Team chess and substitutions

Running Chess Tournaments
1

I’m part of an organization that is hosting a team match tournament next month and no one in the organization has any experience either running or competing in a team match tournament. So, I’ve been studying the rules applicable to team chess, and am having trouble with how to interpret 31B as it applies to substitutions. Are they allowed at the discretion of the team, or only if a regular player is missing?

The reason I’m not sure is the wording immediately following the first TD Tip to this effect: “If a player is missing from the lineup, …”

My problem stems from not being able to find any USCF definition for what lineup means in this context, nor can I find any definition for “missing”. Thus I can see this particular rule being interpreted by some to mean that the lineup is all players on the team (i.e., the regulars plus the alternates) and that if all regulars are present they must play and alternates cannot.

However, if lineup were interpreted as the list of players to the team has submitted for a particular round’s match, then “missing” player would mean a player who was in the lineup but could not be located. If a team wanted to substitute regulars instead of alternates, they would just have to submit a lineup for that round listing the players that would be playing.

One member of our group has read the rule and the TD Tips and interprets that Round 1 must be played by the regulars, substitutions can be made in latter rounds but that if a player is substituted for, that team member cannot play subsequent rounds. I don’t get this at all, as common sense tells me that in this type of competition, a team should be able to allow a player to sit out a round and bring the player back in for a subsequent round. The way I read the rule, nothing prevents this, although depending on the definition of “lineup” and “missing”, perhaps the player could only be substituted for if he were missing. Even if I allow that as the correct interpretation, however, I still can’t read anything into the rule that would say that if the missing player turned up, he couldn’t play the next round. In fact, given that interpretation, I’d say he was obliged to.

I would greatly appreciate hearing from anyone who has experience directing and/or playing in these type of events who could describe how substitions are actually handled.

2

If you look at page 175, of the official rules of chess (5th edition, published 2003). The director, or the agreement with the director and the team captains of the teams, or the organizer of the team: should and will make the agreements on the variations on this issue. The organizer, could have made a blanket statement on how rule 31B will be designed with the variation. There is no universal variation, its the agreement with the director, or the organizer of the event: with the team captains or the organizer of the team. The best answer, you should ask you’re team captain, or the one that organized the team. Since its a month away, the agreement on the variation could have not been worked out, at this time.

3

This is an internal matter for the organizer to decide. However, all team tournaments of which I am aware (including the USAT and the Olympiads) allow substitutions at will, within the limits of the tournament rules. After all, why should a team be prevented from fielding a weaker lineup than it could?

4

In practice, the main problem occurs when a player (other than on last board) is not present when the match is to begin.

In most team tournaments, the rule is that forfeits must begin on last board and move up from there. For example, with 4-player teams, if board 2 is not present, boards 3 and 4 must move up and play on boards 2 and 3 respectively, while the team forfeits board 4.

But what if the board 2 player is merely late for the round, and may or may not show up within the hour? In some events I have observed, the TD has given the team captain two options: (a) start on boards 1, 3, and 4, and if the board 2 player is more than an hour late, the team will forfeit all three boards 2, 3, and 4, or (b) start on board 1 only, with all four clocks running, so that the team will have the option, any time before the hour is up, to move players 3 and 4 up to positions 2 and 3, thus dismissing player 2 for that round.

Bill Smythe

5

Thanks to both “rfeditor” and “Localtdforsythe” for the quick replies.

It is exactly page 175 of 5th edition USCF rules that I’ve been reading. Although I don’t see it anywhere on that particular page, I understand generally that when it comes to suggested variations that they can be implemented as long as pre-event publicity mentions them. However, none of the suggested variations on pages 174-176 speak to the issue of whether or not substitutions are allowed at will. At least as far as I can see, those variations only suggest different ways for the TD to handle the situation of a player who is expected to play but is not present for the start of the round.

rfeditor’s point about the illogic of preventing a team from fielding a weaker lineup is well-taken and exactly why I don’t think the USCF intends a reading of all the text about a missing player to imply that that’s the only time substitution can be made.

