Byo-yomi: Do you like it?

[Kirby]

So I keep getting PM'd by a particular member on this forum due to a comment I made about liking byo-yomi.

Anyway, I thought that the discussion would be more productive if it were an open one in which everybody could participate.

So... Do you like Japanese byo-yomi? Why or why not?

[CarlJung]

It's simple. I like simple.

[rubin427]

compared to sudden death, byo-yomi is wonderful.

[TMark]

No, since it is not a system that works easily with analog clocks. Nearly all of the tournaments in Britain continue to use such clocks, so the only way to operate byoyomi would be to have someone sitting by the board reading out the seconds. Electronic clocks are wonderful machines bu the best way to set them is with a six-pound hammer. While analog clocks will continue to be used, by far the bast time systems will be a) sudden death and b) Canadian overtime.

Best wishes.

[cdybeijing]

No, since it is not a system that works easily with analog clocks. Nearly all of the tournaments in Britain continue to use such clocks, so the only way to operate byoyomi would be to have someone sitting by the board reading out the seconds. Electronic clocks are wonderful machines bu the best way to set them is with a six-pound hammer. While analog clocks will continue to be used, by far the bast time systems will be a) sudden death and b) Canadian overtime.

Best wishes.

Fortunately this opinion is one from the Dark Ages. There is absolutely no benefit to using analog clocks instead of digital timers aside from the cost and existing stocks. Of course, I recognize that given an analog clock only situation, you have to play sudden death or Canadian overtime.

However, digital timers can be had for around USD30 these days and in absolutely every tournament situation, a director should give priority to the digital timer if available. Fischer timing, byo-yomi, and Bronstein (time delay) settings are all superior to any possible setting on an analog clock.

So as to completely make this a moot point, simply compare an absolute time setting (a horrible choice for go) on a digital timer versus an analog clock.

[cdybeijing]

To answer the original question, there is a simple hierarchy of optimum go time settings given that a digital timer is available. Fischer time >> byo-yomi > time-delay >>> absolute time.

[TMark]

No, since it is not a system that works easily with analog clocks. Nearly all of the tournaments in Britain continue to use such clocks, so the only way to operate byoyomi would be to have someone sitting by the board reading out the seconds. Electronic clocks are wonderful machines bu the best way to set them is with a six-pound hammer. While analog clocks will continue to be used, by far the bast time systems will be a) sudden death and b) Canadian overtime.

Best wishes.

Fortunately this opinion is one from the Dark Ages. There is absolutely no benefit to using analog clocks instead of digital timers aside from the cost and existing stocks. Of course, I recognize that given an analog clock only situation, you have to play sudden death or Canadian overtime.

However, digital timers can be had for around USD30 these days and in absolutely every tournament situation, a director should give priority to the digital timer if available. Fischer timing, byo-yomi, and Bronstein (time delay) settings are all superior to any possible setting on an analog clock.

So as to completely make this a moot point, simply compare an absolute time setting (a horrible choice for go) on a digital timer versus an analog clock.

So, where we have a tournament for 70 people and we already have an acceptable stock of analog clocks, the tournament organiser or the BGA must pay out over $1000 just to "give priority to the digital timer", when the tournament is normally run on Canadian overtime? That is overstating the case a little.

Best wishes.

[cdybeijing]

No, since it is not a system that works easily with analog clocks. Nearly all of the tournaments in Britain continue to use such clocks, so the only way to operate byoyomi would be to have someone sitting by the board reading out the seconds. Electronic clocks are wonderful machines bu the best way to set them is with a six-pound hammer. While analog clocks will continue to be used, by far the bast time systems will be a) sudden death and b) Canadian overtime.

Best wishes.

Fortunately this opinion is one from the Dark Ages. There is absolutely no benefit to using analog clocks instead of digital timers aside from the cost and existing stocks. Of course, I recognize that given an analog clock only situation, you have to play sudden death or Canadian overtime.

However, digital timers can be had for around USD30 these days and in absolutely every tournament situation, a director should give priority to the digital timer if available. Fischer timing, byo-yomi, and Bronstein (time delay) settings are all superior to any possible setting on an analog clock.

So as to completely make this a moot point, simply compare an absolute time setting (a horrible choice for go) on a digital timer versus an analog clock.

So, where we have a tournament for 70 people and we already have an acceptable stock of analog clocks, the tournament organiser or the BGA must pay out over $1000 just to "give priority to the digital timer", when the tournament is normally run on Canadian overtime? That is overstating the case a little.

Best wishes.

No, but if any player owns a digital timer of their own the tournament director should give priority to using that clock, with an appropriate byo-yomi setting or other common standard. Canadian timing is a patch, not a solution.

This is how you slowly update an old stock of equipment while at the same time not penalizing anyone. It is a necessity that tournament go worldwide move to the digital timer as quickly as possible.

[DrStraw]

No, but if any player owns a digital timer of their own the tournament director should give priority to using that clock, with an appropriate byo-yomi setting or other common standard. Canadian timing is a patch, not a solution.

This is how you slowly update an old stock of equipment while at the same time not penalizing anyone. It is a necessity that tournament go worldwide move to the digital timer as quickly as possible.

This is a very personal point of view and one that I (personally) think is wrong. There is nothing intrinsically better about either Canadian or byoyomi: each has its place. As Mark points out, if you have a stock of analog clocks then Canadian is just fine and there is absolutely no reason to switch to byoyomi. In fact, it is totally impractical. If, on the other hand, you have analog clocks then you have equally valid choices between the two. Overall this makes Canadian a preferable choice because it allows a consistent approach with all clock types.

