OGS - Frequently Asked Questions - Title tournaments
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- OGS Tournament Titles
- OGS Tournament Formats
- What are the prerequisites for entering a title tournament?
1. OGS Tournament Titles
There are currently 6 title tournament, of which 5 are yearly and 1 (Kuksu) is twice-yearly. Each tournament has three classes: a main class, which consists of even games on a 19x19 board, a nines class, which consists of even games on a 9x9 board, and a handicap class, which consists of proper handicap games on a 19x19 board. The time control for every tournament are Fischer timing: 7 day initial timer, 1 day increment and 7 day maximum timer, and all games are rated. The nines and handicap classes for each title start 1 month before the specified date below (which is the date where the main class starts).
In each case, the winner of the first cycle for both the main and nines classes will become the title holder. Users are given a free 32 gamepoints for each title they hold whilst they hold the title. Title holders are not allowed to enter subsequent cycletournaments in the same title and class as they hold, and the winner of such tournaments will be a "challenger" to the title, and will play a best of 5 games match against the title holder, with the game start points being staggered (2 weeks apart for main class games, and 1 week apart for nines class games).
Provisional players (those whose rating confidence is less than 50%) are not allowed to enter handicap tournaments. This is to help ensure that the handicaps provide the opponents with an equal game. If a player is in a handicap tournament and becomes provisional - either through timeouts or lack of play - they are not allowed to advance to subsequent rounds, even if they are at the top of their group. For nearly all players this is not a problem, as their continued playing of games increases their rating confidence.
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1a. Meijin - Starts on the 1st of February each year
The OGS Meijin title is a group Elimination tournament with Japanese scoring rules. The handicap class is played on 19x19 boards.
Current Title Holders:
Main class:
 Uberdude (2784 :: 7.8 dan)
Nines class:
 pollemand (2353 :: 3.5 dan)
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1b. Honinbo - Starts on the 1st of April each year
The OGS Honinbo title is a 3 round group McMahon tournament with Japanese scoring rules. The handicap class is played on 19x19 boards.
Current Title Holders:
Main class:
Uberdude (2784 :: 7.8 dan)
Nines class:
 vitality (2405 :: 4.1 dan)
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1c. Kuksu - No fixed start date
The OGS Kuksu title is a League tournament with Japanese scoring rules. There is no handicap class.
Current Title Holders:
Main class:
Uberdude (2784 :: 7.8 dan)
Nines class:
pollemand (2353 :: 3.5 dan)
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1d. Mingren - Starts on the 1st of August each year
The OGS Mingren title is a group Elimination tournament with Chinese scoring rules. The handicap class is played on 19x19 boards.
Current Title Holders:
Main class:
Uberdude (2784 :: 7.8 dan)
Nines class:
pollemand (2353 :: 3.5 dan)
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1e. Tianyuan - Starts on the 1st of October each year
The OGS Tianyuan title is a group McMahon tournament with Chinese scoring rules. The handicap class is played on 19x19 boards.
Current Title Holders:
Main class:
 Rathbone (2352 :: 3.5 dan)
Nines class:
pollemand (2353 :: 3.5 dan)
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1f. Alan Turing - Starts on the 1st of December each year
The OGS Alan Turing title is a group McMahon tournament with Chinese scoring rules. Robots and computer assisted human players allowed.
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2. OGS Tournament Formats
There are three formats for OGS tournaments: elimination, MacMahon, and league.
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2a. Elimination
This was the format used for all of the first five tournaments before the titling system was introduced.
All dan players and previous finalists of both group elimination titles and the first 5 tournaments (class-specific, so full tournament results do not apply to the nines class and visa-versa), get a free bye to the second round. The handicap class is exempt from the bye system as all players should have an equal chance of success.
All tournament rounds are seeded single round-robins, with the top player (and in later rounds, occasionally top 2 players depending on number of groups) going through to the next round. In the event of a tie at the top of the group, all tied players progress.
