All tournament games should be rated

Originally posted by incandenza
Since you're not responding on that point, I guess you concede.

Maybe they haven't read your post yet! 😵

So do I win by timeout then? 😀

Actually he already responded to the post. Although I think a lot of people here don't really read what is said, or don't think about it.

Originally posted by incandenza
You're missing the point, which is that your argument about skill doesn't hold together.

Since you're not responding on that point, I guess you concede.

LOL!

"I said something, and you were not waiting here with baited breath to post to me... I win!"

Your idea is as lame as that last post.

3 was decided as the number. That number could be 5, it could be 2... it could be 10.

But it's not, the number is 3

P-

So basically, for you guys, the argument boils down to "the status quo is always right". Why? "Because it was always that way! So it must be best!"

Again, you're failing on the reading comprehension. He *did* read and respond to my post. I'm not saying that he just didn't have time to respond. The point is, he didn't respond to the parts of my post that shot down his reasoning.

It's funny; I would expect chess players to be good at the whole logic thing. But from the evidence on these forums: not so much.

And by the way, the word is "bated", not "baited".

And as for my other post: are you referring to the one where you so sheepishly apologized when you realized you completely failed to understand what I was saying?

The way I see it is; someone could possibly accept a game or join a tournament either by mistake or on impulse. But once they have also made one move that shows it wasn't an accident and they should play on or suffer some sort of penalty.
As is often said in these forums, their ratings will quickly return to the correct level - unless they make a habit of messing people around, in which case they deserve all they would get. [or lose]

nb: My opinion.

OK, I admit you have a good point in the scenario you presented.

As for the timed out games, I did note that they would need to be adjudicated as to who was winning, which was part of what you conveniently ignored in my post.

"So you expect Russ and Chris, the site admins to adjudicate on timed out games to see who takes rating points?"

Of course not! I would never suggest such a thing.

My point is, when you reach an absurd conclusion by a series of logical steps, one of your premises must be wrong. In this case, it cannot be true that all ratings changes are the result of a display of chess skill. Timed out games demonstrate that some ratings changes clearly are not.

If you don't allow a huge ratings drop for someone not following through on a tournament, why do you allow a huge ratings drop when someone leaves the site, and then potentially comes back at an artificially low rating?

Maybe this argument is too subtle for you to grasp.

The reason, in my opinion, is that you have already committed to playing. Whether you enter a tournament or make a single move in a game, it should be rated.

After all, the ratings are meant to predict the chance that you will win against a given player. Part of being able to win is that you will show up and make the moves. If there is a good chance you won't, because you've dropped a lot of games in the past, that should be reflected in your rating. (If you have dropped so many games in the past, why should we assume you won't in the future?) Again, it is your actual performance (predicted and past) that matters, not your theoretical chess skill.

I admit you have a decent opposing argument in terms of the rating being very inaccurate after dropping 500 points in a split. But I think there is merit to both viewpoints.

edit: Another problem is, as you say, the opponent picks up the 3 (or likely 6) points. This makes it very easy to skew the results of a tournament if you should choose to; just drop your games against friends you want to help and you don't suffer a penalty. Now, you could say this is cheating, but I don't think there's an actual rule against it. (How can there be a rule that says "you have to try"?) At least if you're rated, you're losing points if you choose to do this.

The ratings in online chess are pretty meaningless, when all is said and done.
By having them as rated after the game has started it may at least prevent some people being messed about so much.
I'm personally sick of people accepting invites and then deleting them after 1 or 2 moves. If anyone has another suggestion that would prevent this I would be happy to hear from them.

The post that was quoted here has been removed

i've entered a few tournaments just to play against people stronger than me, resigning the rest.

the last one was the 2007 chaps group 11

would i do this next time and lose my rating points? yes.

it might stop others who care about their rating though.

pointless in clan or any other games.

RHP has an awful lot of members, both subs & nonsubs, and we all expect different things from this site. In my opinion there is NO rating system yet invented that can prevent all inappropriate rating losses or gains, whether intentional or unintentional. As has been said already in this thread, ratings are pretty meaningless in online chess.

I think Russ and Chris, and those people who make the decisions about how the site works, do a brilliant job of keeping most of the people reasonably happy most of the time. What more could you expect?

I say leave the rating process alone, and use it or ignore it as you see fit, just stop whingeing about it.