The interpretation of Rule 31B that makes the most sense to me, and that would seem to be consistent with the way that “rfeditor” describes the workings of the USAT and Olympiads is as follows:

  1. “Lineup” as used in the text of Rule 31B refers to the specific players the team wishes to field for the upcoming round. This lineup may consist of only regulars, or of regulars and alternates, or of all alternates, as the team wishes and without regard to whether or not the regulars are present and capable of playing.

  2. “Player missing from the lineup” refers only to a player who the team expected to play for that round but cannot be located and nobody knows if the player is about to show up at any time and be available to play.

If this interpretation is correct, no advance notice would be needed in order to allow teams to make substitutions throughout the tournament.

Part of my concern is that my organization requires teams to submit a “roster” in advance of our tournaments. Roster has a specific meaning in our organization. It is defined as list of potential players, submitted by the team’s coach, with those players expected to play in the event designated as “primary” players, and those not expected to play but available in case a primary becomes unavailable designated as “alternates”. Up until this time, all of my organization’s events have been “individual/team” events. Obviously in this type of event, a player cannot be substituted for mid-way through the event because of the importance of individual results and their effect on the pairings. My fear is that some of the coaches who are used to entering their team in these individual/team type events, unless educated otherwise prior to the team match tournament, will:

a) equate our “roster” with USCF “lineup” and our “primary player” with USCF “regular player” and
b) make the assumption that substitutions are not allowed unless a primary player is not present (i.e., “missing”) and
c) object when another coach interprets the USCF rule as I do and makes a substitution.

Before I go off educating the coaches, which in this case happens to be practical, I want to make sure my interpretation is in fact reasonable, and that I won’t be corrected or contradicted by someone more knowledgeable of the workings of USCF-sanctioned fixed roster team events.

6

“missing” as quoted in 31B and in the TD Tip, refers to players who are actually missing (haven’t arrived, or are late), their arrival uncertain, and no alternates available.

Your question, I believe, involves substituting regular players with alternates. In all team tournaments I have organized/directed and played in, these substitutions are permitted. Further, there is nothing in the rules that forbid the regular player to return for later rounds.

In my opinion, a team may sub regular players with alternates at will, as rfeditor indicated. Bill’s reply is accurate as to what to do when a player is actually missing, with no alternates available.

7

Your interpretation is reasonable.

8

Thanks again to all who have replied so quickly.

evansvillecc is on the mark when he describes my question as involving substituting alternates with regulars when all team members are present and accounted for. I’m pretty comfortable with how to handle a player who is actually missing, whether or not there is an alternate available to take that spot on the team.

I suspect that anyone who has participated in or witnessed team events prior to reading 31B would not have any confusion due to the use of the term “lineup” and the descriptions of how to handle missing players given in the USCF rule, and my questions may have seemed silly to those with such experience. However, not having that experience, and the complete lack (at least as far as I can see) of any text in the rulebook that explicity states that substitutions are allowed even if all “regular players” are available (i.e., not “missing”), coupled with my organization’s use of “rosters” and “primary players” (described in my post above), led me to realize that interpretation of Rule 31B could end up being quite varied within my organization (none of whom have any direct experience with a team match tournament).

I was pretty sure that USCF team match tournaments allowed free substitution, but I wanted to verify that prior to promoting such an interpretation of Rule 31B within my organization. And I wanted to have some way to logically differentiate “lineup” as used in the USCF rule, from “roster” as used by our organization. With everybody’s help, I think I’ve figured out a means of communicating the intent of the USCF rules in a way that won’t seem in conflict with our past practice in running individual/team events.

This forum is AWESOME! I can’t believe the quickness of the replies. Thanks for everyone’s input.

9

It may be easier to explain this through examples.

In the Amateur Team (East, West etc.), matches are between four-player teams with an optional alternate. The average rating of the top four must be below 2200. The alternate, by definition, is the 5th-rated player. Teams must play in rating order. Subject to these limitations, a team may field any combination of four of its five players (assuming they have five).

