Faking a LOW rating to win !!

Hello? What are we saying here? Don't the comments say be revelant, helpful, and NICE

ok K_brown I will bite ,

answer to your question #2 Why should there be a rule against it ? : first and foremost in most tournaments whether it be chess or sports or whatever, different levels of competency are determined by various methods and the players are then usually seperated into different levels. This is done to promote competition and fair play. If a player sneaks into a level that is much lower than his or her true playing ability don't you think that would give him or her an unfair advantage and ruin the competition ? It seems pretty clear to me and to most reasonable people. Thats why there are different levels or classes of play in almost every sport or game.

As for your question #3 : How would the rule be implemented in a sensible manner ? .... That seems pretty obvious as well. When a player is found to be clearly intentionally losing games in order to enter a tournament at a much lower level than his or her "normal" ability, then they should be immediately disqualified from the tournament and or banned from Chess.com. There are many moderators on this site that do take action when cheating is found out and the cheaters are banned. Thats the way it should be, cheating or sandbagging ruins the game and shows a severe lack of integrity.

The problem is that there are quite a few subjective terms in this matter. People like to make a large fuss even when they are banned for violating an instated rule. Anyone who lost to a player approximately 50 points below their rating would go nuts if this was a rule because people are ridiculous. It seems like this should be a rule but maybe this would also create a nightmare for the staff. "I'm being hazed by chess.com because I had a bad day of chess!" and the like. The next point is How does this actually qualify as cheating? It is shit sportsmanship but I don't think it is quite cheating. I feel like getting this implemented is going to depend on how you present your arguement to the staff. Then there is the arguement about what actually qualifies as intentionally losing games.. 

All in all, you have a point. Maybe it needs to be refined a little but it is worth a shot to try to get the staff behind this. I could go on for a while with "if and or but" because this really is a subjective matter but I get what you are trying to say.

Look at the very recent thread Unfounded Accusations for an example of the kind of things that would happen even more frequently. Perhaps there could be more things put in writting about etiquette on chess.com but honestly it is all kind of pointless. The internet is always going to be the internet. You can present any case you have to the moderators and let them decide.

@ slimcheffy

lets put it this way.  its not good business sense to make accusations you can't absolutely prove. 

blatant cheating does of course get alot of people upset and chess.com has made recent waves on the chess scene by calling out an engine user.

on the other hand;  I might lose chess games today that I won yesterday, because I was drunk, distracted, and my kid just decided to use MY account.   this is all grey area-- if I lost deliberately game after game.... but a game here, a game there. 

very effective sandbagging and just no way to prove it.

fact is, if you here to improve, sandbagging is actually pretty awesome.  a chance to play a higher rated player- and perhaps a chance to score a win your didn't deserve (after all; if he's still trying to sink; after a brief and half-hearted opening why not just lose)....

Rant about all you want, but chess.com is going to do what makes business sense.  ban engine users =yes.  Kick out sandbaggers =no.

I also think that chess.com is going for the more casual chess playing experience approach so this might even be counterproductive for their goals as a whole and what they are trying to do. If you start implementing all the rules that should be implemented the site will lose that casual feel really quick.

@thegreat_patzer, I'm sorry my friend but they do kick out sandbaggers here, and rightly so ! Also I did present proof of one such a case in this thread : check out post #181 on page 10. and let me know what you think of this persons play. I'm going to guess you see exactly the same as me, clear and deliberate sandbagging. 

What's this? http://www.chess.com/home/game_archive?sortby=&show=live_blitz&member=drifblim 

How should this be treated? Any suggestions? Am I allowed to do this too?

Probably just trying to see what the lowest rating is.

And now probably just trying to see what the highest rating is. What if it was an untitled account? Rules doesn't apply in the same way for titled and untitled players?

I did that, intentionally brought down my blitz rating to 1100 from 1700, and won 50 games in a row. It was fun, but didnt worth i can say since bringing back the account to initial state requires some effort, but can't say i didn't try. People should experience new things :D (p.s i lost someone rated 1500 on the way which shouldnt happen, and lost 2 games on time 3+0 games )

Intentionally losing games is against the TOS of the site and can result in account closures.

https://support.chess.com/customer/en/portal/articles/1444879-fair-play-on-chess-com-what-you-need-to-know

I imagine a warning and a link to the rules is more likely 

ummm isn't what you just described also called faking a low rating to win??? People do this to get a cheap thrill from surprising unsuspecting opponents and obliterating them in a game.

thanks for your insight, I appreciate it. I know I make alot of stupid moves during blitz games, sometimes they make no sense to me either lol! I think it's the time restraint that forces you to try to think too quickly. Aside from that, yes of course people do sandbag and fake low ratings for what appears to be no reason to a sane normal person.

dude many people do it
I being 1500 earlier had lost to 1200s
even some 1300 had cheated to win against me
This is very common in tournaments and often below 1000 rated players come in top 3 in arenas.