King + two knights vs king, always an automatic draw?

The Chess.com article "How Chess Games Can End: 8 Ways Explained" describes a position with a king + two knights vs a king as a draw with no exceptions: "With this combination of pieces checkmate is possible, but it cannot be forced. The game is a draw."

However, there are certain positions where a mate can be forced when there's only a king and two knights on the board. For example, in the position shown in the picture below, if white gives check from h3 and the black king takes the bishop in the corner, Nf2 would deliver mate.

My question is: will the algorithm automatically declare this position a draw if the black king takes the bishop?

https://www.chess.com/article/view/how-chess-games-can-end-8-ways-explained#insufficient-material

Just contact chess.com to refund points in case that happened and was considered as a draw. Not sure if it possible though. 

This did not happen to me. I'm just curious. If the rule is interpreted literally, the algorithm would consider this a draw, even though it doesn't make any sense:

• King + two knights vs king

With this combinations of pieces checkmate is possible, but it cannot be forced. The game is a draw.

https://www.chess.com/article/view/how-chess-games-can-end-8-ways-explained#insufficient-material

The question just occurred to me when I was watching a game which, to my surprise, was instantly declared a draw when a lone king took a pawn, leaving the opponent with only two knights.

Quite perplexing, can you share the game?

This mate is possible but it cannot be forced. To get mated, the lone King has to "cooperate". Of course, 2 Bishops and Bishop and Knight mate can be forced.

But it is "possible", which means the computer should not automatically declare K+N+N vs K endgames a draw.

I'm afraid you're missing the point. In the example, white has two knights, a bishop and a king against a king, so there's obviously no draw yet. But if black takes the bishop, white only has two knights + king, which according to the rules leads to an automatic draw, even though white can deliver mate in one.

Because  its never forced

Just Chess.com's. To my understanding FIDE rules are more complicated and sometimes require arbitration.

You can find the rule in this article:

https://www.chess.com/article/view/how-chess-games-can-end-8-ways-explained#insufficient-material

thats not a link

Copy it then paste it on the search bar

According to the rules, " King + two knights vs king
With this combinations of pieces checkmate is possible, but it cannot be forced. The game is a draw."
The rules themselves admitted that "with this combinations of pieces checkmate is possible", and in positions where winning is possible it wouldn't make sense for the site to automatically declare the game a draw.

this has been asked many times:

situations like this are so incredibly rare that it's not even worth changing the code over... notice that it's impossible to force a checkmate with well over 99% of cases involving lone king versus 2 knights.

the mistake came earlier, allowing the bishop to be taken instead of a knight... also before that, allowing all the pawns to be traded off;  which is also rare.

note that if the rule was changed then it would be possible to flag an opponent with material that is clearly insufficient to force a checkmate with, which seems to be the desired goal of most people asking.

not very fair to the vast majority of games, is it?

I think the rule might make sense for Daily games that could otherwise go on forever, but even then the algorithm should be able to identify exceptions where a mate can be forced, as in my example. But in faster games, especially blitz and bullet, I see no reason to implement this rule.

I think you're the one missing the point. The article says you can't force Black into a mate with two knights. Your example only works if you require Black to take the bishop. But Black isn't required to take the bishop. Therefore your example does not force Black into a mate with two knights.

there are situations where the mate would be forced, but the main idea is that it's too rare of an instance to be worth changing the code:

in the highly unlikely case that you run into this issue at some distant point in your lifetime, just open a ticket & ask support to change the result for you.

well one argued this already

"... if the rule was changed then it would be possible to flag an opponent..."

That's a very good point, thanks for clarifying! Maybe one solution to the problem would be to declare draw after either of the players run out of time in situations with insufficient material to force mate.

But I don't agree that "the mistake came earlier, allowing the bishop to be taken instead of a knight", as according to the rules of chess, taking the knight leads to a mate in one. I don't think allowing the bishop to be taken is a mistake; I think Chess.com's rule is wrong in this particular situation. I'm not an expert on coding, but I doubt that changing the code would be too complicated. A complicated game requires a complicated code anyway.

I'm pretty sure I'm not missing my own point  which is: in this situation it's white to move and Nf2 delivers a mate. But according to the rules of Chess.com it's a draw due to insufficient material.

The original position in my post is just an example of how this kind of situation might occur. Of course black is not forced to take the bishop, but if they do it's king + two knights vs king and should be a mate in one. And just to be clear, I'm fully aware that taking the bishop is a terrible move (unless black knows it leads to a draw), but in chess people make terrible moves all the time. It's just a part of the game.