A few people have now raised a dislike that a very good record can be beaten by a 0% record if enough games are played, and there have been two proposals launched to help combat the extremes of this situation. As a result, I have compiled a list of the three options (current system, proposal A, and proposal B):

Current system (50% points for a loss):

Effectively a loss is worth 50% of a win, so playing 3 people and winning each is worth 6 points, and playing 3 people and losing each is worth 3 points.

Scenarios (assuming all different opponents):
Scenario 1 - 0-13 record = 13 points
Scenario 2 - 2-11 record = 15 points
Scenario 3 - 5-8 record = 18 points
Scenario 4 - 6-4 record = 16 points
Scenario 5 - 6-0 record = 12 points
Scenario 6 - 4-0 record = 8 points

Proposal A (25% points for a loss):

Reduce the number of points awarded for losses to 25% of wins. In the above situation, the 0-13 result will be worth only 6.5 points, and a 4-0 record will be good enough to have an advantage.

Scenarios (assuming all different opponents):
Scenario 1 - 0-13 record = 6.5 points
Scenario 2 - 2-11 record = 9.5 points
Scenario 3 - 5-8 record = 14 points
Scenario 4 - 6-4 record = 14 points
Scenario 5 - 6-0 record = 12 points
Scenario 6 - 4-0 record = 8 points

Proposal B (50% points for a loss, but capped loss points):

Same as the current system, but the total number of points awarded for lost games cannot exceed the total number of points awarded for wins. So, with a 3-10 record, 6 points are available for the 10 losses. If the player then wins another game, they can pick up an additional 2 points for their losses too. (EDIT: There are also discussions about the possibility of a lower bound to this cap - e.g. a player can always get 5 points for losses, but to get more than that they need to get more than 5 points from wins)

Scenarios (assuming all different opponents):
Scenario 1 - 0-13 record = 0 points (5 points with the 5 point lower bound)
Scenario 2 - 2-11 record = 8 points (9 points with the 5 point lower bound)
Scenario 3 - 5-8 record = 18 points
Scenario 4 - 6-4 record = 16 points
Scenario 5 - 6-0 record = 12 points
Scenario 6 - 4-0 record = 8 points

Scenario results in descending points order

1 - Current system (13 points), proposal A (6.5 points), proposal B (0 points - 5 with lower bound)
2 - Current system (15 points), proposal A (9.5 points), proposal B (8 points - 9 with lower bound)
3 - Current system (18 points), proposal B (18 points), proposal A (14 points)
4 - Current system (16 points), proposal B (16 points), proposal A (14 points)
5 - Current system (12 points), proposal B (12 points), proposal A (12 points)
6 - Current system (8 points), proposal B (8 points), proposal A (8 points)

Ranking of scenarios in proposal order

Current System - 1st (5-8), 2nd (6-4), 3rd (2-11), 4th (0-13), 5th (6-0), 6th (4-0)
Proposal A - =1st (5-8), =1st (6-4), 3rd (6-0), 4th (2-11), 5th (0-13), 6th (4-0)
Proposal B - 1st (5-8), 2nd (6-4), 3rd (6-0), =4th (4-0), =4th (2-11), 6th (0-13)

This change is what will make me join the league eventually. B seems to be a favorable change in my opinion.

There are other ways B can be tweaked of course. For example, instead of "points for wins", the cap could be whichever is higher out of 5 points and "points for wins", to make sure that all players can at least get to 5 points.

Taken from another ASR thread on this topic, I posted the following that seems relevant:



Yes, I agree, and I feel very guilty about being 5th, as I think I should be demoted this month, my record has sucked! I don't think this is likely to be an issue for people promoting unreasonably, as there are always strong + active players in a class, but there are a number of people displaying aggravation that people aren't being demoted with incredibly weak records. I didn't feel particularly strongly either way before, however, my personal experiences have changed things:

Now, I am slightly in favour of a change purely because I feel guilty about my record putting me in the top half of the class, as I think it shouldn't. I've found myself playing games "just because", which is against the spirit of the league. My first 3 games were played with a high fever because I didn't want to fall behind in the first week of the class, but they were all epic disasters. The majority of the games I've played have been either tired, between midnight and 2am, or in a tabbed window at work, because I haven't had a great deal of time to play this month, I've just been too busy in the "normal" part of the evening. Some games I've taken on knowing I'll lose but thinking "Ah well, it's all points!" - I should be taking on expected losses as serious games with the intent of learning and having, in effect, a teaching game, but actually the point reward has been enough just to play regardless of how tired I am or how I'm feeling.

