Correlation between chess ratings (in Elo) and Go ranks

[Alcadeias]

Hello.

I'm a total beginner at Go, but I'm a 1750 Elo chess player.

I would like to know what each Go rank (kyu and dan) corresponds to approximately in terms of chess Elo rating.

In other words: if someone invested as much time in chess as in Go, and he had a rating of X Elo in chess, what would be his rank in Go approximately? (for different values of X)

Thanks in advance for your answers.

[RBerenguel]

Hello.

I'm a total beginner at Go, but I'm a 1750 Elo chess player.

I would like to know what each Go rank (kyu and dan) corresponds to approximately in terms of chess Elo rating.

In other words: if someone invested as much time in chess as in Go, and he had a rating of X Elo in chess, what would be his rank in Go approximately? (for different values of X)

Thanks in advance for your answers.

How many pears is an apple worth?

[Abyssinica]

Hello.

I'm a total beginner at Go, but I'm a 1750 Elo chess player.

I would like to know what each Go rank (kyu and dan) corresponds to approximately in terms of chess Elo rating.

In other words: if someone invested as much time in chess as in Go, and he had a rating of X Elo in chess, what would be his rank in Go approximately? (for different values of X)

Thanks in advance for your answers.

How many pears is an apple worth?

It depends on the price.

[jeromie]

Time invested is a poor metric for comparison (it varies too much from one person to the next), but that doesn't mean one can't make a meaningful comparison. I think a better (rough) comparison is to see where one lies on a rank distribution graph. My very unscientific attempt to compare the first two histograms I could find (http://senseis.xmp.net/?KGSRankHistogram and http://chess.stackexchange.com/questions/2550/whats-the-average-elo-rating-whats-the-average-uscf-rating) suggests 1750 ELO roughly compares with 2k KGS.

There are all sorts of holes with my methodology, but since I'm posting from a phone I think this is the best I can do at the moment.

[DrStraw]

Some ranking systems in go have a corresponding ELO attached. DGS does and I think the EGF rating does (although I am not in Europe and cannot confirm that definitely).

On DGS when I hover over my rank I would guess that shodan is about 2100 with 100 ELO points per rank. So 1750 ELO seems like it would be about 3.5 kyu

[EdLee]

I'm a total beginner at Go, but I'm a 1750 Elo chess player.

Hi Alcadeias, (adding to jeromie's post) if we look at the level distribution bell curve for chess, where's the peak of the curve ? Around 2100 ELO ?
Maybe for Go ( curve ), it's around 1k or 1d ?

[Bantari]

I'm a total beginner at Go, but I'm a 1750 Elo chess player.

Hi Alcadeias, (adding to jeromie's post) if we look at the level distribution bell curve for chess, where's the peak of the curve ? Around 2100 ELO ?
Maybe for Go ( curve ), it's around 1k or 1d ?

I think this is a good idea. But the curve you cite is only for KGS, which means that it does not really accounts for most of the really strong players in the world. Actually, in mainly accounts for western players, I think. But in general, I think it is an excellent approach.

I had in mind something simpler, and less exact, but easier to evaluate (you don't need much data) and possibly sufficient for this application.

Just look at bottom levels of both scales, look at top levels of both scales, and evaluate any level based on how far any given rank is from those ends on both scales.

For example:
Let us assume ELO goes from 500 to 3000 or so. 1700 can be said as roughly in the middle, maybe little less.
Go goes from 20k to 10d (10d being all the pros and other strong players.) roughly half-way through is what? 5k?
So, as a gross approximation, ELO 1700 corresponds to (KGS?) 6k.

Not sure this is exact enough, but might be sufficient to get an idea.

PS>
I know that both scales are not really linear. But bell curves might also be slightly misleading since they do not take into account that both games can have major stumbling blocks at different levels, which affects any curve. Ultimately it *is* like comparing apples to oranges, but it you need some kind of comparison, there is one or two.

[Elom]

A simple question, but I'm afraid it's a complicated answer.

There are two main "lines of thought" here,

1: Skill based
2: Status-based

Skill based comparisons are extremely difficult to ascertain, due to the unlimited number of variables involved in the calculations.

I'm a total beginner at Go, but I'm a 1750 Elo chess player.

Hi Alcadeias, (adding to jeromie's post) if we look at the level distribution bell curve for chess, where's the peak of the curve ? Around 2100 ELO ?
Maybe for Go ( curve ), it's around 1k or 1d ?

