Under current rules, could an organizer USCF-rate a tournament with a 10-second delay, provided it was announced in advance?
How would this affect whether the tournament was quick-, dual- or regular-rated?
Of course.
The standard is less (think 3 seconds), but there is nothing in the rules that say a TD can’t announce a differnt time delay.
Personally, I think 3 seconds for 5min games, 5 seconds for 6 to 29 minutes time controls, and 10 second delay for time controls greater than 30 minutes is preferable.
Of couse, for really long games (GM length time controls), the delay might be as long as say, 2 min/move. Although that would be under match, or round robin conditions, with only 1 game being played per day, rather than in a swiss tournament that needs to get 3 to 5 rounds done in a single day.
Not positive, but I think the initial time (under 30, 30 to 59, and 60+) still dictates which rating you need to use. I don’t play tournament though, so not entirely sure.
It would be ratable under the regular rating system. I think they’re doing both these days, aren’t they?
This is a quote from Mike Nolan in another thread about increments/time delays. It appears as long as the Increment/delay is less than 15 seconds, when the Initial time is between 5 and 29, it can be quick rated, between 30 and 59 dual rated, but if the delay/increment is 15 seconds or greater it is regular rated only.
So a Game/25 with a 15 second increment would be regular rated only.
- Yes. 2) Which system it would be rated under would depend on the time control.
Very helpful. Thanks.
I bet our players might like a quick rated g/29 with a 10-second increment, or a dual rated g/45 with a 10-second increment. 
Based on the updates to the rules (see the link posted previously), the increment/delay has to be GREATER than 15 seconds for the event to be regular ratable only.
G/45 + 15 seconds increment (or delay) would be dual ratable.
G/45 + 16 seconds increment (or delay) would be regular ratable only.
aa i hate when i read it wrong… lol I thought it said 15 seconds or more, not more than 15 seconds. Thanks Mike.
Not a serious mis-read, I don’t know of any events having been held with 15 seconds delay/increment anyway.
This event have a 15 second delay.
uschess.org/msa/XtblMain.php?200808179611
However it had two time controls so it was regular rated only. The organizer deducted 10 minutes off the first control and 5 minutes off the last control. The time control was 40/90 and G/45. Delay clocks the time limit became 40/80 G/40.
I think I would have been better off bringing an analog clock and hope the opponent didn’t want delay. Making 40 moves in 80 minutes was very difficult even with that delay.
Having two (or more) time controls no longer requires that an event be regular rated, it depends on the total amount of time per player in those time controls. If it is between 30 and 60 minutes, then the event is dual ratable, regarless of how many time controls there are.
Someone could hold an event at 15/15, 15/15, 15/15, SD/15 and since that adds up to 60 minutes it is a dual-ratable event.
(Whether that’s an event anyone would want to play in is separate from what rating system or systems it would be ratable under.)
The event you cite had a total time per player of more than 60 minutes so it was regular ratable only.
the 15 second delay or increment was chosen precisely because it is unusual. It is about half way between the typical delay (5 seconds) and the typical increment (30 seconds)
Regular rated: Greater than G/60 OR increment or delay Greater than 15 sec
Dual rated: G/30 to G/60 AND increment or delay less than or equal to 15 sec
Quick rated: G/5 to G/29 AND incremet or delay less than or equal to 15 sec
For calculation purposes multiple time controls are to add the minutes of equivalence to the G/mm number. that is 40/30; SD/30 => G/60 for this purpose.
This allows for a great variety of time control situations, and is intentional in that respect.
For example, an event G/1min inc/30sec (or basically 30 seconds per move) is a regular rated event.
Standard delay is 5 seconds. Non-standard delay of just about anything is allowable if announced in advance and is rated as outlined above. Likewise for increment (standard is 30 sec). For this purpose, and throughout much of the rules, increment and delay are treated as the same thing.
If you want anything other than standard you just have to announce it in your advance publicity.
the shortest possilbe regular only event is G/0 inc 16
The longest possible dual rated event is G/60 inc 15
the shortest possible dual rated event is G/30 d/0
The longest possible quick only event is G/29 inc 15
Note that, in fact, this allows for considerable overlap in the total length of the games.
This gives an organizer a great deal of rope, either to lead you with or to hang yourself with. You be the judge.
I’m not sure I like the idea of G/0 + 16 seconds being regular ratable.
We don’t allow G/0 + 5 seconds as quick ratable, the minimum time control is 5 minutes on the clock, regardless of the increment/delay setting, per the rules passed last summer, so we shouldn’t allow G/0 + 16 as regular ratable either. What should the minimum time on the clock be? 30 minutes? 60 minutes?
I miss-spoke (a little). the TD tip states that “At no time should the basic, primary time control be less than 5 minutes”
Granted, technically this is not the “Rule” but a strong suggestion or recommendation (TD tip).
Perhaps that is a good DM, i.e. promote that sentence from the “tip” to the last statement in the “Rule”. I could live with that.
So, folowing that tip, the shortest regular time control is G/5 inc/16.
Note also that “standard” increment is 30 seconds. 30 seconds/move I would argue is resonable for regular ratings.
We wanted to allow games that had a “time per move” option, like “2 minutes per move” to be ratable as regular. Hence, G/5, inc/120. The wording was intended to avoid the messy formulas trying to convert second of increment, or delay, to total time per game. A formula that doesn’t really work anyway.
That is another reason I would like to see 5Fa dissappear (along with ILC). But (sigh) that was voted down last year.
40/80 with a 15-second delay is exactly the same as 40/90 - 40 moves x 15s = 600s = 10m. Personally I think it’s too fast for quality chess, but if you can make 40/90 you can make 40/80+15s.
No, I’m sorry, it is not EXACTLY the same, though it is quite similar. Whether that’s too fast for quality chess is highly subjective.
I guess one way to think of it is you take away 10 minutes that a player can use whenever or however s/he wants, and replace it with 10 minutes that need to be used in 15-second delay chunks. If the player makes a move in five seconds, s/he actually loses a 10 second chunk of time, compared with the longer non-delay control. Maybe it has the effect of reducing the duration or number of long “thinks” in a game, and makes more of a regular rhythm out of moving.
In 15 second DELAY mode, if someone makes his move in less than 15 seconds, then he doesn’t get 15 seconds of additional time for that move, just the actual time he used. (ie, no time is subtracted from his clock.)
In 15 second INCREMENT mode, he gets 15 additional seconds per move, regardless of how long it takes to make that move, so if his move takes less than 15 seconds then he has more time remaining than he did prior to that move.
Hmm, this generates the following table showing how main time (down) and increment/delay (across) determine the rating system:
| 0 to 15 16 to 999
--------------------+--------------------------
G/61 to G/9999 | regular regular
G/30 to G/60 | dual regular
G/5 to G/29 | quick regular
This leaves a hole, doesn’t it? G/5 to G/29 can be either regular- or quick-rated, but never the intermediate, dual-rated.
Bill Smythe
yes, but I wouldn’t call it a “hole”, rather a “feature”.
I was wondering if anyone would ever catch that.