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    EEG will be glad to know that 960 Chess is growing on me.

    My opponent kindly awarded me a trophy for Strikingly Strong Play after I eventually forced him to take my Queen.

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      Nice, IT. Glad you're enjoying 960. Did that rather special opening array arise by chance or is there some option somewhere for the players to choose a starting position?

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        It was randomly assigned to our board in a club match.

        We're in the endgame of the reverse match, in which it was a novel sensation for me to play 1. e4.

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          You lot will be aware of how seldom I am in this position (I am black by the way) so you may not be surprised that I was completely surprised on this being awarded a draw due to stalemate. Never heard of this ridiculous rule before but will more careful to ensure that I completely get the king in check next time.

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            That's quite impressive in a way, to play for a good few years without knowing about stalemate! Try looking up the lesson on chess.com about winning with king and pawn against bare king (or conversely, forcing a draw with king against K+P) - that is largely based on dealing tactically with the stalemate rule.

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              Ad hoc, did you ever hear back from the site in response to your appeal?

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                I got an email this weekend saying they'd forgotten to look into it and they would be doing so this week

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                  Originally posted by ad hoc View Post
                  I got an email this weekend saying they'd forgotten to look into it and they would be doing so this week
                  The professionalism just oozes off them.

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                    Originally posted by Evariste Euler Gauss View Post
                    That's quite impressive in a way, to play for a good few years without knowing about stalemate! Try looking up the lesson on chess.com about winning with king and pawn against bare king (or conversely, forcing a draw with king against K+P) - that is largely based on dealing tactically with the stalemate rule.
                    Come on, EEG, you have played against me enough to know that I am rarely in a position to force a checkmate let alone this. It's like I doubt Italy have a tactic for draws against Wales in the 6 Nations.

                    Thanks for that, I will have a look.

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                      https://twitter.com/ChampChessTour/status/1387848472741752837

                      Can someone help me out with one of the games Carlsen identifies here. Clearly he has phenomenal powers of recall, recognition and research and given that I can understand how he identifies most of them - impressive thought it is. But how does he work out the Anand vs Zapata one? Three standard moves, one unusual but not completely unheard of. And he identified the exact game. That position must have been in loads of games he's looked at. How did he know which one.
                      Last edited by Etienne; 03-05-2021, 07:58.

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                        My assumption (from other comments I read) is that Carlsen starts with knowing that it is likely some high-level match, picks out the unusual move and realizes it was Anand, then guesses one of them. He's doing a bit of 'cold reading' off the other guy here, as well. I don't know that match, but other comments implied it was fairly well-known.

                        I enjoyed (somewhere I read) that Carlsen's response to this video was basically: "People know this is my job, right?"

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                          The moves that Carlsen was shown are nothing unusual per se; the Petroff Defence (1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nf6) is a common, solid choice for Black.

                          Zapata-Anand is infamous because Anand resigned after White's sixth move as he was sure to lose his Knight: 1 e4 e5 2 Nf3 Nc6 3 Nxe5 d6 4 Nf3 Nxe4 5 Nc3 Bf5?? 6 Qe2 1-0. (If, say, 6 ... Qe7 7 Nd5, and the Queen must either move off the e-file and allow 8 d3, or if 7 ... Qe6 8 Nxc7+ wins.)

                          The fact that Howell plays out the moves from the start would have signalled to Carlsen that this was the game in question.

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                            OK, that makes sense. So, Carlsen knew these were likely to be famous games, and was able to guess on that basis.

                            ​​​​

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                              I think I might (NB "might") be able to recognise a position from precisely one (maximum) famous chess match in history - Morphy v Duke of Brunswick, 1859 (haven't checked that year but my memory for dates is rather better than for chess positions).

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                                Do I take it that we have kicked the tournaments in touch (in Chess.com, at least)? A shame if we have. I have been playing a couple of friends which has been enjoyable enough and having been winning a couple of matches - indeed just had a three match non-losing streak - enough to get my rating over 900. It has shown me how much better players you guys are. However, i do miss playing you all.

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                                  I'm up for a match with you, Bored, if there's not enough interest in a tournament. It's a tricky one tbh - I miss the tournaments too, and I don't know any chess site other than chess.com, but I am really pissed off about ad hoc's summary ejection from the site. ad hoc, I suppose no news yet of any review of their decision?

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                                    Yeah, I don't want to run a tournament if ad hoc isn't able to enter.

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                                      Yes, sorry about not updating my status. I did finally get a response and they declined to reverse their decision. However, their original threatening email which basically said "you can either appeal or you can sign a statement which said you cheated and then we'll let you open a new account, and if you appeal and your appeal fails you will never be allowed back" has now been modified somewhat, after I have appealed. Now I am being invited to open a new account (and I don't have to start by signing a statement, or hire a light aircraft to fly around the world trailing a banner saying "I am a cheat")

                                      So, now I'm pondering whether to do that. My inclination is no, but if me signing up again would encourage you lot to resume your tournaments I would probably do so

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                                        Actually, having written that I've gone into the form and I do need to click on a button marked "I admit that Chess.com's Fair Play Rules have been violated, and that outside assistance was used on my account."

                                        which I'm not going to do, so I'm remaining out of chess.com

                                        But, I really really don't think you should stop the OTF tournaments which are clearly enjoyable for everyone just because of this.

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                                          We could use another site. I just feel that if I managed to win an OTF tournament that you couldn't play in that it'd be a bit hollow.

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                                            gameknot is where I currently stay active. The tournament organization there is a bit 'premium subscription' focused, but there would be other options for making something happen there.

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                                              Originally posted by Etienne View Post
                                              Yeah, I don't want to run a tournament if ad hoc isn't able to enter.
                                              Absolutely this. There must be somewhere else we can go.

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                                                Yeah, fuck chess.com (albeit I will probably stay on it to play my mates as it is hard to explain to them about boycotting due to bad form against imaginary friends off t'internet)

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                                                  I was going to suggest (not for the first time) lichess.org but I've just signed in to my account there for the first time in ages and can't find an option to create a daily/correspondence tournament, only 'live' ones.

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                                                    Hold on a minute, you lot have started a tournament yourselves, haven’t you!

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