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BGonline.org Forums
One suggestion re slow play
Posted By: Joe Freedman In Response To: How I wish I had more time to rant in general (David Rockwell)
Date: Monday, 6 December 2010, at 1:58 a.m.
Good post. A lot of folks seem to forget that the purpose of clocks is to eliminate slow play, not to put a premium on speed and hand-eye coordination. It's also worth considering that some people just do not like clocks. I certainly prefer to play without one, unless my opp. is unacceptably slow.
Here's one suggestion: Note the time a match begins (this is easiest in Swiss-style formats where they all begin at the same time.) After a time certain, survey how many points have been scored at each table. Those who have not completed a percentage of total possible points would then be put on a clock. E.g, if the match is 11 points, players whose combined score does not total at least 5 after 30 minutes would be put on a clock.
To respond to two potential objections: (1) An unscrupulous though clever player could intentionally play slow in the first 30 min. in order to clock the rest of the match. This is not that big a deal, at least compared to mandatory clockage. There might also be some sanction that can be placed on players who habitually are put on clocks.
(2) This rule favors matches with big cubes and penalizes players grinding out their points one-by-one. My answer to that: so what? The goal here is to eliminate matches that take too long. If an otherwise slowly played match is resolved by an 8 cube, that's great. And the only "penalty" for tighter players is to be clocked if they are slow.
(3) It's a nightmare to keep track of. Yes, it does require some effort, but the players could write down their starting time, and either the tournament staff or one of the players would call attention to time exceedances. Again, it would work best in a format where all matches begin at the same time.
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