Vote chess improvements

One of my favorite places to be at this site is vote chess, but there are a lot of room for improvements there and I know there are several people on this site which agrees to at least some of my suggestions (some are also suggestions from others). There would be a lot of work to make it the way I want it to be, but I think it is worth the effort. It is mostly about creating a new vote chess rating for groups, some more options/opportunities to play vote chess and a few rule changes. If you want to discuss vote chess I suggest joining the Vote Chess Forum. Here is the list of things I want to improve.

1. Create a vote chess rating (like the rating in online chess, there is an interest and it is possible to create it based on all teams finished games which is proven by the team Vote Chess Elo Rankings.)
2. Be able to play rated/unrated games
3. Challenge teams with a specific rating range
4. Be able to create challenges with 2 simultaneous games (one with each color)(this would also be a good addition in online chess)
5. Have a specific time when all vote chess games starts (Like for example all vote chess games with 2days/move starts 12:00 every even date, this makes it easier to remember when it is time to vote as it always is the same time for all vote chess games with 2 days/move)
6. Be able to set a starting time for vote chess games (to make it easier for teams to for example always have at least 1 vote chess game with their current turn)
7. Be able to have a rating range to people that can join the vote chess games (not rated games for teams, cooperation is at its best if all players are at the same level)
8. Be able to challenge players (unrated as the pool of players is much larger than the pool of teams, the player will play like online chess while the team play like vote chess)
9. Link to the last move at the archive when a team resigns
10. A link at the bottom of the comments to see the comments from last move (easier way to navigate without using the archive over and over again). Also a link at the top of the comments to see the comments for the next move.
11. Be able to change your current vote (why not, its practically the same as to wait until the last minute to vote)
12. All players that haven't voted get an alert when it is not much time to vote left (can be removed from the alerts by the player himself like all other alerts).
13. Admins and superadmins for groups being able to see who votes what
14. Admins and superadmins for groups being able to set a time that must expire before people can vote.
15. Admins and superadmins for groups being able to set if the current votes should be revealed or hidden before people votes
16. A list of "eligible" candidate moves be presented separate from the discussion. Anyone can add to the list and only moves on the list can be voted.
17. Be able to quote at the team discussion in vote chess games
18. Posts should be numbered (like it is in this forum)
19. Adding vote chess tournaments (like the tournaments in online chess, there is a big interest in this proven by the groups CSC, Vote Chess League Tournament,  World Cup of Chess Openings, TEGERMON VOTE CUP and Team Tournaments)(also a good addition to team matches).
20. Admins and super admins being able to remove players from vote chess games without removing them from the whole group.
21. Super admins being able to ban players from all vote chess games in the group without banning them from the whole team (also a good addition to team matches)
22. A single click to insert a diagram with the current position (instead of needing to copy and paste the FEN-string every time)
23. A link to the teams at the vote chess games. Currently you see the teams names over and under the chess board, but it is impossible to click on them to get to the group homepage.
24. After a move has been made comments at that move should be impossible to edit or delete as it is supposed to become a part of the public archive after the game (see FirebrandX's suggestion at comment #74)
25. In the lists of completed vote chess games, it would be good if it said the name of the teams who played the game and the result of the game.

@Martin0 - Great article and some very good ideas! Would it be possible to make the list Numbered rather than Bulleted, making it easier to respond to individual suggestions?

I agree that this is a great list. I'd add that I think it should be possible to have "one click"-access to the discussion on the last move from the page with the discussion about the current move. Also, posts should be numbered to be easily referrable.

Edit: This is item #10.

I will add a suggestion - That voting be disabled until a specific time i.e. when 24 hours remain. This could be an option selected when the game challenge is created.

edit: this is items #13 and #15

additional suggestion - that a list of "eligible" candidate moves be presented seperate from the discussion. Anyone can add to the list and only moves on the list can be voted.

great, all of that will make vote chess more exciting and reach. I lke the idea to give admins and superadmins more opportunities to manage the settings when creating the vote game or during it to change settings according to team interests (set specific time to vote, hidden or show which moves were voted etc)

I'm glad you all liked the list I changed it to numbers instead

@Bubatz, Isn't that the same as my number 10, at the bottom of the comments there should be a link to the comments from last move.

