Blitz - Ratings and Titles/Norms

[Chexhero]

After some careful consideration, it has been decided that the ACF's current titles and norms required to achieve those titles cannot be achieved through blitz events. We will consider having separate titles and required norms for blitz.

There is also talk about having a separate ratings list for blitz only. It seems to make sense and is how chess currently does it.

One of our concerns however, is will there be enough future blitz events to implement this kind of new system for blitz? Hopefully there is, as blitz is a good variant from traditional play and can maybe help attract newer people to the game.

[clintolsen]

After some careful consideration, it has been decided that the ACF's current titles and norms required to achieve those titles cannot be achieved through blitz events. We will consider having separate titles and required norms for blitz.

There is also talk about having a separate ratings list for blitz only. It seems to make sense and is how chess currently does it.

One of our concerns however, is will there be enough future blitz events to implement this kind of new system for blitz? Hopefully there is, as blitz is a good variant from traditional play and can maybe help attract newer people to the game.

All doable. FYI, this will require quite a bit of work to manage this in the current ratings database/system. I would propose that players playing a blitz event for the first time use their current ACF rating (if one exists) as their starting rating. Only players who have played 1+ blitz games would show up on the blitz rating list. Players could be treated as being in Provisional status until a certain number of blitz games are played. This will get players to their true blitz ratings much quicker, which is important when you are (likely) going to have very few blitz events. Otherwise the ratings list would be useless / wildly innacurate for many years.

[Alex_Moiseyev]

Just trying to refresh my memory- how many Blitz events we had in the past 10 years … and how many of them we’ll have in the next 10 years ? Is that the only important thing ACF has to think now and waste time ???

For the time now I believe - it is more important to process accurately rating for all events accumulated in the past 2 years and do a proper rating processing transition from Clint to Dennis.

[Chexhero]

Hey Clint, I tried messaging you about this on FB, but I wasn't sure if you got my message or not. I did want to ask you if it would be possible as myself and some others in ACF executive committee are interested in the idea. Glad to know it is a possibility. Like Alex says, we will have to consider if taking on a project like this would be worth it, considering blitz events in the ACF have been quite rare over the years. I do believe that with new ACF leadership we can push to make blitz a more common event. Checkers has to evolve in new ways in order to survive. Beginner/weaker players I think would be more attracted to checker events that are less days and with games played at a much faster pace.

[clintolsen]

@Alex - I finished training Dennis a few weeks ago and he's been doing an excellent job entering results (21 tournaments entered already) quickly and accurately since then. We'll process them when he gives me the go ahead to do so.

I've also been communicating with Travis Weddle who is supposedly working on a new ACF website - I gave him an overview of the ratings system last weekend and will be writing up some documentation for him so he knows what to move / not break.

[Alex_Moiseyev]

@Alex - I finished training Dennis a few weeks ago and he's been doing an excellent job entering results (21 tournaments entered already) quickly and accurately since then. We'll process them when he gives me the go ahead to do so.

I've also been communicating with Travis Weddle who is supposedly working on a new ACF website - I gave him an overview of the ratings system last weekend and will be writing up some documentation for him so he knows what to move / not break.

All great news, thanks for update Clint ! It is nice to hear that along with ratings, we also have someone working on ACF website!

If some day we have sufficient number of Blitz events, separate "Blitz Rating" may work and become an encouraging tool.

[clintolsen]

Wouldn't it make more sense to have separate ratings for 3-move and go as you please?

[champion374]

Having separate ratings confuse things in my view.Will just give the rating guy more work.In chess there is
noting called Blitz rating.

[clintolsen]

That's incorrect. In chess they have classical, rapid AND blitz ratings.

[champion374]

oh i never saw it.Well you guys in charge shall see.

[Chexhero]

Wouldn't it make more sense to have separate ratings for 3-move and go as you please?

I have thought about that and from a certain standpoint I think it would make sense. But then we might want to think about how many rating lists we want to have. If we do a blitz and non-blitz rating list (2 separate lists), if we then add in a separate rating list for GAYP, that would give us potentially 4 separate rating lists. And then to be logically consistent, we then do the same for 11-man, giving us 6 separate lists. Or, we could just do a separate list for each of the different styles in non-blitz, and then just combine all blitz styles into one. That would still give us 4 separate rating lists. A lot of different rating lists, for not so many checker events. GAYP and especially 11-man tend to be played quite a bit less than 3-move. But I am not totally against the idea either. Some players are obviously stronger in GAYP than 3-move, or vice versa. Also, having separate lists can provide more accuracy on where to place certain players in regards to the different tournament divisions. If you think it is feasible, then perhaps this is something we should consider.