Make "analysis disabled" the default (poll) - COMING SOON!

That’s a historical example which is widely considered to have not been fair play.

Your argument now boils down to “It could be worse.”

Is there any good reason for live, ranked games on OGS to be different in this way from a normal game of Go?

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this is all still your reading… even putting stones on the board you are limited to your own reading

IMO the word reading doesn’t encompass analysis. I see the terms reading and calculation as referring to sequences visualised entirely in one’s mind.

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Actually, my argument boils down to “the difference is both negligible and irrelevant”

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One aspect of reading is knowing which sequences to pursue.

The other is being able to pursue them in your mind.

Analysis removes the second part, and makes the first part easier, because previously intractable options in your mind are now viable to pursue.

It’s good to have that clear.

I totally disagree.

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This is a good point although I think I still lean towards #2 and having analysis off by default, I like bugcat’s description of changing the cultural norm. Actually it made me wonder, do we know how many games are played with or without analysis? Breakdown by ranked or free?

As for disallowing analysis in ranked play, I wonder if someone in favor of this could explain, what is the harm if you can limit your own ranked games to analysis disabled? Presumably you would never encounter an analysis-using player, seems like the current state is fine for both in this regard?

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what is the harm if you can limit your own ranked games to analysis disabled? Presumably you would never encounter an analysis-using player

This assumes that you create your own games.

If you use the automatch or accept open challenges then it remains an issue.

[woops, misquoted]

Oh I forgot you cannot specify. I think “prefer/require analysis on/off” should totally be in automatch settings. More significant than time settings or rules for some people, maybe

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There are many changes to the rules that could be described as negligible and irrelevant to most players. You could, for instance, have komi shift stochastically within a few points on the basis of the temperature of Hawaii. This would not, on average, change the strength of a player, but I’m sure no one would agree to having this new variant of Go be the default form of ranked games on the server. If there is no real difference, what is OGS gaining by departing from the norm of irl Go?

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Well, for one… we are online… there are a great many differences between IRL play and online play… and it would be folly for one to try to perfectly replicate the other.

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The rules, at least, should be the same. I can even set automatch to prefer or require certain rule sets. but I can’t require that analysis be turned off.

EDIT: I just find it strange that OGS seems to see analysis as completely benign change to the game. It’s really not. There are many times when players misread a liberty, or misjudge what the situation will be after their move. It’s a big change by any metric and should at least be optional for normal ranked play.

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I like the idea of a newbie that starts playing go using analysis and then grows and matures the decision (*) of not using it.

So I’d stick with what we have now.

My opinion is based on the fact that I can’t believe this:

I could happily accept to have it strictly disabled (no options) for live games (not correspondence).

(*) Is “to mature a decision” a thing in English? It’s literally translated from Italian.

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Totally agreed. When I started two years ago, I used analysis extensively, then realized it is not good for the long run and gave up. It did release stress and help me to see wide options. I can also say the feature would not help anyone go too far, evidently by the fact that I am still a 1kyu. :stuck_out_tongue:

Once can use it in a live game, but will lose the opportunity to learn read, focus, and truly strategize the game.

At the same time, Go is also a fun game. It’s good to have options for folks to have fun and even learn in the way they choose.

So I would not worry about changing anything in today’s setting. If one does not want to use it like me, one can disable it. I don’t really care what my opponents do or not do.

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for me this is not an issue - analysis enabled / not enabled - it doesn’t bother me…

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Between IRL and online world, it happens often that players asked me if and where I play online.
Well with my Chinese friends most don’t know that OGS exists (and its analysis tool) and with some more informed western players OGS is seen still more as a correspondence server. Analysis tools in this view isn’t any problem.
Till now, be quiet, no one to downgrade OGS because of the analysis tool in live games…

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Not really. You would probably say, “the person matures enough that they make a mature decision”, i.e. as a verb, mature would not usually be applied to a decision, only to people (or cheese, wine, etc); but as an adjective, mature could be applied to a decision.

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Thanks!
In Italian we use the transitive form to mean “conceal and develop” an idea until it’s “ripe enough to pick it up”. :slightly_smiling_face:

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I think the appropriate English adage would be to “mull over a decision” which usually means to give it careful consideration over a longer length of time.

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The intransitive form could be used similarly. “The decision matured”.

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I join the others here in thinking this should clearly be disabled by default for ranked live games. Using these tools after the game to explore sequences and see what you could have done better is one thing, but doing it during the game is another thing entirely.

The only other server which has such “helping” tools (albeit different ones) is CGS, which for example highlights stones in atari or can display each group’s number of liberties. However CGS is purposefully positioning itself as a colorful server mostly aimed at beginners (although with mild success) and those features are readily apparents, it’s even the key point of CGS. Plus at the end of the day, except for real beginners I think these helping features still have less impact on the game than analysis on OGS.

In any case no such thing would be allowed on the other regular servers, for good reasons, and I find it odd that OGS is on the fence here (and seeing the clear-cut poll results I am not alone).

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I strongly disagree.

Sure, have tournaments where it’s off, allow people to create a game where is off, but not off by default.