Want to ask to apply the following changes in the rating lists:

(1) If one player gets a rating higher than the FTP (= former top position), then the FTP has the right to invite the NTP (= new top position), and the NTP has either to accept this invitation during the next two months or to resign the game (here is just to change the button "decline" in "resign") If the BKR of the NTP is so high, that even after losing against the FTP he remains at the top, then the FTP may invite him to another game again and again, as long as the NTP is unable to reach a victory or at least a draw against the FTP. In this case, it should be also impossible for the NTP to put the FTP on the blocked user list - of course he can do this after resigning the games against the FTP.
So it should become impossible to take the position of the FTP without fighting with him.

(2) On the other side, a player may not sitting pretty at the top by declining again and again invitations from the SP (=second position) or simply put him on the blocked users list. The SP has the same rights as mentioned in
(1) and may invite the TP again and again as long as the TP cannot reach a victory or at least a draw against the SP.

Would be nice to read comments, please not just
destructive ones ("i don't like what you suggest"), but constructive with the points you want to be changed

In Chess there is a new name in top position (kpaba), have invited her but she has declined. It's OK that everybody can invite and decline whenever he wants, but the case that a player takes the top position from another without playing with him needs IMHO an exception. In this case the former one should have a right to play with the new one for the top position, and a declination of the new one to play should be regarded as resigning the game.
(Of course, not only for Chess, but for all games).
Fencer: Can you implement in the ratings ladder an
automatic function that makes this feature possible?

AbigailII: Fortunately, the exception you mentioned is an extreme rarity. Let's take from
Retep
a spot check of 10 games, we get an average of 19.4 moves per game and variance sigma^2 = 132.93. Probability that a game ends in 50 moves = phi(50; 19.4, 132.93) = 0.00292267, that it ends in 4 moves = 0.00298107. Probability
that in a 8-player-tournament just one player ends all his 7 games in 50 moves while all the other 49 ghames end in 4 moves = 0.0292267^7*0.0298107^49 =
3.19*10^-86. We should make a lot of tournaments - more tournaments than atoms in the universe! - in order that the situation, that a player will be accidentally be detected as "hand-brake" coz he has just 50-moves-games while all other have 4-moves-games, occurs even a single time...

About vacation no other comment that every player has vacation days from the server. It's the job of Fencer if he will give more or less vacation days.

But enough said, this theme seem to cause so much trouble that i don't want any longer suggest a solution for all of us but found a solution for myself: Today i quit all fellowships and will
not start in new tournaments.

mctrivia: This does not solve the prob. If a player is so slow that he has not finished a single game while all the others have finished their games (except with him), the system believes it is possible that he can win the round even if he is the weakest player in the tournament. So it will hold up the next round. Hence i remain in the suggestion for tournaments in new modus (flexible time frames). Of course, it should remain the option to create a tournament with the old modus.

pattypoo: Since the conditions will be known before the tournament start, there is no surprise and a player can chose if he want to join a tournament with flexible frames or one with unflexible. Cannot see something unfair here...

There are some tournaments where all players have finished their games before months - except with one tournament participant, example

► BIG BAD WOLF Presents: Assimilation Tourn #1

In such a situation where all unfinished games contain the same player name, my suggestion is that the server changes immediately the time per move to only 1 day per move, so that a single tournament participant doesn't block dozends of others for months or years. Players who join to a tournament and need all the time for reflection of, say 7 days per move, should be aware that
they could become the hand-brakes of a tournament, then the time would change to the faster mode of
1 day per move and they would risk to lose by time control.

grenv: Upps, have overseen that.
SafariGal: Sorry, SafariGal, and i agree 100% with your idea

mctrivia: Wouldn't making a terniment or game with aproprietly short time limits do the exact same thing?

No, it wouldn't. The same idea was some messages before written with title "Simple Solution?", but the idea misses an important point:

When someone creates a tournament in a new game (example: Fabrice in his excellent game "Ambiguous
Chess"), then his main motivation is to discover some strategy of the game, opening theory, etc.
Even if he creates a tournament with only 1 day per move, this doesn't prevent slow players to join in and then lose by time. You may think that then all is OK, they lost and are "punished" and the faster players have the winning point. But the intention of the tournament was to learn something about the strategy of the game and not an easy winning point by timeout!
So, to create a tournament with short time limit is not enough to prevent slow players to do harm against the intention of the tournament.
Therefore, i tried to give this species some name, remember "Specialist" or "Unrestricted Mover", hoping that would make it easier to take measures against this phenomenon.
The suggested names were 0-1-variables, only to make difference between "Specialist" and "Not specialist", but now grenv has suggested a rating, which measures even between the 0-1-extremes "how much specialist" a player is!
I think this includes the solution of the problem, and agree 100% with the suggestion of grenv, as always his idea is convincing!

Mr. Shumway:
(2) Every player can define by creating tournaments if "unrestricted movers" are allowed or not, and every player can choose if he want to put "unrestricted movers" automaticly in his
Blocked-user list

The second point about automatically putting "unrestricted movers" on the individual blocked users list would eventually cause a too high server load

It is possible to put only the flag "unrestricted mover" on the Blocked-user-list, and in every actually situation the server could check in milli-seconds the setting of this flag.
Of course, to put all the names of the "unrestricted users" on the Blocked-user-list would make it unnecessary big.

