Really Annoying Chess Site

Today I tried playing on a well known site that can't be named (but may or may not have two numerals in its name).

1) After every game it takes 4 actions to start a new one, including scrolling the screen down so you can see the board. What kind of amateur BS design is this?

2) On other popular chess sites, if you've picked up a piece, and decide you don't want to move it, you can just press the right mouse button. This automatically puts the piece back.

On the Really Annoying Chess Site if you try this it drop the piece on the square it's over. Instead of canceling your moves it makes your move. So anyone who tries their site for the first time will be annoyed by muscle memory causing blunders.  

Blame magnus 

I play there often; try another one?

You also can't do what I call "hovering."

If I premove, then pick up another piece to hover it over a square, the act of clicking cancels the premove.

More importantly, this means in time scrambles if you try to premove quickly and your opponent pauses, you will end up canceling your own premove which could easily lose the game... that's right, you're punished for moving too fast in a time scramble.

Apparently they've put a lot of money into that site (drawing in various personalities, players, having their fair share of content, etc). It's too bad they get the most basic and important stuff wrong, IMO.

Yeah, definitely. I can see why they're at best as high as 3rd among the top sites

There's a pretty honest article published on US CHESS regarding where to learn and play chess especially during these difficult times during the Coronavirus social distancing, the effect it's had on having to play chess online almost exclusively, unless playing with family members at home. 

I just wanted you to know that while chess.com was highly recommended, this site you're referencing was not, due to users possibly not liking the UI.

So, your post is pretty in line with their analysis of that site. (I was redirected to US Chess from IM Eric Rosen's website [he was not the author of aforementioned article] ).

Thank you for sharing this information. 

As a new chess player, I appreciate your input.

Thank you. 

Oh yeah of course once you mentioned the numbers, I knew what it was . Chess.com ♟didn’t change the name of another site in the forum called ‘Telling players on [other chess site] to join chess.com’, because it wasn’t advertising that chess site. I wonder if this is the same case. But this was kind of off topic

But there is one big advantage to play there for anyone who is 1200 elo or less;it's easier to win.

Once you get a bit better (like around 1300 elo )you have a lot more fun here against anyone rated here 1400 or less.

I've heard that before, so I'm really curious. It seems like if you're rated correctly then it doesn't matter where you play, your win percentage will be roughly 50%.

So by easier to win do you mean the style of play on chess.com for low rated layers is really annoying? In other words, even though you win the game wasn't fun for some reason?

Just not fair. We unpaying, freeloading wastrels demand better?! And if we don't get better we will go to another free site and demand better there.

I'm not talking about this site.

And I'm not talking about anything complicated. Just common sense design decisions.

not at all!

Let say your real rating is 1300 elo or 1350 elo.

If you start to play here you will probably win 20 games on your first 20 if you play only  players rated from 950 up to 1250 but they are very tough.....around 4  will be really rated under 1000 elo..all the other will be around 1200-1250 elo.

My point is;80% of the players here rated between 950 and 1250 play very well for 20 to 25 moves than they blunder....so that is why you win if you are a real 1300elo,you just wait and suddenly they make a mistake.

But if you are a real beginner(rated 1150 let's say) your chance of winning is only against the 4 or 5 that are really bad (under 1000 elo)  they are very few....

on the other sites  60% of the players rated under 1300 are kinda weak and you see it pretty early!

The players here are better and for a beginner ( 1150 elo) it's really tough.

That's true!!!!!!!!

When i started to play here a long time ago i thought that 80% of the players were cheating,because 80% of the players from 950 to 1180 were really tough until after 25 moves they did blunder....the 20% were really terrible.

And they all blunder (the 80% ) after 25 or 30 moves.

And i was wondering how come they could play so well and than blunder.

The answer is simple....they are all real 1200-1250....even if they are rated 950-1180.

They play like a 1250-1350 for 25 moves and than they all blunder....

So if you are really a 1350-1400 elo you will have a lot of fun beating all those guys under 1400 here but if you are a 1150elo you will not win much...probably 2 or 3 out of 10.

Btw it's a lot tougher to get a rating of 1800 at rapid here than on a few other sites but this site is not the toughest,i think it's the second toughest.

And i do love playing here and i'm a paid member since 2006,

I think I understand what you're saying, and I'm starting to link it to my own experience.

There's something Jan Gustafsson often talks about (half jokingly) in his videos and that's "chess culture." Like a modern day equivalent of "every Russian schoolboy knows." This is separate from rating, it's more about how much study a person has done.

So I think the more difficult sites have a higher chess "culture" so to speak. I don't think chess.com 1100 players are secretly 1200, but they probably use better openings, and know more basic tactics. Sure they blunder, but skills you've gained by beating up on people who play the scholar's mate every game wont work on them.

In my own experience, I've played on small sites. And for example, some site a lot of people play openings like the philidor and stay passive. Is this a terrible opening? No. But in general you get the feeling people are using these stop gap solutions instead of actually learning (some openings were basic attacks like stonwall then sac on h7 or something).

Around 2017 I stopped playing chess for almost a year except for on some small sites. When I came back to bigger sites like chess.com it was shocking at first because the overall level of knowledge and play (regardless of rating) was higher.

So I think this is what I'll call it... chess culture

And who will feel this difference the most? Of course new players, because no matter how genius or high rated they are, being new means you lack a certain amount of knowledge, and most of all you lack experience.

I agree,here their opening is often very aggressive even at very low level (rating under 1200).

I couldn't believe the pressure they were putting on me because when i started 20 years ago on the net there was not that king of pressure in the first 10 - 15 moves...but after that they just blunder a bit later to my surprise.