where they can not be viewed as fully orthodox, nor fairy -- and thus, they will never be corrected).

Can you not understand why it might be in the interest of some to refuse any correction of this situation?
They refuse to accept any legitimate definition of orthodox/fairy, because of what ...?
They refuse an honest and level playing field, because of what ...?
They obstruct the restoration process for a number of older problems (composed by our friends), because of what ...?
And, you want to blind yourself to the truth about the rule book (and propagate falsehoods) because of what ...?

I honestly hope none of this is for malicious reasons; but, willful ignorance is hardly a healthy plea.
I honestly do not understand how it is that you could be so unaware of these issues; but, I strongly encourage you to open your eyes.

>So in the modern era the Rules of the Game have in fact remained quite stable, enabling us to enjoy the problems of Loveday, Loyd, Loschinsky, Linss all under the same rules!

This is fiction -- you forget how many of those classic problems were actually corrected/restored (you may not have noticed, but you are not always viewing the original versions).
Not only are they corrected for soundness (and retrograde issues), but also for a variety of standards -- all of which must be included in the "orthodox chess problem" specification.

Some (like Georgy and Nicola) say that "orthodox chess" (and "orthodox chess problems") may be defined according to whatever the masses are willing to believe.
They ignore that a legitimate game-viewer might not play some problems that they want to call "orthodox."

If they want to define "orthodox" as a set of rules (including FIDE rule books: past, present, and possibly future), then a viewer of such problems requires an objective accounting of the members of their set. But, they refuse to even acknowledge that their definitions imply multiple members in their "orthodox" set (and they obstruct any effort to list them)!

If you want to create a specification for a viewer which would be capable of playing any orthodox problem, then you must not only specify the members in the set of allowed rule-books, you must also enforce some methodology to distinguish which problem belongs to which rule-book!

Further, if you want to determine the SOUNDNESS of any "orthodox" problem, or you want to determine which "orthodox" problems might require restoration, then you need more than rules -- you need to define the standards under which a problem operates (including retrograde standards, promotion-dual standards, etc).

Further, we need to address an important question: is there a need to correct/restore old works, if they were completely sound in their day?
In other words: if those problems may already need to give a condition (read: point to a rule-book, and the standards), under which they were composed, and they are sound (as they were intended), then why should they be "restored" to conform to the rule-book of an evolving game?
Remember: Georgy and Nicola both say they were "orthodox" as they were -- in their day! -- so, why the contradiction? Why the two standards?
Either they are not being honest with themselves, or they are not being honest with you.

If you want "orthodox" problems to be a legitimate classification, if you want a viewer to play all orthodox problems, if you desire a fair & honest standard, if you want some methodology to determine which old problems require restoration, if you want an objective mechanism to judge a problem's economy (of rules), then you need to begin with a rigorous definition (better yet: an algorithmic specification) for the classification.
 
   
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(164) Posted by Neal Turner [Tuesday, Oct 21, 2014 20:18]; edited by Neal Turner [14-10-21]

When one goes to a shop and buys a chess set, along with the board and the pieces there'll usually be a copy of the Rules of Chess to enable beginners to start playing.
It would be interesting to compare the rules from a present day set with those from a set bought 50 (or 60 or 70) years ago.
My guess is that there will be NO DIFFERENCE AT ALL between the two sets of rules.

As Kevin couldn't be bothered to provide even one example of the rule changes he has in mind, or of a problem which has been invalidated by these unspecified rule changes, I wonder if anybody else has any idea what he's talking about, or know of any examples of invalidated problems?
 
   
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(165) Posted by Dmitri Turevski [Tuesday, Oct 21, 2014 21:36]

@Neal

"studies which were intended to end with multiple pin-stalemates..." could be a reference to the 2nd Prize in the 3rd FIDE Cup: http://www.wfcc.ch/wp-content/uploads/D-3FIDECUP-pre.pdf

After 11.g8=Q neither side can checkmate with any series of legal moves, so the dead reckoning applies.
 
