How many games need for a grade

General discussions about ratings.
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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Wed Nov 30, 2011 11:19 pm

Richard Bates wrote:But i don't see how it can be justified including a game which pre-dates an omitted game.
Is this not what already happens with 4NCL games? Are they not all sent in for one FIDE rating list at the end of the season, regardless of when they are played? Thus earlier league games get rated after later tournament games.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Roger de Coverly » Wed Nov 30, 2011 11:59 pm

Christopher Kreuzer wrote: Is this not what already happens with 4NCL games? Are they not all sent in for one FIDE rating list at the end of the season, regardless of when they are played? Thus earlier league games get rated after later tournament games.
That's absolutely the case. The performance is always based on the rating the date the league starts. So for this season's 4NCL it will be the November rating.

It would be better to rate each weekend separately. That would require FIDE and other interested parties agreeing that a single game can count towards a part rating. I think it's under consideration.

Jonathan Bryant
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Jonathan Bryant » Sat Jan 28, 2012 1:07 pm

Richard Bates wrote:If the result of this is that games such as the September game cited above NEVER get graded, then so be it....
As somebody who has six games not counted at grading performance of 22 points above my grade published an hour ago, I'm not sure I agree!

That said, those opponents have improved by an average of over 4 points per person. That, and the above average performance rating for my London League games, would skew the figures in my favour if and when they do get counted.

The cost to my published grade this time around seems to have been a couple of points, that's all, but they've given me a huge head start for next summer. All I've got to do is make sure that I play enough games to stop the London Chess Classic Open from counting and I should be laughing.

Richard Bates
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Richard Bates » Sat Jan 28, 2012 1:15 pm

Jonathan Bryant wrote:
Richard Bates wrote:If the result of this is that games such as the September game cited above NEVER get graded, then so be it....
As somebody who has six games not counted at grading performance of 22 points above my grade published an hour ago, I'm not sure I agree!

That said, those opponents have improved by an average of over 4 points per person. That, and the above average performance rating for my London League games, would skew the figures in my favour if and when they do get counted.

The cost to my published grade this time around seems to have been a couple of points, that's all, but they've given me a huge head start for next summer. All I've got to do is make sure that I play enough games to stop the London Chess Classic Open from counting and I should be laughing.
Well i've had 4 games not counted at plus 12 costing me 4pts and a equal career best. C'est la vie.

Still i can console myself with my silly 234 rapidplay rating 8)

Jonathan Bryant
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Jonathan Bryant » Sat Jan 28, 2012 1:20 pm

Richard Bates wrote: Still i can console myself with my silly 234 rapidplay rating 8)
That's impressive.

My silver lining is that when the games finally get counted I will have - technically at least - drawn with a player rated over 200 for the first time. (He was 'only' 193 at the time we played but he's had a decent bump in the right direction).

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Sat Jan 28, 2012 1:24 pm

I think the effect on my grade of having 14 games not graded (35 were graded) has been an increase of 3 grading points rather than a decrease of one (or staying the same), which is my best-ever grade, but it feels a bit sullied by not having the missing games included.

What I'm not clear about now is how to calculate how the 14 games will be graded for the July 2012 list. Which grades will be used? Do I need to look up my opponent's new grades and do a new calculation? And the six games I've played in January, I obviously need to calculate those using the January 2012 grades, though at the time I noted down the July 2011 grades as those were the only ones available?

(Yes, I know, more time reading and studying chess rather than chess grades...)

Roger de Coverly
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sat Jan 28, 2012 8:17 pm

Christopher Kreuzer wrote:What I'm not clear about now is how to calculate how the 14 games will be graded for the July 2012 list. Which grades will be used? Do I need to look up my opponent's new grades and do a new calculation?
I think Richard Hadrell has confirmed that whether logical or not, that all games submitted for the July 2012 list would use the January 2012 grades irrespective of when they had been played. This may exclude Juniors if they are still running the "treat juniors as new players" rule. I assume Juniors would use the July 2012 grade.

