Quote:some are afraid it's a way of fixing games.
Well, technically it is of course. The problem, as SWJediknight says, is the drawishness of top-leve chess now. It seems the computers have done a lot to take the fun out of the game, for those of us who care most about the fight between two fallible humans...
Gididns wrote something similar over at Chessbase:
http://www.chessbase.com/newsdetail.asp?newsid=8162 I don't want to see competitive chess dying a slow death, so what's the best way to make it less drawish while retaining the elements that make it worthwhile? The "no-draw-offers" rules seem rather comical when people are forced to play on in hopelessly drawn position or when neither side is motivated to make an effort; so the incentives or the nature of the game must be changed too.
I had some hopes for the Sofia rules, but they don't seem to make much difference in practice. I didn't think I would ever say this, but I think shorter time controls (leading to more errors) will be part of the solution. And also, contra Giddins, Chess960 could be worthwhile in the future. Or develop western chess in the direction of Shogi and Bughouse, where captured pieces may reappear on the board.
All these will make the game less drawish while preserving the fight and the mental challenge. Though radical changes to the rules will of course "level the playing field" and devalue a lot of the hard work currently strong players have done to build up their knowledge, so the change is hard to accept...
I wonder how smoothly the 15th century rule changes went by; were there lots of protests from experts bent on keeping the rules all their strategies and knowledge were tied to?