Default timer for FFA

There have been some recent discussions regarding a possible default timer change for FFA.

The current default timer is 1+7. This timer has a short start time but a long possible game time. If you are attacked at the beginning of the game you have very little time to think about the position. This gives the player attacked first a disadvantage. Then the potential game length is too long which we saw recently in the festival game which lasted hours 2.5 hours and 400+ moves.

So it is clear that the 1 min start time is too short. You basically start the game in time trouble and stay that way throughout the game and the +7 increment is too long. Which has been realized by those in charge and an 8+2 timer was used for the festival final. This is an improvement but still not perfect as the +2 makes things a bit sharp at the end and makes playing on mobile difficult.

So i think it would be good to discuss what is the best timer for FFA . 5+4 or 8+3 are possibilities but i'm not sure. A +3 or +4 increment seems logical.

Any thoughts would appreciated.

We have this argument, where as I slap 10|15 on every single variant of mine.

I would say 6+3 from my experience of variants.

10 minutes seems fine

As much as I like 10 min, unless you’re prepared to blitz out moves near the last few minutes then it’s not that suitable. At least it guarantees that the game will finish in less than 45 min (when factoring in premoves and move delay)?

Maybe something with a base 2 or 3 would be fine, if the increment is kept around 5 to 10. In my opinion with the prevalence of team like strategies in FFA, it could be even wise to copy the teams time control and just go with 2|10 as the default for higher level, however that may be implemented, and have 1|5 and 1|7 for lower level who don’t want to spend hours.

Not to judge, but you only have one game of 4PC Teams and 0 of FFA, so is this experience coming from custom variants or like a previous account?

We have this argument, where as I slap 10|15 on every single variant of mine.

I would say 6+3 from my experience of variants.

Not to judge, but you only have one game of 4PC Teams and 0 of FFA, so is this experience coming from custom variants or like a previous account?

Previous account I would rather not share.

Also some from custom variants too

I’m liking the suggestions here. Might point you back to the very very beginning when the founding fathers started with 4 + 4 as you can see in Danny Rensch’s playing 4PC video here: https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=f-cVupxkQpo&t=731s&pp=2AHbBZACAQ%3D%3D

3+4 is my suggestion tbh 4mins on head start is too much imo as there is not many possible moves in the first 4-5moves they are just standard ofc after that the time needs to be used properly for tactics and stuff. Again 4+4 is also pretty decent but I would surely like 3+4. again the main objective is to keep the increment low as 4-5 as people shuffle in many cases which wastes too much time. Also not to forget the passive players who do nothing in start to help opposites (obv i am talking about high rated games) they mostly dont waste time and keep too much time as playing passive dont need to waste much time. Due to this many players get too much time and the games goes for more than 1hr which i dont think many people have time for. So keeping 3+4 is my opinion.

Also one more thing is changing 30secs hyper back to bullet. The main reason behind this is 30sec is way too much time for hyper. 15sec and 6sec hyper are ok as they serve purpose of speed mostly. In 30sec you mostly have to keep up with tactics as you have enough time to think. Yesterday I played few 30secs games and saw that players who plays 6sec and got rating of 2200-2300 are not able to keep their ratings balanced in those games. This is mainly because 30sec dirty tricks are not possible mostly. Also I know that there are not many bullet players active but there are few players who still play bullet and would actually love that they could play 30sec as bullet again.

That's the problem, the game should not continue for too long, players will also learn how to allocate time properly and effectively. I do not have too high ranking in this category, it can be said to be low, so my words may not be as weight as the top players, but that's because I have not played much, I know 1 game FFA will usually take a long time so I am very lazy to play this genre. I have also seen a lot of matches of the top players and see most of them exceeded 100 moves, there are matches even up to 1 and a half hours, so I don't understand what is enough. If that's just enough from your perspective, then maybe I think we should add a new genre, Classical, like Lichess. Rapid needs to have a calculation speed, not merely calculating, if you do not distribute a reasonable time, then you will naturally have less time in the endgame

Agree

Anything less than +5 increment or 15|D is too short. Personally I like 2|7 or 3|7 but can see the merit to something like 5|5.

The main reason games take 400 moves is because people play passively (which is not because of the time control). If you want the game the end sooner you can play looser from the opening and end the game easily in under 100 moves.

3/3 or 1/20D! Delay is essential in 4pc imo

Is it a full moon? Delay is terrible there is no advantage in playing quicker. u want everyone to think for 20 secs about every move and get a cup of coffee too? 3/3 or 1/20D couldn't be two more different timers. like you're suggesting a 30 min game or a 1.5 hour game makes no sense!

3/3 is too fast and people will flag in most cases and 1/20D is too slow

i dont think people even have time to play these tcs as they would take too much time and i am pretty sure they have life too

4pc is life what's the issue

I think changing the default just won't happen, people enjoy that timer even if it's not super balanced. You can make your own timer if you don't like that. The only issue is nobody will ever want to play another time then 1+7. Everybody picks 1+7 over others like the 10 second delay one because those are fun. The default is designed for fun and not SKILL.

3+4/4+4 have to be a little too fast, no? At 8 seconds a move we're living on increment in just 24 moves. That seems a little quick for rapid where your game is easily going to last fifty moves.

yea i dont want to waste time playing 1|7 which takes a lot of time if players like being stupid and passive in 3 player stage. I have faced this in the festival semi finals and have decided to not play these stupid long time controls. I do agree that u need thinking in FFA but you should be able to think fast too. There is already 3/4 min head start which is pretty good and I don't think you need to waste much time in first 5-7 moves. Again in crucial moments you surely need long time controls but you need to see that people have life too. Some people can't play for hrs in 4pc just for a game. I wanna ask you a question that would you like to waste a whole hour of your life for a 4pc game which won't even do much change in your life? Again i don't really care about this as I won't play these long time controls unless there are good players. I mostly play 10min or 8min FFA which is good too but some people disagree with is because they are slow/ can't think fast and then flag. Well if the FFA time controls are not going to 1|7 its not really going to hurt me but there are people who don't have time to waste on 4pc and disagrees with 1|7 time control