The game of chess needs 2 major changes.......

[Chessqueen]

I'd change the points allocated to something as follows (just an example):

1.0 White win
1.4 Black win
0.5 White draw
0.7 Black draw

Chess needs NO CHANGES for 99.99% of we human beings.

I agree.

That is the reason why I started with this statement. There are so many Engine vs engine draws etc ...concluding that Chess needs NO CHANGES for 99.99% of we human beings.... But I believe Mr. Graham nailed it by mentioning and proposing to change the points.

[jefk]

"Chess needs NO CHANGES for 99.99% of we human beings."

but Correspondence chess, where computers are a allowed, imo (soon) needs changes at
least for the top 30 pct or so of the participants (who are knowledgeable about computer
chess); within this group, games are only lost if someone passes away, or (possibly) gets a
(usually windows) system crash and lost motivation, ergo only some rare events.

Allowing scoring(s) with several values between 0 and 1 is an option (it also would allow
including remaining endgame material differences (eg. giving 0.7 vs 0.3 if you're a pawn up in the
endgame ) But (-besides ensuring equal b-w games ie. a vs b and b vs a) it also would
require changes to tournament software which nowadays only awards with 0, 0.5 or 1.0.
Considering the impact of other changes as eg. some proposed Kaufman rules
(where there's still some discussion i noticed eg. about draw rules when comparing
with Shogi), this imo shouldn't be a big hurdle.
Then, as long as there isn't a 'strong solution' for chess (which will take quite some
time i admit) there are the engine tourns, and besides the restricted openings, other
rules may also be an option (to distinguish the strength of various engines; whereby
for human analysis Lc0 imo already has achieved what most humans need; for
conventional Cpu's, engines as Obsidian (made from Lc0 network, or Mtcs engines
as K.dragon and Shashchess also are ok, and the latest SF also isn't that bad btw )

A coordinated effort (or at least study) instead of looses discussion fragments
in various threads (mainly in this forum) would certainly help i guess.
New anti-draw chess would be a new variant anyway, at least initially, but indeed it should
be as close to original chess as possible for obvious reasons (there are zillions of other
chess variants, only chess960 got accepted (and maybe later a restricted chessxxx with
less than 960 options), and this is after many decades after a certain Fischer proposed it.

Thus it's not an easy topic, and imo requires coordinated effeort(s) so I'll see if i
can setup a separate thread here with eg. 'Adressing the draw problem in (engine)
chess, e.g. with modified rules' (if there's not someone else who wants to initiate this topic)

[Ras]

People who think that chess has become boring should just quit chess. Pick up Go or something. At least, that doesn't pretend to be a "fixed" (rather: ruined) chess.

[towforce]

I'd change the points allocated to something as follows (just an example):

1.0 White win
1.4 Black win
0.5 White draw
0.7 Black draw

Good idea.

[towforce]

I'd change the points allocated to something as follows (just an example):

1.0 White win
1.4 Black win
0.5 White draw
0.7 Black draw

Good idea.

Caveat: this would be good for humans, but for unbeatable engines, it would give an unfair advantage to black.

[jefk]

tf wrote (about the GB scoring proposal)
"Good idea"

maybe, but it's just one proposal, and it should be tested imho (yeah also
with engines, if this is an unfair advantage for Black, then it can be
adjusted in such a way it becomes more 'level').

And like i said some tournament software should be adjusted; with
some open source tourn software that should be no big deal for some
genius blokes here in the programming forum i presume

[chesskobra]

maybe, but it's just one proposal, and it should be tested imho (yeah also
with engines, if this is an unfair advantage for Black, then it can be
adjusted in such a way it becomes more 'level').

Since you believe that chess is a draw, you should only accept equal points for white win (draw) or black win (draw); otherwise it is not 'level'.

But I agree with another poster that chess ain't broken, so don't fix it. There was plenty of exciting chess in the recent candidates and in the last world championship. Those who do not like draws can take up something like Hex, which is always decisive. In fact what is nice about Hex is that it is theoretically winning for white but nobody knows an explicit winning strategy. For such a game black win may be rewarded more in terms of points. Or maybe if a chess game is drawn, the players have to play a game of Hex to decide the winner. That would be better than armageddon.

But if a rule change is contemplated, my suggestion is to permit only opposite side castling. So if your opponent castles first, you have only one side available for castling. This does not make the game unrecognisably different to be considered a variant.