Mr. Shumway:
OK, i will be consequent, the limit should be only for people who wish it.
So my features request actually is:

(1) Player *who want it* should have a move limitation, that self-regulates the max. number of
started games to a limit they can handle. I suggest, that after the first time-out they can have 1000 open slots, after the second 500, etc.,
but here we can find of course some better algorithm. Let's call player who choose this self-restriction "players with max limit", and players without it "unrestricted movers" (a better word than "specialists", i think)
(2) Every player can define by creating tournaments if "unrestricted movers" are allowed or not, and every player can choose if he want to put "unrestricted movers" automaticly in his
Blocked-user list
(3) When someone is searching tournaments, then to let hidden this tournaments where players have
joined who are on his Blocked-user-list
(4) When he has joined a tournament, then should work an automatic that immediately eliminates his name from the tournament in the moment
when a player of his Blocked-user-list joins in this tournament

This features only consider the personal decision of a player with whom he want to play or not to play. Or do you regard it even as a restriction for the "unrestricted movers" that after that they will not be able to force the other players to play with them?

joshi tm: I'm now also playing as some kind of 'specialist'. I don't like this title, I really want to do something about this, but I became too busy.

Have taken my wish for feature #3 back, coz some people didn't want to be restricted.
On the other hand, you prove that there exist cases in which players would regard the move limitation not as a restriction, but as a real feature for them. BTW i hate the irony in the word "specialist" that i have introduced, we should find as soon as possible a better word.

Actually i have the same opinion like Fabrice (nabla), that we need a simple and fair algorithm for a moves-limitation.

mctrivia: There is a very simple solution to your problem. Do not play games with long time limits or vacations. Stop trying to restric people

You are right. In the case of the feature #3, which restricts other players, i am not interested any more in his introduction.

But for features #1 and #2, which include a personal decision with whom we play or not,
we should continue to suggest their introduction
(to have an other player in the Blocked-user-list can also have other reasons than his slow play)

Eriisa: Last week I had to let over 60 games time out because I could not come online. It was unexpected and unanticipated. I do not cry or complain since things happen, but I do not think I should be punished by the system either

Hmm, usually we have about 3 - 7 days for a move,
and over this for such cases like a technical defect we have the auto-vacation.
Can it be that you trusted technical resources (which by experience sometimes fail) so that you renounced to use the auto-vac? Or did you use the 30-days-vacation and nevertheless you exhausted the time in 60 games?

In both cases this argument against the "specialist-regulation" is too weak.

grenv:
Which i think is solved by not allowing people to move on vacation days

Great idea, fully agree with it.

mctrivia:
I am really busy. But if I hit a wall I can come online and play a game or 2 to get my mind off the problem then get back to work

If someone is "really busy" and has to take the vacation day, then for him it doesn't matter that he is not allowed to make other moves in this day. If someone is not so busy and assuming he didn't start more slots than he can handle, then he should make his moves. Your argument is weak: using it someone can say he is "busy" in games where he expects a defeat and "not busy" in games where he sees a victory...

whopper:
mctrivia: If they are constantly timing out they will run out quickly.

Not to be misunderstood: i don't think the slow playing "specialists" want to make the other players angry, but they simply have started more games than they can handle. Now, for losing as few games as possible by timeout, they manage to make the most urgently moves and to use their vacation tolerance where it is possible.

Such a tournament is indeed in my mind, and without a special player it would have taken about a week, but now with the "specialist" i am afraid it will not be finished this year. Even if the specialist
will lose in the next summer ;) by timeout, the other players want much more to start the next round of the tournament than to wait a year
for getting a winning point from the specialist...

In tournaments where players are trying a new game (example Ambiguous Chess) and want to make some experiments in opening theory etc., they would be glad to see the results of their strategies this year if possible ;)
To start another tournament is no solution, coz the specialist can start thousands of games and participate in every tournament he likes.

A complete other idea for solution would be a counter for the timeout-defeats of a player in a year. The first timeout should limit his
open slots to 1000, the second to 500, etc.
until this system self-regulates the poor forecast of a "specialist" and reduces his open slots to exactly the quantity he can handle.

There exist some players who are playing so slow that some of us decide to put them in the Blocked user list. Hope there will be a way to use this Blocked-user-list for the following features:
* When someone is searching tournaments, then to let hidden this tournaments where players have
joined who are on his Blocked-user-list
* When he has joined a tournament, then should work an automatic that immediately eliminates his name from the tournament in the moment
when a player of his Blocked-user-list joins in this tournament
* When the joining of a player would mean that
3 player or more would be removed from this tournament, then the automatic should prevent
the joining of this special player in the tournament

In some games where both players have made blunders, - often as beginners who are surprised with unknown rules - it would be good if it exist besides "draw offer" an option "delete offer", where a game can be deleted, if both sides want this, without that it affects their ratings

In someone's new games list don't appear invitations with BKR limits outside his own BKR.
Is it possible that in a similar way we can define day-per-move limits so that invitations outside this limits don't appear in our lists? Want give a limit of maximum 10 days per move, coz i have
some times overread this item and now too much blocked slots by super slow opponents of whom each needs 19 - 20 days per move...