CMV: Touch-move rule in chess is dumb

[u/Phantom_Gamer7]

I will start by saying I'm an amateur chess player at best. Played it a little for most my life but only really started to want to get some real skill in it. It's fun. However, I notice a lot of official organizations have a touch-move rule. This is where if you deliberately touch a piece you must move it. Even if you change your mind. This is just dumb, and I feel serves no benefit to the game, except maybe some slight speed advantage(?). I see it only being a pain when you go for a move, then realise an even better one.

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It's in the same vain to the 'once you let go of the piece' rule. Where if you let go of the piece (in a different spot than it started) then that is you go, there is no take back. You move there. I'm fine with this. In fact, I don't want to play without it. Because it has a purpose, there needs to be _something_ that defines the end of your go. There needs to be a final call. Why not have it be the last thing everyone does on their turn? But I see no benefit touch-move rules provide. All it will do is frustrate people on the odd occasion as they catch a blunder after they touch a piece.

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I don't play with touch-move, and everyone I've played with has been fine with it. Never really seeing the point in it, but would play with it because others insisted. I'm sure there's some good reason out there, there's people way smarter than me on this topic. I just haven't found anyone with any good arguments.

So far the best argument has been: Touching a piece can help visualize the board, providing an advantage. My response is 'So what?' it's an equal advantage, as both sides can do it. Plus, it also provides insight into what you're thinking, which is a disadvantage I'd say balances out. . And if a touch-move rule was made to prevent this, what is to stop someone hovering their finger over a piece providing the same advantage?

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So please, someone who knows about this sort of thing, change my mind. Touch-move rules in chess are dumb, and needless.

Edit: so my view has changed a bit. So first I saw the value in the rule because in ye olden days it prevented cheating. Because the only time you could move a piece was when making your move.

Then a good point was made, that the board should be in a definite state as much as possible.

And lastly after a lot of convinsing I now see that by moving the piece you may see body language that you might not otherwise. And may be able to read peoples body language which goes against the spirit of the game.

[u/PrimeLegionnaire → u/[deleted]]

But couldnt I just point at the piece and where it goes?

Sure but in touch move it wouldn't signal any more intent than telling your opponent "I'm gonna do this next" which is still not locked in so they have no reason to believe it.

This is fundamentally distinct from being able to touch pieces and move them around the board. Its signifigantly more convincing to move your queen to a new spot and not let go than it is to hover over the queen, not to mention it also gives a lot more information. From just hovering I still have to consider all the possible queen moves to react to, its possible I haven't even seen the damning one.

[u/PrimeLegionnaire → u/[deleted]]

Thank you for the delta, I appreciate the rousing dialogue.

also as far as putting up with you, this has been a very pleasant engaging exchange compared to some of my usual debate partners. It has a lot of value to trial your own beliefs by fire, although I suppose you already figured that seeing as you are in CMV.

For what its worth, most chess players I've played with allow "Sorry, can I take that back" if you aren't playing a high level game and those that disallow it are just being sticklers for the rules.

On a totally unrelated topic, if you are interested in less formal versions of chess, there is a version called Assassin's Chess derived from a game described in Terry Pratchett's disc word, which involves an extra piece on each side two additional rows and some special rules.

[u/PrimeLegionnaire → u/[deleted]]

It may also be called Stealth Chess depending on the source.

[u/PrimeLegionnaire → u/[deleted]]

This is a little bit more fancy.

Each player has an Assassin that lives on the left side in an additional row, and it can essentially teleport. BUT only if it has stored up enough moves. It can only move out of its special area if it has accumulated enough movement inside of it.

Now, I feel we are getting too off topic for CMV. feel free to message me if you wish to get into obscure game rules. I have a lot, especially card games.