4NCL On-Line Season 4

Venues, fixtures, teams and related matters.
MartinCarpenter
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Joined: Tue May 24, 2011 10:58 am

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by MartinCarpenter » Wed Dec 01, 2021 8:32 am

Neil Graham wrote:
Tue Nov 30, 2021 10:07 pm
James Toon wrote:
Tue Nov 30, 2021 2:46 pm
Tension averted for Guildford Castles in Division 3 as Shropshire & Friends 3 can't raise a team. We must screw our courage to the sticking-place v Charlton Cobras or Hackney Thirsty in the final.
Disappointingly three teams out of eight defaulted (including both matches in Division Three). Meanwhile we did win our match so meet Martin's team in the Final so despite our doubtful technical abilities we were guided through - so thanks to Andy Howie (holed up in his hotel room in Dubai) and the other arbiters.
Especially to Andie for staying so good natured after I kept him up so long finishing off a piece up ending. Deserves a medal.

The extra stuff was slightly mixed in the end I guess? As expected, a thoroughly sane reading of the basic rules by the arbiters - the written advice could definitely do with being clarified a little bit to match the rather saner reality. It definitely helped the atmosphere a bit but also some hassle and the defaults hopefully weren't related.

Had to stop myself talking to myself about the game a couple of times.

Its a slightly curious team for me this one - loads of links with E&C, including most of Jorvik coming from the club. But between Covid and so on I've never actually met any of these specific teammates in person!

It looks like Division 1 should have a very solid quality final, hope everyone manages to have fun :)

John Hodgson
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Joined: Thu Jul 29, 2010 10:13 am

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by John Hodgson » Thu Dec 02, 2021 3:52 pm

Streatham Default in Division 2

Two of our four players did not have the right technology to play under Zoom. As one of the two remaining, I had an important social alternative that I would have given up in a competitive match, but not for this one. With one player left we decided not to contest the match.

There is a 4NCL Online rule that all players have to have played at least four games during the season. As this rule restricted us to only four players there was no opportunity to bring in two new players (who would have been lower-rated than the players replaced).

My personal opinion (not discussed with my captain) is that the 4NCL online competition should not be taken so seriously. Because of these rules our opponents were denied a game. Should they be revisited for season 4?

Roger de Coverly
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Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by Roger de Coverly » Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:32 pm

John Hodgson wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 3:52 pm
My personal opinion (not discussed with my captain) is that the 4NCL online competition should not be taken so seriously. Because of these rules our opponents were denied a game. Should they be revisited for season 4?
Is there any compelling reason not to run the leagues as a Swiss? If that was the case, the need for playoffs between the sections is elimated.

LawrenceCooper
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Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by LawrenceCooper » Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:38 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:32 pm
John Hodgson wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 3:52 pm
My personal opinion (not discussed with my captain) is that the 4NCL online competition should not be taken so seriously. Because of these rules our opponents were denied a game. Should they be revisited for season 4?
Is there any compelling reason not to run the leagues as a Swiss? If that was the case, the need for playoffs between the sections is elimated.
One reason given for not doing this when setting up the online league was to avoid huge grading/rating discrepancies and to attempt to have teams of similar strength playing each other.

John Hodgson
Posts: 73
Joined: Thu Jul 29, 2010 10:13 am

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by John Hodgson » Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:53 pm

Roger de Coverly wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:32 pm
John Hodgson wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 3:52 pm
My personal opinion (not discussed with my captain) is that the 4NCL online competition should not be taken so seriously. Because of these rules our opponents were denied a game. Should they be revisited for season 4?
Is there any compelling reason not to run the leagues as a Swiss? If that was the case, the need for playoffs between the sections is elimated.
According to the rules (section 6) teams finishing 1st and 2nd in their group are promoted regardless of the results of the play-offs. So the play-offs are for prestige (or the opportunity to play extra games), not promotion.

