I am running our first JTP tournament in my school club.
Our club meets M-Th during what we call a Learning Community right before lunch. Our school also has an ICU program in which if a student hasn’t completed their homework, they do not go to their LC or regular lunch, instead they go to the ICU program until their work is done.
I am playing G25 d5 games each day. I have stated that if they are not present for ICU, they forfeit their round. However, when they get out, can I play the players who should have played in the forfeited round as an Extra Game? The game will not affect the tournament results, but it allows them to get a rated game in.
I don’t think so. Extra rated games (and certain other techniques) are pretty informal anyway. The idea is to get games for everybody, so nobody has to sit around without a game.
Besides, this event isn’t U.S. Chess rated anyway, is it? So you could do pretty much whatever you want.
If it is a JTP event, that seems to suggest it is being rated.
There are pluses and minuses to extra game sections.
The biggest plus is they can make the crosstable easier to read and more consistent with what was posted at the event. (You’d be amazed how many people write US Chess to complain that little Johnny, who finished in a 5 way tie for 3rd place, got the 5th place trophy on tiebreaks, but is shown in 3rd place on MSA.) There are other things that can happen that would cause the crosstable to not match up with the posted final standings of the event. We don’t know what tie breaks were used, for example.
The biggest minus is that splitting the games for a player into two sections can affect the computation of that player’s rating. For example, it can affect whether or not a player with a pre-event based on 9 or more games earns a bonus or not. (It’s a bit more complicated with players with fewer than 9 games, since they’re rated using the special formula, so there’s no bonus points, but the order in which sections are rated can still matter.)
The best practice appears to be to move games to an extra games section if they had no direct impact on pairings or prizes in that section. For example, a player’s opponent is a no-show and that player is paired against a player from another section who also has a no-show opponent. Both players get a forfeit win for pairing and prize purposes in their respective sections, so that game should go in an extra games section.
If you do use an extra games section, make sure it is the last section numerically, because if there are multiple sections in an event and they all have the same starting and ending date, the section number determines the order in which the sections are rated.
A few years ago, ratings chair Mark Glickman and I looked at the possibility of rating all sections of an event that had the same starting and ending dates and the same time control as a single block of games. It is possible, but it was enough of a complication to the ratings process that the idea was set aside for now, though it might be something that factors into the next rewrite of the ratings system (probably next year as part of the infrastructure upgrade.) It could still impact whether bonus points are earned in an event or not (in either direction), and it wasn’t clear how it should impact norms.
This is the example of what I’m trying to achieve:
Bob and John were paired together for the first round.
Bob was not able to play and receives a forfeit. John receives 1.0 for the game.
Later, Bob and John are available to play each other. I want to play them in the Extra Games for rating purposes, although John will still keep his 1.0 for the forfeited game.
None of my players have any previous rated games. I’m trying to provide opportunities for them to establish a rating.
I wouldn’t be too concerned about the impact of a separate extra-games section on the post-event ratings of the players. These are young players with little experience; their ratings will likely go wildly up and down anyway (mostly up) during their first several tournaments.
Incidentally, in the scenario you described, if John happens to win, you could include the result of that game into the regular section, replacing the forfeit result originally listed there, and not bother with an extra-games section at all. That idea, however, won’t work well if Bob wins, or if the game is drawn.
I’d probably just put that game in the event, not in an extra games section. They didn’t actually face each other the first time around, so they aren’t really being paired against each other a second time.
With small events or events that are played on an ‘as available’ basis (such as in-school or after-school events), some of the Swiss System rules tend to go out the window. (As the late Ira Riddle put it, you have to know when to break the rules.)
I’ve found that most players are sympathetic to the TD’s pairing challenges in these situations. I once had a 4 round event where black won every game in round 1 and again in round 2. It was difficult to find pairings for round 3 where some player wasn’t going to get 3 blacks in a row. I explained it to the players, and a couple of them said they’d be willing to take a third consecutive black. (BTW, one of them won that third game with black, too, I think the other one drew.)
There is a consideration when using an extra games section. If there ends up being only one extra game then the upload software will treat that as a match pairing. If either player is unrated or provisional (or the rating difference is more than 400 points) then TD/A will flag it as a violation of the match rules. If you have a legitimate extra game, but only one, then you can submitted it by entering the players a second time in the section, pairing them together for the one round, entering the result, and then inactivating them so they don’t get paired for future rounds. Thus you would have, as an example, Bob getting a forfeit win over Charlie in round 4 and a second entry for Charlie drawing a second entry for Bob in round 4 with no other rounds paired for those second entries. (PS that also makes all games count for norms and bonus points)
If Bob and John ask to play a game against each other then that would be a requested match. If you decide to have them play the game they were originally paired in then it is a pairing assigned by the TD and not a requested match.
Thanks. The latter is what I’m looking to do. Have students play the games that had been paired previously, but were not played due to one student being in ICU. Thus, it is the pairing process that is determining the opponents, not a requested match.
The preferred solution is not to pair Bob at all. If you know Bob isn’t going to be there for the first round, either give Bob a 0 pt bye or leave him inactive until he comes in. Then do the pairings for those who are actually there. If a couple of players come in late (after the pairings) but still early enough in the round, you can have them play each other as their round 1 game.
Another possibility is if you don’t know Bob won’t be there, do the pairings, and then as you start the round or even very shortly after, you find out Bob won’t be there as well as another player, then match the two waiting opponents against each other rather than give them both forfeit wins. Repairing players with no opponent coming works well in the first round and with players who are relatively close in rating. This is perfect for most beginner level scholastic sections.
If there is no one else for John to play and he did get a forfeit win, sure you can use the extra game section for the extra matchup. But, at what point was it when Bob finally came? When did Bob and John finally play? Was it still during round 1 or sometime later in the day? Even if Bob is delayed he still gets the time control to arrive before the forfeit happens. Say the official time control is 30;d5 Bob still has 30 minutes to get the board (even if there’s no actual clock being used).
If the game was later in the day, then it’s probably better to use the extra game section as it truly is an extra game (at least for John).
Clearly not - as JTP only applies to K-3 players in one type of JTP, and K-12 same school players in the other. Note - if adults play in the section, then it cannot be submitted JTP.