More activity is a core tenet of the ASR, but "junk games" aren't supposed to be. Ok, I'm guilty here of being a hypocrite by advocating the league and then playing games without the seriousness they deserve, but the reward system sure made it tempting to do so. If the limit system proposed were adopted, I'd currently be on 13 points, and to get more, I'd need to win games. That will encourage me to take the games more seriously, and encourage me to seek out weaker players for wins (an advantage for them RE: teaching as well, because I always offer to review properly), so that I can enjoy my games against stronger players for learning. I will then make the most of those games against stronger people, because I won't be getting an endless supply of points for those losses, so finishing quickly to play the next one has no reward.

This is only my perspective, and it's one I've only really formed over the last few weeks, but I am steadily becoming of the opinion that the current system encourages junk losses for the sake of simply fitting games in, even if only a minority use it for this.

Proposal B - 1st (5-8), 2nd (6-4), 3rd (6-0), =4th (4-0), =4th (2-11), 6th (0-13)

this proposal does not promote activity purely because someone who played 13 games is behind someone who only played and won 4 games. I think someone who played 13 games in the league should have benefits because playing only 4 games and being in front of them is just wrong.

_________________
admin of the ASR league and KGS admin

This is false logic. Someone who played 13 games still has more points than someone who played 3, it just increases the relative reward of wins in these two examples. Activity is still clearly promoted by having rewards for simply playing games.



Remember that this is just your opinion, that is shared by some but not all of the league members. I think there is a fine balance to be gotten between activity and score, and it will probably never be reached for everyone. I am beginning to believe from received comments that it could currently do with tweaking, and my own experiences this month make me inclined to agree.

If those 13 games were just quickly thrashed out with little thought to get 13 points, would you feel differently?

I voted change A, but I'm fine with change B also. I feel that you are right about the amount of junk games being played. I've played against a couple of weaker people that didn't seem to really care about the game and just wanted to get it over with (for the points I suspected). So yeah, I agree on change, what change I'm not sure.

I like proposal A.

I don't like the idea of capping losses with wins because that puts more emphasis on winning rather than playing games as a fun experience. Of course, there is a lot of weight on winning as it is, but I feel this cap would pressure players to worry about winning even more, which is not what I think go should be about. Proposal A would make sure those who are losing many many games aren't gaining much from them, but ARE gaining something. This way, a weaker player would be more likely to play a stronger player even if he doesn't think he can win. With proposal B, it could be harder for stronger players to get games and even harder to inspire participation from new weaker players to join the league because of the difficulty in attaining points.

Proposal A would lower the points from losses enough that it would be difficult to "unjustly" be promoted or stay in a higher level. But it would also push players to play more games, even if their opponents are stronger.

does the score need to be a linear function of wins and losses? What if you tried something like wins + sqrt(losses) ? The value of each successive loss decreases, so playing without trying to win has diminishing returns. For the examples you gave, the result would be:

6-4 : 8.0
5-8 : 7.8
6-0 : 6.0
2-11: 5.3
4-0 : 4.0
0-13: 3.6

This seems simpler and harder to cheat than a system based on caps.

The only problem with something like this is tying it into the current system, which already has diminishing returns on both wins and losses when against a player you have already played. One thing I intend on doing in the back-end code is separating out "points from wins" and "points from losses" so that we can implement a number of the suggested ideas - once that's done, the scope for what else we can do improves.

Now that i have been looking how the system goes, the current system works very fine to really encourage activity among all people, this is a good thing, but some people dislike it beacause people wich good win record but few activity dont go well, claiming that someones are superactive, and they are right, but you have to be superactive to play the 39 available matchs you can in a month, that means playing at least a match in a day or play many matches in few days, this also makes you play only league matches instead a regular rated matches, wich is also good for more serious playing.

