Posting on Behalf of Mike Pollard who sent this round earlier this week
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Last season the internal tournaments were unfinished due to a number of unfortunate and unavoidable circumstances.
Often it was a case of players joining the tournament and dropping out again, players not getting their games arranged or being unable to contact opponents, no blame is being placed upon anyone.
So for this season and with a few requests for a change I would like to propose the following for the events.
Entrants are split into 3 groups of 5 players (assuming at least 15 entries). Championship, Major, Intermediate.
Players in each group to play each other and twice against players in the next lowest group.
All players who enter are placed into one draw and matches are conducted with a time handicap based on difference in ratings. Assuming 15 entries then players are split by ratings to be able to compete for championship, major or intermediate.
Keep format the same as last year but provide a list of entries to all players who can arrange games at their leisure during the course of the season.
Also I would like to suggest that all entrants pay a fee for the event they enter as a promissory for completion of games with a percentage (50%?) returned when all games played.
The season is two months away so no immediate decisions need to be made but i would like some suggestions from you and any alternatives to be considered.
Best Wishes
MP
Option 3 & rated games for me please
Steve
My vote would be for #3. I'd want the games to be rated.
#1 I just don't understand how that works to be honest, and with big differences in rating I don't see how this can be any fun for an evening's play
#2 Can you really have a significant time handicap in classical? What would be the handicap per rating point?
#3 Makes the most sense and would probably be easiest to manage. Maybe if someone hasn't played a game for say 6 weeks they're just removed from the league?
(Option #4 set date fixtures, 5-round swiss (maybe play a 2 game series (1 Black 1 White) over 2 fixture nights) then highest placed Championship, Major, Intermediate. Anyone that can't make a date get 1 1/2 point bye then 0s after that, and draw the fixtures on the day from the people that are there)
I'm not sure why we're taking a cut of any promissory if matches get played? I wouldn't want to try to nick a few quid off people for the sake of a tournament (isn't this what club membership is supposed to be for?)
Dan
Posting David Mills comments which were sent by email: Hello Mike,
Apologies for the late response. Picked up this message accidentally as I’m a long way behind clearing emails because of Karen’s eye surgery and my domestic situation. A couple of points:-
I am reluctant to enter anything at present for a variety of reasons, not least noisy playing conditions at the club, but what about the following points:-
Not being able to contact an opponent is not a genuine excuse for not playing. Entrants should be supplied with the correct contact details and told to make contact within a prescribed period. If this is not possible, entrants should liaise with the competition controller for advice.
I don’t understand how the ‘playing those in a group below’ as well as those in your own group would work. Championship entrants playing those in the Major means that those in the Major will meet everyone!? Players in the Intermediate will just meet others in their section. There would be no section below them!? I must be misunderstanding something.
If you have a time handicap, none of the games will be rated and the contests are not a genuine test of ability. Not the type of event that appeals to me. I have organised tournaments in the past, and the problem is simply that certain entrants are either unable to complete their games because of good reasons or are simply dilatory. I have failed to come up with a genuine and simple way of ensuring games are actually played, other than ‘pestering’ entrants to ‘extract a finger’! Unfortunately, however, the most effective format is some form of ‘Swiss’, involving one of each pairing being defaulted after the appropriate time period has expired. Unless one of the pair takes responsibility for the game being unplayed, you ask both for their reason and award zero to one or both of them. Personally, I prefer an all play all, either single or double round, but that relies upon entrants taking responsibility for actually playing games!
Best wishes,
David.
Can you confirm what you mean by this:
"Players in each group to play each other and twice against players in the next lowest group." - For the championship league this sounds like most of their games would be against significantly lower rated players which might not be ideal? Not sure if I'm misunderstanding this. I like the thought of having a time advantage competition. When I was looking at the handicaps for HERCA I created a match probability calculator which might be useful to work out the time advantages - MP I'll email you a link if it's decided that we go down that path. With regards to paying a fee, I don't think that there is much benefit in doing this as it won't be much of a deterrent. Dave