Jigo implementation? ✅

All kudos here to @dexonsmith , drove this one like a locomotive!

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What does that mean? Jigo (outside of problematic settings like tournaments) will work correctly the next time anoek pushes to prod? The backend stuff that was holding up jigo is fixed, but it still needs to be implemented in the front? Something else?

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From what I can see going on, this ticket is just one of a bunch of work happening in this area. So much I can’t follow it :smiley:

So probably best to stay tuned for when it all comes together and is pushed to prod to find out what we’re getting overall :slight_smile:

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I don’t know what “pushed to prod” means. So this isn’t implemented quite yet?

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The phrase “pushed to prod” is short for “deployed to the production server”, i.e., the changes going live and actually running on the server.

What I posted above just seems to indicate that the issue was closed on GitHub while being marked as complete. This would typically imply that the code has been written and ready to go. Closing an issue on GitHub is just external note keeping, which could happen either before or after the changes actually go live.

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The other day (after I had seen the above post announcing the issue closed), I played some 9x9 games, two of which ended in jigo, but were marked as B+0, hence my asking for clarification on what exactly the closed issue meant. So no, to my knowledge it is not yet implemented live, I do not know if there are any dev builds where it is implemented yet.

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From where I’m sitting (developer chair) I can’t see one yet. Some big changes relating to jigo and “better selecting initial ranks” are in development … “big changes” means “not quick to release” :slight_smile:

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IMO (I know this opinion is far from widespread), the possibility of draws is one of the major causes of the decline of chess. (and yes, I think any fair observer will agree it has declined from its golden age in mid-20th century).


Ian

One major difference is that roughly 50 % of all chess games result in draws, and around 70 % of games between players of 2750+ ELO.

Draws in go would be much rarer, even if NZ rules and 7.0 komi were universally enforced. Even KataGo only draws around 37 % of its games in those circumstances. Humans are likely to have a much lower draw rate than that.

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So, here’s the neat part, this new feature doesn’t really change anything for those not using integer komi. If you don’t like draws, then continue playing games without integer komi, which is the default for all of the rules except New Zealand rules.

However, for those users that like this feature, now it will be properly supported.

Oh, did chess only add draws in the mid-20th century?

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Online Chess had a giant boom during the pandemic.

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That’s correct. For example in the 2005 San Luis chess tournament, one of the strongest all-play-all tournaments of the last 20 years, 32 out of 56 games were drawn.
It’s noteworthy that despite the large proportion of draws, the tournament still had a clear winner. Veselin Topalov finished with 10 points (6 wins and 8 draws), a clear 1.5 points ahead of second place.

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Yeah, my feeling is that chess is a good example of about as drawish as you can have a game be, while still having it be good as a competitive endeavor. My preference is for games like Go and Shogi with appreciable but small draw rates even at high levels

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I have a short-term goal in go: to play a drawn game (of 19x19). After that, a longer-term goal: to play a drawn game with no captures. Not intentionally; just by having been that evenly matched. To me, that would be philosophically beautiful.

I’m really happy this will soon be possible on OGS. Thanks for working on it!

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Of course not, and it hasn’t been the only factor involved. Please no strawmen!


Ian

Boom as measured by what? Quantity is not everything.


Ian

Draws in chess

To be fair that was supposedly done in protest.

Though I did just come across

Though there are other legitimate ways to draw like

though I’m not sure rules updates like

actually affect these kinds of draws by repeitions.

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There was a controversial jigo in the 1991 London Open.

The year started in controversial manner with the result of the London Open. Two soviet players, Ivan Detkov and Alexei Lazarev, contrived to draw their last round game to end on the same score in first place. Amid allegations this was pre-arranged, the EGF adjudicated that the game should be voided, as the players had been unsportsman-like and had failed to cooperate with the congress organisers. That left Michael Katscher as the worthy winner, with Zhang Shutai second.
[Go in Britain: 1991 | British Go Association]
[London Open: Results 1990 | British Go Association]

In a later interview Ivan Detkov readily admitted collusion:

Can you tell us about the famous story: your draw with Alexey Lazarev?

It was a New Year Grand Prix tournament in London. The organizers decided to do something special. They excluded 0.5 from the komi. A draw granted 0.5 of a point to each player, just like in chess. I was leading the tournament together with Alexey before the last game. A draw guaranteed our split win.We decided to make this result by several reasons. Our team had been discussing a possibility of such situation before the tournament and the conclusion was it is bad for the game. We did not like the rule and we were planning to demonstrate it to officials very clearly. Split win was also a great result for our team. The last but not least reason was challenge to our abilities to make a draw in a game that was very closely watched by public. Officials warned us about possible consequences, but we were in a bit of a hooligan mood.The game was developing very nicely. It had several mini-battles with complications, several small size ko-fights, and more. We were keeping the balance very close, calculating the territory pretty much after every move. The result was prearranged (within the limits of our abilities) but the game was not. There were no really bad moves in the game; just the level of risk was constrained. Our rivalry with Dutch players, who were still the best in Europe at this time, was on the peak. I do not remember the name of the guy who was the secretary of EGF. He participated in the tournament and he was very unhappy about this draw. A huge campaign started right at the tournament ended in our disqualification. We already could fight with Dutch on the board successfully but we were no match in politics.Whatever happened after the game, it was one of the moments in my life, which I am especially proud of. It was a truly professional level and it was done in a tournament under serious pressure. I am sure that many of you will have a totally different view of this story.
[An interview with Ivan Detkov | Russian Go Federation]

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Interestingly, in poker tournaments noone would bat an eye at players at a final table agreeing to any split they deemed fair.

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Would it still be deemed fair if such a deal would negatively affect the prize money of other players in the tournament?

In the case of the London Open, I think the issue was that this jigo affected who would take 2nd place. If it was a win for either of the soviet players, they would take 1st and 3rd place, but a jigo between them meant that they would take 1st and 2nd place (winning a bigger portion of the prize money). I think that was the main reason for this controversy.

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