I was watching the game around that point, and the context certainly made it more interesting. Though I remember thinking about ...h4 instead of ...Kh7 (on my phone, forget the move number, both probably work -- well my move might not work, I didn't analyze much).

Now the only questions left for this round are who gets first in the first group, and whether I or HungryHippo moves on (though my game with him might not be the deciding factor, so it's not quite as exciting). How does round 2 work?

I actually intended to play Rg3 then I decided at the last minute that Rh3 looked better.

(Notice the lack of any real analysis there, just playing by "look." That's how you play flail-mode ).

*looks at Rg3 now*
*facepalms*

Since I'm not actually sure that Kh7 DOES "work", because of Rg3, I find your h4 idea intriguing. Another possibility for black's 24th move might have been Nf6; it's what the (really low quality) chess.com analysis engine suggests. I suppose with the idea of responding to Rg3 with Ng4.

Round two will work the same as round 1, basically. Theoretically, since 8 players were supposed to advance, there should be two groups of 4 that would play double-round-robins, with the top two advancing to the third and final round. Because of the unbroken tie in group 4, I guess there are now 9 players advancing, so one of the two groups in round 2 will have 5 players instead of 4. And I suppose that introduces the possibility that if there are any such ties in round two, that more than the expecte four players could advance to the final round as well...

Unless you were actually asking how it decides who goes to which of the two groups in round 2, in which case I have no idea, lol.

Heh, I checked briefly to see whether I could figure this out from their help files and failed...

Hmmm, I'm no longer as sure of ...h4. 24...h4 25. g3 h3 26. g4 maybe? It could be that the really low quality engine is actually right.

Well, the really low quality engine doesn't give multiple alternates either. It lists Nf6 as leaving black with an edge of more than 5 points, while it lists my move of Kh7 as leading to a dead even draw. I don't know if either of those evaluations is right, but I also have no idea what it thought of h4. It could have graded at -4.8, and been fine, or it could be seriously flawed.

I'll look at it in Houdini tonight once I'm off work, that'll give better insight, lol.

Houdini analysis on the key moves in our game, starting with this position:



23. Nf3:


23. ... gxf3 24. Rxf3:


24. ... Kh7:


25. Rh3:

Just a quick note, the tournament is now held up while I finish 5 games. I'm trying to play them more quickly now, though it would be even quicker if my opponents all just resigned...

As an aside, I tallied up the results of the 75 completed games so far: 35 white wins, 35 black wins, and 5 draws (3 of which belong to HungyHippo). Why I did that instead of analyzing a game for my next move, I'm not sure.

Take your time. You're not just playing for pride.

You're playing for a spot in round 2 of the 2+2 Correspondence Championship.

(An interesting thing about this tournament is the small number of upsets, defined as someone who finished lower in the tournament beating someone who finished higher. Although I think this is due in large part to timeouts. And HungryHippo has four draws.)

yeah no rush

Well, it's been 48 days since anyone else played a move in this tournament except for me and my opponents. Today, HungryHippo and I finished the (currently) longest game of the tournament. I have one ongoing game, but the result won't make any difference. So, just a heads up that the next round should be starting soon-ish, and a bump to be sure this doesn't get archived.

Good idea to keep this from being archived. I've been watching the games, and I think HungryHippo might have let you escape at the end there. If he had won, he'd have had the better tiebreaks...

http://www.chess.com/echess/game.html?id=48723443
For sure, I had losing positions more than once in that game. Without doing more checking, I remember thinking that 12. Qb5 would have been much better for me than 12. Nb5, but I didn't see the move until less than a second after I hit the "submit move" button. Fun game to play, even though riddled with errors.

I wonder if I was really lost just before or just after the queen trade. Any thoughts?

And he would have had better tiebreaks unless I would have won my last game, that I think is drawn now but I feel I should have won while up the exchange.

Well, my initial thought was that Black had excellent winning chances with just 42...f6 or something rather than inviting you to take the pawn, trade queens and draw.

Moving back a few moves, I think Black complicates his life when he missed 35...Qh3 (or something). In the game, Black basically just lost a tempo with Qh1-f3-g4-d7 over Qh1-h3-d7, which allowed you to through in Nh6+ which makes the win less clear.

I think I started watching the game a few moves before that, and I do think HungryHippo made some good moves in that weird middlegame to keep the pressure on.

certainly, i totally missed your combination there and was very lucky to stay in the game at all.

In my mind, I was very lucky to stay in the game at all as I very nearly missed that combination. I was ready to make a losing move because I couldn't see what else to do. My attempts to win a queenside pawn seemed to be failing to your kingside attack. I wish I could say that I saw it through some systematic board analysis (though really, we should have since they tell us to always consider all checks and other forcing moves, and evaluating the geometry between the king and queen should always be done too), but it came out of nowhere.

And round 2 starts today. Good luck all (but still let me win if possible, thanks)!

It looks like it is just based directly on current rating, without any regard for the first-round pairings (or seeding).

Good games, all!

I feel like I'm getting better at chess, but holy crap I'm no match for you 2nd round guys.

I can probably help you get a point or two...

By the way, did anyone notice the 30% time-out rate? That seems high

I timed out in one. Not even really sure how.

Against me, by a couple of hours (or less--you moved in time for the other game). Unfortunate, too, since that was shaping up to be an interesting middlegame.

Yeah hiphop timed out both of our games which is a pity as I think I had a really good chance of winning the one

I timed out in all the games because of real life ****.

Exactly why he "timed out"