The Olympiad is played between four-played teams with up to two alternates. The teams must play in board order, which is not quite the same as rating order but usually works out to the about same thing. Again, a team may use any combination of its six players, though there are some restrictions on when the team lineup has to be presented.

Another approach was seen in the USSR vs. the World matches which some of you may remember. Those were ten-board matches, with two alternates for each team. Board order was decided by the team captains before the start, and in some cases placement seems to have been tactical. Alternates could be plugged in on any board at the captain’s discretion – thus, Stein replaced Spassky as Larsen’s opponent on first board in the last round of the 1970 match.

There is no hard-and-fast rule about this sort of thing in the USCF Rulebook, nor should there be. It is a matter of custom and organizer choice.

10

Preparing for a team tournament last year, another issue about alternates that didn’t seem clear in the rules is their rating. Should the alternate be lower rated than the entire primary lineup, or simply lower rated than the person they replace? For example, an alternate really prefers not to play unless needed, but is higher rated than the primary lineup’s bottom board, possibly allowing them to sub for the top 3 boards.

I understand that the TD can state just about any variation in advance and advise all of the coaches. But what if this issue comes up at the last minute? Would this be normally acceptable in team tournaments which those in the forum are experienced with? :confused:

Mike Swatek

11

It depends on the nature of the tournament. In the USAT, the teams are limited to an average rating of 2199. This is the average of the four highest rated players on the team. By definition, the “alternate” is the fifth-rated player, no matter how many games he plays. If your tournament does not have any rating limit, on the other hand, there wouldn’t be any problem plugging in an “alternate” of about the same rating as the person he replaces.

The problem you are talking about seems to be a team tournament run for the first time, in which the organizer fails to spell out the rules in his advance publicity. (E.g., stating that everyone must play in rating order, average rating of [defined set of players] must be under x, etc.) There really is no answer to this except to think it through before you start.

12

It seems to me there is an obvious solution to this. Simply set up the team in rating order. Let’s say the alternate is the second highest player. Then for every round in which it is not absolutely necessary that he play, play board three on board two and the alternate on board three. Does that make sense to everybody?

Alex Relyea

13

What could be happening with the event you will be at, will be a two day team match tournament. Since it will be having more then one round per-day, the only problem should be a ‘missing’ player then a substitution. The ‘lineup’ of the players could change even on the day of the event, if someone on the promoted lineup became sick or unable to be at the event. Then a substitution would replace the player for the whole tournament.

Someone could play one day, then would be sick the next day needing a substitution on the team. The director would and should feel the sickness could be a way to change the roster – because of a poor performance the day before. Its hard to judge, as the director does not know if the player is sick or was pulled from the team.

It would be best, talk to you’re team captain or the organizer of the team. Find out how the team will take care of the substitution. Everyone that has made a post on this subject, are right in there frame of mind. You want answers about you’re team and you’re event you will be in. It would be best to email the director of the event.

If you want more help, will need some information about the event. What type of team tournament are we talking about, is it high school or college. How many players are on the team with how many days of the event? With how many rounds will the event have? Will this event be in Michigan or what state?

14

My reading of the USCF rules pertaining to team match tournaments and players’ ratings is that the intent of the USCF rules are to:

  1. Insure that the rating of the team is calculated as the average rating of the ‘x’ number of highest rated team members, where ‘x’ is the number of board numbers used in the match. The rationale behind this probably is to prevent teams from attempting to manipulate the ratings to increase the likelihood of favorable pairings.

  2. Insure that no matter which players are playing, that the highest rated player for a team plays the lowest board number, etc. This probably is to keep teams from manipulating the matchups (i.e., “conceding” the lower numbered board matches in order to increase the chances of winning on more of the higher numbered board matches). I understand that many international tournaments do not impose such restrictions and team captains have more freedom to attempt to get favorable matchups based on how they think certain players will fair against specific opponents.

  3. Not to provide any specific limitations on a team’s ability to substitute players at any time during the tournament. As for as USCF is concerned, the team may substitute as it sees fit due to a particular player’s frame of mind, physical well being, coach’s superstitions, or whatever. Any limitations on number of alternates allowed, substitution policies, etc. are up to the organizer to determine and communicate to the participating teams prior to the actual event.