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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Sat Jan 28, 2012 10:29 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Christopher Kreuzer wrote:What I'm not clear about now is how to calculate how the 14 games will be graded for the July 2012 list. Which grades will be used? Do I need to look up my opponent's new grades and do a new calculation?
I think Richard Hadrell has confirmed that whether logical or not, that all games submitted for the July 2012 list would use the January 2012 grades irrespective of when they had been played. This may exclude Juniors if they are still running the "treat juniors as new players" rule. I assume Juniors would use the July 2012 grade.
Thanks. What I've managed to work out, after a bit of faffing about, is the following (apologies for the focus on my own grade here, I'm using it as an example because it's the one where I know the details):

(1) I played 49 games in the period June 2011 to December 2012. My grade in the July 2011 list was 168.

(2) 35 of those games ended up being graded for the January 2012 grading list, and 14 did not, but are likely to end up being submitted for the July 2012 grading list. My grade in the January 2012 list is 171.

(3) My calculations show that if the 14 games that were not submitted had been, and they had been graded for the January 2012 list, then my January 2012 grade would have been 169.

(4) In January 2012, I've played six games so far. This means it is possible to do three calculations: (i) work out what the grading performance so far would be if the hypothetical 169 grade is used and only the six games played so far are taken into account; (ii) work out what the 'count-back' grade would be to get to 30 games from the 6 played so far (can't be bothered, and it's not clear how that count back works anyway); (iii) work out what the effect is of starting with the actual 171 grade, recalculating the 14 yet-to-be-graded games (using the new grades) and then including the six games played so far in January 2012.

It turns out the answer to (i) is 170 and the answer to (iii) is 166. This is essentially because the 14 games yet to be graded were poor results for me overall, but the effect of those 14 games is felt less when included with a batch of 35 games (the effect being to change 171, the grade after 35 games, to 169, the grade after 49 games), while the effect is felt far more when the 14 games are included with a batch of 6 games (the effect being to change 171, the grade after 6 games, to 166, the grade after 20 games).

Not quite sure what this all means, other than for those who are very active the effects probably average out, but for those that play less often, there will be more volatility in their grades, and half-year lists will increase this volatility, especially if blocks of games ending up in one half-year or the other create large imbalances.
Last edited by Christopher Kreuzer on Sun Jan 29, 2012 2:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sat Jan 28, 2012 10:41 pm

Christopher Kreuzer wrote: Not quite sure what this all means, other than for those who are very active the effects probably average out, but for those that play less often, there will be more volatility in their grades, and half-year lists will increase this volatility, especially if blocks of games ending up in one half-year or the other create large imbalances.
I think you get more volatility even for the most active players. My grade dropped from 184 to 175 over 49 games (should have been 50 since a game against C Arbiter was actually played). If I were to average towards 195 for the rest of the season (and January is looking good), then I would have had a no change season of 183 to 185 under the old rules.

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Christopher Kreuzer
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Christopher Kreuzer » Sun Jan 29, 2012 1:59 am

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Christopher Kreuzer wrote: Not quite sure what this all means, other than for those who are very active the effects probably average out, but for those that play less often, there will be more volatility in their grades, and half-year lists will increase this volatility, especially if blocks of games ending up in one half-year or the other create large imbalances.
I think you get more volatility even for the most active players. My grade dropped from 184 to 175 over 49 games (should have been 50 since a game against C Arbiter was actually played). If I were to average towards 195 for the rest of the season (and January is looking good), then I would have had a no change season of 183 to 185 under the old rules.
So you are saying under the old rules 183 to 185 (very little change) and under the new rules (splitting the season in half and recalculating at the midpoint) you would get 183 to 175 to 195? That does look more volatile, yes. I wonder if what some people say about performing better in one half of the season than the other really is true? I've never bothered to look at my results in enough detail to work that out, but it will be interesting to see what the trends are over a few years. Of course, make the period of time you are averaging over small enough, you get more spikes, and make the period of time long enough (e.g. 10 years) then the data is smoothed out. I don't think it can be avoided.

