Thoughts on takebacks?

@orinharris did you just compare chess to holding the door for somebody? muhahaha..

Do you understand what chess is? When you play rated or in a tournament (or even casual actually) chess is a COMPETITION. It's a sport, your skills versus your opp skills, like boxing. Lasker even called it a 'fight' which is exactly what chess is. The game itself was invented as a wargame.

So you choose to play on a trackpad knowing full well that sooner or later you'll make a slip because of it... your opponent doesn't even know you're using a trackpad so what do you do, you start explaining it to him in chat?
You completely interrupted the flow of the game, you broke your opponent's concentration with your sad trackpad story, and if he doesn't accept HE'S showing bad sportsmanship?

Man up, play chess with a mouse, like everybody here said, mouseslips are part of the game and are the sole responsibility of the one having made them.

And start seeing chess as a competition, instead of holding the door for a little old lady, you'll thank me later when you win more games :)

@CafeMorphy, I just don't see everything through the lens of competition, and find your attitude immature, sort of a high-testosterone "you lift bro?" over-competitive perspective on what is ultimate just a game on the internet. I don't particularly care about winning, I'm just trying to enjoy a good game, and find the "winning is the only point" attitude perplexing. But to each their own. The best analogy I can give is if you were to apply the same attitude to everything else in your life. Someone slips on the ice? "Man up and get shoes with better traction, you're losing the game of life bro. Life is a competition." Yeah, sure, you can have that attitude. But I find it sort of douchey, whether in chess or anything else.

@orinharris, the previous comment already explained why your analogies aren't apt.

If you don't particularly care about winning, you shouldn't care about being granted a takeback. And if you hate abandoning perfectly good games because of a misclick, then get a mouse.

But who said this attitude applies to everything in life?
I'm the first one to hold a door open, and just last year I helped an old man up who fell hard exactly cause of ice...
I'm sure most athletes are complete gentlemen on the streets, but race Usain Bolt in a sprint tournament and I guarantee you he'll do his best to blow you away.
Nothing 'douchey' about it, the guy is there to win his race. You should be there to win your game.
And we're all here just 'to enjoy a good game' so stop annoying your opp with takeback requests (what this is all about)

@orinharris I agree. To be honest it is stupid never to allow a tackeback.

Imagine playing casual game against a friend , he blunders and immediately notice that and you act like a little bitch having a tantrum : " OMG YOU CANT TAKE IT BACK! IT IS IN THE RULES!!11!! A PRO PLAYER TOLD ME SO!"

@CafeMorphy You surely know the concept of "fun"? Not everything needs to be handled with a darwinistic "i will beat them all" attitude, and guess what - there are people out there playing chess NOT only to get a 1-0.

#25 too funny :-))
"I SWEAR!! Wait, where is it...here, rules printout, NO DAMN TAKEBACK CHAPTER AT ALL! LOOK!! LOOK!!!!!"

#23 exactly.

In friendly games against weaker opponents I give takebacks, but I rarely play much weaker players unless I'm teaching them. When I'm teaching chess I give takebacks ofcourse to make the learning experience better, because the longer the games goes on the more phases of the game we get to practise.

In rated crazyhouse I once gave a takeback for an obvious misclick, because variants are not serious for me (apart from fischer random).

But other than that. No takebacks in rated standard chess, ever, period. In an OTB tournament there is the touch rule, you have to be careful with your hands, same thing with the mouse. Most of the tournament OTB players understand this and we just resign right away if the missclick results in something horrible and ask for a rematch. It is polite to give a rematch in such a case.

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#25 gets it. The point isn't to always give takebacks. The point is that if it helps to continue an otherwise enjoyable game, or if it is an obvious misclick, it doesn't hurt to be a good sport about it. @CafeMorphy, I'm reminded of www.reddit.com/r/HumansBeingBros/. In any case, it's no big deal. I could get a mouse. But it would also be nice if humans would be bros more often.