I think most confusion about what the rules are really saying probably stems from the use of words such as “regular” player and “alternate”, without providing any technical definition of such terms, and the lack of any wording at all to the effect that alternates may be substituted for regulars subject only to restrictions publicized for the specific event in question.

Does anyone else have a different take on the intent of the actual USCF rules? It would really be interesting to learn the opinion of those who actually wrote these rules in the first place, if those individuals are still around.

15

As far as I can tell, there’s really no point in distinguishing between “primary players” and “alternates”. Most team tournaments require that each team submit a roster at the beginning of the event, and choose each round’s lineup from among the players in the roster.

Furthermore, most tournaments require that each round’s lineup be kept in the same order as the original roster. Generally, the roster must be in rating order, though a few events may allow for transpositions of up to, say, 50 points. Or there may be special rules for unrated players. But in any case the roster order may not be changed once the tournament has started.

If a tournament is for 4-player teams with up to 2 alternates allowed, then the roster size is 6 and the lineup size is 4. Any 4 of these 6 players may be used in each round, BUT they must be kept in roster order.

For example, the lineup in one round may consist of players 1,2,3,4, and in another round 1,3,4,6. But it could not consist of 1,6,3,4 because that would violate the original roster order. In other words, you do not substitute an “alternate” for a missing player. Rather, you move up the entire lineup, and plug in the alternate at the bottom.

The only real distinction between “primary player” and “alternate” is that the ratings of the primary players – the top 4 in our example here – are used to calculate the average team rating.

I’ve never understood why team tournaments impose a limit on the number of alternates. What harm could there be in allowing a team to submit a 10-player roster, as long as they’re in rating order and the order doesn’t change? The team could then select any 4 of its 10 players to play each round, as long as they keep them in order.

Bill Smythe

16

Its’ very much up to the organizers. The team can have as many players in the lineup, or as many people in the roster, the lineup and roster numbers are set up by the organizer of the event. If we look at the U.S. Womens’ team, the lineup was 3 with a roster of 4. The alternate with this team was Jennifer Shahade. There was a organized plan for a 4 game match between Jennifer Shahade and Rusa Goletiani (Shahade Goletiani match never happened), just to settle who would be the alternate. Just to settle the alternate, they had a tournament (2004 Womens Championship) just to settle the alternate. It would have been nice to send a lineup of 3 players with a roster of 5, the organizer (FIDE) made it clear the lineup is 3 with a roster of 4.

The USCF does have its’ own guide lines, how they would have a USCF organized event for a team tournament. The reason why the rules are very open, on how a team is built, as each organizer has there own rights. If there was hard rules on what is a team, of how many players in the lineup, or how many in the roster, or what the rating of the team has to be – it would be guidelines. With it being guidelines, it will still not force the organizers to use the guidelines, as its not a USCF event. If you are asking the guidelines to be rules, it would take away the rights of the organizer. The USCF is not in any way want to micro-manage a non-USCF event.

17

This has been a good discussion. Like Grubbs, I had the “opportunity” to organize and direct a State Team Championship event last October, without ever having done so or even played in one.

Looking through the archives, visiting with much more experienced TDs at the US Open and some Google research indicated that WinTD was much more adept than Swiss Sys at handling team tournaments. This gave me an excuse to finally try it out. Simulating several Team tournaments with WinTD paid off and the pairings went smoothly. It also uploaded easily as a Swiss event using the TD/Affiliate features.

In the end, the event was a success with eleven 4-person teams and no substitutions used. :smiley: We’re planning to do it again this year. The clarification provided about how the roster and alternates are done in most cases will be helpful. I really appreciate this learning opportunity about a type of tournament which is relatively uncommon here in Oklahoma.

Thanks to all,

Mike Swatek

18

Another consideration is board prizes. If there is a prize for the best result on Board 2, if Board 1 is unavailable for a round and everybody moves up a board, then that might affect who wins the Board 2 prize.

That’s why the rulebook tends to defer to the specific team rules for the event wherever possible. What works well for the Amateur Teams might not be desirable for a state team-on-team scholastic championship.