The handicap draw will be performed in the same manner as the others, seeded to have a large distribution of player ability in the first round. All groups will be groups of 7 or as close to it as is sensibly achievable.
The winner of the title will be the winner of the final, tie-broken by the Sonneborn-Berger (sum of the scores of opponent's beaten). In the event of a complete tie the title will be shared.
Tie-Breaks
1. Sonneborn-Berger (sum of the scores of opponent's beaten)
Trophies
Gold, Silver and Bronze trophies will be awarded to their respective positions Green trophies will be given to class finalists.
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2b. McMahon
This is strictly not quite the system used in real life McMahon format tournaments, and probably shouldn't have the name, but the resemblance in style is close enough that it seemed appropriate to use it.
All groups will be sorted into groups of 7 players, seeded but with players of the same ability directly together (top 7 players in the top group, next 7 players in the next etc). The first Honinbo title used groups of only 5, but larger groups give more ability for under or over rated players to find their correct position.
All players in the top group will start at 0 points (effectively, these are the players "above the bar"). The top player in the second group will be at -1, and players below this will start at a relative score based on the rank difference. Only whole numbers will be given, and a rating difference of 1 kyu equates to 1 point in starting score. In the first Honinbo, groups consisted of players of the same ability (second group at -1, third at -2 etc), but this system appears to be fairer, especially in larger tournaments.
Each group will be a single round-robin with the higher score player as white. If players share the same score white will go to the higher rated player. Due to the nature of the way the group system is likely to work and the aim of the tournament with regards to rewarding the best even performance, there will be no handicapping of games in the main or nines classes.
At the end of each round, the groups are reseeded based on score (so a player in group 2 with 3 wins would end the round with a score of 2), tiebroken by Sum of Opponent's Scores.
At the end of three rounds in this format the top ranks will be given out based on McMahon score, tiebroken on Sum of Opponent's Scores.
The handicap class will be exactly the same but without grouping together players of similar ability. The groups will be drawn entirely at random for each round and the scores for everyone will start at 0 in the first round.
Groups will be of 7 players for all classes.
Because of the unknown numbers of players, some people in the bottom groups may find themselves in a group of 6. For each of these 0.5 points will be added to the score, so that 100% wins is worth 5.5 points (range will be 5.5 -> 0.5 instead of 6 -> 0)
Tie-Breaks
1. Sum of Opponent's Scores
2. Sum Of Defeated Opponent's Scores
Trophies
Gold, Silver and Bronze awards will be given out appropriately to those with the highest respective scores. Green awards will be given to those with a 70% winning percentage.
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2c. League
Based on the suggestion by rcc, this will consists of a top group (championship division) of 8 players playing for the tournament trophy itself.
Below the championship division, the rest of the tournament will be designed as a tier-system, in a pyramid format (3 groups in tier one, 6 groups in tier two etc.) designed to keep the bottom divisions as close as possible to the top.
Each season, the bottom two players in any division will get relegated to the tier below, to be replaced by the winners of two of the divisions in the tiew below.
Newly entering players will be proportionally divided between the divisions below the championship division. The championship division will always consist of 8 players, the other divisions will be variable, though the aim will be keep the numbers in each division as close as possible to ensure that everyone gets to play approximately the same number of games.
Having discussed the difficulties of setting up a fair league format for the handicap system, we were unable to find a solution that would appropriately allow people to shift quickly enough between tiers when the games are technically 50-50 chances of winning for each player. As such, there is no handicap class for league tournaments.
Each division will be a single round robin.
Tie-Breaks
1. Sonneborn-Berger (sum of the scores of opponent's beaten)
2. Head to Head
Trophies
Gold, Silver and Bronze awards will be given out to the top three positions, and green awards will be given out to the remaining finalists.
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3. What are the prerequisites for entering a title tournament?
Users must meet the following requirements:
- Have finished 2 rated games.
- Have a rating confidence of 10% or greater (50% for entering handicap tournaments).
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