[lordmayo]

I have read previous links, threads and comments about the concerns about rating and fully agree that it would be terrible to make BBO pointlessly competitive or make cheating rampant. However, if we just have a simple rating system on a 'rated section' that rates people in perhaps 5 broad categories rather than exact points, I think it should have the desired result that I see of - 1) seeing if I am improving and have a goal and 2) playing in broadly similar groups.

Chess.com has ratings and it is very easy to cheat there too..but frankly you are only cheating yourself. The vast majority of users find it very useful to make each game more enjoyable.


Dining the rating itself isn't that complex.


I recognise this is not new but the previous thoughts are lost in so many different posts

[CSGibson]

Are you an ACBL tournament player? If you want to amuse yourself with ratings, you can google Colorado bridge power ratings and ask the person running that website to include a summary for yourself.

Ratings at bridge would be the next thing to meaningless - this is a team game, and it is impossible to accurately and automatically split the credit for a team win individually in this case.

[RunemPard]

We have an IMO, fairly accurate and effective handicap(rating) system here in Sweden...

[TylerE]

 lordmayo, on 2013-May-29, 02:10, said:

Dining the rating itself isn't that complex.

May I suggest that you are grossly oversimplifying and likely not even close to understanding the issue?

[mycroft]

I reiterate what I said before about my experience with "choose rated or unrated" games on Another Site:

- nobody would play in an unrated game
- rated games were "X-2 to X+2 ratings only", so the ratings "never" changed...
- people got really obnoxious about it, especially when I was playing as a mentor
- bailing was even worse than on BBO.

Also, there were continual requests to "reset my rating", which meant that anybody around 50% was either:

- a 50% player (not likely, but hard to find reasonable games when the rest were either:)
- a chronic "resetter" that is actually 46% (and maybe worse than that, and frequently obnoxious as well as arrogant), or
- a new player to Site, with totally random actual skill (like any provisional rating).

Finally: ANY rating scheme can be gamed. ANY rating scheme will be gamed. Unlike chess, as was pointed out, here the person you're cheating is not yourself - and I have yet to hear of someone who wants a rating scheme for their own rating. They want to know they're getting a decent game for them from their three opponents (i.e. LHO and RHO slightly worse than they are, and CHO slightly better, to cover their own mistakes).

The only rating scheme I would be interested in would be one like was posted on another thread - where the scheme itself was unknown to the public, one's rating was unknown to the player, everyone else's ratings were unknown to the player as well; and the only thing it was used for is "find me a game". Even then, I'd rather play with a player somewhat worse than I am that is polite than someone at my level who needs everyone to know it; and I'd prefer playing a weaker game where partner plays one of the systems I do, even if it's 0300 Calgary time, than a stronger game that either partner or I would be playing "blind" - so it's not that helpful is it?

[helene_t]

It is easy obtain you own rating, just play some hundred sessions of robot rebate and you know your rating relative to other RR players.

Actually this method has most of the advantages and not many of the disadvantages of a rating system. And it creates revenue for BBO.