EGF and Fischer

[willemien]

It looks from all the reactions that i am a very small minority (of one?)

Moves that do not warrant thinking time are, for example:

• Taking back a ko when your opponent has responded to your ko threat.
• Responding to ko threats that are obviously large enough.
• Playing out the moves of a squeeze that you have decided to play
• Playing out standard sequences (e.g. hane and connect endgame)

With such moves, if they are playing with 30 seconds delay, then you're effectively forcing players to use 28 seconds on reading other things if they want to use their time optimally. Which is annoying, IMO.

I don't think we will ever agree on this. you see overtime as an full part of the time. And so every(?) spilling time system is unfair. (I hope I don't exaggerate to much)
While I see overtime as a method to prevent players pushing eachother into time pressure.
(what i do not find good sportmanship)

Or more practical, you would think of playing forcing moves (just) to get extra time as a good thing while i see them as ugly.

I guess it are just different ways to look at the game

[HermanHiddema]

It looks from all the reactions that i am a very small minority (of one?)

Moves that do not warrant thinking time are, for example:

• Taking back a ko when your opponent has responded to your ko threat.
• Responding to ko threats that are obviously large enough.
• Playing out the moves of a squeeze that you have decided to play
• Playing out standard sequences (e.g. hane and connect endgame)

With such moves, if they are playing with 30 seconds delay, then you're effectively forcing players to use 28 seconds on reading other things if they want to use their time optimally. Which is annoying, IMO.

I don't think we will ever agree on this. you see overtime as an full part of the time. And so every(?) spilling time system is unfair. (I hope I don't exaggerate to much)

I don't see it as unfair at all. But if I want to use my time optimally, then I should use those 28 seconds for something. In the case of taking back a ko, I have the choice to let them spill, or I can use them to already look at other ko threats, and only take back the ko on the 30th second. That way, I've gained thinking time, and used it, by not letting time spill. There is nothing unfair about it, as it is the same for both players. But my personal opinion is that I find it annoying to play with. The clock is "forcing" a pace on me.

While I see overtime as a method to prevent players pushing eachother into time pressure.
(what i do not find good sportmanship)

Yes, but there is no inherent advantage of delay time (Bronstein) over bonus time (Fischer) in preventing this. If anything, delay time leads to more time pressure than bonus time, because you can never build your time back up.

Or more practical, you would think of playing forcing moves (just) to get extra time as a good thing while i see them as ugly.

No, I wouldn't. If you play forcing moves to gain time, you're losing ko threats at the same time. So they are not a good thing, they are bad moves, though they do gain time.

Also, the same moves also work with delay time. If I want 30 more seconds to think, I can play a forcing move on the 29th second, repeatedly if need be. This is the same also with byoyomi, where it is know as a "time tesuji". I've seen opponents play time tesujis that turned out to be aji keshi and lose them points in the endgame. So they were bad moves, though perhaps necessary for them from a time perspective.

I guess it are just different ways to look at the game

[topazg]

Yes, but there is no inherent advantage of delay time (Bronstein) over bonus time (Fischer) in preventing this. If anything, delay time leads to more time pressure than bonus time, because you can never build your time back up.

I agree, I find Bronstein much more time pressured than Fischer

Or more practical, you would think of playing forcing moves (just) to get extra time as a good thing while i see them as ugly.

Bronstein makes this a worse issue than Fischer timing. There's no advantage to doing this in Fischer time unless your clock is literally about to run out. In delay timing, this tactic can hold advantages at every stage in the game. Got 8 minutes left on the clock but in a really difficult situation? No problem, waste your ko threats by playing out the forced sequence against that group over there 10 times and you buy yourself 5 minutes for free and still have 8 minutes left. In Fischer time, those moves will earn you the time whether you play them straight away or wait the full 30 seconds each time, so the tactic of deliberately waiting and playing a time tesuji doesn't apply. You'd only bother if that 8 minutes turned into 8 seconds.

[willemien]

you are all starting to convince me.

my last line of defencce is that the bonus time in Bronstein timing can be higher than in Fisher timing. (because of all the spilled time) But I guess that doesn't solve the problem

Bronstein makes this a worse issue than Fischer timing. There's no advantage to doing this in Fischer time unless your clock is literally about to run out. In delay timing, this tactic can hold advantages at every stage in the game. Got 8 minutes left on the clock but in a really difficult situation? No problem, waste your ko threats by playing out the forced sequence against that group over there 10 times and you buy yourself 5 minutes for free and still have 8 minutes left. In Fischer time, those moves will earn you the time whether you play them straight away or wait the full 30 seconds each time, so the tactic of deliberately waiting and playing a time tesuji doesn't apply. You'd only bother if that 8 minutes turned into 8 seconds.

