I'm now 2-3k on KGS, 5k (-1%) on DGS, and 5kyu AGA, so I signed up as 5kyu. Looking around, it seems like OGS ratings are way tougher than elsewhere. Does that seem right?

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When you think your opponent has made a mistake, that's when you should be the most cautious.

I have never played on OGS but DGS is tougher for sure. People read a lot more and deeper and are generally stronger than their rank for one thing. Also the slow pace in which you play games on the turn based servers make the ranks follow your improvements at a much slower rate.

My .02 cents.

I play a lot on OGS.

I have examples of regular players .. One 4k EGF player (ranked over ten years EGF database) is currently 11.5 kyu on OGS. There is a KGS 1 dan who is ranked as 6 kyu and these examples are not uncommon in the SDK range.

It seems that after about 1 Dan things get easier..I think uberdude is about 27 Dan now...

Regulars kind of ignore the rankings. I offer two stones to everyone above 1 kyu.. (OK I lose a lot) and I don't find people are too worried that they will "lose their rank". The fluctuation does cause havoc in tournaments.

Having said that I find the Chinese site:

http://www.wuzheng.org/

also turn based.. way way tougher. I notice that a few of the OGS regulars "work out" on Wuzheng.

No it's not. When I still played turn based go, I played both. At that time my rank on DGS was 8-9k and on OGS 10-11k. You can also look at the rank comparison list (it's the variant of the list with intervals, but I think this is more accurate than the better known list)

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SL | EGF | KGS | GMT+1

At my level (OGS 21-22k), I've come across several opponents of similar rank but who are actually KGS 8-10k. The OGS rating system seems to be open-ended at the bottom - for example, the lowest ranked player is 45k! Perhaps this results in a wider ranking spread.

I think he meant that DGS ranks were tougher than most other ranks, not that they're tougher than OGS ranks. Could be wrong, though.

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When you think your opponent has made a mistake, that's when you should be the most cautious.

I'm KGS 1d, but my OGS account is 6k. This is mostly due to my OGS games being blitz in slow motion, though.

Yes I did not mean to imply that DGS ranks were as low as the OGS ones. I even said I never played on OGS see.

A friend of mine plays as a 3k in swedish tournaments but is 8k on DGS.

Actually I wasn't thinking of you. there's a German 1 Dan who plays a lot of games and cant seem to break 6 kyu on OGS.

There is something odd with OGS ratings. One guy has been playing there for three/four years and his rating is getting worse. He's also diligent about the game. The 2010 updated rank comparison chart doesn't seem to correlate quite as well with what I'm seeing now. Possibly because there is a strong group of players who play each other a lot and how ever much they improve the ranking system can't cope/recognise.

I've experienced low kyu players who are struggling to keep up with DDK's on OGS.

Time outs make a big contribution to rank.

The problem is that a "strong player" registers and gets thrashed by a 13 kyu and then leaves. I have suggested in the past that "best ever ranking" be used rather than the volatile system in place at the moment.

Having said that, I've found OGS a good place to learn and I have used it for external tournaments.

If you are 2-3k on KGS then yes you could struggle to hold 5k on OGS as the sdk ranks are quite tough. On KGS it is rare to find people weaker than 20k, and a total beginner is probably 25k. On OGS the ranks do start at 30k and that is what many beginners are. Some even fall down to 40k. So kyu players on OGS are spread across a broader range.

But you can't simply say X rank KGS equals Y rank OGS. For example I am 3d EGF and 6d OGS. joachim is 2d EGF and 2k OGS. This does not mean I can give him 7 stones for a fair game, I would get slaughtered. Maybe I could give him 2 stones, but it would be tough (I've won by around 10 points a few times). My much higher rank on OGS is a reflection that I can beat someone like him, a stone or two weaker than me, 100% of the time (8 wins, 0 loses). This is because I am a little bit stronger, but put a lot of time/effort into my games whereas I think he blitzes.


Just reached a new peak rank of 2656 (6.6d) yesterday, still some way to go And it's not easy to maintain that rank, I lose 40+ rating points when I lose a game, and only get a few when I win. The 2-3d are pretty darn tough and I have to work really hard to beat them. For example solving this problem: viewtopic.php?f=15&t=5099. Something else to bear in mind is there are only a few dozen dan players on OGS.

I'm 2d AGA (just barely after the last tournament I was at :/ ), and barely 2k on OGS.

But I do play slow blitz there. Also I have this horrible habit of noticing the "rating" of my opponent and then playing super blitz if it's much below mine. Which is bad because there are 5 and 6k OGS players who are dan level in more accurate systems... All told, I'd rate the OGS ratings as "wildly inaccurate", but that may just be inevitable for that type of server.

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That which can be destroyed by the truth should be.
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My (sadly neglected, but not forgotten) project: http://dailyjoseki.com

Whether OGS ratings are accurate depends what you think they are measuring. If you think they are measuring how good you will be on KGS or in the AGA or EGF rating systems then sure, they are wildly inaccurate. But if you think they are measuring how well you play on OGS I think they are pretty good (though there are some problems e.g. timeouts or recently registered users). The big difference between turn-based Go and those other systems is the asymmetry: one player might spend 3 seconds of instinct on a move, the other 3 hours of in-depth analysis, trying out variations, yose calculation etc. (I do occasionally, no exaggeration).

OK, here's a OGS rank distribution chart. 1st quartile is at 26k, median 15.5k, and 3rd quartile 7.5k.
Cluster around 29k seems to reflect the default 30k starting point of players new to the server.

Well, personally I've settled on 6 kyu, maybe 7 kyu if this spate of games goes badly. I was 2 kyu on KGS and am 5 kyu on DGS, so it does seem that the ranks are quite tough.

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When you think your opponent has made a mistake, that's when you should be the most cautious.

For what it's worth, I was about 8k OGS at 4k KGS and 4k OGS at 1d KGS. But playing according to opponent ranks on OGS is a bit dangerous because the rating might not be accurate due to time-outs/not enough games/recent strength improvements.

Nevertheless, I tend to take more time against higher-rated opponents, and I suspect I'm not alone - this means that games against lower-rated opponents may be tougher than otherwise.

How are the ranks determined? More specific than "It's based on ELO", I mean. It's rather curious that the ranks go all the way to 45k and that 30k is practically the mode.

http://www.online-go.com/faq.php?name=rating

30k is the mode because that's the default for new players. I think more people join OGS thinking it's some random web based game like Bejeweled than do on KGS. You get 45k because if you keep losing you keep going down.

I see, I see. That all makes sense.

yeah.
The rank in OGS is surely hard because anybody who's stronger than us and if that person just got away for a few months so his rank will be decrease a lot. and then I feel it when I play with him. It's too cruel.