How many levels are there in chess?

Originally posted by Habeascorp
I noted Michael Adams beating Stuart Conquest in the British Open. Apparently this is the 12th win in a row by Adams against Conquest. Whilst this may be a statistical oddity it got me thinking as to how many levels of chess there are.

For this purpose, please assume that x is a level better than y if he would get 8 points out of 10. (I have avoide ...[text shortened]... tyles etc but any guesses whether i am overestimating or underestimating the number of levels.

Chess is a single level game. One level, on a two dimensional board. That is all that matters.

To me a level is roughly 150/200 rating points - elo. I'm 1512 blitz on chesscube which is about my average I've been as high as 1600 and low as 1460. Players over 1650/1700 are clearly better than me, players under 1400 are clearly worse-judging from the way they play.

This of course is blitz which is different as ratings can get inflated, the top players on ICC can get upto 3500! So I'd say there are about 13 levels or so.

Originally posted by Mad Rook
I'm not sure where you're going with this thought. The "levels" are dependent upon your definition of 8/10. Change the definition, and the number of levels change. (In the elo system, a winning expectancy of 0.8 correlates to about 240 rating points.)

More importantly, I don't understand how this information would be useful to anyone. (I guess what I mea ...[text shortened]... his - Is there any significance to the 8/10 number, or is it just plucked of of thin air? )

It can be useful !
We could argue that in itself, the elo rating system is a scale with "levels", but determining a scale of (arbitrarily) 8/10 gives a more universal view and allows comparison with other games (or even sports?)

For instance between beginner and world champion(even though world champion is arbitrary, not being the top of the scale and fluctuating),
- for chess there are 10 such levels
- for go there would be about 20 ?
- for bridge ?
- for golf ?
- for football ? (elo has actually been used for football)

It could also be useful for roleplaying games, to get a scale of chess level as any other skill