EC Systems Discussion

[Javaness]

We have nothing to learn from European 2-dans! And you force us to meet them during EC

How absolutely horrible for you! Those despicable 2-dans, there ought to be a law!

The point is that the tournament pairings are bad

[RobertJasiek]

Even if one is very strong, it is not so easy to improve one's rating a lot quickly. To improve one's rating quickly into the top rated region, one needs to beat quite some top players. Suppose somebody like Kulkov improves fast and wants to increase his rating quickly during 6 months. Maybe he would need to attend 5 to 10 top tournaments. Maybe there are just enough tournaments but to really play in them he has to travel a lot throughout Europe. Can he afford the travel cost and time? More likely, he cannot. He would then have missed the rating region in the current year and in the next year it might be too late for him, see Kulkov.

I agree with you that supergroup players should not meet 2d etc. One does not need to make the supergroup smaller for that purpose - there are also other means like pairing restrictions to rank differences. Currently the system is McMahon (with supergroup) and "let the pairing program make the pairings". The consequence are the typical McMahon pairings regardless of rank differences but using the McMahon scores. For the sake of the argument, let us assume for the moment that we make only the supergroup smaller. We would still get top European against weak 4d pairs. You would still not be happy. So, when using McMahon, forced pairings due to some guidelines or buffer MM groups (in a well visited tournament with lots of strong players: lower 4d half, upper 4d half, lower 5d half, supergroup) might do the trick. Such means are more than TD work though - they amount to a system change from "all equal" to "upper top players are more equal in their rights to the title than lower top players". You like to complain about me specifically that exactly I would create such pairings - but actually it is the nature of the McMahon system in use; all tournament supervisors and TDs would have to pair McMahon style. This is not only my setting but everybody's application of the rule that the EGC is a McMahon tournament. Your mistake is to blame me all the time when what you want to blame is the system. With your system proposal, you continue to overlook significant parts of the nature of that system.

Playing against Koreans is the only way for you to improve? I see you studying from pro games etc. a lot. Does this not improve you any longer? Or is my impression wrong and you have stopped reading literature? Other players can improve from playing equally strong players, can't you? Maybe. This is different from player to player. Can you improve from afternoon games against Koreans or can you improve only from morning, EC, games against Koreans?

[LovroKlc]

Robert, please mention any European, who is not in best 16 by EC rating, but has real chances
to become European champion, if all best 16 take part.
Here is the list of best 16:


10313237 Dinerstein Alexandr RU 16Kz 3p 2742 84 5
10586785 Taranu Catalin RO Bucu 5p 2739 55 6
10298013 Guo Juan NL Hilv 5p 2733 108 7
12013342 Shikshin Ilja RU 16Kz 7d 2706 122 9
10301236 Shikshina Svetlana RU 16Kz 3p 2695 54 10
10333389 Pop Cristian RO Bucu 7d 2676 143 12
10301247 Koszegi Diana HU BuPe 1p 2665 119 13
10337382 Zeijst Rob_van NL Toky 7d 2660 31 15
12662870 Kachanovskyj Artem UA Rivn 6d 2642 63 18
10337481 Silt Ondrej CZ KaVa 6d 2637 247 19
10225875 Mero Csaba HU BuPe 6d 2625 155 21
10486817 Mateescu Robert RO Bucu 6d 2617 20 22
10498246 Balogh Pal HU Debr 6d 2613 131 24
10249195 Heiser Laurent LU Lux 6d 2607 20 26
12486639 Zatonskikh Anton RU 27Kh 6d 2605 18 27
10998163 Florescu Ion RO Pits 6d 2601 55 28

Let me know the name of this superstar!

Dusan Mitic. He can become the champion. But, I agree with you Alexandre, your way would probably be the best. Dusan is an insei in Korea, but I do not belive that any player out of this list would have chance for becoming the champion, only insei - they improve a lot, but do not get to play on EGF tournaments.

And Robert, do you think Alex could improve by reading your book? I am not so sure...