Thanks

[Javaness]

Why should there be anything wrong with time pressure though?

[Liisa]

Why should there be anything wrong with time pressure though?

There are many kinds of time pressures. There are several dimensions for time pressure, not just severity, but also smoothness and controllability of time pressure need to be considered.

If controllability of time pressure is high, such is the case wit 20 sec Fischer, we can always claim, that any time losses are due to time pressure and player did not find proper move within given time control. Thus time loss was justified.

But if in overtime, last moves of overtime period must always be done within few seconds before time loss, and time loss can be due to time pressure, but also external causes such as position of planets, may cause the time loss. E.g. on last weekend in championship qualifications I lost one game because on 15/5min Canadian overtime I played last stone of period on time, but I was quarter seconds too too slow in pressing the clock.

In this case, time loss had nothing to do with actual time pressure. Therefore within given time control there are always more dimensions than just time pressure that need to be considered. Time pressure itself is always good thing, because tournament schedule overrules always everything, but time pressure should be smooth and controllable.

[Harleqin]

Why should there be anything wrong with time pressure though?

Nothing per se, but there is a difference between time pressure and fooling around with a clock.

[henric]

Moves that do not warrant thinking time are, for example:

• Taking back a ko when your opponent has responded to your ko threat.
• Responding to ko threats that are obviously large enough.
• Playing out the moves of a squeeze that you have decided to play
• Playing out standard sequences (e.g. hane and connect endgame)

This is more or less true, but I think Willemiens point was that it's still sometimes a mistake to respond without thinking. There are different replies to a ko threat, sometimes the opponent replies in a way that doesn't solve the problem, in such cases it's a mistake to take the ko without thinking, this happens now and then. Thinking a couple of seconds maybe you find a better reply to a ko threat than the most obvious one. Still,

With such moves, if they are playing with 30 seconds delay, then you're effectively forcing players to use 28 seconds on reading other things if they want to use their time optimally. Which is annoying, IMO.

I agree completely with this. Of course one can learn that sort of time management well and some players are very skilled at it. But it interrupts the natural flow of the game and the thought process, one would like to concentrate on what's most urgent. This is the most important advantage of Fischer time, compared to both byo-yomi and Canadian overtime.

Canadian overtime is the worst alternative in my opinion, it also includes having to keep in mind how many stones remain to be played, so the time planning becomes more important than it has to be, at the expense of thinking about what's going on at the board. Another potential disaster with Canadian is when a player ends up with say 10 stones to play in 5 seconds or something like that, so that the game ends in a completely silly way. Moreover, the intermittent stopping of clocks and counting up stones interrupts the concentration of both players.

Byo-yomi with only one period has the disadvantage that there is no time to think if the opponent e.g. throws in a corner invation that shouldn't work, so that the game ends either with loss on time or with a mistake that is below the level of the game as a whole.

Byo-yomi with more than one period is better in that respect, there is both time to carry out relatively trivial moves, and a pool of reserve time to use for solving some problem that turns up.

I have hardly ever played go with Fischer time, but I think it is probably best of the systems mentioned in this thread: there is always time to make a relatively trivial move, but it is also easy to build up a little reserve pool of time for problem solving. So I think Fischer time should be encouraged in go tournaments. Finally, organisers should choose their solutions to this sort of details freely, and the players should choose accordingly which tournaments they want to participate in!

cheers,
Henric

[Matti]

I find Fischer time a reasonable timing system. However if I had chance to program the clock's for a tournament with more than one round a day, I would set the increment to decrease when the game progresses. It might go down in steps or alternately the increment might be T/n. Where T is the increment for the first move and n is the number of the move to be played. If the player plays over 180 moves the increment could be 2-5 seconds for the remaining moves.

[John Fairbairn]

Based on the limited amount I know, I wouldn't have any qualms about being asked to use Fischer time in a go tournament, whereas I would normally refuse to play sudden death, and in real over-the-board play Canadiam byoyomi seems to create more problems than it solves.

But I have never used Fischer timing or seen it used, so I have a couple of questions.

