Life In 19x19

Perhaps it would be very convenient to arrange chess, shogi, xiangqi, makruk, shituyan, etc, and also Atlantic Draughts variants so that they never use per-side timing. When you do for games that don't self-end, you have to introduce inelegant features like the 50-move rule and such. These games are played on 2 dimensions of space and 1 dimension of time, and there is a way to handle the last one way more simply and conveniently than even my last mention.

Especially since draw are so common in these games. The method is . . . To . . . Have a single time limit shared by both players. When the time runs out, the score fraction between zero and 1 is determined by the proportion of time each player used. However if one player wins outright, then all the remaining time left is used up by the opponent. If a stalemate occurs, both players share the rest of the time!

Go, on the other hand, can be self-ending because we can base move limit quite easily based on the number of points, 360. so that after that number of moves players switch must play all their moves from the prisoners lid. If your opponent captures your stones, it gives you more stones to play with. Not 361, to make sure black is normally first to play from prisoners lid. Only triple or more ko can extend this setup, but that can be automatically labelled as a draw with no need for superko.

Afro-arabic Draughts variants namely mancala-backgammon, since they are almost certainly just variants of the exact same game, can also use per side absolute time limits since they are also self-ending.

There isn't necessarily a need for Fischer or Byo-yomi except Hayago TV matches, in which case of course these are way better.

I think this proposal is an attempt to solve a problem that doesn’t exist. When I play casually with a friend, I have no need for a time limit at all. When I play online or in a tournament, existing ways of limiting the time spent on a single game are sufficient.

This would also, in my mind, make the game worse in practice. It doesn’t make gameplay more elegant (simpler to implement or understand) and it introduces an additional axis for gamesmanship that takes away from the contest on the board. I would find it immensely dissatisfying to have the game scored as a proportion of time used, and it would lead to situations where one player rushes the opening and, as soon as the other player had used close to their half of the time , the first player could create a difficult situation and then allow time to run out to score a “victory,” even if by a slim margin. What not just allow one player to run out of time in an absolute sense, if that’s the same end you’re headed towards?

jeromie wrote:I think this proposal is an attempt to solve a problem that doesn’t exist. When I play casually with a friend, I have no need for a time limit at all. When I play online or in a tournament, existing ways of limiting the time spent on a single game are sufficient.

This would also, in my mind, make the game worse in practice. It doesn’t make gameplay more elegant (simpler to implement or understand) and it introduces an additional axis for gamesmanship that takes away from the contest on the board. I would find it immensely dissatisfying to have the game scored as a proportion of time used, and it would lead to situations where one player rushes the opening and, as soon as the other player had used close to their half of the time , the first player could create a difficult situation and then allow time to run out to score a “victory,” even if by a slim margin. What not just allow one player to run out of time in an absolute sense, if that’s the same end you’re headed towards?

Firstly, your correct that I should clarify that this isn't meant for casual games. This is a time setting only for tournament games or multi-game matches. And two, forms of gamesmanship would use relatively extreme examples. In a single casual game there's no practical difference anyway, although fischer and byo-yomi's may be better for the same reason as in TV games!

In the case where the player used close to half their time, the entire point of this time limit is to simulate absolute timing while preventing one player forcing a win on time when there is a draw on the board. If they used absolute timing they would have nearly run out of time anyway and the first would create a difficult situation on the board and win on time. In other words, each player is supposed play exactly as if it were in absolute timing. The only difference is in absolute timing the second player would get zero points while in the first they get a bit more than that. In addition, the first player can't 'just' create a difficult situation, since no matter the timing system the second player is not supposed to play without determining whether they have enough time left to allow. In other words, they should avoid overly complicated positions if don't have much time left or if they've used up too much time no matter what the timing system is.

So, just as in absolute timing, the entire second player should not use up more than half the time. It would be a timeout anyway in absolute timing. The only difference is that in a tournament there is no incentive because they would score less points the more time they use and points are aggregated throughout the chess tournament.