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Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

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Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#11

Post by fjsolwmv »

mindgam3 wrote: post #8
gregorymichael wrote: post #6

tl;dr after 11 draws, Carlsen offered a draw from a superior position in the final game to head into the short-format tiebreaks, where: > he is ranked No. 1 in all three formats (classical, rapid, and blitz). Caruana is ranked 10th and 18th in rapid and blitz respectively. Critics are appalled that he didn't fight for the win out of sense of honor. I don't see how this is different than, for instance, fouling at the…

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

Lower risk than playing the #10 seed in Rapid for the title?

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#12

Post by hackinthebochs »

mindgam3 wrote: post #8
gregorymichael wrote: post #6

tl;dr after 11 draws, Carlsen offered a draw from a superior position in the final game to head into the short-format tiebreaks, where: > he is ranked No. 1 in all three formats (classical, rapid, and blitz). Caruana is ranked 10th and 18th in rapid and blitz respectively. Critics are appalled that he didn't fight for the win out of sense of honor. I don't see how this is different than, for instance, fouling at the…

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

Time pressure and the position being in flux guaranteed that Fabi would accept the draw. If he had waited a few more moves, Fabi might have decided to play on. While Magnus was on the attack, his king position wasn't secure. If Fabi could have secured his position, he might have chosen to play on, considering he knows Magnus is the favorite to win the tie break.

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#13

Post by nic_wilson »

fjsolwmv wrote: post #10
lazyant wrote: post #4

In past World Chess Championships when they finished tied with points the current champion retained the title, which I found disappointing https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Chess_Championship_1987#...

The effectively cointoss plan for this tourney isn't better. They should accept co-titles for equally matched players

I like this idea but not sure how that would work in the format of the World Chess Championship.

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#14

Post by amenghra »

mindgam3 wrote: post #8
gregorymichael wrote: post #6

tl;dr after 11 draws, Carlsen offered a draw from a superior position in the final game to head into the short-format tiebreaks, where: > he is ranked No. 1 in all three formats (classical, rapid, and blitz). Caruana is ranked 10th and 18th in rapid and blitz respectively. Critics are appalled that he didn't fight for the win out of sense of honor. I don't see how this is different than, for instance, fouling at the…

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

Perhaps Carlsen is confident he'll win the blitz games tomorrow? Caruana was low on time, but they are both 9 moves away from getting additional time.

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#15

Post by enneff »

mindgam3 wrote: post #2

Ladies, if he: - doesn’t return your texts - doesn’t comment on your pics - offers a draw in a clearly superior position just as his opponent gets into time trouble in the final round of the World Chess Championships - says he “doesn’t care” at the press conference when informed that all chess playing engines, grandmasters, and rank amateurs could see that he had a dominating position - was previously legendary for h…

> says he “doesn’t care” at the press conference when informed that all chess playing engines, grandmasters, and rank amateurs could see that he had a dominating position

This response was to a question that only mentioned the engine, not the other embellishments you added. It was a stupid question. The engines can always see something that humans cannot. Magnus is one of the best chess players in the world, playing against his strongest competitor, and he didn’t see a path to a win from that position. Why should he care if the engine could?

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#16

Post by yazaddaruvala »

mindgam3 wrote: post #8
gregorymichael wrote: post #6

tl;dr after 11 draws, Carlsen offered a draw from a superior position in the final game to head into the short-format tiebreaks, where: > he is ranked No. 1 in all three formats (classical, rapid, and blitz). Caruana is ranked 10th and 18th in rapid and blitz respectively. Critics are appalled that he didn't fight for the win out of sense of honor. I don't see how this is different than, for instance, fouling at the…

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

Has it not occurred to anyone that maybe Carlsen is just bored?

It takes effort to tie 12 straight games between two world champions.

Additionally, it is not in Carlsen's best interest to finish the tournament. During the tournament he is a super star. After the tournament he is just some guy who has a chess trophy (i.e. most people in real life don't care).

Maybe he is just testing himself with some criteria that is harder than "just winning... again"?

Maybe he just wants to prolong his time in the spotlight? Create some drama, have people talk about the year where every game, including Armageddon, ended in a draw!

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#17

Post by mindgam3 »

gregorymichael wrote: post #9
mindgam3 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

I don't understand either. But Carlsen was in the seat for all 12 games, and he knows what was going on in his own head. Maybe he was simply exhausted and didn't trust his decision. Maybe that particular position gave him difficulty in a match four years ago. For whatever reason, the best chess player in the world decided that offering the draw was his best move in that moment.

I tend to agree. The most plausible reason I can think of is a combination of him being supremely confident in his rapid skills + being a bit afraid of Caruana in classical. But his lack of confidence in himself in classical is not a good sign going into the blitz.

The best chess player in the world got there by using good judgment when it comes to selective aggression. We’ll find out tomorrow if this was a brilliant move to fend off a challenger or the beginning of the end...

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#18

Post by z92 »

scrooched_moose wrote: post #3

If anyone doesn't know, "Armageddon" is a type of chess game that guarantees a victor; it's not just a click-bait title. It's the last tiebreaker after a series of other Rapid and Blitz games. (all this is covered, just way at the end of the article) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fast_chess#Armageddon fivethirtyeight has been covering the tournament and their rough calculation gives it a 1:5000 chance of making it to…

Armageddon :

"the players proceed to a single game of Armageddon, where the parameters are set to so far as possible give each side a 50-percent chance of winning—White gets 5 minutes, Black gets 4 minutes, and a draw will make Black the World Champion."

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#19

Post by mindgam3 »

fjsolwmv wrote: post #11
mindgam3 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

Lower risk than playing the #10 seed in Rapid for the title?

Rapid and blitz chess rely on trusting one’s intuition. If he doesn’t trust himself enough to play on in such a strong position, his admittedly large advantage in rapid may evaporate.

Re: Armageddon Looms over World Chess Champs after Carlsen’s Shocking Decision

#20

Post by mindgam3 »

hackinthebochs wrote: post #12
mindgam3 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What I don’t understand is why Carlsen didn’t push for even a few more moves. Fabi was running out time, it was low risk for him to probe a little more and see if he could get something a little more decisive.

Time pressure and the position being in flux guaranteed that Fabi would accept the draw. If he had waited a few more moves, Fabi might have decided to play on. While Magnus was on the attack, his king position wasn't secure. If Fabi could have secured his position, he might have chosen to play on, considering he knows Magnus is the favorite to win the tie break.

Fabi had no real chances for counterplay any time soon. This is why playing on for at least 5 more moves would have been advantageous. Virtually guaranteed fabi would accept a draw even if Carlsen makes no headway given Fabi having burned a few more minutes on the clock.
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