EvC Chess Tournament

EvC Members:We have decided that with the recent increase in chess playing between EvC members it would be interesting to have an "official" tournament where each player could advance through a series of games until one player (or two) came out the final victor and would be declared EvC Ultimate Chess Champion.The site that would be used is: Play chess online! Join the premier online chess battleground. Play chess games online with friends or compete in chess tournaments and more, FREE!. If you would like to enter the tournament, please sign up with a username at that site and list it here in this thread. Tournament matchups will be announced pending adequate participation. Sign up will take place between now and this Friday. If adequate participation is had, matchups will be assembled over the weekend and announced on Monday, along with instructions on how to set up a game, take an appropriate screenshot, and other basic rules and/or regulations.Once again, if you are interested in participating, please register at Play chess online! Join the premier online chess battleground. Play chess games online with friends or compete in chess tournaments and more, FREE! and post your registration name here before Friday of this week. Best of luck to all those who participate .Regards,
Jon A.
EvC Chess Council

I will be the first to enter. My username at gameknot is: jonevcJ0N

I will enter. My username is phatevc

I'm entering. but only in unrated games.unless the person has a high enough of a rating so that even winning doesn't lose me points.

Don't worry, that is definitely one of the conditions. This tournament is being held for ranking in EvC chess, NOT at GameKnot. This tournament will have no affect on your member rating at GameKnot.Would you also provide us with your member name, please?Thanks,
Jon
EvC Chess Council

Members:I should probably make a post to include everyone in the following information regarding the overseeing of the tournament. The EvC Chess Council will be responsible for matching opponents and keeping track of who is to play who next. As of now, the EvC Chess Council consists of three people: Phat, Kuresu, and myself. In my opinion, we should be able to properly handle the tournament; however, I am leaving it up to the other council members to make the final decision as to whether or not they want additional people on the council.Thanks,
Jon
EvC Chess Council

I signed up at gameknot last night. My username is zawievc

oh yeah, i forgot. i've got an evil profile name there.it'sk_himagachi.

A question: is on-line chess playing meaningful since anyone can use any of a number of chess programs? Maybe it's just me, but if I can't see my opponent's hand strike the chess clock right in front of me, then his move could have come from anywhere.I remember having similar thoughts back in grad school where Hans Berliner was also a student (the oldest in the department, as it happened). Though he was working almost exclusively on his backgammon program at the time (what a fun way to get a PhD!), he'd been a world postal chess champion, and one question I asked him more than once was what guaranteed against cheating in postal chess. His reply was that if you weren't the best player you knew, then you shouldn't be playing in such competitions. Of course, while this was a good decade after the Greenblatt program, it was still in the days before truly effective chess playing programs existed.But today everyone has access to great chess playing programs.--Percy

I'm in. Gameknot ID=Omnivorous.I can't imagine taking any satisfaction in cheating one's way into victory in a contest of skill, but who knows?--especially among all these unbelieving evilutionists who have no objective moral underpinning.Still, there's no alternative to an honor system on not resorting to chess analysis software.

The site rules at GameKnot prohibit using a computer to move. Anyone caught doing it will be immediately suspended from GameKnot.I would like to make a motion for the other members of the council for the following:
"I should now say, and perhaps set this up as the first rule of the EvC tournament, that you will not only lose membership at GameKnot, but will also be immediately removed from the tournament, and possibly shamed and/or stoned by fellow members if you are found to be determining moves with any other device than your own brain. That includes people, computers, chess manuals, etc."Learn what you need to know now, because looking up strategies in a book during the middle of a game, will result in disqualification from the tournament."Council members can discuss this, or vote on it. Two votes are needed to pass it. (too few concil members for all that seconding mumble jumble )Thanks,
Jon
EvC Chess Council

Hi, Jon. May I suggest a protocol for this potential problem?I doubt anyone here is playing above USCF Expert level--if so, they are almost certainly USCF-rated and should declare and document that now (USCF ratings, I believe, are public). I once played just above USCF Expert level, but that was 30 years ago when I was regularly active in tournament play .Most chess software allows the user to set the skill level for the analysis of specific positions: if a player protests that an opponent seems to be playing too expertly, the EvC Chess Council could use software set to Expert or Master level to consider whether the play seems to be artificially augmented.But I am optimistic that EvC members will play with honesty and honor.

I share in your optimism, but the Council can still look into the obtaining of special software that could be used if (and only if) one member called another member out for unusually expert game-play.Jon
EvC Chess Council

The enforcement part of the proposal is clear, but what about the detection part? This seems a crime impossible to detect. Somebody pulls a 14-move double-bishop, double-knight, double-castle, queen sacrifice leading to mate and you say, "Wait a minute, that's just too incredible, you must be using Deep Blue," and the reply comes back, "I didn't look 14 moves ahead, I just saw a few moves ahead and then other opportunities became apparent as we played." Or maybe, "I didn't look 14 moves ahead, I just made a mistake, lost my bishop, made another mistake, lost my knight, attempted to rally but lost my queen, then I got desperate and starting looking for opportunities and found that forced mate which by that time was only a few moves away."About not studying chess books while playing, during the period in my life when I was playing tournaments I always had my nose in at least several chess books all the time. To expect someone to sit at a computer screen waiting for their opponent's next move and just tap their fingers, or to not investigate things when there's a suspension in play, just doesn't seem reasonable.Or if there's someone else in the room peering over their shoulder, there's bound to be kibitzing.Maybe it's just me. Perhaps I have an overdeveloped sense of cynicism. But I don't think so. All I have to do is look around this board and count the number of times people have tried to pass off a cut-n-paste as their own to restore my faith in human nature. --Percy

User name is the same