I say yes there is luck in the game of chess.
We have all played a bad move putting a piece on a square where
10 moves later it just happens to be in the right place at the right time
to win the game.
You never intended for this to happen when you played this bad move.
It was a blunder that lost, let's say a Rook.
With best play you should never have won, it should never have happened.
Yet you won the game by playing a bad move 10 move previously.
This is called LUCK.
If you disagree then tell me what other single word describes
what has just happened.
I thought most people would say no, and that was my gut instinct too. But having googled it like GP there do seem to be some convincing arguments that luck is a factor.
To quote someone from the 08 thread: "luck is success in regard to the consequences of random chance".
Now all that happens in a game of chess is a sequence of moves. Surely players do not pick moves at random? Now that I think about it, from time to time I do. Not completely at random, blindly reaching for a piece, but what if I think of two equally good moves? Usually there is one move that I feel strongly is 'the best', but sometimes I just can't decide. I have literally flipped a coin to decide on a move before.
Now I can't see 20 moves ahead, what if one of those moves led to a certain win and the other to a certain loss? The outcome of that game would be partly down to chance. Now I admit I very rarely flip a coin, but I am often in the situation where I have two or more available moves and I have exhausted my reserves of logic to decide between them.
Of course there is luck in chess. Because humans are involved.
Chess is not entirely mathematical. If it would, like when Fritz is playing Deep Blue, then there would be no luck involved.
Whenever a human is involved in any activity, there are elements of luck involved.
Originally posted by nimzo5Intuition is not quite the right word. That would imply that he thought it was a good move at the time. In the example that GP gave he clearly would have changed the move had he realised he was about to blunder. It was lucky that his "mistake" won him the game.
Intuition.
This has certainly happened to me, and as GP says, I am sure it has happened to almost everyone.
With due deference to the Green one.. he does give two examples one where a piece is placed somewhere and 10 moves later is perfectly placed and then the second where it is a rook and it is captured.
So the first example if you are Tal you call it intuition.
The second example if you are Kasparov you call it home preparation or a "sacrifice."
In the strictest sense of the definition every move until one can see a forced mate is luck from the player's perspective. In a practical sense compared with games of chance, there is no luck, just our own lack of calculating ability.
Intuition would mean I played to lose the Rook on purpose
sensing I had mate on.
No I blundred away a Rook I did not make that move to lose a Rook.
It was not done on purpose.
"I should resign but I feel 'Lucky' I'll play on."
You could replace Lucky with 'unbeatable' however, you were getting beat
and with correct play you should have been beaten. But no, you were Lucky.
As rich as the English language is, sometimes there are no words.
A man's wife dies, he is a widower.
A wife losses her husband is a widow.
A child who losses both their parents becomes an orphan.
But parents who lose a child become.......
So I think you are on safe ground saying yes there is Luck in chess
simply because there is no other word to replace it.
You won not by your good play but becuase of your opponents bad play.
You need a single word that wraps up that sentance and does not mean you were Lucky.
Good Luck!