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Adding an analysis mode option to games?

I think it would be great if there was a button you could click during a live game that would allow you to move pieces around and analyse lines and variations on the board itself without having to open a new window or looking at a new board on the side.

and then you could click it again to return to live mode and play your move.

Sometimes if i'm playing a very high level game I have my other laptop on the table next to the one i'm playing on and I have this window open :

http://www.chess.com/analysis-board-editor

(i also like the fact that it has an "enforce legal moves" option unlike the board editor on lichess )

and that way i can kind of avoid blunders and analyse a little deeper than how i normally play.

Some of you might complain and say things like "You should learn to visualise" or "they dont have that option in OTB games"
or "it's cheating" or "it will make you worse than learning to visualise"

^ which IMHO arent really valid opinions. I have played much higher quality games like this. and It's actually helped me improve.

and really how is it any different if someone was playing online and just had a physical chess board next to them to analyse their moves?

Anyways, I would like your opinions on this.

Thanks
BUMP. Doesn't anyone think this is a good idea?
Yeah, it's cheating the way you are supposed to play. If you are analyzing with using assistance from any part of your body but your eyes and brain, then it's cheating. No use of hands should be allowed imo.

No one would dare to analyze while they play OTB games (touch move would be called!), so the same standards should be applied to online games.

The only time this tool would be okay imo to use is if you are spectating someone's other games, not of your own.
Yeach but this isnt OTB chess. You can't hold online chess to the same standards as OTB chess.

LIke I said : there's no way you could control someone who tries out lines on a physical board next to him while playing online.

That's like expecting someone not to use databases,opening books for correspondence games. It's just expected these days.

And chess.com already has this option for live games. So if chess.com has this option then someone on that site must have thought it's a good idea.

I think it would be really helpful for the lower rated people. And IMO could eventually help you improve your calculation skills.
There's two bits of logic here. First, it's generally agreed that outside of correspondence, having a physical board next to you is "cheating" but there is no way to enforce it. However, facilitating people by adding such an analysis board access might be divisive, since the main element of chess is problem solving from a pattern through visualization.

The other point though, and a much stronger one imo, is that the majority of players on this site focus on fast games. Bullet has always been the most popular variant here, and now there's super bullet, and blitz tournaments are also quite popular. Even most classical games are played with rapid time clocks well under an hour even with the various increments. There just isn't much time to go fiddling around with a move on an analysis board outside of long classical games (most of which here end up being casual games anyway) or correspondence (where there is already analysis board access).
Well, thanks for your feedback guys. I personally don't really play blitz too much and don't see it as cheating if both players have access to the same resource (analysis mode).

I don't think it hinders visualization skills and could be very beneficial to lower rated players . Or just anyone wanting to have a higher quality game.

I was surprised to see it allowed on chess.com .

I was reading some threads on the chess.com forums about this very topic and came across this humorous post.

"andh
I am fed up with people like the OP who think it is perfectly ok to see the pieces. As a blindfold purist, I do not think aides such as looking at the board is fair at all, since chess is a game of the mind, not of the eye. Hopefully dishonest cheaters like you will eventually learn to recognize that you are violating the spirit of the game and you will stop playing with your eyes open."

Anyways, hoping to hear from tibault or on of the admins on this site about it.

Cheers.
Hahah! Well as amusing as that blindfold post is as an analogy for parody, it falls a bit flat.

There is a complete difference between doing everything to enforce the rules of the game and trying to enforce a handicap. Blindfold chess is a handicap, it was designed as an exhibition of talent, much like simuls or playing without certain pieces. Trying to enforce a handicap on everyone is just plain silly.

Likewise, trying to justify give oneself the benefits of a handicap on the grounds that it would be available to everyone doesn't make it any less against the rules of the game. Everyone has access to a chess board, they could set it up next to their computer and use it. The majority of players online do not, because the rules of the game are one piece-one move, not shuffle all the pieces around on a secondary board and then go back to the main board and move.

The argument that "you cannot hold online chess to the same standard as otb" also falls short, as the online production of the game is based on its otb counterpart and thereby should make every attempt possible to follow the rules as closely as possible. Since the game otb is not intended to have a secondary board, likewise when playing online (with the exception of correspondence in which shuffling one's pieces around for days on end to check lines is generally expected) one should not have a secondary board.

Hope that helps explain the thought process on that side of the argument. As I said though my argument is simply that it wouldn't benefit many players here because there aren't many people who play long games outside of correspondence, which already has the feature. If you like long games and want access to analysis maybe you should try correspondence? It's quite surprising that chess.com would have this feature you are describing outside of correspondence games, and I have played off and on there and never seen it, it must be relatively new?
(also, as an aside, while you're waiting to hear from a moderator or developer about the issue, in the past someone once asked about playing with a physical side board and Clarkey I believe, though it might have been one of the others, is the one who brought up the subject of using a side board in standard games being illegal)

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