Is this a thing now?

Just played one of my first rapid games in ages with no increment, reached a drawn position and had my opponent try to flag me for 40 or so moves refusing all draw requests until the game forced a draw due to no pieces being taken for however man moves.

Is this the new normal in rapid now?

I do not know

Mee too

The fifty-move rule...

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fifty-move_rule

50 moves without moving a pawn or capturing a piece is a draw. The last capture took place in move 55.

@goofy00 I meant trying to flag in rapid games rather than accepting a draw.

I was aware of the 50 move rule but didn't know the exact number of moves because it's not something I've ever had happen before in tens of thousands of games on lichess.

I also thought it had been made obsolete after engines found mating sequences that would be declared draws by the rule before the sequence was finished.

For some time there has been a 100 move rule and a 75 move rule but they where abolished by the FIDE.

People trying to flag you have always been around and they always will. But I have not seen such a behaviour as in your game. Playing on 50 moves in a dead drawn endgame... I would block him, even though he played according to the rules.

Time to move to the King of the Hill variant. No draws are possible there. Problem solved.

In my opinion your opponents behavior is completely legit. You play without increment, so basically you can win by checkmating or flagging, even in a drawn position.

I don't enjoy these scenarios too much, so I play with a small increment, like 8mins+2secs.

Whenever I play without increment, I also try to flag if I see a chance to win.

No increment encourages this behaviour however if you wanted a draw why did you keep moving your rook?
Surely from about move 57 leave your Rook on the 4th rank and move your king into the corner and rock it back and forth and make them look foolish. If they attack your Rook with their king just swing it to the other side. If they want to try and win on time they have to avoid threefold repetition and look silly at the same time.

The way you played it looks like you didn't want the draw either.

@crowchess fair enough if I had 20 secs on the clock. I had 2 mins 58 secs left on the clock at move 57 though.

And moving the rook off the 4th rank was due to a slip up on move 74.

Ultimately I offered 3 draws all declined and if they're playing not to draw rocking my king back and forth in the corner makes no difference because they have 5 or 6 ranks/files they can move their rook around in without delivering any checks or repeating moves.

Also I prefered moving the rook a lot because if I'm moving fast it reduces the chances of them picking it up with a cheap shot if I've just been premoving my king for the last however many moves.