In a blitz tournament, G/5, d0, White plays Qb7 mate with one second left on his clock, but knocks over a pawn. Before he can replace the pawn on its square Black calls White’s flag. Both players have mating material. What’s the result?
Doesn’t rule 13A apply in this situation? Determining a legal move resulting in checkmate immediately ends the game. It does not matter whether White has knocked over a pawn or pressed his clock; the game is over.
It’s not clear whether White knocked over the pawn before or after he played the checkmating move. Would you change your answer if it could be established that White knocked over the pawn before playing Qb7#, or at the same time?
I would let the mate stand. The fallen pawn is mere collateral damage.
Now that blitz is going to be rated, does everyone realize that there will be an increase in arguments, belligerence, fistfights, and other hyperaggressive poor behavior? There is enough of that in unrated blitz. Have seen more than a few fights over a game because of perceived tricky behavior and bending/breaking of “rules”, especially where money is involved. We already know how precious rating points are to some people.
Once a move that produces checkmate has been determined, unless I’m missing something, the only claim that is allowed is that the move is illegal. Otherwise, the game is over, and the time for claims has passed.
Seems like the only place people worry about such things is PA. We are such a gentle, peace-loving commonwealth, too.
I see the Marshall plans to run Blitz tournaments with cash prizes big enough to notice in NYC later this year. Could be interesting.
I disagree with this because depending on where the pawn was could determine whether the move was legal or not.
I would defer to blitz rule #9:
9.) If a player accidentally displaces one or more pieces, they shall be replaced on (sic) the player’s own time. If it is necessary, the opponent may press the clock without making a move. If the player presses the clock after displacing pieces, then a penalty may be assessed.
IMHO, if it was determined that the pawn was knocked over prior to the checkmate, or at the same time, then I would uphold the loss on time as the player clearly has to reestablish the position on his own time before making a move.
If the checkmating move was made and completed then somehow the pawn got knocked over then the checkmate would stand.
If it was undetermined which happened first then you have a decision to make. I would hazard a guess that in the majority of times the pawn would be knocked off the square prior to, or at the same time, as the mating move was made.
There are no procedures in place for what happens if there is a class prize of $2000 or more in a Blitz event. If that event uses Blitz ratings, does that create a Blitz money floor? A regular money floor?
If that event uses regular ratings for section and pairing purposes, should that create a regular money floor? A Blitz money floor?
Speaking of money floors: thepennyfloor.com/
An interesting detail. I’ve been reading this thread thinking it’s a random and superfluous rook pawn that has no bearing on the final mating position.
If you’re not keeping score and there are no witnesses, how can a TD verify which pawn was knocked over and whether it would have blocked the mating move? White has a mating position on the board and Black has called White’s flag…Black would claim his pawn was blocking the mating move and White will claim the pawn didn’t blocked it. Complete impasse.
Black didn’t claim that White’s mating move was illegal. His claim was that it wasn’t checkmate until White replaced the pawn on its correct square, so White lost on time.
Then Black has tried to be clever, but has lost. The legal move causing Mate ended the game.
Now I’m more interested in the thoughts on the dispute over whether the checkmating move was legal based on the previous position of the displaced pawn or piece. I assume that there would need to be witnesses to support Black’s contention that White loses on time; otherwise White’s checkmating move (provided all else is legal) would end the game.
There’s a technical problem here, that I’m sure you would have pointed out if the above question had been posed by anyone other than yourself.
How is it possible to determine, from the rating report submitted by the organizer, whether regular or blitz ratings were used for section, pairing, and prize purposes?
Bill Smythe
Clairvoyance.
I once tried to date a woman named Clair Voyance. But she broke up with me first. (variant of Steven Wright)
All those who believe in psychokinesis raise my hand. - Steven Wright.
I would think even more interesting would be - “How much piece displacement need occur before we would agree with Black’s argument?”
Currently there is no way to tell, but if the rules for issuing money prize floors from blitz events depended upon knowing that information, we would have to ask about it.
There’s already a checkbox for ‘blitz rules used’, it would not be difficult to add one for ‘blitz ratings used’ or, more likely, a radio button for blitz/QR/regular ratings. As this is information that is not in the current upload file, it would mean TDs would have to edit that field for each section in that event, just like they have to edit things like the time control information.
The question is academic at this point, at least until someone runs a Blitz event that has $2000 or higher class prizes in it. Shouldn’t we have rules in place before that happens?
A new XML-based rating report format would probably ask both what type of ratings were used for each section and what specific ratings were used for each player. The latter is something WinTD and SwisSys know, but not necessarily the former.
Does “radio button” imply that only one button can be selected or can any combination of buttons be selected? CCA quick tournaments use regular or quick rating, whichever is higher.
That was my ruling: that White won because he checkmated Black. So far most TDs agree with that, with two notable exceptions: Chris Bird and Bill Goichberg. Chris made the argument in favor of Black winning on time in his reply earlier in this topic. In justification of my ruling I will cite rule 11C in the 5th edition rulebook:
As I see it, since White has checkmated Black the game is over and there no need for White to press the clock, hence no need for White to reestablish the position. If the rule had said “the move is not complete (or determined) until the position has been reestablished” then I would agree that White would lose on time unless it could be proved that he knocked over the pawn after playing Qb7#.
Of course in this game we were using blitz rules rather than regular rules, but I think the principle is the same. As Chris Bird said, the blitz rule is:
Again, the rule doesn’t say that the move isn’t complete until the displaced piece(s) has/have been replaced, but it does say that a player can be penalized for pressing the clock without replacing the piece(s).
Given that the rules are somewhat ambiguous maybe in the next edition of the rulebook there should be a TD tip addressing the situation where one or more pieces are displaced in the process of making a move which ends the game, e.g. by checkmate or stalemate.
I have difficulty bringing myself to agree with this. Again, I may well be oversimplifying, but I believe rules 13A and 14A are clear in stating that a legal move producing checkmate or stalemate, respectively, immediately ends the game. There is already a TD Tip that clarifies that it is not necessary to press the clock in this situation.
I believe you made a correct ruling by applying the text that already exists.
What’s clear to one TD may not be clear to another one. Take the Rule 32B3 prize distribution discussion that we had last summer, for example. It would be nice if the rules were unambiguous enough that any competent TD would rule the same way in a given situation.