I have a game where I am left with only seven pawns, and my opponent has six. The pawns are basically in opening position. He/she offered a draw, and I declined it thinking I'm a pawn up and in better position (I have two groups of pawns, while they have three, one isolated). With my opponent's next move came a message stating that technically it should have been a draw, and u had your chance!! I reviewed the FIDE laws, and I find no article stating this situation should necessarily be a draw. Am I missing something here?
I just checked out your game vs ChessMonkey. Considering his rating and the position on the board, I think he's trying to bluff you into agreeing to a draw --although it is going to be hard for you to get anything more out of it than that.
I say: don't agree to a draw just yet, if only to learn something more about pawn-only endgames.
I would highly recommend a book called Essential Chess Endings Explained Move by Move by Jerimy Silman.
Silman does such a nice job at gearing the knowledge towards intermediate players 😀
But there are examples with just a few pawns on each side that are so complex and so difficult to understand...
And perhaps your opponent does see the draw and knows how to pull it off...make him prove it!!!!!
You have to trust your own understanding of the game. This is very important. If you have a stronger player going for an all out king-side attack, you have to CALCULATE the strength of his attack and PLAY ACCORDING TO YOUR OWN CALCULATIONS. You will make mistakes and lose games as a result, but how else will you learn to evaluate a position correctly?
Once, during an over-the-board tournament, I reached a similar position with a pawn up and found myself actually playing for a draw.I was able to play towards one of the simpler positions from the Silman book and knew I could force the draw. I made an offer to my opponent and he declined. It was cool being able to see a forced draw over 15 moves deep into a position, and 15 moves later my opponent acknowledged the draw.
I guess the main point is that the position was probably simpler and still seeing the draw meant looking ahead 5 moves to a "book" position that I still had to know how to play to force the draw. So the question do you see a forced draw yourself; and THEN you can ask yourself if you're absolutely sure your opponent knows how to pull it off or if you want to make him prove it.
Good Chess!
Bryan
it would make an excellent new years resolution, for many people, to buy a decent endgame book (there was a recent thread of recommendations) AND actually read it 😀 you will find you can draw many "technically lost" positions and win "technically drawn" ones. half points are squandered by people with one mistaken move if, for example, they do not know the nature of "opposition" in a position (as i have found to my own cost! 😳)