Draw (chess)


In chess, there are a number of ways that a game can end in a draw, neither player winning. Usually, in tournaments a draw is worth a half point to each player, while a win is worth one point to the victor and none to the loser.
Draws are codified by various rules of chess including stalemate, threefold repetition, and the fifty-move rule. Under the standard FIDE rules, a draw also occurs "in dead position", when no sequence of legal moves can lead to checkmate, most commonly when neither player has sufficient to checkmate the opponent.
Unless specific tournament rules forbid it, players may agree to a draw at any time. Ethical considerations may make a draw uncustomary in situations where at least one player has a reasonable chance of winning. For example, a draw could be called after a move or two, but this would likely be thought unsporting.
Until 1867, tournament games that were drawn were replayed. The Paris tournament of 1867 had so many drawn games to be replayed that it caused organisational problems. In 1868 the British Chess Association decided to award each player half a point instead of replaying the game.

Draw rules

The rules allow for several types of draws: stalemate, threefold repetition of a position, if there has been no or a pawn being moved in the last fifty moves, if checkmate is impossible, or if the players agree to a draw. In games played under time control, a draw may result under additional conditions. A stalemate is an automatic draw, as is a draw because of insufficient to checkmate. A draw by threefold repetition or the fifty-move rule may be claimed by one of the players with the , and claiming it is optional.
A claim of a draw first counts as an offer of a draw, and the opponent may accept the draw without the arbiter examining the claim. Once a claim or draw offer has been made, it cannot be withdrawn. If the claim is verified or the draw offer accepted, the game is over. Otherwise, the offer or claim is nullified and the game continues; the draw offer is no longer in effect.
An offer of a draw should be made after a player makes a move but before he presses his game clock. The other player also declines the offer if he makes a move, and the draw offer will no longer be in effect. The offer of a draw should be recorded by each player in their using the symbol as per Appendix C.12 of FIDE Laws of Chess.
In early tournaments, draws were often replayed until one of the players won, however this was found to be impractical and caused organizational difficulties. Since then, a draw has normally been scored as a half point to each player. A minority of tournaments use a different scoring scheme, such as "football scoring" where 3 points are awarded to the winner and 1 point to each in the event of a draw. For the purpose of calculating Elo rating, these tournaments are treated as if they were using standard scoring.

Draws in all games

Article 5 of the 2018 FIDE Laws of Chess gives the basic ways a game may end in a draw; more complicated ways are detailed in Article 9:.
It is popularly considered that perpetual check – where one player gives a series of checks from which the other player cannot escape – is a draw, but in fact there is no longer a specific rule for this in the laws of chess, because any perpetual check situation will eventually be claimable as a draw under the threefold repetition rule or by the fifty-move rule, or by agreement. By 1965 perpetual check was no longer in the official rules.
Although these are the laws as laid down by FIDE and, as such, are used at almost all top-level tournaments, at lower levels different rules may operate, particularly with regard to rapid play finish provisions.

Examples

Draws in timed games

In games played with a time control, there are other ways a draw can occur,.
In chess games played at the top level, a draw is the most common outcome of a game: of around 22,000 games published in The Week in Chess played between 1999 and 2002 by players with a FIDE Elo rating of 2500 or above, 55 percent were draws. According to chess analyst Jeff Sonas, although an upward draw rate trend can be observed in general master-level play since the beginning of the 20th century, it is currently "holding pretty steady around 50%, and is only increasing at a very slow rate".
In top-level correspondence chess, the draw rate is much higher than in the over-the-board chess: of 1512 games played in the World Championship finals and the Candidates' sections between 2010 and 2013, 82.3% ended in a draw.
In computer chess, the draw rate among top programs is typically between 50 and 60 percent.

Drawing combinations

gives these combinations for the weaker side to draw:
Andy Soltis discusses the vagueness of the terms "draw", "drawish", "drawable", "book draw", "easy draw", and "dead draw". In books and chess theory a position is considered to be a draw if best play leads to a draw – the difficulty of the defence is not taken into account. Soltis calls these positions "drawable". For instance, under that criterion the rook and bishop versus rook endgame is usually a theoretical draw or "book draw", but the side with the bishop often wins in practice. In this position from an actual game, the only move to draw is 124.Rf8! White actually played 124.Rd8?? and lost after 124...Re3, with the winning threat of 125...Bh3+ 126.Kg1 Re1#.

Articles on draw rules