I think any player who has played once in the main tournament should be allowed to play in the play-offs (unless special rules are needed for Division 1)

Mick Norris
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Location: Bolton, Greater Manchester

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by Mick Norris » Thu Dec 02, 2021 5:25 pm

John Hodgson wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:53 pm
Roger de Coverly wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 4:32 pm
John Hodgson wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 3:52 pm
My personal opinion (not discussed with my captain) is that the 4NCL online competition should not be taken so seriously. Because of these rules our opponents were denied a game. Should they be revisited for season 4?
Is there any compelling reason not to run the leagues as a Swiss? If that was the case, the need for playoffs between the sections is elimated.
According to the rules (section 6) teams finishing 1st and 2nd in their group are promoted regardless of the results of the play-offs. So the play-offs are for prestige (or the opportunity to play extra games), not promotion.

I think any player who has played once in the main tournament should be allowed to play in the play-offs (unless special rules are needed for Division 1)
I'm not sure about once, maybe two or three times might be the right number?
Any postings on here represent my personal views

MartinCarpenter
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Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by MartinCarpenter » Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:04 pm

4 seems fine to me, in fact, but you do then have to let people freely draft in replacements when they need them!

With 4NCL scoring even one default renders a 4 board match pretty pointless.

John Hodgson
Posts: 73
Joined: Thu Jul 29, 2010 10:13 am

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by John Hodgson » Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:44 pm

MartinCarpenter wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:04 pm
4 seems fine to me, in fact, but you do then have to let people freely draft in replacements when they need them!

With 4NCL scoring even one default renders a 4 board match pretty pointless.
As I said above, we only had 4 players who had played at least 4 games. Unless I have missed something, we were prevented from bringing in reinforcements, even those who had played in previous matches. If reinforcements are allowed then 4 is not the number.

MartinCarpenter
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Joined: Tue May 24, 2011 10:58 am

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by MartinCarpenter » Thu Dec 02, 2021 7:45 pm

John Hodgson wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:44 pm
MartinCarpenter wrote:
Thu Dec 02, 2021 6:04 pm
4 seems fine to me, in fact, but you do then have to let people freely draft in replacements when they need them!

With 4NCL scoring even one default renders a 4 board match pretty pointless.
As I said above, we only had 4 players who had played at least 4 games. Unless I have missed something, we were prevented from bringing in reinforcements, even those who had played in previous matches. If reinforcements are allowed then 4 is not the number.
Yes, E&C were in precisely the same boat - and I presume most other teams would have been.

My suspicion is that the rules as applied in practice might have been rather more lenient than the unworkably strict written ones - they let us have things like toilet breaks on the day.

Maybe covered by the below, which really should have been phrased hugely less aggressively!
"Where either the spirit or the letter of the rules has been breached in the opinion of the Chief Arbiter, the Chief Arbiter will contact the captain concerned and discuss the problem, and work with the captain to organise a legal team for the match."

There's definitely a mild difference in intent, at least, between '4 and you can patch' and 'play whoever' (although you can obviously exploit the former if you really set out to - but who would care enough?).

David Sedgwick
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Location: Croydon
Contact:

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by David Sedgwick » Tue Dec 14, 2021 5:45 pm

David Sedgwick wrote:
Wed Dec 01, 2021 12:51 am
,Congratulations to Ashfield and the other four teams who qualified for the Finals by playing and winning. Here's hoping that all eight finalists get to play on Tuesday 14th December.
Good luck to all the teams in the Finals.

MartinCarpenter
Posts: 3041
Joined: Tue May 24, 2011 10:58 am

Re: 4NCL On-Line Season 4

Post by MartinCarpenter » Wed Dec 15, 2021 3:03 pm

From what I can tell it did all go well :) Div 3/4 definitely did.

E&Child nearly had to test whether we'd have been allowed a sub who hadn't played 4 games, but got a last minute reprieve and managed to sneak our way to a win of exceptionally minor importance.

The zoom etc stuff does seem to help the atmosphere a bit, although obviously also annoyances. Wonder how well season 5 will go?!

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