[Harleqin]

Breakfast, in the last 4 Go congresses, you have played:

• professionals: 2
• 7 dan: 15
• 6 dan: 9
• 5 dan: 8
• 4 dan: 4
• 3 dan: 2

That you even mention 2 dans is a strawman argument.

That 3 dans with two wins get to play with super group players who lost the first two rounds is natural when the bar is set at 4 dan. The problem here is not the size of the supergroup but the height of the MacMahon bar.

(Just to make the terminology clear: the MacMahon bar is the minimum rank to get into the top group, the super group is another group which has a starting MacMahon score one point higher than the top group.)

I am sure that it is possible to get the AGM to just allow a higher MacMahon bar.

[RobertJasiek]

LovroKlc, you agree with Alexander's system, so please tell us what it actually is! Is it the top 16 Europeans of the rating list or is it the top 16 rated Europeans of those present at the congress? Does he want to prohibit almost all Asian professionals in the supergroup because they do not have an EGF rating yet? Does he just want to complain about great rank differences or does he want prescribed forced pairings and / or enough buffer MM groups? Why does he want to determine the top 16 by comparing ratings of players regardless of whether they have played very few or very many games to justify their current rating and why is that any good? Does he want to have weak Asians in the supergroup just to fill the number 8? Or does he want to have a yet smaller supergroup if almost no top Asians are present? In that case, how are the pairing programs, TDs and tournament supervisors supposed to do their job since the pairing behaviour of 16 supergroup players in a 10 rounds tournament is not know so far? With so many open but central questions of what his system is actually supposed to be and how its pairings might work, how can you justify to already agree to it?

[RobertJasiek]

Today the four official proposals by Hricova are discussed.

http://www.eurogofed.org/egf/proposals2010ec2.pdf


Proposal Hricova 1A

(12 player round-robin, seeding by ratings)

+ The round-robin system has a high pairing quality.
+ 11 rounds create a high confidence for the numbers of wins.
+ Usually the champion and his closest competitors play the same number of games.
+ The champion is determined by European-only games.
+ The system fits rather well into the congress schedule.
+ The system is simple (or, in case of optional playoffs, of
intermediate complexity)

o For the final results ordering in case of ties on the number of wins, one has the choice between a) shared title, b) tiebreaker Direct Comparison applied iteratively, c) tiebreaker Direct Comparison not applied iteratively, d) tiebreaker Direct Comparison applied only to exactly two tied players, e) doubtful tiebreakers, f) playoff games with shorter thinking times (this requires finishing the 11 rounds,
e.g., on Thursday so that playoffs can be played on Friday or
Saturday)

- The seeding to the championship has a very low quality. E.g., if peak rating during the last 12 months is used, then players with 0 rated games during that period are compared with players with 100 rated games. Therefore the strongest European might not be seeded.
- Only few players play in the EC.
- Top non-Europeans do not play the top 12 Europeans in the Open-EC.
- If playoffs are used at all and in the rare case of 3+ playoff rounds (5+ players), a slightly shorter playing time is needed for the playoff games.


Proposal Hricova 1B

(12 player round-robin, seeding: 3 players of previous EC + 4 players of previous Open-EC + 2 optional wildcards for players with rating 2500+ + X players by rating)

+ The round-robin system has a high pairing quality.
+ 11 rounds create a high confidence for the numbers of wins.
+ Usually the champion and his closest competitors play the same number of games.
+ The champion is determined by European-only games.
+ The system fits rather well into the congress schedule.
+ The system is simple (or, in case of optional playoffs, of
intermediate complexity)

o The seeding of 4 players of the previous Open-EC gives the Open-EC good meaning for the next-to-top Europeans and gives the EC fresh blood every year but qualifies the 4 players due to one year old results.
o For the final results ordering in case of ties on the number of wins, one has the choice between a) shared title, b) tiebreaker Direct Comparison applied iteratively, c) tiebreaker Direct Comparison not applied iteratively, d) tiebreaker Direct Comparison applied only to exactly two tied players, e) doubtful tiebreakers, f) playoff games with shorter thinking times (this requires finishing the 11 rounds,
e.g., on Thursday so that playoffs can be played on Friday or
Saturday)

