Advanced Study Room

Li Kao · #1

I've been playing in the ASR league for two months now, and I think some of you might be interested in playing there too.
It is an interesting opportunity to play even games with both stronger and weaker games in a league system. The only disadvantage I see is that you get PMed for games when you don't want to play.
You play in a group with about a dozen other players. You get points for won and lost games(obviously more for won games), and at the end of the month the top players of each group move to a higher class, and the lowest ones move a class down.
A new month and thus a new round will start soon, so now is a good time to sign up

http://www.stalkor.nl/ASR/?page_id=6

Join Advanced Study Room under Lessons on KGS and message one of the admins(Cgbspender, vortex, stalkor) to sign up.

Loons · #2

I just joined this month... Immediately some even games against 4 dans and other such strong players. They review the games really nicely for me.....

Incidentally, hey, I see you're also a Gamma_I...

(My secret goal is to try and beat Shaddy on our third game, but I think it's a little bit of a long shot)

Peter Hansmeier · #3

I highly recommend this league! I played in the ASR league a while back, and I enjoyed playing games with people who liked to review. I had to drop out when time conflicts prevented me from playing enough games to make it worthwhile (boo finals), but this is a great opportunity.

usagi · #4

Peter Hansmeier wrote:

I highly recommend this league! I played in the ASR league a while back, and I enjoyed playing games with people who liked to review. I had to drop out when time conflicts prevented me from playing enough games to make it worthwhile (boo finals), but this is a great opportunity.

Hello!

How is the league doing these days? I like the look of the new webpage, are there many active players?

Li Kao · #5

There are about 135 registered players atm. I'd guess perhaps 100 of those are active(playing at least 4 games per month).

usagi · #6

Helel wrote:

From his SL page I get that usagi would prefer if the ASR League discontinued. :shock:

"Although the Advanced Study Room still exists today (with different management) and is as popular as the day I left it, it's my wish that we leave our hopes of a league system with the Korean Insei Style League."

That's because I want the korean insei system to be successful and I thought the ASR league was floundering, now that I see the ASR is doing well I'll change that message. Although I'm not involved with it any longer, it's definitely a sense of pride to see my work continued.

Li Kao · #7

The main differences I see are that ASR is free and reviews are just a courtesy of the stronger player and breakfast's league costs money but offers official teachers/lessons for that.

stalkor · #8

Since early this year i've worked on the ASR league together with CGBspender (who has taken a leave of absence since may) to get this league back on its feet. its been a hard struggle, but i think the work is finally paying off. we have about 150 players in the league now and many active players.

I would also like to announce the Advanced Study Room is going to make a start on an ASR school! I'm working on the details the coming weeks and hope to launch it this year. There will be free lectures of course but also a paid section. When we have more information i will make a post about it:)

if you have questions about anything in the ASR, please ask:)

btw, you can sign up for this months league until the 15th, after that you are put on a waitinglist for next month.

topazg · #9

I'm very much enjoying the ASR at the moment, it's a great idea, it really is.

However, I do wonder slightly as to the value of losing games - it seems a 20k can keep his place in Alpha quite easily by just playing lots and lots - is this the intention to reward games played that much? If so, fair enough, it's not a complaint at all, that makes some sense, I just think wins should be more than twice as valuable as losses

fwiffo · **#10**

Hey, they're using my WordPress plugin. :mrgreen:

Chew Terr · **#11**

Hey, is there an information page that tells how exactly this works? Are all of the games even? Is there an easy way to find people in your class to play?

topazg · **#12**

Basically, open up the ASR room on KGS. Talk to stalkor (or send a message) to be added (deadline 15th for this month), he assigns you a Gamma group, and you play even games against anybody in your division with sensible time controls.

