Playing Ungraded Opponents Only

[Alex Holowczak]

Suppose the following situation happened:

4 player round-robin. Each player plays the opponent three times, a total of 9 games (the minimum number of games to get a grade). The tournament is graded. All 4 players are initially ungraded. The players play no other graded games in the season.

How are the players graded?

[Rob Thompson]

Or, with even more hilarity, the player who comes last plays a single graded game against a strong opponent who intentionally loses, just to see what would happen

[Alex Holowczak]

Well, this was inspired by an individual tournament at my University, which is at the moment a 4-player double round robin, so that's 6 games. But suppose they played against a triple round robin. If none had a grade (I do, so this won't actually happen), what would happen?

[Neill Cooper]

You can replace 'ungraded player' by junior since I think they are all still to be treated as such.

[Roger de Coverly]

How are the players graded?

With difficulty

You can establish the relative grades of the players using well established methods. In order to get the absolute values, you have to use guesswork. At one time, you would assume all new players were 100 (if adults or nearly that status). A local grader might seek the opinion of spectators as to the standard of play. You could ask for the score of the game in PGN. If the answer was "what's a game score", a conclusion as to the relative experience would not be difficult.

It's an old problem, the grading system manage to survive the influx of players in 1972 following the Fischer match.

[Ian Thompson]

Well, this was inspired by an individual tournament at my University, which is at the moment a 4-player double round robin, so that's 6 games. But suppose they played against a triple round robin. If none had a grade (I do, so this won't actually happen), what would happen?

This happened in the league I grade a couple of years ago - two ungraded players who played each other and no-one else. When I asked why their game was missing from the Master List, the answer was "When a pool of new players have played only amongst themselves, grading their games is impossible and not attempted. Games played is shown as 0, and the games are carried forward to next year."

Whether this is still the case with the changes that have now been made to the grading system, particularity for juniors, I don't know.

[Richard Haddrell]

4 player round-robin. Each player plays [each] opponent three times, a total of 9 games (the minimum number of games to get a grade). The tournament is graded. All 4 players are initially ungraded. The players play no other graded games in the season. How are the players graded?

Impossible to say, without more information.

You can replace '[initially] ungraded' by junior since I think they are all still to be treated as such.

True, and the information is still insufficient.

This happened in the league I grade a couple of years ago - two ungraded players who played each other and no-one else. When I asked why their game was missing from the Master List, the answer was "When a pool of new players have played only amongst themselves, grading their games is impossible and not attempted. Games played is shown as 0, and the games are carried forward to next year." Whether this is still the case with the changes that have now been made to the grading system, particularity for juniors, I don't know.

This is right. The rule has not changed.

You have to distinguish between “ungraded” and “new”. Ian’s players were new. A new player is just that - he has no previous games at all (or, strictly, no previous games sufficiently recent to count). Where a pool of new players have played only amongst themselves, the situation is as Ian describes.

“Ungraded” is different. An ungraded player is one with no published grade. He may be new. Equally he may have some games from the previous two years, but not enough for a grade. In this case his previous-year games are available for calculation, and will be used if he has less than 30 games in the new season.

Juniors are not treated as new. They are treated as ungraded (with some differences in the detail). Their previous-season games are not thrown away. Their previous-season grade is, on the ground that it may be grossly out of date; but the games are still there and may be used.

Richard Haddrell
Grading Administrator, ECF