I think this is a good idea. But the curve you cite is only for KGS, which means that it does not really accounts for most of the really strong players in the world. Actually, in mainly accounts for western players, I think. But in general, I think it is an excellent approach.

I had in mind something simpler, and less exact, but easier to evaluate (you don't need much data) and possibly sufficient for this application.

Just look at bottom levels of both scales, look at top levels of both scales, and evaluate any level based on how far any given rank is from those ends on both scales.

For example:
Let us assume ELO goes from 500 to 3000 or so. 1700 can be said as roughly in the middle, maybe little less.
Go goes from 20k to 10d (10d being all the pros and other strong players.) roughly half-way through is what? 5k?
So, as a gross approximation, ELO 1700 corresponds to (KGS?) 6k.

Not sure this is exact enough, but might be sufficient to get an idea.

PS>
I know that both scales are not really linear. But bell curves might also be slightly misleading since they do not take into account that both games can have major stumbling blocks at different levels, which affects any curve. Ultimately it *is* like comparing apples to oranges, but it you need some kind of comparison, there is one or two.

Hmm, Elo is based on winning probabilities, not on raw skill. Traditional Go ranks are also not based on raw skill, but on a kind of logarithimic-natured skill rating, similar to richters and decibels (e.g. a sound has to become 10X more powerful to sound twice as loud to the human ear, ie ten people clapping sounds only twice as loud as one. Moving from 20k to 10k seems like becoming twice as strong, but is actually becoming anywhere from 3X to 10X as strong, we don't know).

Go ranks start from 30k. The 20k start adoption is seperate from what we are trying to deduct this with the elo/kyudan comparison. While it's possible to be weaker than 30k/500, Taking 500 (the weakest chess beginner) as the same as 20k (playing for a small while) doesn't work well. Therefore, the midpoint is 10k, which I believe falls considerably lower than 1700. Think of it on this fashion; the probability of a 15k defeating a 10 k is higher than the probability of a 10k defeating a 5k. The probability of a 1500 winning against a 1700, however, is equal to that of a 1700 against a 2000.

Status-based comparison is by no means easy to find, but not the nightmare of Skill comparison. Basically, we look at countries Where Go is popular, and then where chess is popular, and look at the expected strength of people in certain positions:

KGS/Tygem/etc Dan of Strongest player of average Local baduk club in Several leading Baduk countries V Elo of strongest of average local club in several leading Chess countries? (do the same regionally as well)

Elo/Dan of strongest juniors in the leading Chess/Baduk countries?

ETC...

Does anyone have this kind of information?

I think that EGF 7d and Elo 2400 is comparable in that 7.5d is around professional level in Japan (obviously nowhere near pro level in Korea or China)
and 2400 is what is generally considered pro level. Am I right?

ps: Sorry for flooding yet again, and excuse if there have been an unusual number spelling errors in my posts. Practically 95% is due to the fact that using half of a 3" screen to type means many typographicall errors. And a long time typing. (the whether/weather mix up is completely my fault though, heh.)

[odnihs]

I've always considered 2500 (grandmaster in chess?) to be weak pro strength equivalent in Go, as (I think) there's about the same number of chess grandmasters as there are Go professionals (~1400 vs ~1300). Because the top pros can probably give the weakest pros several stones, this would put the top pros around ~2800, which is relatively similar to the top chess players. If we consider the weakest pros to be around 8d kgs and assume 100 ELO for each dan rank, then that would put 1d at 1800 ELO. Of course, because the difference between dan ranks is much higher than that of kyu ranks (in terms of ability needed to improve), we can put less ELO between each kyu rank. Let's say there's a 75 ELO between 4k-1k, putting 4k at around 1500. Then let's say 50 ELO between ranks after that, putting 10k at 1200, which I think is reasonable.

I'm just pulling numbers out of thin air, but I think it works overall haha.

[fanfan]

Hello,

2000 +/-50 ELO for a 1d, 2800 ELO +/-50 for a 9d, 100 ELO per dan: simple and probably closed to the reality.

[Bantari]

Go ranks start from 30k. The 20k start adoption is seperate from what we are trying to this with elo/kyudan comparison. Whole it's possible to be weaker than 30k/500,

Well, then ELO starts with what? 0?
When I was starting, many years ago, I was told that Go ranks start at 20k. Anyways, it is a attribute of a particular system, which makes things more confusing.

In either case, I presented a method more than a real calculations. We can calculate Go ranks starting at 30k, sure, but then we can also take that the top of the scale is 15d or even 20d rather than the 10d I assumed (which is obviously wrong - there are people out there able to give KGS 9ds quite some hand stones.) These numbers would put my calculations back to where they were, give or take. But still, it is just a method to approximate, not some rigorous calculation.

