Are there any big chinese chess tournaments or even a world/country chines chess tournament. I am confused about "Chinese Chess", sounds like something made up. Or "Chinese Chess" isnt the real name of the game that you are talking about.

http://boardgamecentral.com/games/x...

The pieces in the very first picture, is the setup of the pieces before play.

The middle of the board is where the 'river' is. And immediate behind it, is the five soldiers (pawns). followed by 2 cannons.

Anyway, you're just trying to prove that stalemate=win would lead to absurd situations. But such situations would be very rare, while the stalemate=draw rule much often saves from a due defeat a player that has been outplayed during the whole game.

Other have written that if a player overlooks a stalemate trick he doesn't deserve to win. I don't agree with that. It's like if you are going to win a 100 meters race. When you are arriving first someone moves the target line another 100 meters ahead. And if you don't arrive first this time someone tells you "ha ha, you see, you didn't deserve to win". Ok, if you are very good you'll still win the race, but why needing to continuously prove something?

I think <al wazir>'s points are sound. Evidently, you don't because stalemate is often a "trick" to save an outplayed player from defeat. But then, what about the "perpetual check" trick? Would you say that this should not be treated as a draw either? After all, it is also often used to save the player with a worse position.

Starting with the position

click for larger view

(again, don't ask me to justify it), the moves are 1...cxb2+ 2. Kb1.

A stalemate occurs when a player is not in check, but his position is so dire he cannot make a single move without exposing his king to capture. The verdict in this scenario: Drawn. Now, think about this objectively for a moment. Does this result make sense to you? If a golfer hits a ball so far into the woods he has no shot, would it make sense to award him a par? If a boxer has been pummeled to the point where he can no longer defend himself, would it make sense to call the fight a draw? Clearly, the rule is illogical. Far more logical would be to treat a stalemate position is a kind of "zugzwang checkmate" - the king, under compulsion to move, must surrender in lieu of throwing himself to the wolves.

Aside from eliminating an illogical rule, awarding a win for a stalemate would have the added benefit of reducing draws, a definite problem in top level chess. Now, some players will say to that, "Oh, come on. I've been playing tournament chess for years, and I've never had a game end in stalemate. I doubt one game in 5,000 does. The increase in decisive games would be trivial." Well, actually that's not true - stalemates are a lot more prevalent than you might think. Many textbook draws - king plus pawn vs. king, for example - are drawn because playing out the position would ultimately lead to stalemate. The stalemate never actually occurs on the board because the ending is never played out to the point of stalemate. So, make stalemates a win for the stronger side and you'll see a tangible drop in the percentage of drawn games.

Now, some folks fond of irony like to argue that eliminating stalemates would INCREASE the number of draws. No, that's as absurd as it sounds. If you believe that taking away stalemates would increase the number of draws because players would take fewer risks, then you must also believe that removing seat belts from automobiles would reduce fatal accidents, because it would encourage drivers to be more cautious. Anyway, the "tangible drop" when stalemate = win is probably only a few percentage points. For exampe, most pawn down R+P endgames don't require the stalemate rule to hold the draw. So, I doubt that eliminating stalemates will discourage the sacrificial maniacs.

<al wazir> You're right! You could make a contest on who can create a legal chess game ending with that position!

<YouRang> Of course many endgames would change value, so what?

Don't worry nobody will ever change such rules, but I'm sure that if chess were invented today from scratch the king could be taken, the stalemate would be a win, the en passant would not exist and probably the king would already be in a safe position at the beginning.

And notwithstanding these simplification nobody would play it, because it would be deemed too complex for a modern game!

If, on the other hand (as dzechiel said) a knight on f5 using the old rules could take the pawn on e4, and (after the rule change) could now take another pawn in a a similar situation (Nf6 could take a pawn on e5, etc) then the rule would be valid.

The game could be tied 0-0 after 9 innings, even though team A got several more hits than team B. Maybe team A got runners to 3rd base several times, and team B only got a few runners to first base. Should we award the win to team A?

I would answer, "no". However you look at it, either team A failed to capitalize on their opportunities, or team B successfully stopped them.

There is nothing wrong with the simple rule that says to win, you must checkMATE. Checkmate is clearly superior to stalemate, so it makes sense to call checkmate a win and stalemant a non-win.