   
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(166) Posted by Neal Turner [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 00:07]

There's the whole lowdown on dead-reckoning on Andrew Buchanan's pages:
http://anselan.com/chess.html

I see this award is dated 2013 so there can hardly be any complaints in this case that the nice ending was spoilt by a change in the rules dating from 1997!

But what about this rule:
"The game is drawn when a position has arisen in which neither player can checkmate the opponent’s king with any series of legal moves. The game is said to end in a ‘dead position’. This immediately ends the game, provided that the move producing the position was legal."

The first thing to notice is that it does nothing to affect the result of the game on the board - if a position is dead-drawn it's always going to remain dead-drawn.
So it's not actually changing anything in terms of Chess

In fact it's not really a Chess rule at all - it's a Tournament rule designed to prevent people maliciously playing on in drawn positions or trying to win them on time.

The only differece between this rule and a statement of the bleeding obvious is the word 'immediately'.
And it's this word which is the problem!
In the other drawing situations - 3-fold repetition, the 50-move rule - the draw doesn't happen automatically, it needs one of the players to make a claim.
If those who drew up this rule had been consistent and required a player to make a claim, then there'd be no dead-reckoning and no effect on Problem chess!
 
   
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(167) Posted by Georgy Evseev [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 07:56]

Neal!

I mostly agree with what you have said in posts 164 and 166.

Moreover, FIDE rules generally imply that the game flow is recorded and these records are used to check the 50-moves and 3-times repetition rules. Without such records it is generally considered impossible to enforce these rules, though I have not found direct description of it in FIDE rules.

Some time ago I saw the game between two grandmasters which has reached the time stage "until end of play". Maybe it was rapid play from the beginning, I do not fully remember. One of the players had a "must win" situation and reached an endgame with R+S against R without pawns. It is quite easy to defend such a position for the weaker side, but there was no record of play at that moment.

After quite a number of moves the arbiter confirmed that 50-moves rule cannot be applied when the game is not recorded. No manual move count was considered acceptable. Fortunately, after some more moves (I think in the end more than 100 with these forces on board only), the draw was proposed by stronger side. Still it looks like a tough decision for the judge if he had to call this game finished.
 
   
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(168) Posted by Hauke Reddmann [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 11:59]

Words don't come easy. (F.R.David)
Even a simple statement "Chess rules have changed since FIDE
took over - yes or no?" is hopelessly unprecise. :-)

The omission in the above sentence is "De jure or de facto?"
De jure someone could have castled Krabbe-style before the
bug was repaired, but de facto any player insisting on this
right in a real OTB game would have ended in a nice quiet
room.

The effect of things like "dead reckoning" on problem chess
is of course a different matter.
 
   
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(169) Posted by Georgy Evseev [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 12:29]

The effect of "dead reckoning" is obvious: it gives to retro composers some new possibilities.

All this fuss about stalemate endgames is childish, because you are not able to claim "dead position", until you have seen the stalemate in question.

Does anyone really considers it to be a big difference between:

11.g8Q+ = (as 11...Kxg8 forces a stalemate).
and
11.g8Q+ Kxg8 stalemate.
?
 
   
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(170) Posted by Neal Turner [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 12:54]

...post 166 continued.

Let's imagine a tournament game coming down to K+B v K.
Now two things can happen:
- the players accept the draw, shake hands and retire to the bar.
- the guy with the bishop (some kind of teetotaller) insists on playing on.

What's his opponent to do?
The only thing he can do is call over the arbiter and claim the draw!

So we see the difference between this rule and the other end-of-game rules - mate & stalemate - in which one side can't make a legal move.
The players can carry on moving in a dead position, which puts it in the same category as 3-fold repetition and the 50-move rule - if your opponent doesn't agree a draw, you've got to make a claim!

Conclusion:
The last two sentences of the rule are completely unnecessary.
Dead-reckoning is a mirage!
 