1. Is it taking over in the chess world?

2. Where it is extensively used, have there been any complaints about abuse of the system or the need (if any) to plan time-management, such that newcomers to the system may have a significant disadvantage compared to those who have plans in stock, as kit were?

I am a little sceptical about some of the arguments used to support current byoyomi practice for go. One claim to counter the idea is that byoyomi is bad because the opponent might play an awkward invasion when you are under time pressure is that a player ought not to wall off an area unless he already knows how to defend it. I'd tend to repudiate that on the grounds that the short main time limits used in amateur games preclude analysing every loose end.

Having read a book by O Meien on the endgame recently, I have also come to the tentative conclusion that playing even a very lengthy endgame in byoyomi is, for pros, normally nothing like as onerous or skilful as it is usually taken to be. The necessary work is done by the pro before that stage and for them it looks quite simple, even in quickplay games. Byoyomi fits their way of play rather well. But, apart from the extra element of counting out stones, amateurs have to manage their time in an entirely different way and what's sauce for the goose is not sauce for the gander when it comes to timing systems. At any rate, this contributes to my feeling of a provisional thumbs-up to Fischer timing.

[zinger]

I have never used Fischer timing or seen it used, so I have a couple of questions.

1. Is it taking over in the chess world?

2. Where it is extensively used, have there been any complaints about abuse of the system or the need (if any) to plan time-management, such that newcomers to the system may have a significant disadvantage compared to those who have plans in stock, as kit were?

1. I am not deeply involved in the chess world (although I used to be). As I understand it, Fischer time is the dominant system used on servers, but not so in live tournaments.

2. I am aware of no complaints/abuses, although I probably wouldn't be, since I am not really involved in chess much anymore.

The prevalence of Fischer on the servers suggests to me that this would also occur in Go. I know wms won't implement it, but my nickel says that if he did, it would become the most popular choice.

[dfan]

But I have never used Fischer timing or seen it used, so I have a couple of questions.

1. Is it taking over in the chess world?

Yes, it is becoming more common every year, including at the highest level. Even when the earlier time controls are non-Fischer (e.g., 2 hours for your first 40 moves), the last time control (e.g., 30 minutes for the rest of the game) now often have a modest increment attached.

2. Where it is extensively used, have there been any complaints about abuse of the system or the need (if any) to plan time-management, such that newcomers to the system may have a significant disadvantage compared to those who have plans in stock, as it were?

Not to any great extent.

Note that chess timing at the highest level has basically gone through three stages, historically:

I. The equivalent of Canadian byo-yomi (but time carries over from block to block), e.g., 2 hours for 40 moves, then an additional hour for every 20 moves thereafter. This required adjournment to the next day once the game went over 6 hours or so, so players and their support groups would often spend all night analyzing the endgame in question.

II. Sudden death for the last stage, largely because the availability of computer analysis made adjournments more silly.

III. Increments during the last stage.

Most of the complaints have been more about the transition from I (endgames are now played with far less precision than they were in the middle of the 20th century, purely because of these factors) than the transition to III.

[Liisa]

1. Is it taking over in the chess world?

Yes. In Finnish chess tournaments Fischer is dominant time control. About half of the weekend tournaments uses Fischer and practically all longer (championship) tournaments. Typical settings for weekend tournament is 90 30f. Although Fischer is dominant, absolute time control is also used. (E.g. 90min/40moves + 30 mins for the rest)

The prevalence of Fischer on the servers suggests to me that this would also occur in Go. I know wms won't implement it, but my nickel says that if he did, it would become the most popular choice.

This is reasonable assumption, because Fischer suits go better than chess, IMO. Although I am little doubtful if it would be most popular in Kgs. In FICS 3 0f is my favorite and most popular settings. Also my personal opinion thinks that in Kgs blitz I would not change readily my preferred timing system from 3x10sec, although in IRL I blitz using delay or Fischer. For slow games it is very difficult to argue that Fischer is not the best choice, for both chess and go.

However if I had chance to program the clock's for a tournament with more than one round a day, I would set the increment to decrease when the game progresses. It might go down in steps or alternately the increment might be T/n. Where T is the increment for the first move and n is the number of the move to be played. If the player plays over 180 moves the increment could be 2-5 seconds for the remaining moves.

This is very bad idea for number of reasons.