So this high level of activity makes you keep playing and improving more. But well some people(strong people) dont want to play that much and still keep playing in the league, and they have their point. So one of the few viable solutions to have everybody happy(superactives, strong-but-underactives and everything else) is to only have one match per player, so you only have to play 13 matches, there will be no need for superactivity and this single match may rise in quality beacause of its importance since you can only play 13 times, so better you win all of them. This of course improve the quality of the matches and keep strong busy-in-other-things people happy.

About improving, mmm i guess both ways are good quality and quantity are both very important, still the current matches are already of high quality . So this is one more option that can be added, but since people prefer 3 matches instead of 2, i bet also prefer 3 instead of 1, this tells people like activity.

Also making the losing points going half his value, seems half right , but looks like the proposal is not very popular, still i like more this proposal of half points than capping the losing points wich seems will make the strong players play less, if people want play less, just reduce the amount of matchs available or make go to half the value of losses point, but this cap loss points thing doesnt seems good, also others ubermambojumbo systems looks very strange and seems solving nothing.

So in resume, yes a change may be good, be it: one match per person or half the value of losses, otherwise keep the current system wich is already great. By the way the 3/6 promotion demotion is a very good admin move, thanks to all the admins for they very great work. =)

At the time of this posting, 60% of the voters favours change. I'd say: viva la revolución!

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My name is Gijs, from Utrecht, NL.

When in doubt, play the most aggressive move

I've seen point systems before, and I like this system the best...

3 points for a win, 1 point for a loss. If you play the same opponent, then the points decrease by half each time.

so A vs B and A wins = A 3 points and B 1 point.
Then A plays B again, A gets 1.5 which brings 3 up to 4.5, and B gets .5, which brings him up to 1.5.
Third round, A wins, A gets .75, and B gets .25= A 2.25 abd B 1.75.

As for if B wins the third round, the same math can be applied from the system that's in use to provide the divisions. But the start or main being a 3/1 ratio is my favorite.

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Check out my youtube channel at http://youtube.com/Clossius/

I will teach 100 people how to play in order to get 1 Go player.

Instead of punishing the many loses players, you should award the many wins! This gives the same result but better feeling for those who play actively.

On how to do it, you can do as how goverment taxes you. If someone's win points is higher than 10 then they have 20% bonus for points above 10; above 20 50%; etc.

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长考出臭棋.

it seems over 50% has voted for the current system to carry on.

I think the current system has gotten better when we decided to have promotion/demotion at 3/6 so in hindsight we can better keep the current system and "tweak" the things around it. I would like to thank everybody who decided to post their own ideas, this helps us have an open mind about what is possible and keeps us from getting tunnelvision. Feel free to use this thread to have a discussion about different systems a league can use (for instance compare korean insei league vs ASR league, or even real life leagues)

I still think this system is best when considering online go, keeping in mind that internet does not bind players like a real club does. Though i think i am gradually turning ppl around in thinking there is merit to being part of an online community, but thats a painful and longterm goal. KGS is still the most social place to play go on and i will continue finding it a good place to play go:)

_________________
admin of the ASR league and KGS admin

Give a win bonus of 1/10 or 1/8 points for every win.

Strong players get trumped by weak players who "cheat" the system by piling up meaningless losses.

_______Current-->Fixed

0-13 = 13 points --> 13 points
2-11 = 15 points --> 15.2 points
5-8 = 18 points --> 18.5 points
6-4 = 16 points --> 16.6 points
6-0 = 12 points --> 12.6 points
4-0 = 8 points --> 8.4 points

_________________________
November Alpha "controversy"
_________________________
cut-line 'outrage' -->1/10 point bonus fix

25/3 = 36.5 --> 39
23/1 = 34 --> 36.3
17/6 = 27.5 --> 29.2
16/3 = 24.75 --> 26.35
11/11 = 24.25 --> 25.35
3/28 = 23.25 --> 23.55 # these 3 gamed the system
4/26 = 23.25 --> 23.65 # now only one succeeds
4/28 = 22.75 --> 23.15 #
_cut-line____
11/9 = 22.75 --> 23.85 ## these two got cheated
13/4 = 22.5 --> 23.8 __## now rewarded
10/9 = 22 --> 23 ____### at 1/8 bonus this guy may ALSO MAKE IT
5/11 = 16 --> 16.5
4/4 = 10.5 --> 10.9
1/4 = 5.5 --> 5.6

edited again...

