Originally posted by xnomanx
Hello all,
As I'm fairly new here, I'm not real sure how the ratings on this site correspond with "real world" (USCF, FIDE, etc.) ratings. I don't play any rated OTB matches, therefore I don't know what my rating is, but it strikes me that RHP is a bit inflated compared to OTB. If so, is that a simply a by-product of correspondence chess? It would make p ...[text shortened]... to the use of databases, unlimited thought time, etc.
Am I on track here? Your thoughts?
There is something odd going on here. This thread keeps repeating, under different headings, and each time the character of the initial post is the same: a new player, still provisional, with very few finished games under his belt, makes the assertion that RHP ratings are "inflated". However, an examination of the player's game record here invariably shows that the author has no objective basis for such a statement.
In the case of xnomanx, his bar chart shows that of the twelve finished games here at RHP, he played against only three opponents who (at the time of the game) had ratings greater than 1200 (everybody starts with 1200 here). Of those three, xnomanx beat two, RussellR and Beatnik. However, both players *now* have ratings below xnomanx (and in the case of the provisional Beatnik, hundreds of points below), so it is difficult to see how this could support his claim that RHP ratings are "inflated". (The other opponent rated higher than 1200, FDodi, beat him, and unlike the other two, his rating is still higher than xnomanx's.)
Furthermore, in the present case, we find that xnomanx doesn't play rated OTB chess and doesn't have an OTB rating.
In light of these two facts, taken together, it's difficult to see what the basis for comparison is. He doesn't have the experience on RHP to get an impression, and on the other hand he doesn't have the OTB experience either. Puzzling. I would like to ask xnomanx: whence the impetus for this question?
Previous examination of this issue has shown that there are players with RHP ratings higher than their USCF ratings (for example) and players with RHP ratings lower than their USCF ratings. What has emerged from previous threads on the same topic is that there doesn't seem to be any significant correlation, either positive or negative. Of course, nobody has been systematic about investigating it, but one has a strong impression that a genuine random sampling of sufficient size would show no "inflation".
In my own case, my playing skill varies considerably, depending on what else is going on in my life at the moment (i.e., background conditions). I just resigned a game where my play was abominable -- or rather, at a critical point it became abominable -- and if that were typical of my games I would have to plead guilty to having an inflated rating. Fortunately it isn't: and my only defect in judgment in the game in question was my decision to play chess on a day when I could not even see my hand before my face, figuratively speaking, instead of waiting until the cloud had passed (though of course, part of the problem was that I did not realize the extent of the problem until it was too late). The rest can be blamed on what poisoned me the night before.
RHP Ratings
03 Jan '08 14:561 edit
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