 
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(171) Posted by Sarah Hornecker [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 14:27]

My e-mail of 7/17/2014 to bernd ellinghoven, with CC to Harold van der Heijden:

 QUOTE 
Dear bernd,

nachdem ich in EG einen entsprechenden Artikel von Per Olin gesehen habe (daher CC an HH), möchte ich den Antrag stellen, dass der Kodex für Schachkomposition wie folgt oder sinngemäß ähnlich erweitert wird:

"If a dead position arrives, the author may choose to show why it is a dead position. This can include the notation of further moves, even if they would be played after the dead position is reached. If a relevant phase is written out by the author in such a manner, it shall be judged as if the play would not end in a dead position earlier.

Problems of any genre as well as studies are not to be considered incorrect or ending early if a dead position is reached in the course of their solution. Their full solution shall be given regardless, provided the author intended the play to be continued after a dead position is reached."

Die praktische Bedeutung kommt vor allem Pattbildern in Studien oder (Hilfs-)Pattaufgaben zu.

Beste Grüße,
Siegfried


I don't know if this was actually proposed at the WCCC. Does anyone know?
 
   
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(172) Posted by Georgy Evseev [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 14:35]

Siegfried,

No, this was not included into Agenda, and there were no meetings of Codex Committee.
 
   
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(173) Posted by Per Olin [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 15:36]

There have been, as far as I know, in the past couple of decades two changes in the chess rules that have a significance for problem chess. In 1997 was introduced the concept of 'dead reckoning' and in 2008 was taken Chess960 into the FIDE chess rules.

Addition to what has been said about dead positions in several posts: Based on discussions in Bern 2014, I have understood that the endgame study community is starting to prepare an instruction that in the written solution of a study are not noted rules that concern practical play (50 moves rule, threefold repetition and dead position/reckoning in form of an upcoming forced stalemate). This was not on the big agenda, but discussed in the endgame study subcommittee. - As response to Georgy / post 169: Correct, one has to see the stalemate in order to note the dead position. When opening the discussion about this topic in EG, I published an original study with the solution ending in '11.axb7+ and dead position as white would be stalemate after the obligatory capture by black king'. As mentioned above, this technicality is getting attention. - One small peculiarity remains, also mentioned by Siegfried: selfstalemates, where black is forced to stalemate white from a position that is a dead position, i.e. the play has already ended according to the rules.

In 2008 Chess960 (Fischer Random Chess ) was included as an appendix into the chess rules. This has only some significance for proof games, where there are possibilities to start from an unknown initial position. Chess960 is a fairy chess form until, if ever, defined to be orthodox. In the end it does not much matter, because as we know, for retros & proof games generally no distinction is made between orthodox and unorthodox/fairy. Is this the highest or lowest level a problem genre can reach?

Mate, win/draw are the signs of an orthodox problem. Stalemates are automatically fairy chess, although not explicitly so said in the Codex. How then about dead positions? Do we automatically put them into orthodox for being part of official chess rules or fairy for not ending in mate or win/draw? On many occasions these have a significant retro content and are then, of course, retro problems. Is it meaningful to classify problems due to how the solution ends (mate, stalemate, dead position)? Referring to grouping in post 162, do we put stalemates and/or dead position problems to be H1 Other orthodox problems or H2 Other fairy problems? Note that H1 tends to have a forgotten role, e.g. we have in an Album seen such a peculiarity as a mathematical problem among retros. To which group in the Album competitions would you put a splendid mathematical problem?

To sum up, I see no difficulty in defining orthodox chess to be based on official chess rules, all other problems are unorthodox/fairy. Correctness evaluation and classification of a problem is to be done by rules in force at publication.

We are now a bit outside the scope of the headline of this thread, but it is not the first time in the history of this forum.
 
 
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(174) Posted by Joost de Heer [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 19:17]; edited by Joost de Heer [14-10-22]

> All this fuss about stalemate endgames is childish, because you are not able to claim "dead position", until you have seen the stalemate in question.

