[dmurray]

People get hung up on the unfair White advantage in chess, but actually it's not large enough.

In tennis, on every point there's a big advantage to the server. Not because he "gets to go first" but because he gets a second chance in some situations. You can prove this: in high level mens tennis the server wins ~70% of points [0] but on a second serve - equivalent to playing without the second chance - he wins almost exactly 50% [1]

This creates a tension in every game where one player is attacking and expected to win, the other player needs to "break" him at least once or twice in the course of the match to win the overall contest.

Chess is similar, but worse because of the possibility of draws. 60-90% of top level chess games end in draws.

Computer chess is even worse again! 95%+ of top computer play ends in draws. Organisers of engine tournaments have solved this: they let the computers play from positions considered advantageous to white, usually where they expect White to score ~75%. They play each position with both White and Black. [2]

This wouldn't be a popular or practical change for human play. But that's not the point, letting White take back his moves à la tennis wouldn't be a change people would accept either. The point is that chess isn't in need of evening out the first-move advantage.

[0] https://www.ultimatetennisstatistics.com/statsLeaders [1] https://www.braingametennis.com/the-art-of-winning-2nd-serve... [2] https://tcec-chess.com/articles/TCEC_Openings_FAQ.html

[js8]

> This wouldn't be a popular or practical change for human play.

What about Fischer random chess? That could help, no? I heard that even Magnus Carlsen played in some tournament with it.

[dmurray]

Right, that's a good example: it's the most mainstream of variants, gets support from FIDE and rich sponsors and world champions, and improves on perhaps the biggest complaint people have about chess - and it still only attracts a few percent of the audience and the participation of the standard game.

[Maxatar]

Fischer random chess is interesting because some starting configurations give a pretty big advantage to white (more than a half pawn advantage) whereas other starting configurations give less of an advantage to white than standard chess.

[vintermann]

The main thing is that people have invested so much in getting good at the game as it is, that they don't want to change it, making so much of their hard work useless. That's understandable, and OK. As long as everyone understands that this is the reason things are as they are.

What's more mystifying to me is that in a weird variant like Duck Chess which has oddly gained a lot of popularity online, where so much of the hard work is invalidated anyway, they don't take the opportunity to fix the starting imbalance. In particular, in that variant it would be so easy: just let the first move be duck only!

[dmurray]

> In particular, in that variant it would be so easy: just let the first move be duck only!

I don't see why that would make a significant theoretical difference. Black plays first and moves the duck, he can block either e4 or d4 (or something offbeat like g6 if what he wants is to get a Modern Defence at all costs) but not the other one. I suppose there's a practical difference where White couldn't specialise in e4- or d4- openings, and Black gets to choose which to face depending on the opponent.

(And in any case, as above, I disagree with the thesis that the imbalance should be "fixed").

[ebiester]

I honestly really want to see a TCEC style rapid chess tournament. The Capablanca variant tournament is somewhat similar, and I really enjoyed that, but the idea where we pick obvious imbalances and see how many can be saved is fascinating to me.

[linearrust]

> People get hung up on the unfair White advantage in chess, but actually it's not large enough.

It's fairly significant given the 'theoretical' assumption that perfect play always ends in a draw. However, in practice, whites wins significantly more than black.

> In tennis, on every point there's a big advantage to the server. Not because he "gets to go first" but because he gets a second chance in some situations.

Yes. It allows servers to take chances and go all out on their first serve. It's extremely beneficial to power servers. But you don't get 'take backs' in chess. So your analogy doesn't apply. You can't gamble with white and if black knows the opening, then start all over with another opening.

> The point is that chess isn't in need of evening out the first-move advantage.

As long as both players get equal chances to play with white. No player would agree to a tournament where you get black 10 times and your opponents gets white. Just like no tennis player will agree to a tournament where his opponents gets to serve all game.

As you computer chess stats show, it seems like better play leads to more draw. And the assumption that if chess is solved, then perfect chess is always a draw. But that's not how it works in the real world. White has a distinct advantage. Whether it is due to human psychology or something else altogether is up for debate.

[vsuperpower2021]

The statement still applies even if you found one thing that isn't literally the same. The point wasn't "you can do takebacks in chess so this is exactly the same!!!" but that the advantage for moving first in chess is much smaller than is already accepted in other sports.

[linearrust]

> The point wasn't "you can do takebacks in chess so this is exactly the same!!!"

That wasn't my point either. My point is that if chess allowed white takebacks ( as in tennis ), the white advantage would skyrocket to 70%+. The analogy was pointless because it wasn't comparing likes with likes.

> but that the advantage for moving first in chess is much smaller than is already accepted in other sports.

Yes. But in most sports, you get equal or close to equal chances to 'move first'. In tennis, you alternate serves with each game. In football, you take turns playing offense. In chess, it's not necessarily like that. Some tournaments you get to play the same opponent with black and with white in equal amounts. But in many tournaments, that's not the case.

So in tennis, you are pretty much guaranteed an equal game since both sides get to serve. But in chess, even though the first move advantage is less, it's still more significant than in tennis many tournaments don't have equal games of white and black.