I failed to follow your scoring point example at the bottom, is there any chance you could explain it?

I suspect the 1/10 or 1/8 is unlikely to be popular, as the larger value of 1/4 (still half the current value) got only 10 out of 48 votes in this poll. However, you do have a point about "meaningless" losses. There are some games that feel particularly like someone has simply played a game without much care just to get their points, and this is rather against the spirit of the league. I do however suspect that this is in the minority - An 8k that plays a 3d but knows they have no chance of winning can still give the game their all, use their time, and be involved in the post game review. If so, the loss is not at all meaningless, and exactly the sort of game the ASR is trying to promote. If that person gets a 0-18 win/loss record we still want to have a system in place that really rewards their effort to get games in, provided that games are valuable games.

Interestingly, I share part of your feeling, and this is why I put together proposal B above. I have found out that many kyu players participate because they really want to get promoted and think they can do so simply by "playing lots". I find this slightly uncomfortable because a) I think it encourages people to play guaranteed losses and just quickly get them over with so they can start the next one, which isn't useful to anyone, and b) it seems to misunderstand the basic value of promotion. Being in Gamma isn't really "cooler" than being in Epsilon, and you'll still have plenty of stronger people to bash your head against in Epsilon. If your goal is truly to learn and get stronger, surely being in any tier is fine if you have a 0-18 W/L record, as clearly you have plenty to learn from people in your class - why would you want to get promoted further if you weren't winning the majority of your games? I mean, what's the point?

So, I still prefer the idea of having some form of cap - if you aren't getting points for losses after the first 5 until you win some, at least you will take on the loss games because the game itself has value, rather than just the points you can earn. However, I think people feel that part of the motivation is gone for kyu players if they do not feel they can promote - I feel this is sad, as it doesn't seem to be a major point of the ASR, but for some people it is, and that is important.

Either way, we do want the higher tiers to be populated with people who play fairly actively, and any dan player who gets in 15 to 20 games per month will promote up to Beta in consecutive months. Getting into Alpha is hard, but frankly a KGS 1d is at the weak end of the Alpha class, so considering all the players are both strong and active at that end of the league, getting into Alpha is supposed to be hard

My "proposition C" has the advantages of;

Simple to understand for players.
Easy to code for.
Fixes the more obvious score manipulating shenanigans.

Should keep dan guys happy if they are rewarded for teaching kyu guys in lower classes. They get a fair shot at top classes without worry of "tweakers" holding them down.

If ~4d guys have to play ~7k on even all the time there is no way many of them will stick around. It gets old really fast.

In 14 man groups, 20 played games out of ~40 possible should be considered as an active player. If a guy plays 20 extra games but loses them all should he really trump the guy who put in 20 quality games?

I agree, but it seems to be not what the majority of the league wants from the voting on proposal A. EDIT: See next post, I'd misread



I agree, but I haven't seen any examples of being held down by tweakers. We attempted to seed dan players into Delta this month to help with the problem, but the seeded dan players have been almost completely inactive so we won't be doing it in January.



I have never seen a dan player get 20 games played and not promote, except in beta where three dan players were competing for two spots. If the games are sensibly distributed (say play 2 players three times, 4 players twice and 6 players once), you get 31 points from 20 games. 39 losses (3 against each player) gives only 22.75 points, over 8 points less. So the answer is no, the guy shouldn't trump the quality player, and the guy most likely won't manage to without a good number of wins himself.

EDIT: For example, you are already storming ahead in your class, with 10 points (twice as much as second place). Realistically, with dropouts, I expect 6 people to promote from Epsilon. If you hit 20 points you will definitely promote, and 15 is probably enough, so you're virtually there already. It's not as onerous for a dan player to work their way up as you're probably thinking at the moment, I promise (having been there myself)

Further comment: I misread your proposal. I see now what you are asking. That's a possible idea certainly. I'll speak to my fellow admins.

The problem you are attempting to resolve is the the reason that I decided to create the poll. Spam losing is not a viable strategy for promoting, but it is a good strategy for avoiding demotion. Having a fix for this that doesn't affect our kyu players' desire to play is still a good thing to aim for.