Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Debate directly related to English Chess Federation matters.
Hok Yin Stephen Chiu
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Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Hok Yin Stephen Chiu » Wed Aug 25, 2021 8:49 am

I don't know how many people feel the same way, but the new ECF ratings, does not make sense, in context of our English chess circuit.

The best feature of the old system was that your grade was calculated from your last 30 games, and (as I understood) it reset, if you haven't played in several years. It allowed players coming back and improving after a break, to have their grade accurately reflected within one grading cycle.

I currently know several 1500 players at university, who in the almost two years of the pandemic have reached 2000 online, and was consistent beating/drawing with 160s/170s in our local online chess league. With issues like the k-factor of 30/20/10, it will be a distant future until these players will ever reach an accurate reflection of their chess playing ability, if (and is true in many cases), on average, they play in one or two rated-rapidplays a year, and 5 to 10 long play games (if you are lucky to fit that many in).

In the old system, the effective range of grades was from 0-280, and wins and losses costed you +/- 50, which is about 20% of the full range. Whereas single digit changes (or a low double digit change) in a four figure system, is about 1% of the full range.

This is not much of a responsive system, and ruins how we can accurately assess the strengths of these university players / young people, in general. And creates a disruptive effect on the intermediate and minor sections of local congresses and rapidplays.

I do wonder if the ECF instead of abolishing the Old System, should have run it in parallel with the ELO system, at least for a couple of years, to see whether it made any sense in the context of English Chess.

If it ain't broke, don't fix it...

To my mind, perhaps the ECF Board/Council should have delayed this change during the middle of a pandemic, as people weren't playing graded/rated chess, but were continuing to improve, through study and online chess. Perhaps this should be an item to consider/discuss/reconsider at the next ECF Council meeting?

(I've put the debate under ECF Matters, instead of the Grading, in light of the upcoming ECF Council meeting, and wonder what opinions other reps, and local leagues/organisers/etc think on the matter)

MartinCarpenter
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Re: The Old ECF grades are better than the New ECF 4 fig ELO

Post by MartinCarpenter » Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:26 am

Its interesting. There are normally, of course, very solid reasons for a rating system to be somewhat conservative. Historically most players have improved to an underlying grade then just sat roughly there for the rest of their careers. That includes most people coming back to chess.

You really don't want to start badly over reacting to slight fluctuations in form/luck. It is hard.
(The pure last 30 games system could be quite comical if you were playing a lot of games each year and had a good/bad tournament just on edge of the sample. Huge jumps.).

What, if anything, they should do for people grades post the pandemic - with loads of online chess included - I'm not so sure. I'm not even so sure if online strength is going to inevitably carry over to over the board play. It doesn't work all that well the other way round.

Nick Ivell
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Nick Ivell » Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:34 am

Call me a troglodyte, but I don't believe in all this 'improvement due to online chess played during the pandemic'.

Hok Yin Stephen Chiu
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Hok Yin Stephen Chiu » Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:37 am

Nick Ivell wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:34 am
Call me a troglodyte, but I don't believe in all this 'improvement due to online chess played during the pandemic'.
I suppose, there's probably as much decline, as improvement, over the pandemic period!
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Roger de Coverly
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Roger de Coverly » Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:52 am

Hok Yin Stephen Chiu wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 8:49 am
To my mind, perhaps the ECF Board/Council should have delayed this change during the middle of a pandemic, as people weren't playing graded/rated chess, but were continuing to improve, through study and online chess. Perhaps this should be an item to consider/discuss/reconsider at the next ECF Council meeting?
Making the changes during a period of very low activity makes sense from the viewpoint of robustness, allowing the changes to be implemented without the stress of volumes.

There are likely players who took a break from serious chess who will retain their old rating. I could also be a sceptic about whether online results will carry over into OTB chess in the absence of the availability of the odd hint or assessment.

Up to a point Elo based systems are self correcting. Whilst it would be possible to retain an obsolete rating, it isn't possible to do this and exploit it to any great extent particularly with monthly updates.