I base it on the two pieces of info I can be pretty confident about, and nothing more, since nothing else can be stated with any confidence at all, I think.

The two pieces of info are:
1. Beginner levels in both games are equal, and
2. Top levels in both games are equal.

[DrStraw]

When I was starting, many years ago, I was told that Go ranks start at 20k. Anyways, it is a attribute of a particular system, which makes things more confusing.

When I started I was not given a rank at all. I played my first tournament about 10 months after I started and so I had to be assigned a rank to enter with. The stronger players I had been playing against put their heads together and decided on a number. I forget what it was: somewhere between 5k and 10k. I do remember them saying that DDK ranks (a term not used then) were pretty much pointless and people's playing strength had a large random element until at least 10k.

[Bill Spight]

When I was starting, many years ago, I was told that Go ranks start at 20k. Anyways, it is a attribute of a particular system, which makes things more confusing.

When I started I was not given a rank at all. I played my first tournament about 10 months after I started and so I had to be assigned a rank to enter with. The stronger players I had been playing against put their heads together and decided on a number. I forget what it was: somewhere between 5k and 10k. I do remember them saying that DDK ranks (a term not used then) were pretty much pointless and people's playing strength had a large random element until at least 10k.

I played for years before learning that 10 kyu was an actual rank. I thought that it was a catchall term for beginner.

The thing is, now that DDKs play other DDKs that they do not know, you do need ranks for them to set reasonable handicaps. OTOH, just playing even with no komi can be fun, too.

[hyperpape]

About DDK players: the old-timers are mistaken in this case. The EGF and AGA offer plenty of evidence that ranks below 10k can offer meaningful information. We forget this on the go boards, but there are players who keep ddk ranks for years. Perhaps they improve by a stone or two each year.

For the original question, one thought would be to look at absolute distance from the best players. We don't have good ELO figures that include both amateurs and professionals, but the EGF does retain (extremely noisy) numbers for professionals who play in international events featuring European players.* A conservative estimate is that the best players are no less than 2900 ELO.

By that argument, you might map 1700 chess to 1700 or 1800 EGF, which is 2 kyu or 3 kyu.

* (Since players start with a rating based on their professional rank, you can't look at the EGF database and say "these people have x rating and have it mean anything. But what you can see is that when European players compete against Asian professionals, the European players are not generally gaining rating points, indicating that the Asians are overall not overrated by the EGF system...As I said, it's a crude estimate.)

[RBerenguel]

This almost answers the question, taken from here.

Kaufman and I have had closely similar chess ratings for four decades. However, in the last game we played he gave me odds of rook and bishop and beat me handily. Then he told me that the world champion could probably beat him giving the same odds.

This was not Western chess, where I would be pretty confident of beating anyone given just an extra bishop. It was Japanese chess, called Shogi. Shogi has no piece with the power of a queen, and the armies have just one rook and bishop each, so the odds I received were maximal. The main difference from Western chess is that captured pieces become their taker’s property and can be “paratrooped” back into the game. This prevents the odds receiver from winning by attrition through exchanges as prevails in chess, and throws upon the leader a burden of attack.

It also makes Shogi deeper than chess in a way that can be defined mathematically. Say two players are a class unit apart if the stronger expects to score 75% against the weaker in a match. In chess, this corresponds to a difference of almost exactly 200 points in the standard Elo rating system. László Mérő, in his 1990 book Ways of Thinking, called the number of class units from a typical beginning adult player to the human world champion the depth of a game.

Tic-tac-toe may have a depth of 1: if you assume a beginner knows to block an immediate threat of three-in-a-row but plays randomly otherwise, then you can score over 75% by taking a corner when you go first and grifting a few games when you go second. Another school-recess game, dots-and-boxes, is evidently deeper. We don’t know its depth for sure because it doesn’t have a rating system and championship format like chess does.

Chess ratings in the US go all the way down to the formal floor of 100 among scholastic players, but I concur with the estimate of Elo 600 for a young-adult beginner by a discussion of Mérő’s book which I saw in the 1990s but did not preserve. This gave chess a depth of 11 class units up to 2800, which was world champion Garry Kasparov’s rating in 1990. If I recall correctly, checkers ({8 \times 8}) and backgammon had depth 10 while bridge tied chess at 11, but Shogi scored 14 and yet was dwarfed by Japan’s main head game, Go, at 25.