I registered on IGS years ago when I was 10 kyu or so and never played much so was 9k?. For the last few years it's been 2d?, I think I reset it to this for the European Team Chsmpioships because there were client troubles making even games with people of different ranks. Recently I played some games using the Panda Tetsuki android app and passed the 20 rated games mark. I rather stupidly lost to a 2d (feel asleep after crushing him) and IGS gave me a solid 7k rank. Looking at the rating help pages it seems I have to grind my way through the kyu ranks (over 100 games) to whatever dan rank I should be. This is boring for me, and unfair for all the kyu players I massacre on my way out of sandbagger land. Unlike KGS big win streaks can't quickly correct a wrong rating like mine. Is there a way to fix this other than a new account? I'd rather keep Uberdude. Perhaps I can still reset my rank in the desktop client? I just have phone access atm.

According to the help pages, you can reset your rank all day and it won't matter, since the rating is what counts, and that's calculated by the system. (Rank and rating appear to be independent, which I find slightly confusing.)

Have you tried emailing an admin about the issue?

You can simply set a new rank. This will be marked with a "?" until you have played some games (I believe 20 games).

In glGo: tools -> my stats -> my account -> change rank

Or you can simply type "rank 6d" in the console.

Right, but will that affect the rating at all?

I'm not sure, but I think the rating will be calculated new depending on the results of the 20 games with the "?" mark.

But would it even matter if not? As long as your rank is correct you will play against equal strong players.

Everything else is wild speculation. If you find the corresponding entry in the help files or some other informational source on IGS, let us know.


"help rating" says that matches between players "more than 4 stones apart in strength" will be unrated, and I am sure this refers to the *rating* of the players. In fact, the way I understand it is that the rank is pretty much just used for the initial entry into the rating system and subsequently as an easy-to-read-but-basically-meaningless alternative to the actual rating, which is what is used internally by IGS.

However, I'd suspect that uberdude's rating has a high "uncertainty" value attachted to it by now. So, if the IGS-rating system isn't completely backwards, it should be easier for him to rank up, or rate up, I should say. (Anyone with a clear head might want to look at "help math" to see if that's correct. I'm currently too tired.)

It's kind of trivial to state that the phrase "I'm not sure" contains some speculation, isn't it? However calling it "wild speculation" implies that it is a completely random guess.
Beside writing an email to igs I think it is worth a try if uberdude doesn't want to make a new account.


Ah ok, that's much better said

I believe the only uncertainty is that for newly solid players each even game win causes a gain of 150 rating points rather than 100. As I am about 15000 points away from my correct rating that's not much help!

IGS does not handle ratings at all like KGS. There is no similar "uncertainty" concept, and ratings do not decay over time. That does not make the IGS rating system completely backwards (I actually prefer it to KGS), but that is another topic.

IGS awards you 100 points for winning a game with the proper handicap (based on ratings), but you get more points for winning an even game against someone rated far higher than you. Unfortunately the extra points do not increase very rapidly with rating difference, so you will still have to win a large number of games to fix your rating. Also, as you note, it is unfair to the player you beat, since his rating will take a big hit.

The earlier suggestion to email an administrator seems like the best chance for a fix.

Wow you did the hard way and just played your way up..
I guess contacting an admin would have been easier indeed, but the above email doesn't work anymore.
So, for future issues, use