- Wildcards replace qualification by playing strength by qualification by politics. The rather small size of the EC players field makes this impact particularly severe.
- The seeding of 5+ players to the championship by rating has a very low quality. E.g., if peak rating during the last 12 months is used, then players with 0 rated games during that period are compared with players with 100 rated games. Therefore the strongest European might not be seeded.
- Only few players play in the EC.
- Top non-Europeans do not play the top 12 Europeans in the Open-EC.
- If playoffs are used at all and in the rare case of 3+ playoff rounds (5+ players), a slightly shorter playing time is needed for the playoff games.


Proposal Hricova 2A

(10 rounds Swiss of 16 players, seeding by ratings)

+ The champion and his closest competitors play the same number of games.
+ The champion is determined by European-only games.
+ The system fits well into the congress schedule.

- Unless the title is shared, tiebreakers for the final results ordering play a great role for determination of the winner.
- 10 rounds Swiss of 16 players is not a well understood system with respect to a) pairings and b) the effect of pairing difficulties on the tiebreakers for the final results ordering. It might happen rather easily that making good pairings during the last rounds will become difficult to impossible because of the low ratio between players and
rounds.
- The seeding to the championship by rating has a very low quality. E.g., if peak rating during the last 12 months is used, then players with 0 rated games during that period are compared with players with 100 rated games. Therefore the strongest European might not be seeded.
- The number of players is relatively small. The strongest player might be missed.
- Top non-Europeans do not play the top 16 Europeans in the Open-EC.


Proposal Hricova 2B

(10 rounds Swiss of 16 players, seeding: 4 players of previous EC + 4 players of previous Open-EC + 2 optional wildcards for players with rating 2500+ + X players by rating)

+ The champion and his closest competitors play the same number of games.
+ The champion is determined by European-only games.
+ The system fits well into the congress schedule.

o The seeding of 4 players of the previous Open-EC gives the Open-EC good meaning for the next-to-top Europeans and gives the EC fresh blood every year but qualifies the 4 players due to one year old results.

- Unless the title is shared, tiebreakers for the final results ordering play a great role for determination of the winner.
- 10 rounds Swiss of 16 players is not a well understood system with respect to a) pairings and b) the effect of pairing difficulties on the tiebreakers for the final results ordering. It might happen rather easily that making good pairings during the last rounds will become difficult to impossible because of the low ratio between players and
rounds.
- Wildcards replace qualification by playing strength by qualification by politics. The intermediate size of the EC players field makes this impact rather severe.
- The seeding of 8+ players to the championship by rating has a very low quality. E.g., if peak rating during the last 12 months is used, then players with 0 rated games during that period are compared with players with 100 rated games. Therefore the strongest European might not be seeded.
- The number of players is relatively small. The strongest player might be missed.
- Top non-Europeans do not play the top 16 Europeans in the Open-EC.

[Liisa]

One small improvement for the current system is that if we have a 4 dan as top group bar, then we also could have ca. 32 player middle group below ca. 32 player super-group. If we apply middle group , then it would be easier to decrease the super group size to 16+8 as Breakfast has suggested. Personally I think that 32 is good size for super group.

{addendum: I personally do not think anymore that 32 is good super group size. Instead we should have 24 player super group, ca. 24 player middle group and the rest of 4-dan+ top group players. This setup would also solve the issue with 4-dan top group bar.}

[RobertJasiek]

If we apply middle group , then it would be easier to decrease the super group size to 16+8 as Breakfast has suggested.

Inhowfar easier? For the better or worse? Why exactly 16? Why exactly 8? Why exactly 8 if there are fewer than 8 strong Asians? What about strong players that are neither European (citizen) nor from Asia?