Richard Bates
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Richard Bates » Sun Jan 29, 2012 10:54 am

I wonder how keyed in congresses actually are to the introduction to January grades? Not that i've looked that closely but i haven't noticed entry forms for forthcoming tournaments routinely making clear whether they intend to use January or July grades for their tournaments. As an example the Bournemouth congress in late April, which has a good website, is actually listing a small number of entrants to date with July grades listed. Some of these naturally include people who have entered tournaments for which they would not now be eligible under January grades. Presumably they will have to be moved, although the entry form doesn't include the standard wording about organisers reserving the right to refuse entry/move people into different sections.
Last edited by Richard Bates on Sun Jan 29, 2012 11:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sun Jan 29, 2012 10:56 am

Christopher Kreuzer wrote: So you are saying under the old rules 183 to 185 (very little change) and under the new rules (splitting the season in half and recalculating at the midpoint) you would get 183 to 175 to 195? That does look more volatile, yes. I wonder if what some people say about performing better in one half of the season than the other really is true?
It's speculative of course that I can perform at well above 175 for the rest of the season. But assuming I do, then my grade will recover back towards the 180s. What the grading system is now showing is a poor run of form in August 2012 (17 games) and a mediocre result in the London Classic (9 games). This previously would have been masked provided I got some decent results in leagues and weekend events. Equally the really decent results are sometimes masked by a poor run.

If you examine results by event, grading performance can be quite volatile. In an Open, a 50% score is usually worth around 175 to 180. So 3/5 is worth 185 to 190 and 3.5/5 195 to 200. Equally 2/5 is worth 165 to 170. So you get a run of decent scores in Congresses and that is a grading boost. It rarely lasts an entire season.

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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Richard Bates » Sun Jan 29, 2012 10:57 am

Christopher Kreuzer wrote: I don't think it can be avoided.
Well it could have been "avoided" using a rolling yearly list but that debate's been had. It might become more relevant if the idea of making lists even more frequent, say monthly or bimonthly, gains currency, since this would only really be sensible on a rolling format.

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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Roger de Coverly » Sun Jan 29, 2012 11:03 am

Richard Bates wrote: Some of these naturally include people who have entered tournaments for which they would not now be eligible under January grades. Presumably they will have to be moved, although the entry form doesn't include the standard wording about organisers reserving the right to refuse entry/move people into different sections.
I'd doubt that Congresses have yet worked out a treatment. You could, as suggested, move people to a different section, but their entry might be conditional on not playing in the higher section. Whilst it might encourage sharp practice, would it be practical for organisers to say that early entrants, perhaps received by organisers before the publication date of the new grades would be allowed to stay in the sections first entered?

Kidlington is coming up next weekend, it will be interesting to see what grades are used for pairings and whether any previously entered players are allowed or required to change sections.

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Re: How many games need for a grade

Post by Richard Bates » Sun Jan 29, 2012 11:15 am

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Richard Bates wrote: Some of these naturally include people who have entered tournaments for which they would not now be eligible under January grades. Presumably they will have to be moved, although the entry form doesn't include the standard wording about organisers reserving the right to refuse entry/move people into different sections.
I'd doubt that Congresses have yet worked out a treatment. You could, as suggested, move people to a different section, but their entry might be conditional on not playing in the higher section. Whilst it might encourage sharp practice, would it be practical for organisers to say that early entrants, perhaps received by organisers before the publication date of the new grades would be allowed to stay in the sections first entered?

Kidlington is coming up next weekend, it will be interesting to see what grades are used for pairings and whether any previously entered players are allowed or required to change sections.
Well theoretically Kidlington has the additional problem of not having an Open section. Had i entered and my London League games been graded i would have been in a position of becoming technically ineligible for any section. I don't think your idea would necessarily encourage "sharp practice" (in fact organisers would probably like the extra incentive to get entries in early) - although it would create extra work/confusion if people entered a higher tournament and then expressed a desire to go into a lower section post publication. Whatever the situation congresses need to make clear their policy on their entry forms.

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