Long-awaited ratings update

[Charlie Reams]

After an epic battle with my own program, I finally got stuff fixed tonight, and the ratings are updated at last! To see your rating, point your browser to http://thecountdowncorral.com/cd/ratings.asp. The ratings include COMA and all games of COOT up to tonight.

The most interesting point is Paul Howe's ascension to second, after back-to-back wins over Conor and tonight's victory against Corby. Many people expect to see Julian Fell ascend through the rankings as he plays in COOT, so it'll be interesting to see how far he can get. The only new entry is Ben Pugh, at a surprisingly low 32nd after three straight losses.

We're approaching 100 rated players so this is probably the last update before I prune some of them off. Possibilities include raising the minimum number of games to 6 (=one COLIN), and removing players with long periods of inactivity. Other suggestions welcome.

[Julian Fell]

Glad to see Corby's got a more realistic ranking now. Corby how much have you improved since you were on TV , back then you were pretty beatable but now, I'd back you to give Beevers a good game. It's Ben P who has the unrealistic ranking now, I'm sure most people would agree he's a top-ten player and hopefully the rankings will reflect this soon.

Charlie both your suggestions would mean my being removed from the list as things stand... which would probably be fair enough! But, I don't know, the list is supposed to be a bit of fun so does it matter how many people are on it?

[Charlie Reams]

Charlie both your suggestions would mean my being removed from the list as things stand... which would probably be fair enough!

Actually it's specifically because I didn't want to remove you that I held out on pruning the list for so long. Luckily your forthcoming appearance in COOT will solve my dilemma.

But, I don't know, the list is supposed to be a bit of fun so does it matter how many people are on it?

I personally find it distracting that the list is full of people who played at some event years ago, never post here and never read the ratings -- basically space fillers. It's more fun if the ratings are made up of people who actually play reasonably regularly and might conceivably care about their rating. What I may do is publish "full ratings" (of everyone with at least 4 games) and "current ratings" (everyone who has played in the last two years and has 8 or more recorded games.) I believe the ABSP do something similar and it works quite well. The variables might need some tweaking but that's easy enough.

[Jon Corby]

Corby how much have you improved since you were on TV , back then you were pretty beatable but now, I'd back you to give Beevers a good game.

Quite a bit, in the sense that I only completed my "dictionary" project after my series finals, so since then I've been playing at least 3 games a day (I play 2 guys at work, plus against the TV show) with a program which tells me (pretty much) every available word. That obviously helps a lot. However, I'd say I've gone backwards in some ways. While the strict dictionary study doubtless pushes up your average overall, I feel like I'm less likely to spot "uncommon" or "pure" words (like MMC's 'beetroot'), which I don't like.

My numbers game has also probably improved a bit, but then what you saw on TV wasn't really near my standard at home anyway.

(Plus I wouldn't back me to give Beevers a good game.)

[Julian Fell]

Actually it's specifically because I didn't want to remove you that I held out on pruning the list for so long.

Am v touched