1: First we can adjust this by changing the ratio of increment and time given at the start. E.g. 80 min T270 adjusted Fischer time is equivalent with 12 30f, 35 20f, 58 10f and 71 4f.

2: Second problem is that balancing time usage is difficult and is fixed to assumed mold. Not everybody want to use time lots for the beginning and middle game, but I find it very difficult and time consuming to play small endgame when I know that game is really close.

3: Third reason is that we do not have and never will have game timers for such.

4: this kind of timing would not be any better than absolute timing without any increments. At least absolute timing is predictable and people do learn to control it if they practice.

5: if several games are scheduled for the day, maximum increment is 20 secs. That means that T360 game for 40 20f will last 200 mins where as T270 will last 170 mins. And schedule can always bend 30 mins if such a rare event would occur that somebody plays 360 moves AND uses all their time. This kind of bending of the schedule is more likely with regular slow overtime than similarly slow Fischer.

6: sixth reason is simplest that it introduces extra variable and thus increases complexity of the timing system and people do need to use integral calculus to calculate how much there is time left.

[Matti]

However if I had chance to program the clock's for a tournament with more than one round a day, I would set the increment to decrease when the game progresses. It might go down in steps or alternately the increment might be T/n. Where T is the increment for the first move and n is the number of the move to be played. If the player plays over 180 moves the increment could be 2-5 seconds for the remaining moves.

This is very bad idea for number of reasons.

1: First we can adjust this by changing the ratio of increment and time given at the start. E.g. 80 min T270 adjusted Fischer time is equivalent with 12 30f, 35 20f, 58 10f and 71 4f.

Do you find all these equally desirable as a player?

2: Second problem is that balancing time usage is difficult and is fixed to assumed mold. Not everybody want to use time lots for the beginning and middle game, but I find it very difficult and time consuming to play small endgame when I know that game is really close.

No one forces you to spend your time earlier you want. If you want you can save time for the endgame.

3: Third reason is that we do not have and never will have game timers for such.

I wrote if I had a chance to program the clock. If you choose to discuss, this is not a reason against.

4: this kind of timing would not be any better than absolute timing without any increments. At least absolute timing is predictable and people do learn to control it if they practice.

Do you means that this kind of timing is unpredictable? Why?

5: if several games are scheduled for the day, maximum increment is 20 secs. That means that T360 game for 40 20f will last 200 mins where as T270 will last 170 mins. And schedule can always bend 30 mins if such a rare event would occur that somebody plays 360 moves AND uses all their time. This kind of bending of the schedule is more likely with regular slow overtime than similarly slow Fischer.

Are you comparing my idea to Fischer or somethig else.

6: sixth reason is simplest that it introduces extra variable and thus increases complexity of the timing system and people do need to use integral calculus to calculate how much there is time left.

Naturally the clock would show how much time there is left.

On average the time needed for each move slowly decreases during the progress of the game. Of course there a fluctuations, some times players play quicker are somtimes slower. It is good to have a fixed amount of time to begin with. At the end to fill dame one needs a couple of seconds for each move. In next Kido Cup they have Canadian byoyomi where first period is 20 stones in 5 minutes, next 30 stones, and then 40 stones. This is one way of increasing the speed. But we cannot predict when exactly players enter yose or start filling dame, so increaseing the speed gradually would be another method.

[Harleqin]

On average the time needed for each move slowly decreases during the progress of the game.

I do not think that this assumption has any grounds to stand on. The only data on time usage patterns I know of is Timing Systems Redux on sensei's library. There were 10 games analyzed, where the players did not enter byoyomi at all, and the conclusion was:

• A typical game consists of a majority of plays made using very little time and a minority of plays made after thinking for longer periods of time. This probably surprises no one familiar with the game. However, the extent to which the distribution of plays is skewed toward the short end probably will surprise many. Typically players use about 10% of their time for the shortest half of their plays and 90% for the longest half. Typically players use 40% to 60% of their time for their longest 10 plays.
• The plays that use more time are randomly scattered throughout the game. This contradicts the "common knowledge" that Go players think longest early in the game and require less time later.

I think that the idea to strangle the time bonus comes from the misconception that a game under bonus time could "last forever". However, this is not the case at all: for example, a 30/15 game of 300 moves cannot take longer than 2:15 h, and even 360 moves do not extend that much (2:30 h). You can comfortably schedule the round starts three hours apart, maybe even two and a half hours. This schedule security is one of the main advantages of Bonus time.