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I have a suggestion for a new feature:

In GO and chess, one can state ones current rating when entering Little Golem for the first time. I propose that this options is also made available for other games. As it is today, one has everything to lose and nothing to gain to play against a good player who has just joined - that is, a player which is worth 1900 points, but only has 1500. Does anyone have any views on this? I know this might also let people give themselves an artificially high rating, but what would they have to gain from that?

Marius

When i play a new player who's assigned 1500 rating points, and i lose my game i do _not_ lose any rating at all. This happens for the first 10(?) matches from this privisional player.

It is hard for a player arriving to the site to actually say which rating he has... I mean 1600 in reversi used to be easy to get for example but since this site has becoming a home to many competition players maybe 1550 now means you are stonger than if you had 1650 at the end of 2002... I just mean the ratings have no meaning outside LG and you can't ask an outsider to come in and have a clue what his rating is, even in games where he plays daily in real live!

Hjallti, you have a good point. I should say that my experiences are mainly from Hex. In Hex, most good players who have joined recently also play at kurnik, another great site where Hex, among other games, are played. They would be able to compare their rating at kurnik with other players that play both at kurnik and at LG, and estimate their rating.

Other players, and I think this goes for most games, probably have played against other LG players one way or another before, and could be able to estimate their rating by seeing what rating these players have. Of course, if you have no means of estimating your rating, just use the default (1500) rating.

And to Michael: True, you don't lose any points to someone who has not played any games yet. But when that player reaches 1600, he has played sufficient games for the rating to be affected (both when you lose and win to this player). If this player really is a 1900 player, then you still are playing "aginst the odds".

Now, this is NOT a big problem. It is a SMALL problem, but I think it is a problem nevertheless, and one which could easily be solved! :-)

Marius

Note that as for the championship rules there is a (solvable) problem, since any player with top10 rating that never played first league is entitled to play first league at the next championship.

Marius has a creative thinking about this suggestion. My immediate concern, however, is that newcomers’ self-assessments will make the existing members’ ratings cheap.

We have fought and sweated for months, and have attained certain ratings. Here a new guy just came aboard. Without fighting and sweating, he can simply claim a rating which can be even higher than ours. In a sense, fairness is somewhat lacking. :)

My 2nd concern is that we existing members ourselves will not value our own ratings any more. Sometimes, when I keep losing a few games and my rating keeps dropping, I may just tell myself, what the heck, I do not want this account any more. Let me abandon it, and start a new one with a higher rating.

My 3rd concern lies in that the reliability of the ratings will greatly deteriorate after being mixed by the influx of unreliable self-claimed ratings.

Although my concerns exist, it is not to say that yours should be put aside. In fact, your concern does carry some merits. For example, what if a 9-dan Go pro starts to join LG? Will he start from 20 kyu? Some remedies can be considered.

Perhaps in each game category Richard can form a committee of, say, 5 top players. If a new guy does not wish to start from rock bottom, he can pay an evaluation fee, and have the committee evaluate his strength. These fees can help Richard defray his operating costs.

There is a problem; there is always an answer, as said by YYLZZ. :)

There exists a very good solution to this problem, but it might be hard to implement. In my opinion (which my no means is necessarily perfect), the following way is the optimal way to give newcomers their rating:

The newcomer starts with a rating X, unknown. Then, after finishing a certain number of games (let's say maybe 20), his rating is calculated like this: He gets a rating which is such that if he had started out with this rating, he would have that rating again at this time (that is, after his 20 fisrt games). If the player is very good, one has to wait until he loses his first game, even if it takes more than 20 games, before one can make such a calculation. Same way for poor players: One has to wait until they win their first games in order to make such calculations.

This way, people will always start out close to their true rating. But like I said, it might be hard to implement. Although the math is not very difficult, there could perhaps be problems, but I believe they could be overcome.

Those who have played these players will, ofcourse, only get their rating adjusted after their opponent have finished his first 20 games, based on the rating this opponent would then have at the time their game was finished.

Oh, just one last apology: I used "he" throughout this entire post - it is by no means my intention to be sexist. Please replace "he" with "he/she" at all places! :-)

Marius

On a turn-based site it takes a long time to play 20 games, during which time a player's skill level may change. What if I never lose? :)

If you NEVER lose, you are perfect. Your rating is infinite. However, I think that every player will lose one game, eventually...

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