@wormrose, number 15 is the same as your first suggestion right?, I added your second suggestion

Another suggestion which I believe would be good in ALL forums is to be able to click a specific person's avatar in order to comment to that person specifically.

I agree it is a good suggestion, or at least you should be able to quote as you can in forums like this. I don't see why this shouldn't be possible at vote chess

I always wondered why simple quoting is not possible.

Threads within threads (like at facebook) would also help with discussing specific candidate moves and strategies. I believe the necessary code is open source.

I added quotes and that the posts should be numbered. About "threads within threads" its something that probably would replace quotes and is something that could be an improvement to the whole site. I'm not sure if I would like chess.com to look more like facebook, but as it would affect the whole site I don't think it would fit to put in my list as I am fokusing on improvements for vote chess.

I'm not suggesting the site should be like facebook. In fact I don't like the new "look" which resembles facebook even more than before. In fact I don't like facebook. I only mentioned facebook to provide an example of what I am refering to.

I like being able to start a thread within a thread regarding a specific item (such as a chess move). If someone suggested 4.Nf6 then it might be useful to have a sub-thread on 4.Nf6. Adding [quote] would probably be sufficient.

In lieu of full subthreading capability perhaps threads for candidate moves could be done.

My main suggestion is item #17 the [Candidate List] which I think would solve a lot of problems. Anyone could submit a candidate with or without comment but their name would be associated with the candidate even if it might only be known to the admin. If the name of the submitter were known to all it would probably discourage people from making suggestions. The bad thing about that is that some people might want to suggest a move for the sake of getting instructive feedback.

If votes were only allowed for moves on the [Candidate List] this would eliminate drive-by votes for unknowns since every candidate would be known. If someone were to submit ridiculous moves or votes for inappropriate resigning and draw offers, the admin would know who was the prankster and could remove them from the game.

I believe the admin should have the power to remove a troublesome person from the game without necessarily removing them from the group, this is not now possible. I really don't like the idea of the admin having knowledge of who voted for what and the [Candidate List] would eliminate the need for that. All submissions would be eligible and discussion would weed out the bad candidates.

I think creating candidate moves that only can be voted at is a good idea, I don't think there is anything wrong if someone suggest a bad move and put it on the list and others tell him it is bad. Some things I'm not sure how it should be is:

1. Should a candidate move be removable when everyone agree it is bad and in that case how and who should remove it?
2. Should there be subthreads for each candidate move?

To be all honest I think it should be as easy as possible. Therefor the candidate moves should be unremovable, but this is merely my opinion. In my experience there is usually less than 10 comments/move and therefor I don't see why subthreads are necessary. I think it would get a bit too complicated to have general discussion at one place with links to the previous move and a lot of subthreads for each candidate move. Then after clicking on the link to the previous move you might want to look at a candidate move there. I wouldn't like to navigate like that and want all discussion for 1 move to be at one place. I won't add these details to the list until I hear other opinions.

Sub-threads could actually get very complicated if they were designated each to individual candidates. There might be situations when it could be difficult to decide which sub-thread to post in. For example if there were two plans; Nf3>Bg5 or Bg5>Nf3. So probably that's not such a good idea.

Should candidates be removable? I think not. I think the discussion alone would prevent them from being selected. The discussion about removing a candidate from the list could dominate the forum and distract the team when it would probably be best to just ignore it.

Should admins have the power to remove candidates? Once again, I think not. If the candidates being submitted are malicious: better to remove the troublemaker.

@FirebrandX, I'm not sure how it works with e-mail alerts as I have disabled them. But you get an alert here on chess.com when it becomes your teams turn in vote chess. Personally I think e-mail alerts on every turn it becomes your move in all vote chess games would become a lot of spamming to the mail, but if you want it I think it should be possible. Am I correct if you currently get no e-mails about vote chess and wishes to get messages every time it become your teams turn (Because I don't understand why you would want a message when it becomes your opponents turn.)

@wormrose, I think that means we agree regarding the candidate moves then

Should I add that admins and superadmins should be able to remove people from specific vote chess games (removing them from the member list at the game)? Also they should be able to ban a player from all vote chess games in the group (with an unban option being possible). I think this type of banning would also be good for team matches within the group. This may sound unnecessery, but some teams tend to ban players from the whole group when they for example timeout some team matches or too high timeout ratio (and therefor the player can't play vote chess for the group )