Enter "ASR League" without the quotes within the first 30 moves of any given game and it autoregisters in the league, and you can play up to 3 games against any individual player, with diminishing returns for each subsequent game. Losing is always worth half of winning, so playing games against much stronger players still has plenty of benefit, even though winning is unlikely (for example, winning against a 20k for the second time gives you 1 point, the same as losing to a 7d for the first time!).

http://www.stalkor.nl/ASR/?page_id=88 for all the rules and info

Chew Terr · **#13**

Thanks, that page has all the info I was looking for. This is really tempting...

stalkor · **#14**

topazg wrote:

I'm very much enjoying the ASR at the moment, it's a great idea, it really is.

However, I do wonder slightly as to the value of losing games - it seems a 20k can keep his place in Alpha quite easily by just playing lots and lots - is this the intention to reward games played that much? If so, fair enough, it's not a complaint at all, that makes some sense, I just think wins should be more than twice as valuable as losses

the question you should ask yourself, is the weaker player more active or is the rest of the class just lazy to let a weaker player rise up:P

topazg · **#15**

Well, speaking as someone with limited free time, I'm not sure lazy is a fair comment. In some of the gamma divisions, there are 26 opponents available, which makes just under 80 games to be played a month in principle. That's an awful lot for a comparatively strong player with a young family and other commitments

The question is whether Alpha is supposed to have "strong" players or "really active" players in it. It will obviously have people with both attributes, but at the moment, active definitely trumps strong for promotion.

stalkor · **#16**

yes i think thats true, active trumps strength maybe. but if you promote the strong who play less vs the weaker who play more, at some point it will be so active the weaker demotes no matter how much he plays. sure gamma is too crowded, i hope i can make a delta layer again next month to make it better again, but i can say that the league this month has already had a total of 395 games in comparison to last month where we had a bit over 500 games.

you also need to know that about half of the new players in the league cant manage to even hold the minimum number of games to stay in the league, so i need a bit bigger classes to even out those players so the active players can get some games in.

topazg · **#17**

Don't get me wrong, I think it's very well run at the moment, and am enjoying it lots - the spread of ability in the division is very pleasant, and makes for an excellent learning environment. Considering the purpose is to be a study league, I think having the top league as the "most studious" has a lot of merit

stalkor · **#18**

hopefully with the coming ASR school there will be even more "studious" ppl

topazg · **#19**

stalkor wrote:

you also need to know that about half of the new players in the league cant manage to even hold the minimum number of games to stay in the league, so i need a bit bigger classes to even out those players so the active players can get some games in.

Do you? Even if one of the smaller leagues (14 players) had half its players not play a single game, the other half can still get 18 games in against each other. Considering only 7 out of 151 players have reached this point (ok, it's only 12 days in), and usagi said one of the original goals was the hope that everyone would play all their games if possible, I don't see any issues arising with leagues of a maximum of say, 12 to 16 players. I think I'd rather have more tiers than more players in each division - I've never had a problem getting games.

Marcus · **#20**

topazg wrote:

stalkor wrote:

you also need to know that about half of the new players in the league cant manage to even hold the minimum number of games to stay in the league, so i need a bit bigger classes to even out those players so the active players can get some games in.

Do you? Even if one of the smaller leagues (14 players) had half its players not play a single game, the other half can still get 18 games in against each other. Considering only 7 out of 151 players have reached this point (ok, it's only 12 days in), and usagi said one of the original goals was the hope that everyone would play all their games if possible, I don't see any issues arising with leagues of a maximum of say, 12 to 16 players. I think I'd rather have more tiers than more players in each division - I've never had a problem getting games.

It's an interesting issue. Personally, it seems difficult for me to find the time to play enough games to advance to the next league when there are so many players who can play twice the number of games I have time to play. I'm trying to play more this month, but with only two advancing upwards, it's hard to keep up with the most active players.

On the other hand, with larger leagues there will always be stronger players in the lower leagues, who get left behind by the active players who play 30+ games to their 10-15, so there will always be a mix of ranks in all leagues.

Like everyone seems to be stating, it all depends on the goals of the league ... do you want the strongest up top, or the ones with the best participation? There are advantages to both ...

Advanced Study Room

Who is online