[willemien]

So what do you think about proposal 2? Besides its EC and the Open-EC, optional afternoon games (or a third tournament) between Europeans and non-Europeans can be set.

Sorry for the dalay

Differences between proposel 2 and proposel W1

No their is a big difference between the two proposels. (

Proposel 2 is called a "Modified Swiss system" to me it looks a combination between a swiss system and a "X elimination system" (after X losses you are out, "Players with too few wins will enter the main tournament") Unfortunaedly X is not specified and has a big influence on the rest ( I guess it needs to be 3 to have a clear 3rd place winner)

In the first X rounds in proposel 2 there will be no Strong European - Strong Asian games (they can only happen after some players are eliminated) and also the really strong europeans only become available in the later rounds.
In W1 this is not the case. in all rounds Strong European - Strong Asian games can happen. (but are limited to 3 per European candidate)


Proposel 2 needs to be extended with what is the MM score for players who "fell out" of the Eutropean title tournament. (for both their own and there opponents SOS scores) W1 doesn't have this problem, the tournaments are combined from start to finish.
(In proposel W1 a player and TD can agree that this players falls out of the european title tournament, having more options to play non -europeans, but this is al voluntary)


Proposel 2 only allowes a very limited number of european prize candidates W2 allows a more candidates. (although this is done by accelerated pairing, a field that still needs some investigation)

[RobertJasiek]

Proposal 2:

The number of losses for a player to drop out does not need to be fixed number determined in advance. Rather it is important to keep enough opponents in the EC to determine a) the champion or b) the top T players. Depending on how the top players perform (how many wins they get up to round R), the number of players dropping out must be chosen fittingly.

I have not worked out all the details but the following can serve as a draft guideline:

- In round 9, there must still be enough opponents so that the top points players either player against each other during the remaining round(s) or will have those other opponents available.
- For the rounds 6 to 8, the maximal number of players with the most points in round 9 is predicted. At least as many players plus extra necessary opponents remain in the tournament. This gives opponents with a lower number of wins so far; all players with at least that many wins remain in the tournament.
- After round 3, players with at least 2 losses drop out.
- After round 5, players with at least 3 losses drop out.

After round 5, the number of players is about halved, i.e. ca. 16.

***

The players dropping out enter the Open-EC. Therefore, for the EC places 2+, it remains an option to use an opponent-points-dependent tiebreaker like SOS for sorting the places.

One might leave at least 10 players in the EC until the end to sort them internally up to place 10. An alternative is to start places with the remaining EC players and continue with the top Europeans in the Open-EC.

The MM score of the players dropping out is that as if they had started in the supergroup in the Open-EC's round 1. This allows final result tiebreaker calculation in the Open-EC. It is not a problem at all; one just has to define it like this and manage the EC players also in the Open-EC pairing program.

Proposal 2 does not allow an only small number of European prize candidates but as many as in the current system. I.e., the top 10 European players can be identified to be given prizes.

Proposal 2 assumes that an afternoon Top Players Tournament is created to have games between top Europeans and top non-Europeans.

[willemien]

- After round 3, players with at least 2 losses drop out.

This oin itself allready prevents strong european- strong asian games in the first three rounds. (and in round 4 they will only play agains europeans who have lost twice.

Proposal 2 does not allow an only small number of European prize candidates but as many as in the current system. I.e., the top 10 European players can be identified to be given prizes.

Proposel W1 does allow more players to compete for the european title than proposel 2 (in principle every european can join in, although in practice less , around a 50 would be possible.

Proposal 2 assumes that an afternoon Top Players Tournament is created to have games between top Europeans and top non-Europeans.

I think not many top players want to agree with that.
W1 is better in this. no afternoon games nescesary

[RobertJasiek]

This oin itself allready prevents strong european- strong asian games in the first three rounds.

A purpose of Proposal 2, most official proposals and the AGM decision is to let the EC have Europea-only games.

I think not many top players want to agree with that.
W1 is better in this. no afternoon games nescesary

This has been discussed enough.