Old Thread: IMPORTANT Change Coming to Vacation Use!

I can't understand why people can't understand it, but the change is seriously wrong. Just look at this:

Yesterday I went to visit my grandparents for the first time in 3 months. They live over 100km away, so it's quite a long trip. Before I left in the morning, I played my 1-day games. I left at 9:50.

My opponent moved in 1 1-day game a few minutes later.

I came back home at midnight, so I couldn't switch my computer on to play the moves, I just went to sleep.

Today I woke up a bit after 9:00. I quickly logged on, and I was on chess.com on 9:25

However, anti-vacation was already triggered a few minutes ago! Even though I had about 30 minutes left, I was already on vacation. I had to go off, and I lost 1 vacation day!

So, concluding:

I used 23 hours 30 minutes, and I was on time to play a move. And I still lost 1 vacation day! I think the following should be changed:

-Either change anti-timeout protection to kick maybe 10 or 15 minutes before time is up.

-Or don't make anti-timeout protection take 1 day of vacation. The new rule was made to avoid managing overloaded game list, and if someoe triggers the protection it isn't the case.

I hope it is clear and it will be taken into consideration.

Yeah, that is seriously messed up. What I don't understand, is why the protection kicks in before the time at all? Even the 10 or 15 minutes seem long to me.

Some people like to think 10 or 15 minutes about their moves, so it's ok.

Yeah, but my point is if you get your move in before cut-off it should not cost you any vacation. Unless I'm misunderstanding something here. ( which is likely)

No you're correct. And that was my point.

Auto-timeout protection is not an exact science. Apparently it kicks in any time up to 90 minutes before you time out.

Think of your problem another way. You do not have the ability to access and play at least twice every 22 hours and 30 minutes. Given the current policy, this means you are overloaded with one day per move games, since your limit is zero games with this time control.

The conclusion is that you cannot accept games with this time control.

Okay, so this means that one consequence of the newly introduced rule is to strongly discourage many premium players from playing one day per move games for whom this had been much more easily possible before.

Slowing things down.

It would make one day per move games faster since only players who can make at least two moves in 22 hours 30 minutes will be participating. Those who cannot will stop playing one move per day games.

Good point TadDude, I will certainly not entertain any more one day games. It's highly probable that I could make two moves every day but have no wish to be compelled to do so.  I think many others will see it this way, too.

I have just about 10 1-day games left, and all of them are further rounds of tournaments that I signed up for 4-5 months ago, when things were different...

Given the current policy, you should be able to resign without the site sanctioning you for throwing the games where you are in a winning position. (Ask for a draw in winning positions.)

Would you really recommend to do that, TadDude? Wouldn't you assume that the other participants in these affected tournaments may become even more angry about such external distortions of a tournament than, say, people who seem to be getting worked up about stallers of losing games?

I was hoping to score well there - I'll sacrifice a few vacation days for that...

Not a recommendation but one possible solution if players find they are unable to access the site in time.

Kacparov decided against it, "I was hoping to score well there - I'll sacrifice a few vacation days for that...", but others may decide to save their vacation time for future use.

I'm still going to run out of vacation sooner or later with the amount of OTB tournaments I play...so I will use what I have when I still have the vactaion. And the day I lost now may turn out decisive some time.

Auto time out protection, like everything else, has its positives and negatives.  Positive - it can keep you from timing out if you cannot make your move in time.  Negative - it can cost you a day's vacation if you don't make your move before it activates.  Since the auto time out protection cannot be turned off, premium members have about 1.5 hours less than the time control to make their move.  Doesn't seem like that much of a problem.

It does to me.

But if you have 3 months of vacation it might not make a difference.

Even better: 

If the vacation kicks in, e.g., 45 minutes before losing a game on time, AND it is turned off within those 45 minutes, then it should not take a full day from the vacation balance.

It is even questionable whether it should cost any time at all. Basically, the auto-vacation is an insurance against accidents. If the accident did not happen, it should not trigger any surcharges.

Also, it absolutely should be possible to turn off the automatic protection.

I guess it should just take the time since triggering, but with some protection against people who just let the time run down.