That's exactly the point of the rule: you don't NEED to see it or claim it. In the example: if black oversteps the time after g8=Q, an arbiter should declare the game drawn because of the dead position, not lost due to time overstepping. The same with Neal's example: Extremely put, in a K+B vs K position, you can just walk away from the board and don't come back, and it's still a draw.
 
   
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(175) Posted by Nikola Predrag [Wednesday, Oct 22, 2014 20:53]

3-ple repetition, 50-moves and dead reckoning are the conventions declared as rules of FIDE-chess, required by the restricted time for a game.
But they are superfluous for understanding the essence of chess.
Chess composition should rely on the essence of chess and decide about the conventions best fitting for problems; just as FIDE does it for FIDE-chess for good practical reasons.

There's no clock mechanism switching after each move in a chess composition.
The mentioned FIDE-conventions might have a meaning in problems only if a particular stipulation requires them.
It might be even considered that such stipulations are NOT orthodox, since they require the features which are NOT essential for chess.
 
   
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(176) Posted by Joost de Heer [Thursday, Oct 23, 2014 06:48]

>3-ple repetition, 50-moves and dead reckoning are the conventions declared as rules of FIDE-chess, required by the restricted time for a game.
>But they are superfluous for understanding the essence of chess.
>Chess composition should rely on the essence of chess and decide about the conventions best fitting for problems; just as FIDE does it for FIDE-chess for good practical reasons.

And that's something I completely agree with. There was a discussion about those rules a few months ago on the retros list, and I voiced the exact same opinion. See http://www.pairlist.net/pipermail/retros/2014-May/004211.html
 
   
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(177) Posted by Valery Liskovets [Thursday, Oct 23, 2014 11:23]; edited by Valery Liskovets [14-10-23]

Siegfried,
In my article in The Problemist in Nov. 2013 devoted to completely unavoidable mates I suggested the concept of the (subsequent) "proof-play". I think it is just suitable for a proper description of all similar "automatic" situations (doesn't matter leading inexorably to a checkmate or to a draw and turning out short or long, univariate or branched). Formally the proof-play lies outside of the solution but in fact of course it may well represent (a part of) author's intention, say, a triple pin-stalemate.
 
   
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(178) Posted by Neal Turner [Thursday, Oct 23, 2014 11:56]; edited by Neal Turner [14-10-23]

Yes, Nikola puts it very well.

We have the rules of Chess which govern the game, and then we have the rules of Tournament chess which govern the play of the game in practice.

Kevin is right (did I just say that!?) the rules are continually changing - but it's the Tournament rules that are changing, which is only logical as tournament conditions are continually changing.
The rules of the Chess have hardly changed for 200 years and it's these rules that are the domain of problemists.

Difficulties arise when the Tournament rules begin to infringe on the Chess rules, as with the case of Dead-reckoning with its (unnecessary) insistence that the appearance of a dead position 'immediately' ends the game.
As I tried to argue above, it does no such thing, as the players can continue moving.
This differentiates it from mate and stalemate where the game does indeed end because the player to move has no legal move.


STOP PRESS!!
I just noticed on the FIDE pages (http://www.fide.com/fide/handbook.html?id=124&view=article)
as the first line of 'Laws of Chess' this:

--------------------FIDE Laws of Chess cover over-the-board play.------------------------

So this let's us off the hook! There's nothing to discuss!
Except should we produce our own laws: The WFCC Laws of Problem Chess?
 
   
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(179) Posted by Hauke Reddmann [Thursday, Oct 23, 2014 12:07]

Oh, and folks, you should take a peek into the newest FIDE
rules from time to time. After July this year, now 5-fold repetition
and 75 moves w/o are *automatically* drawn. (Effect marginally relevant
to this thread.)
 
 
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(180) Posted by Georgy Evseev [Thursday, Oct 23, 2014 12:09]

It is interesting the FIDE rules say nothing about forced checkmate - they only mention drawn positions. So, it looks like any "unavoidable mate positions" are not "dead", until the mate really appears on the board.
 
   
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