ratings and points observation

when you beat someone, you should get points based on the rating when you start the game, not when it ends.

I am matched agsint people with equal ratings, then if they go offline the other players call for win 'on time' right away, and their rating goes down fas. So even if my game was in progress longer, because I give them a chance to come back and finish, I only get points for beating someone with a much lower rating. if you start against someone at 1550 rating, you should get points for beating someone with 1550, even if they lost 5 games in a row and the rating went down, when they challenged you, they WERE a 1550 player.

Not fair.

It is fair.  That's how it works for everybody. 

That's an interesting point, but I suspect that this information isn't saved with the game. Also keep in mind that the reverse is also true. The player's rating could go up and then if you win you'll get more points than before. Conversely if you lose, you won't lose as many points because of the higher rated player. In the end, this may even out becoming fair again.

Also, how do "call for win on time?" I thought the games just timed-out naturally when their clock ran out. Or, for that matter, how do you "give them a chance to come back?" I didn't think you had a choice in the matter. Please correct me otherwise.

just because it is the same for everyoe doesn't make it 'fair'. It punishes the player who is kind and gives the opponent a chance to continue the game, it rewards thsoe who ask for a 'time' win at the first opportunity.

When the nice person is penalized and the harsh 'too bad fella' types get more points., that is inherently unfair. so there. .)

trhe game don['t automatically give a win if time runs out. The timer sits on 'less than 60 sedonds'. You have to hit a butto to 'ask for a win 'on time'

and the reverse doesn't actuallay happen, yes they might beat other players and raise theri score, but I am talking about if they just quit playing, they lose every game they are in. And on each los on time, their score goes down. So if you dn't hit the button right away, you lose points. I played someone who went down a full hundred points in rating because they had 12 games going.

regardless of all that, if you are rated a 1500 when the game starts, agasint that player you should stay at 1500, both players are matched equally in terms of actual quality. So the first 'time-keeper' ges full points no his forfeit, the later time requst gets fewer points. Whah whah whah

Ratings aren't your strength, they merely shadow it.

If you start a game vs someone 1550, and subsequent games (win or lose), are completed during the course of your game with them, then their new rating (up or down) is more accurate than their old one.

If it is a question of which rating is more reasonable (or "fair") to use, then the only correct answer is the newest rating.

If you want to argue based on perceived fairness or something then that's fine.

Actually, it's not all that fair, and I do think the OP has a point.

True story:

A much higher rated player than me has 100's of simul games going, and starts timing out.

In the 1st games to time out, the opponents get full benifit of his high rating. By the time my games time out, hes rated 1050 or something, and I get no benefit from from his high rating.

If initial was used, surely it would have been more consistent?

yeah

Two points.

First, one case doesn't make the system bad.

Second, if the they have a 100 game simul going on, and you beat them because they can't keep up, then the people who received more points should receive less, not the other way around where you would receive more, because the player wasn't at his full strength (unless they maintained their rating with a constant load of 100 games).

Because this case is just one of many, and because even it can be explained in different ways, e.g. my way where the other players are the ones who received the incorrect number, it supports point 1.

Again, I believe the most up-to-date rating is the most accurate because this is how the rating system works.  If you want to argue for retroactive rating adjustments, then it would have to be the other way around.  Where players have points adjusted, say, later that week based on games that were still in progress at the time the game ended.

.....Second, if the they have a 100 game simul going on, and you beat them because they can't keep up, then the people who received more points should receive less, not the other way around where you would receive more, because the player wasn't at his full strength (unless they maintained their rating with a constant load of 100 games).

It's not about who gets more, it's about everybody getting the same. Fairness, and consistency.

(slightly different topic)

There's also a case to be made for rating floors, in cases like this. Because a 1800 cant keep up with his games for maybe circumstances out of his control, does not make him a weaker player.

If loss of rating points is intended as some punishment for timing out, this is a very bad idea. While it may be annoying for the culprit, it is much more so for all (100's, remember?) his opponents

Well, it would be interesting anyway but not sure how to do it...

I guess you could take all the game that finish in a day (or a week, or whatever).  Get the performance rating for all of them taken together, and then adjust everyone with one big update at the end of the time period.

The continuous update system should be more accurate though.  Remember rating doesn't equal strength, it's a statistic of performance (e.g. taking on too many games alters performance, not strength, or an opponent who always makes hasty moves, he's not rated on the theory he knows but only on his results) so continually updated statistics would be best.  IMO the unfairness is an error in perception, not the system.

Or you could use the start rating, lol.

If I beat a 2000 rated, and after the game he's 1990, I still think I beat a 2000. So there!

lol, ok, you got me on that one, but I don't like that method :p

Fair enough.

waffllemaster wrote:

Well, it would be interesting anyway but not sure how to do it...I guess you could take all the game that finish in a day (or a week, or whatever).  Get the performance rating for all of them taken together, and then adjust everyone with one big update at the end of the time period.

That sounds a lot harder than just putting the ratings in when your game starts and you get points based on those two ratings for that game.

When a player actually wins or loses it's understandable if the rating goes up or down a little, it's when someone leaves altogether and loses all 20 games they were playing on 'time', the rating goes down a lot, without any real refleti of them being better or worse. And the other salient point that everyone missed is that the current system encourages people to call for a win 'on time' as soon as possible.

Thankfully it's not done by hand, so as long as it doesn't require millions of computations, it's best to go for the most sensible approach.

If sensible to you is what feels good (hey he got more points than me no fair!) then that's certainly an argument to make.

I'm still wondering what button you're talking about. I've won several games "on time" and I've never hit such a button. I've never seen a timer stop at 60 seconds. I gather we're talking about online games here and not live games.

Most of my turn-based games are in tournaments. These certainly auto-time out when the opponent doesn't complete their move. Is it that you are referring to open play games? Do these require you to "request a timeout?" Come to think of it, although every non-tournament game I've played (not that many) had some kind of time control specified, none of them have actually ever timed out yet.

@GKarRacer: In online turn-based games you have to click on the link "Claim win on time" if your opponent runs out of time by default. You can change this behaviour in your settings though. In tournaments the win on time is executed automatically to prevent unnecessary delays in the tournaments. 

GKarRacer:  

It turns out there is a settings choice whether to automatically declare victory on 'time' (on the "settings" page for 'Online chess'). if you don't select that, then you will sit on "a few minutes" until you ask to declare victory on 'time'.  My point of complaint was that it encouraged a 'win-at-all-cost' attitude over a more mellow attitude, I now check when a player gets close, if they obviously went offline and have lost a few in a row, I take the win right away, if it's an isolated incident and someone is just busy with 'real life' I give them a break.