I hate rating because numbers can't tell how good of chess player you are. Knowing a persons rating should not be screaming at you when you are playing a game. You should have the option of knowing a players rating no matter what kind of game you are playing. Ratings are intimidating and if someones rating is lower than yours it can make you mess around and loss. Rating are dumb.

johndeere850dlc wrote:

I hate rating because numbers can't tell how good of chess player you are.

They can.

De-Lar wrote:

If you mess around and lose because your opponent is rated lower, then you deserve to lose the game.  If you play seriously against every player no matter what the rating, then you will not have this problem.

 I wasn't saying i do that but it does happen.

johndeere850dlc wrote:

De-Lar wrote:

If you mess around and lose because your opponent is rated lower, then you deserve to lose the game.  If you play seriously against every player no matter what the rating, then you will not have this problem.

 I wasn't saying i do that but it does happen.

That's why they say, "play the board, not the man."

Furthermore, a rating is merely a statistical record of your performance in terms of wins/draws/losses against other players, given your rating and theirs. In some long-term average sense, they are accurate.

Thus, a rating is basically a better version of a W/D/L record. Someone could have lots of wins, but they're all agaist weak players. The rating takes this into account, and thus yields more information.

I like ratings

I like ratings too.

I love ratings - gives me an idea of how good I am and whether or not I am improving over time. Trying to improve my rating provides me with motivation to work harder - just like a report card in school. The rating helps me to choose my opponents and tournaments so I can enjoy challenging games and still have a chance of winning. My rating even helps me to choose which books to buy. My rating doesn't scream at me - it whispers - it is my friend - not my ego.

In my opinion, ratings can be both good and bad.

They can be good in the sense that they give a player a sense of progress when they see their rating climb.  Your rating can also tell you when you are playing poorly and it sinks.  

Although your rating is ultimately a useless number next to your name, it can serve as the proverbial carrot forever dangling in front of your nose, giving you reason to push forward and climb to higher ground.  Think of it in similar terms to that old gold star your teacher put on your report cad in 3rd grade: not really worth much but a stamp of achievement never the less.

Rating can also be bad in many ways.  Certain grandmasters have brought up the point that when people achieve a certain rank, like expert for instance, some have a tendency to covet that little number and fear playing because that 2011 rating might just drop to 1999 because of a bad game.  Nonsense of course but we do see this in USCF play, and I personally know of many cases where this happens.  

Rating can also be crap.  They can be artificially low, or artificially high or simply a lie perpetrated by a person using an engine.  

For me, I don't really pay too much attention to my rating anymore.  Ive beaten people hundreds of points higher than me and I've lost to people hundreds of points lower.  I've been playing long enough to know when I play like a patzer and when I play well.  I've also been around the game long enough to know that both of those above mentioned scenarios will happen to me again.

Such is the nature of our game.

Really it doesn't matter if you obsess over your rating or ignore it, your performance on the board during individual games(and what you learn from those games) is far more important than any number someone has assigned you. 

rating = self worth

I totally agree with wormrose.  

And knowing my opponent's rating can help me during the game (yes, I do occasionally play the man, not the board).  For instance, I'm strong playing the Queen's Gambit, but weak against the Indian Defenses.  Therefore, I may play 1) d4 against lower rated players, but won't use it against higher rated players, since I think it's reasonable to assume that higher rated players may use the Indian Defenses, but lower rated players won't.

i just got an idea - no chess site has it - an option to block ratings! so you can't see your or anyone else's rating until you unblock ratings again.

A better idea might be to use your online chess to practice playing against indian systems so that when you meet them in a serious game you'll do better. Don't you agree?

Another sort of 'block ratings' (hide your ratings from others) it may come in useful for other reasons - for example there is this 60+ year old person with a sub-novice rating [below 1600] and he said that *I* don't know anything about Q v R endings! :D

Now how useful it would be if that person could hide his rating from me ...

In a way, I don't like ratings.

They don't correlate with any strength except your ability to checkmate (it's true XD)

it's hard to work with a rating that gets affected by disconnections to the server- too bad something can't be done about that.

johndeere850dlc wrote:

I hate rating because numbers can't tell how good of chess player you are. Knowing a persons rating should not be screaming at you when you are playing a game. You should have the option of knowing a players rating no matter what kind of game you are playing. Ratings are intimidating and if someones rating is lower than yours it can make you mess around and loss. Rating are dumb.

 You got quite a negative response for some reason, but I can see why people would want this feature! Many people who are just trying to learn and practise chess don't want to care about their ratings.

I like the ratings, give me an idea of where I am going.

I like ratings in general - I just don't like the one I've got. I'm almost sure it isn't  mine. Does anybody recognise it?

Kaixi wrote:

In a way, I don't like ratings.

They don't correlate with any strength except your ability to checkmate (it's true XD)

Um...

Exactly. Ratings demonstrate your ability to checkmate - i.e., to win chess games.

I like ratings. They help me find people who will whoop my butt. If we had to just play everyone at random because there were no ratings or no one could see the ratings the majority of games would be way lopsided.