I feel like lately I’ve seen a lot of games with unreasonable (reverse) komi. So I thought, shouldn’t there be some limitations for the komi in a custom game?
Here’s what I’m thinking: If the board has 19x19 = 361 intersections, any komi below -361 or higher than 361 shouldn’t be allowed, otherwise it’s impossible for one side to win.
The exact limits probably depend on whether you use chinese or japanese rules, but I think the general point is clear.
I think you already know, games with custom komi are not rated. One can simply resign the game at any time, without risking a rating drop.
He’s not worried about that, he’s just saying there’s as much merit to obscene komi as there is to allowing handicaps exceeding 359 stones.
Even if it’s a non rated game, I think it can be pretty frustrating if you do your best and play a good game, just to notice at the end, that the guy set some unreasonable komi. And I don’t see the point of komi lower than -361 or higher than 361 (depending on the board size, of course).
Thanks for helping brainstorm solutions to this problem. Thing is, the kind of person who would set +/- 999 komi is just going to set it to whatever the limit is, so you’d start seeing unwinnable +/- 360 komi games.
I think the prevailing thought between the developers right now is that komi exploits are not a big problem, and coding effort should go to bug fixes and features.
Speaking personally, if I played well enough to win under normal circumstances, and then lost by komi tricks, I can still take satisfaction in having outplayed the other player. I would also feel sorry for them–that their opinion of their skill is so low and their ego is so high that they had to see “win” on the screen to feel good about themselves after the game. It’s best to just block the person and move on.
Similar behavior: There’s some idiot on KGS with varying nicknames - always signs on as a guest - who creates a 9x9 offer and then gives himself black with 3 handicap stones and reverse komi, despite most likely being sdk. Some people just can’t be helped.
I agree, although I suspect that there are more komi cheats out there than people realize. I’ve seen probably a dozen in the past 2 years, mainly in 9x9 games. Their favorite trick is to give themselves a 55 komi, or a reverse 55 komi to their opponent, hoping the mark will not notice the missing decimal.
It’s a fair point, it wouldn’t fix the problem at all. I guess I didn’t think this one through.