Utility of Byo-Yomi, and practical implication

[msgreg]

We're going to start occasionally using clocks at our club meetings including rating games, and I was thinking more deeply about sudden death vs. japanese byo-yomi and canadian byo-yomi timing schemes.

My thought is that sudden death allows your opponent to spend your time (either intentionally or unintentionally) by playing more end moves than are really warranted. In which case, byo-yomi (either japanese or canadian) would alleviate any need to care about how many moves your opponent forces you to play in the end game, when your responses can easily be made in the span of the byo-yomi period.

And further, the main practical difference between japanese and canadian in this case is whether your clock can handle that mode of counting. In this case, my understanding is that canadian byo-yomi can essentially be implemented with an analog or "sudden death" clock. Whereas a special clock is needed for japanese byo-yomi. (and in our case, I think we will have one of each).

Are there any other practical implications of choosing among main go timing options?

[illluck]

Would Fischer timing be an option? I've never really played with it in real time, but I've always thought it would work nicely.

[quantumf]

We're going to start occasionally using clocks at our club meetings including rating games, and I was thinking more deeply about sudden death vs. japanese byo-yomi and canadian byo-yomi timing schemes.

My thought is that sudden death allows your opponent to spend your time (either intentionally or unintentionally) by playing more end moves than are really warranted. In which case, byo-yomi (either japanese or canadian) would alleviate any need to care about how many moves your opponent forces you to play in the end game, when your responses can easily be made in the span of the byo-yomi period.

And further, the main practical difference between japanese and canadian in this case is whether your clock can handle that mode of counting. In this case, my understanding is that canadian byo-yomi can essentially be implemented with an analog or "sudden death" clock. Whereas a special clock is needed for japanese byo-yomi. (and in our case, I think we will have one of each).

Are there any other practical implications of choosing among main go timing options?

Our standard for tournaments across the country is Canadian, based on the non-availability of fancy clocks allowing Japanese or Fischer timing (as you say, simple analog or chess clocks are fine for Canadian only). Because the tournament standard is Canadian, our club games are also usually Canadian.

You can easily research the practical implications of the different methods. My experience is that Canadian creates repeated cycles of frantic play (whoops, I've got to play 11 stones in 6 seconds), whereas Japanese requires experience of playing timesuji's to allow you to read out a situation adequately. Fischer solves both of those, I gather, but the absence of enough clocks makes it a non-starter for us (for the time being at least).

[msgreg]

You can easily research the practical implications of the different methods. My experience is that Canadian creates repeated cycles of frantic play (whoops, I've got to play 11 stones in 6 seconds), whereas Japanese requires experience of playing timesuji's to allow you to read out a situation adequately. Fischer solves both of those, I gather, but the absence of enough clocks makes it a non-starter for us (for the time being at least).

I have looked at the definitions of the timing schemes, but finding information on the implications is hard to collect.

You documenting your experience here is invaluable to me.

It seems to me that "Japanese requires experience of playing timesuji's" occurs largely after your time is expired (i.e. within byoyomi). In which case, any timing scheme will impose it's own flavor. Thank you for writing about what this flavor means to you! At least it's not imposed unfairly by your opponent (like I had mentioned under my description of "sudden death" in the OP).

[BaghwanB]

If you have clocks that support it, I'd say use Japanese. Less super-frantic play at the end of each Canadian period (where you'll eventually run into SOMEONE trying to play 5 moves in 3 seconds...) and IMO an easier "feel" to B-Y play ("I've got 30 seconds/move but can go over a few times").

Hopefully you can encourage friendly play with this in a club setting so hard feelings will be minimized. I'm just a little scarred by seeing clock abuse in local tournaments (admittedly rare and a long time ago). Personally, I've offered (and bring) clocks to my club but I don't think anyone has wanted to use them for at least 3-4 years.

Bruce "Timer" Young

[msgreg]

I'm just a little scarred by seeing clock abuse in local tournaments

Can you explain what "clock abuse" is?

[Javaness2]

Clock abuse can have 2 meanings
1 - Hitting the clock really hard, normally during a blitz game
2 - Playing to win on time, rather than on the board. For example, you are 20 points behind, all your opponent's groups are alive, he has 5 seconds left on the clock. You start playing inside your own territory in order to run him out of time.

[lemmata]

Ing Cup-style timekeeping seems like a very nice alternative.

The idea is that you get X minutes of main time and you get penalized Y points every extra Z minutes you use. You can be penalized a maximum of W times, after which you lose the game on time.