NickFaulks
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by NickFaulks » Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:54 am

Nick Ivell wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:34 am
Call me a troglodyte, but I don't believe in all this 'improvement due to online chess played during the pandemic'.
That is also my starting position, but it will be very interesting to see how this pans out in practice. Some people have used the 18 month lockdown to play thousands of online games, which will have have kept them in practice, but will it also have got them into habits which are unhelpful OTB? Have the opposite group, including myself, forgotten everything they ever knew?
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Mike Gunn
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Mike Gunn » Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:00 am

The use of the last 30 games in calculating grades was dropped after a year or two because of increased volatility in the calculated grades. We went back to the old system (weighted averages when a player had played less than 30 games in the previous 12 months).

I agree with your basic point - there was nothing wrong with the old ECF system and in some ways it was better than the new system. The real reason for change was to bring us in line with the systems used in the rest of the world.

Nick Burrows
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Nick Burrows » Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:31 am

Mike Gunn wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:00 am
(weighted averages when a player had played less than 30 games in the previous 12 months).
How is this calculated?

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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Nick Burrows » Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:35 am

Nick Ivell wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:34 am
Call me a troglodyte, but I don't believe in all this 'improvement due to online chess played during the pandemic'.
Not necessarily due to online chess per se, but there have been many players working very hard on their chess, more so than in normal times and playing lots of games.
We will see some astronomical improvements imo.

MartinCarpenter
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by MartinCarpenter » Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:38 am

Nick Burrows wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:35 am
Nick Ivell wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 9:34 am
Call me a troglodyte, but I don't believe in all this 'improvement due to online chess played during the pandemic'.
Not necessarily due to online chess per se, but there have been many players working very hard on their chess, more so than in normal times and playing lots of games.
We will see some astronomical improvements imo.
Also a lot of juniors/ex Students etc who have improved about the expected amount over the time period.

The challenge there is simply that the games they've been improving in will be missing from the grading system.

NickFaulks
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by NickFaulks » Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:43 am

Mike Gunn wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:00 am
The real reason for change was to bring us in line with the systems used in the rest of the world.
Except that many countries have then taken the final step and gone over entirely to the international system. This would be unthinkable in England, where many club players continue to believe that the ECF grading / rating system is the primary benefit for which they pay their membership fees.

The most prominent example of the "similar but different" approach is the US, where there are neverending arguments about why USCF and FIDE ratings are different and which one is "wrong".
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by John Upham » Wed Aug 25, 2021 12:41 pm

NickFaulks wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:43 am

Except that many countries have then taken the final step and gone over entirely to the international system. This would be unthinkable in England, where many club players continue to believe that the ECF grading / rating system is the primary benefit for which they pay their membership fees.
How do other NGBs "sell themselves" to their nation's players if they are not offering a national grade / rating?

What are they offering that entices their nations players to maintain their memberships?
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Roger de Coverly
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Roger de Coverly » Wed Aug 25, 2021 12:46 pm

NickFaulks wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 10:43 am
This would be unthinkable in England, where many club players continue to believe that the ECF grading / rating system is the primary benefit for which they pay their membership fees.
It's also relevant that there's still much club and congress chess that takes place using session lengths too short to be allowed for FIDE rating. The ECF charge higher membership fees for the "benefit" of playing in a FIDE rated tournament.

Session lengths of four hours plus have been shown to work in events with two rounds a day, subject to the odd late start or late pairing. Trying to play session lengths of that length at three rounds a day or in an evening would require unacceptably early starts and late finishes.

Roger de Coverly
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Roger de Coverly » Wed Aug 25, 2021 12:49 pm

John Upham wrote:
Wed Aug 25, 2021 12:41 pm
What are they offering that entices their nations players to maintain their memberships?
When they have a monopoly position, it's the right or licence to play chess.

Mike Gunn
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Re: Have the ECF replaced the old grades with the new ratings, at the wrong moment?

Post by Mike Gunn » Wed Aug 25, 2021 1:10 pm

To answer the query about weighted averages suppose a player had played 24 games in the previous season with a calculated grade of x and the grade was y from more than 5 games in the season before the new grade would be 0.8*x +0.2*y.

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