Two related questions:
If the time control for a tournament is advertised as d0 (for example: G/20 d0), can a player decide to use a delay anyway, such as G/20 d3 or G/17 d3? (If so, which is preferred?)
Can the tournament staff decide to change the advertised time control from one without delay to a similar one with delay (for example, G/20 d0 to G/17 d3), provided advance notice is provided and anyone who already signed up is informed well in advance?
Thanks,
Since delay is the standard, it would seem to me that if the organizer overtly advertised d/0 that is expressing an overt intent not to allow delay. Thus I would say that an individual player cannot decide on their own to use delay and the organizers certainly can’t change it on the fly. I would think that if both players agree to use delay that might be permissible with permission of the TDs, but not otherwise. I can see a TD agreeing to G17 d3 but not G20 d3, for instance.
Years ago I played in an invitational round robin event with two rounds per day over a 2-day and a 3-day weekend. By the last round my opponent and I, who were bringing up the rear, were mentally and physically exhausted. We asked if we could play under G/45 instead of the standard long control just so we could get out sooner. He graciously agreed. If we had decided to do so unilaterally he would have been justified, in my opinion, to take action, even double-forfeiting us perhaps.
Let me rephrase the question to make the answer more obvious. “Can we ignore the rule about how much time we have and just give ourselves more time by adding a delay just because we want it?”
As a thought experiment, sit down and try to make a list of all possible answers to “what could possibly go wrong with that?” I would suggest starting that list by thinking about late arrivals. The higher level TD certification exams often contain questions that start with “Bob arrived late for the first round and missed the announcements before the round started.”
What Ken said.
The only thing that I would add is that an old format time control, in which delay or increment is not specified, is not a new format time control with d0 presumed. A default delay is explicitly prescribed by rule (thanks to Ken’s efforts in an ADM last year) in such a case, the amount of which varies as a function of the base time. (For a base time of 20 minutes, the default delay is 3 seconds).
So for a tournament explicitly advertised as G/20 d0, the only proper clock setting is 20 minutes with no delay.
For a tournament advertised only as G/20 (in contravention of the current standard), the only proper clock setting is 20 minutes with 3 seconds of delay.
And then there is the knotty question about what rating system to use for perhaps one game? If the time control is G/25 d/0 and the two opponents give themselves a 5 second delay, the game is now G/25 d5 or 25 + 5 = 30–or dual rated! Players deciding that they should play a different TC also could delay the start of the next round; thus, impacting everyone to just to satisfy their own wants and needs.
I really don’t see why Mr. Gong doesn’t just change the time control to G/90;+30. That would be more comfortable.
Alex Relyea
I’ll take the opportunity to provide an “Organizing 101” tip here.
The original question contained the phrase “anyone who already signed up is informed well in advance.” While this is not stated explicitly in the original question, I assume (given that it’s 2016) the means of informing advance entrants of the change is e-mail.
ORGANIZER TIP (with apologies to Mr. Just): Do not rely on e-mail to provide important notices to players unless you are planning to require active confirmation of receipt of the e-mail from each player and to follow up with each and every player who does not actively confirm receipt of the message.
E-mail is not a guaranteed deliver mechanism. E-mail messages can be lost or delayed for significant lengths of time. They can mysteriously disappear into “spam” folders, never to see the light of day. Or, quite simply, it is altogether too easy for someone to say “I didn’t get your e-mail” even if the person did in fact receive the message if the content of the e-mail is “inconvenient.”
The Metrowest Chess Club explicitly refuses to accept bye requests for its one-round-every-week monthly tournamentss by e-mail exactly because it is an unreliable delivery mechanism. We require players either to write bye requests on a sign-up sheet or to call and leave a message on the club phone line no later than one-half hour before the round starts to request a bye.
The following is somewhat off-topic, but –
I’ve long felt that explanatory (and useful) information does not always need to be labeled as a TD TIP. It could sometimes be simply an extra sentence or paragraph, with the main rule in bold and the extra material (or TIP) in light face.
In fact, even for those sentences or paragraphs which are to be labeled as TIPs, I propose the following categories:
In some cases there might be overlap, so you could also have
– or any other combination which fits any given situation.
Bill Smythe
Then changing or eliminating old tips as necessary becomes a chore–it is part of the rule, and not separate. Changing rules is a long process. Changing Tips (right now) is a fast process that can keep up with the times. Rules need to be followed. Tips do not. Making Tips part of the rule has more downsides than upsides. Ideally I would like the rulebook to be available electronically with links to the tips. Or, using your idea of making Tips part of the rule: Have the Delegates give editorial permission to change those Tips as necessary (the Delegates have recently–I believe sometime in the last two years–given the editor the ability to fix obvious errors like omissions, typos, references errors, grammar, punctuation, etc.).
Sidebar: I also think that there must be a better way to deal with “See Also.”
Actually, I wasn’t proposing making Tips part of the rule. I was suggesting having more categories of Tips – including the “unlabeled” category where an extra paragraph is simply inserted in lightface. The rules could be in bold face.
However, I can certainly understand the necessity to continue to make Tips relatively easy to change – including “unlabeled” tips.
To avoid confusion, maybe the best idea would be to have, in addition to “ORGANIZER TIP”, “ARBITER TIP”, etc, another category, “COMMENT”, instead of unlabeled – and to make it clear that Comments, as well as Tips, would not be subject to the lengthy process required to change rules.
I agree. At present, “See Also” seems to have been computer-generated by the publisher. But about 2/3 of them seem to be unnecessary clutter. Perhaps, after the publisher generates the “See Also’s”, the result could be returned to the editor who could erase the “See Also’s” of marginal value.
Bill Smythe
Back to the OP’s questions:
I’m not sure what motivated the questions, but if it’s because the organizer is having second thoughts about the wisdom of d0, good. The organizer should have second thoughts about d0.
That said, there is no good way to fix post-advertisement. So tolerate the clock-bashing-animalfest you’ve bought yourself, and add d3 for the next event. Your players will appreciate it, and so will you.
Now, if the question is motivated because you are playing in an event organized by a diehard d0 adherent, then you’ve just got to decide whether to play or not. In my view, a time control of G/20 d0 tells me everything I need to know when determining whether or not to play in an event. YMMV.