What do you mean the game keeps on going? One side has to move but has no legal moves.
That's what I was asking - do they get to "pass" and the other side gets to move? This is how it works in the game of go for instance. In chess that would be more or less equivalent to the non-stalemated player winning, because in many stalemate positions if you had an extra move you could checkmate.
The stalemate rule adds something that the attacking player has to keep in mind and gives the defending player something to shoot for - lots of creative and tricky play arises from this, with IM Eric Rosen being the most famous exponent[1] so much so that he now has a particular type of stalemate trap named after him.[2]
I'm not seriously entertaining your Fortnite rule. That is such a radical departure from the game of chess as not to be the same at all, so you could have that as a chess variant or whatever but it's fundamentally a different game.
> What do you mean the game keeps on going? One side has to move but has no legal moves.
As said elsewhere, I would suggest removing rules against putting yourself in check.
> The stalemate rule adds something that the attacking player has to keep in mind and gives the defending player something to shoot for - lots of creative and tricky play arises from this, with IM Eric Rosen being the most famous exponent[1] so much so that he now has a particular type of stalemate trap named after him.[2]
That's why I was careful in saying that the proposed change would make the rules more elegant, less clunky. I did not say anything about this making chess a better game. Sometimes adding weird corner cases to your rules can make the game better.
Just look at all the weird rules that you can find in Skat or Doppelkopf. (Though Mü is an example of a game with much cleaner rules that captures a similar spirit.)
Yes, you are right that this is only an intellectual exercise. (Btw, it's quite popular in the Go world to reformulate the ancient clunky rules of Go into a more modern, mathematical version that might or might not have small differences in gameplay.)
However, I don't actually think that removing check rules make chess worse. But that's subject to experiment.
If you run out of legal moves then that seems like an outright loss condition, no? My understanding of "stalemate" is when you can move but there's no way to actually force a win (e.g. kings chasing each other around the board). I ain't a chess expert, so maybe I'm using the wrong terminology.
No. In ordinary usage "stalemate" means when people are kind of stuck and not making progress, but in chess stalemate specifically means when one side has no legal moves but is not in check. In chess that is a draw. The type of situations you're describing about are covered by four rules.
1. The threefold repetition rule: if a board position repeats 3 times either side may claim a draw. In online chess this is automatic but in over the board chess people may not always realise the position has repeated especially if there is a gap between repetitions.
2. The 50 move rule: if 50 moves pass without a pawn moving or a capture being made then it is a draw.
3. Insufficient material: if neither side has sufficient material to checkmate then it is a draw. In some rule systems [1] it has to be sufficient material to force checkmate in some it's just sufficient material to mate[2] (ie the defending side can blunder into it). So if there are no pawns and both sides just have a lone king, or it is king and knight vs king or king and bishop vs king then it's always a draw. In USCF and chess.com king and 2 knights is a draw in FIDE tournaments or on lichess it's not. King and 2 bishops on up is not a draw because you can force checkmate.
4. Draw by agreement: the two sides can agree a draw. In some tournament situations this is only allowed after a certain move but there are ways the players can deliberately go into some sort of situation which is a known theoretical draw and just repeat 3 times by tacit agreement. Including amusingly/notoriously (depending on your pov) the Carlsen/Nakamura "double bongcloud" game [3]
[1] US Chess federation and chess.com in particular
The important thing to mention: in many respects, you can pretend that in chess the objective is to capture the opposing king. But for historical reasons, the game actually tops one move before, and the king is never captured.
But they also have weird rules that both (A) forbid putting your king in check, and (B) hand you a draw when you are out of legal moves.
A simpler version of chess would actually play until the king is captured, and allow people to move into check.
I do not get this Rosen Trap example you linked to... It's an easy win for blacks, just move the rook to 8th row instead of moving the pawn and it's checkmate. The pawn move seems kind of random, as if it was played by a child.
Generally the attacking side can avoid the stalemate trap but often it happens under time pressure etc so the attacker doesn’t have time to calculate whether the defender has any valid moves.
That's what I was asking - do they get to "pass" and the other side gets to move? This is how it works in the game of go for instance. In chess that would be more or less equivalent to the non-stalemated player winning, because in many stalemate positions if you had an extra move you could checkmate.
The stalemate rule adds something that the attacking player has to keep in mind and gives the defending player something to shoot for - lots of creative and tricky play arises from this, with IM Eric Rosen being the most famous exponent[1] so much so that he now has a particular type of stalemate trap named after him.[2]
I'm not seriously entertaining your Fortnite rule. That is such a radical departure from the game of chess as not to be the same at all, so you could have that as a chess variant or whatever but it's fundamentally a different game.
[1] https://youtu.be/YB_LLivPlY8?si=dWl2bEAEeRmzhBiC
[2] Defending king in the corner with the opposing queen a knight's move away and no other legal moves for the defender. https://www.chess.com/forum/view/game-analysis/the-rosen-tra...