19

Oh yeah, the tiebreak systems used were an issue regarding who got the championship plaques. I did some research on this and the best info seemed to come from the WinTD help screens and supported the Google research. What WinTD has to say is below.

I ended up deciding to go with the Team Performance Index as the first tiebreak, since it seemed to be the best by most accounts, albeit a bit complicated. Game/Match Points was used as the second tiebreak. There were no board awards to use individual tiebreaks for.

At the end of the tournament, players reverted to things they were familiar with and could calculate easily to evaluate my choice of tiebreak and its performance. Of course, after 3 rounds we had ties in 3 of the four possible categories of team championship. One team had members a bit upset about the tiebreak result, having lost 125.5 to 125.0 based on the Performance Index.

Any suggestions based on experiences regarding team tiebreaks would be appreciated.

Mike Swatek

Text Below from WinTD help screens

Team Tournament Tie Breaks

WinTD offers three tie-break systems used only for team tournaments: US Amateur Teams, Performance Index, and Game Points. These are only used for team section tie breaks and are ignored for other types. The USAT takes the sum of opponent’s matches won x points scored against that opponent (WinTD actually produces 2 x this definition to keep things at one decimal). The Performance Index is a weighted sum of the total game points and the team’s Solkoff (see description below). Game/Match Points is the sum of total points won (game points) if you are basing placement on match results and the number of match points if you are basing placement on game points.

WinTD will use the top four tie breaks to break team ties. To determine individual board awards in team tournaments, it will use the top four tie-breaks excluding team-specific tie breaks. For team tournaments, you should probably list either the USAT or the Performance Index first. Use Game/Match Points as the secondary tie break if you want that to have precedence over the match records of the opponents (Solkoff); otherwise, just use the one team tie breaker and put the individual tie breaks next. (A secondary tie break for teams is rarely needed with either USAT or the Performance Index, since they will almost never match after three or four rounds unless the two teams had identical results against opponents with identical records).

Choosing a Team Tie Break

It’s possible to use just a standard tie break like Solkoff or Modified Median as the first tie breaker in team tournaments. This, however, has the drawback that individual games are meaningless once the overall outcome of the match has been determined. The simplest of the three special team tie breaks is Game/Match Points. It is not a good choice for a first tie breaker because it is likely to produce the opposite of the desired result: a team which faces weak opposition is likely to pile up more game points than a team facing tougher opponents.

The US Amateur Teams tie break is superior to those. It has two minor drawbacks: the individual games against a very weak opponent are unlikely to count much (they don’t count at all against an opponent who gets 0 match points) and it tends to put too much weight on crushing wins against middle of the pack teams versus competitive matches with top teams. (4-0 against a team with a 2.5-3.5 record is worth more than 1.5-2.5 against a 6-0 team). The flip side of giving more tie break points to wins against high-scoring teams is that losses to high-scoring teams hurt more than losses to low-scoring teams.

The Performance Index is an experimental tie breaker. It takes a weighted sum of the Solkoff and Game Points, with the weight on the Solkoff becoming higher as the number of rounds increases. It is based upon the following calculation: suppose a team scores S (out of G games) against an opponent who scores W match points in R rounds. Assign to this opponent a base performance value of 100+(W/R-1/2)(50+10R). (This is roughly 1/10 of the typical “rating” for such a performance if all teams had a prior rating of 1000 - we divide the “rating” calculations by 10 to give it a scale more like other tie breakers, and to avoid confusion with the actual ratings). Add to this (S/G-1/2)*80 to get the performance index for this match. Take the average of these across all of the team’s matches. (Unplayed rounds are treated as 0 scores against an opponent scoring 0, as they are in the other tie breakers). Since the sum of W’s is the Solkoff and the sum of S’s is Game Points, the result will be a weighted sum of Solkoff and Game Points. Unlike the USAT tie break, all games are equally valuable. It tends to rank teams pretty similarly to the USAT, but seems more likely than the USAT to place highly teams which lose to the top teams over those which lose to lower scoring teams.