Go championship cycle

  

Go championship cycle


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Thibault de Vassal    (2007-05-03)
Go championship cycle

1st FICGS go WCH will start in a few months, but I'm still not really satisfied with current rules :

"FICGS world Go championship is first a round-robin tournament, involving 11 players including the 6 players who won or lead most Go tournaments started during the previous year and the 5 highest rated players, among players who entered the waiting list. If more than 2 players win (or lead) a tournament with equal score, no win is granted. A win in a "pro" tournament is worth 9 "kyu" wins. A win in a "dan" tournament is worth 3 "kyu" wins. In case of equality, the next places will be taken in account.

The winner of this tournament is the challenger for FICGS world champion title. In case of equality, the winner is the player with the highest tournament entry rating (TER), If this rule can't designate a unique challenger, current ratings will be considered. If current world champion defends his title, they will play a 6 games match. In case of equality (3-3), the winner is the former world champion.

All games are played in 30 days + 1 day / move. Komi is 7.5 points. Rules for Go are chinese rules, as defined by the Chinese Weiqi Association."


Not clear enough, quite complicate and strange, even if I like the idea of a 2-stages tournament (round-robin tournament then challenger vs. champion match) and to give the opportunity to the best rated Go players to enter it without playing tournaments before... Other questions, double round-robin or not, should it be open to all players.. Feel free to suggest your ideas for a nice Go WCH cycle ! :)


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-05-05 15:43:46)
Go championship cycle

Finally ratings could be enough to give the best chances to the best players... Consequently the 9 highest rated players who entered the waiting list would play the round-robin tournament. That's a pity everyone can't play with this formula, but anyway chances to see 'surprises' is much lower in Go than in correspondence chess.


Svante Carl von Erichsen    (2007-06-01 12:26:32)
Go championship

I think that the current rules are quite good. For the current user base, 9 players round robin is enough.

If the user base gets bigger and stronger, you could introduce preliminary stages. Example: sort all players who entered the waiting list by rating, then the final league consists of the 5 strongest players plus 4 players who placed first in the preliminary (which might be a knockout, or another league).

One thing I would change in the current system: the usual custom for multi-game matches between two players is to determine colours randomly for the first game, then alternate. If an uneven number of games is played, then in the last game, colours are chosen randomly again.

As I interpret the rules in that way that all five final games are played simultaneously, I would propose that one of those games is played with random colours.


Thibault de Vassal    (2007-06-01 17:56:58)
Final match

Hello Svante Carl, thanks for sharing your views !

I agree about the round-robin tournament, it could evolve according to the rating list...

About the final match, I have good reasons for not introducing any chancy factor in tournaments (anyway I think it's better this way), I finally agreed with players about the 5-games match but it was hard for me to consider this non symmetrical schedule... Making it different is not a problem IMO, a (2xn)-games final match with equality favourable to former champion - like FICGS chess WCH - was ok for me but 6 games may be too few, giving a too big advantage to the former winner of the tournament.

Anyway, there will be no final match in this 1st championship, it will be probably discussed again & again :)