Example: 1 hour main time + 2 point penalties for every 20 minute overtime period that you start using. 3 maximum overtimes.

1 hour 01 minutes = 2 point total penalty
1 hour 21 minutes = 4 point total penalty
1 hour 41 minutes = 6 point total penalty
Greater than 2 hours = loss by time

Advantages:

1. A simple chess clock will do since we only need to keep track of how much time has been used by each side
2. All games are guaranteed to end within a certain amount of time.
3. Losses by time due to not hitting the clock fast enough (as is sometimes the case with byo-yomi) will be rare.

Disadvantages:

1. Game becomes sudden death after the maximum/last penalty is assessed.
2. Not common, so it takes some time to get used to it
3. You need to remember to include penalties in your endgame counting (although this would be easy to see by looking at the clock)

Some ideas for reducing sudden death clock abuse: Use area scoring (Chinese style)

1. If opponents make unreasonable invasions, we can play in our own territory without fearing that those moves are losing us points
2. Area scoring also makes it easy for us to protect all our cutting points/liberties very quickly at the end and just keep passing afterwards.

[quantumf]

It seems to me that "Japanese requires experience of playing timesuji's" occurs largely after your time is expired (i.e. within byoyomi). In which case, any timing scheme will impose it's own flavor.

Yes. Any byoyomi method is massively preferable to sudden death.

Clocks can be valuable at clubs, some players tend to play on interminably, this can be particularly frustrating if they are not that competent at realizing that groups are dead, or play on in the hope of turning dead groups alive. If someone doesn't want to play with a clock, I'll agree once, and if I find they are "abusers" of (my) time I will subsequently insist on a clock. It's quite rare, but it does happen.

[ez4u]

Ahem... Read this first. I would be surprised if you can buy any clocks outside of the orient that support byo yomi but not various types of increment, including Fischer. If you are stuck with analog clocks then your choices are limited to sudden death or Canadian. In my experience most people care a lot less than timing system enthusiasts, like me. I can't understand it, but there it is.

[BaghwanB]

I'm just a little scarred by seeing clock abuse in local tournaments

Can you explain what "clock abuse" is?

Javaness2's reply pretty much sums it up. Most "dirty tricks" like this only take a tournament director's call to resolve but it can be annoying to have to take it to that level.

The most obnoxious tactic I saw was sacrificing large groups and then claiming the opponent's clock needed to run while he was removing dead stones... Again, it only took a TD to call BS on it but still...

Bruce "10 sec absolute" Young

[Mef]

If you have clocks that support it, I'd say use Japanese. Less super-frantic play at the end of each Canadian period (where you'll eventually run into SOMEONE trying to play 5 moves in 3 seconds...) and IMO an easier "feel" to B-Y play ("I've got 30 seconds/move but can go over a few times").

Hopefully you can encourage friendly play with this in a club setting so hard feelings will be minimized. I'm just a little scarred by seeing clock abuse in local tournaments (admittedly rare and a long time ago). Personally, I've offered (and bring) clocks to my club but I don't think anyone has wanted to use them for at least 3-4 years.

Bruce "Timer" Young

I also think that byo-yomi is well suited to go (since you can't really project how long endgame will run). For a more TD friendly (and perhaps more Western-shopper friendly), you might be able to find a clock that has absolute time with a delay system (Effectively Bronstein time with a small increment). With a delay system you'll have an absolute timer, but your clock won't start counting until a short while (3-5 seconds) after your opponent makes a move. This means it's impossible to run someone's clock out with nonsense moves as they can play within the delay with no time penalty.

[msgreg]

For the record, we'll be starting with the DGT 2010 clock which seems to have a plethora of options. Another member of our group has his eye on a Chronos. These two clocks seem to be the top of the field in terms of flexibility and availability.

I hope others have benefitted from the information provided in this thread. I know I have.

Thank you everyone for your insight thus far!

[Harleqin]

Would Fischer timing be an option? I've never really played with it in real time, but I've always thought it would work nicely.

I have really played with it, and it does work nicely.

Tip: use about 1/120 of the basic time as bonus time, e.g. 20 min basic, 10 sec bonus.

Another tip: the maximum time of 300 moves is (2 x basic in minutes) plus (5 x bonus in seconds) in minutes; e.g. 20 min basic, 10 sec bonus gives 90 min. Few games will go over more than 300 moves, and even fewer by much, so you can plan quite well with this.