[jefk]

chesskobra wrote

agree with another poster that chess ain't broken, so don't fix it

Well maybe you (and the other poster) also think chess960 shouldn't exist
(but it does, and was recently called Freestyle chess in a high level tourn in Germany
as you may or may not know). Anyway my comments were not about normal chess,
but like i wrote, correspondence chess with comps (and possibly engine chess, although
people seem to be happy to play it with restricted openings; how it's going nowadays
on playchess.com with engines, i dunno, but it's mostly a hardware battle i suspect).

Second, even for correspondence chess, we're only talking about one (instead of
hundreds) extra variant(S), with much less (or no) draws, for those who would
appreciate that; which is not you apparently. Normal ICCF corresp chess still can remain
ofcoure as was indicated in the FB group for the ICCF some people still like it because
of eg. opening testing, and getting some experience with high level games.
But then like i wrote, it's imo about the top 1/3 of correspondence players and that's
obvious a small minority of all conventional human online or otb players;
nevertheless (rough estimate) still a few thousand people; and a few hundred
involved maybe in engine tourns and testing.

Since you believe that chess is a draw,

Weell it is a draw indeed with perfect play, that's not a matter of belief (i'm
also close to a -now better- proof I think, first for checkers with network
theory, and then the same or similar method for draughts and chess
but not going to write this here for obvious reasons (negativity etc).

you should only accept equal points for white win
(draw) or black win (draw); otherwise it is not 'level'.

It's not only about me, ideas to add another variant have been made
by Arno Nickel, mr Kaufman, Uri Blass i think, myself, plus some input
sometimes from some others. The 0.7/0.6/0.4/0.3 idea was an
idea by GB, and i also thought a white draw or a black draw shouldn't
make a difference. But for the rest some compensation for Black
isn't such a bad idea. Although chess indeed is a draw with perfect play,
White has a slight positional edge towards the endgame, this is more
clear when you analyze with engines as Obsidian or Lc0 instead of
the (older) SF like in the Chinese database (but this small edge
fundamentally is not sufficient for a win and is reduced to 0.0 as
soon as the game hits the endgame table bases). A slight compensation
of such an edge for White can be an idea, eg. for fast engine tourns, but
indeed it hardly makes sense in high level correspondence chess (i better
like the sort of proposals like by mr Kaufman where draws are abolished).
Anyway a possible -variable compensation for Black in engine testing, like i
wrote, should be tested (eg. with another SF fairy variant just like some
other proposals, like yours for example with opposite castling but then
opening theory will be drastically changed which not many conventional
correspondence would like; second opposite castling is more logical i
think when we switch the queen and the king, but then it already exists,
namely variant 'wild 0 as available on FICS apparently.

[lkaufman]

maybe, but it's just one proposal, and it should be tested imho (yeah also
with engines, if this is an unfair advantage for Black, then it can be
adjusted in such a way it becomes more 'level').

Since you believe that chess is a draw, you should only accept equal points for white win (draw) or black win (draw); otherwise it is not 'level'.

But I agree with another poster that chess ain't broken, so don't fix it. There was plenty of exciting chess in the recent candidates and in the last world championship. Those who do not like draws can take up something like Hex, which is always decisive. In fact what is nice about Hex is that it is theoretically winning for white but nobody knows an explicit winning strategy. For such a game black win may be rewarded more in terms of points. Or maybe if a chess game is drawn, the players have to play a game of Hex to decide the winner. That would be better than armageddon.

But if a rule change is contemplated, my suggestion is to permit only opposite side castling. So if your opponent castles first, you have only one side available for castling. This does not make the game unrecognisably different to be considered a variant.

This is actually a great rule if combined with Armageddon rule. The point is that it greatly increases white's advantage, he can castle short first and force Black to aim for long castling, which takes longer and even if achieved a draw isn't so likely. White's winning chances should be close to fifty percent. You can roughly simulate it by setting castling rights as short for White and long for Black.

[chesskobra]

But if a rule change is contemplated, my suggestion is to permit only opposite side castling. So if your opponent castles first, you have only one side available for castling. This does not make the game unrecognisably different to be considered a variant.

This is actually a great rule if combined with Armageddon rule. The point is that it greatly increases white's advantage, he can castle short first and force Black to aim for long castling, which takes longer and even if achieved a draw isn't so likely. White's winning chances should be close to fifty percent. You can roughly simulate it by setting castling rights as short for White and long for Black.

I will try to simulate this on the weekend. But now that I think about it, it seems somewhat like simply using unbalanced openings.