Any system which allows tournament games to finish on schedule should be considered acceptable. Having said that, I have a strong preference for Canadian because it allows thinking time. I generally play quite quickly but I like the chance to think a little even in overtime. Byoyomi does not allow this. When I play on DGS I usually set low time limit Canadian (about two moves a day) and on KGS I usually set low basic time and reasonable byoyomi. Both of these keep the game moving at a fairly brisk pace, which is what I think should be one in a non-tournament game.

So to answer the original question: I don't dislike it but it is not my first choice.

[prokofiev]

I much prefer the games I play with Canadian overtime to those with byo-yomi. The ability to play quickly sometimes and think for a decent stretch of time sometimes (while in overtime) is very nice.

I haven't tried Fischer time. It may be better, though I must say the reminder in Canadian overtime to count every 25 moves (if one is slightly ahead on time) is not unwelcome.

Possibly I'm just most interested in overtime formats that trick people into (edit: effectively) giving me more time.

[Liisa]

Fischer time >> byo-yomi > time-delay >>> absolute time.

I would set up Fischer time >> time-delay >> absolute time > 3-5xbyouyomi > Progressive Canadian overtime > Canadian overtime >> 1xbyouyomi

For slow tournament time settings (total: 80-180 mins). Fischer increments should be at least 20-40 secs. And delay 20-50 seconds. For byouyomi at least 30-60 seconds.

----

Preferences are little different however for rapid time controls (30-50 minutes including increments and overtime.) Time delay should be 12-20 seconds, Fischer increments 10-15 seconds and byouyomi 20-30 seconds.

Fischer time > time-delay >>> absolute time > 3-5xbyouyomi > Canadian overtime > 1×byouyomi

----

And for IRL lightning:

time-delay > Fischer >>> absolute time > 3-5xbyouyomi >> Canadian overtime > 1xbyouyomi

example settings for time delay is 4 mins + 4 sec delay. 10 second byouyomi. 2-4 second Fischer increments. And 10-15 minutes absolute time control (relevant with analog clocks). For kgs blitz byouyomi is nice, but for real board blitz my handling skill of stones is not good enough for byouyomi. Thus absolute timing with time bonus is highly preferred.

I like to use exact figures instead of vaguely defined generalities, but my preferences can of course change quite easily, so they are not that well fixed.

---

Digiclocks are already quite well available. And we could always use digital clocks for the first 10-20 boards and analog clocks for the rest.

----

[edit:] It seems my preferences has changed little during this discussion. My preference towards Fischer has increased with the expense of Bronsteinian.
[edit2:] In my preferences absolute time controls gets even more relevant. Now I think that overtime is actively bad even if it is compared with absolute time without time bonuses.

[cdybeijing]

No, but if any player owns a digital timer of their own the tournament director should give priority to using that clock, with an appropriate byo-yomi setting or other common standard. Canadian timing is a patch, not a solution.

This is how you slowly update an old stock of equipment while at the same time not penalizing anyone. It is a necessity that tournament go worldwide move to the digital timer as quickly as possible.

This is a very personal point of view and one that I (personally) think is wrong. There is nothing intrinsically better about either Canadian or byoyomi: each has its place. As Mark points out, if you have a stock of analog clocks then Canadian is just fine and there is absolutely no reason to switch to byoyomi. In fact, it is totally impractical. If, on the other hand, you have analog clocks then you have equally valid choices between the two. Overall this makes Canadian a preferable choice because it allows a consistent approach with all clock types.

Any system which allows tournament games to finish on schedule should be considered acceptable. Having said that, I have a strong preference for Canadian because it allows thinking time. I generally play quite quickly but I like the chance to think a little even in overtime. Byoyomi does not allow this. When I play on DGS I usually set low time limit Canadian (about two moves a day) and on KGS I usually set low basic time and reasonable byoyomi. Both of these keep the game moving at a fairly brisk pace, which is what I think should be one in a non-tournament game.

So to answer the original question: I don't dislike it but it is not my first choice.

The issue has been conflated and that is my fault. I will not disagree that between Canadian time and byo-yomi neither is intrinsically better.

However, between digital timers and analog clocks, the former are certainly intrinsically superior. A serious tournament game among professionals will never again take place without the use of digital clocks.

I do realize that there are two ways of approaching this topic about digital vs. analog. The first is from the tournament director's perspective, which I sympathize with, and the second is from the perspective of overall efficiency and accuracy on an individual game basis. I am tackling the question from this latter perspective, with an eye to the former.

Sorry for the topic hijack.

[Javaness]

What is there to dislike about Japanese Byoyomi?

[Harleqin]

It depends on the choice that I have.

- I am convinced that bonus time is the best possible time system in principle, for all occasions from two-day title matches (330/60) to Blitz (5/2).
- If there are only analogue clocks available, canadian overtime is an acceptable workaround, although it has quite some drawbacks (artificial time borders between periods, difficult to estimate game length, time lost with clock fiddling and stone counting).
- If there are only clocks available that can only do canadian overtime or byoyomi overtime, I like byoyomi overtime better, because I almost do not have to look at or think about the clock. Byoyomi overtime also has drawbacks, though (difficult to estimate game length, inflexibility in time use).

[ethanb]

I greatly prefer Japanese byoyomi because I tend to forget about Canadian until I'm making 9 moves in 8 seconds.

Also prefer digital to analog clocks in tournaments because I tend to give my opponent 15 minutes or so extra main thinking time (i.e. the tournament director usually has to notify my opponent that he is in overtime)