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My opinion of the new rating system.

First everyone's rating increased by 300 points, now they've increased again. Pretty soon, everyone will start at 2700 and the best players on this site will be rated 4000.

The new rating system is a multi-colored mess. The useful features like average opponent rating have disappeared in favor of rainbow-blah or whatever this is supposed to be. I know that in theory average opponent rating doesn't matter, but in practice it does. Just ask ChessNetwork who on another chess site obtained a +3000 rating solely playing opponents 500 points or more below him. Though he was only getting +1 rating point per game, over the months this accumulated to give him a >3000 rating.

Taking away the average opponent rating does nothing but help the cowards who intentionally and consistently pick on weaker players than themselves, and allows these people to hide what they're doing so that they don't have to endure even one shred of shame.

The same thing goes with taking away the separate black and white ratings. It's only helping the people who are scared to play as Black and always play from the White side. It's like the new rating system was intentionally designed to make it more comfortable for people who only play White against weaker players, and more confusing for everyone else.
I don't understand why you care that much about "cowards" and "people who are scared to play as Black"... Just play and enjoy the game. Most of the people here are honest and just play for the fun of it. If you want my advise, just forget about trolls, cheaters and this kind of people.
Ok, let's say you're right and we should allow the "only Whites" and "beaters of the weak" a comfortable, shame-free existence.

I also used my own average opponent rating to gauge the validity of my own rating. I made it a point to try and always have an AOR equal to my own rating. Whenever it got below my own rating, I increased my competition accordingly. Again, I know that theoretically the AOR is not supposed to matter, but in practice it did and this has been shown.

With the rating changes I am left confused about my own rating. What rating actually am I? I have no clue anymore. I'm about to stop playing online chess altogether and just play against Rybka 4 because then at least I'll have a consistent yardstick to measure my progress and I know the rating system of a computer program isn't going to change every six months.
Furthermore, I think it's a shame that chess960 got so much degenerated. Before the update this generalized form of classical chess was equal with the standard rating; now it's not.
Neither it has influence on the ratings for different time controls nor to the main rating anymore. Instead it's now on the same level with the rather uncommon "King of the Hill". I don't get it. While KotH adds new rules to the game, Chess960 applies to the normal way of playing chess. Please note this. It would be nice if you could again separate between KotH and chess+chess960.

Thanks.
I agree chegm8, they're lumping together the things that should be separate, and separating the things that should be lumped together.

I hope they go back to how it was. I want to see my average opponent rating. I also want to see my opponent's average opponent rating.

I also prefer not to have an inflated rating. This is why I'm about to be done with this site and just play against Rybka4. That is not inflated for sure, if you got a 1600 rating vs Rybka4 you'd be like 1800 here at least. I imagine it's going to be a big disappointed for some people when they enter a real life tournament and get a real rating. I don't want to be disappointed. If I have an 1800 rating, I want to know that's real.
Hi,

1. This is a new profile page, it's being tested, and as ever, feedback is appreciated. Please don't be massively over dramatic, however, as it makes the developers upset for obvious reasons (OMG THIS IS THE WORST THING EVER I HATE YOU FOR TAKING AWAY MY FAVOURITE FEATURES, &c)

2. Thank you for pointing out some of the criticisms of the new profile page design. It'll be taken on board, and if more constructive feedback is given, I'm sure some great ideas will crop up.

3. Average rating increase - your rating shouldn't have increased by that much, unless you played a lot of cheaters. The method of determining your rating was still the same - the system went through every single game you played, put it into different categories (the same as the old system) - but with two differences: i) the games you played against those caught cheating no longer counted, ii) 960 was split from standard.

4. 960 and King of the Hill was split from Standard rules rating as i) the game mode is different, and b) these games are more of a closed ecosystem like the pools, so the aim is to give a more accurate rating over time, rather than boosting/decreasing your standard rules rating.

5. Global rating has gone, which combined standard and 960.

In my view, it is a shame that average opponent rating and black and white rating have gone.

Finally, real life grades. My real life grade, when converted, for slow games, is around 1577 in real life (this is 1h 30 games). Here, for anything over 8 minutes, it's 1675. Pretty accurate, considering fast games are my forte. In real life tournament, my bullet rating, when converted, is 1915. Here it's 1949. Not as big a jump as you'd think. (Note, these are originally ECF grades. I converted the current endorsed way to FIDE, which is ECF RATING x 7.5 + 700).
Note, lichess is technically still in beta form. The current profile page redesign is temporary, and a stepping stone to the full profile page redesign, which should hopefully make you feel more comfortable.
And thank you for listening to people Cynosure.

I had played some cheaters probably, playing as I did mostly longer games where cheating is a bit more common.

I did not write anything like "omg this is the worst thing I hate you", come on, I would never write that as I like the development team here, and despite my infrequent criticisms I appreciate you all for making this site.

When it comes to ratings, I feel like this is the yardstick I'm using to measure my progress. My goal in life is to play and improve at chess, I spend most of my time studying chess in order to improve. When my rating gets changed arbitrarily, it confuses my life's goal and makes me feel uncomfortable. I'm sure many others have this same feeling since a lot of people here are just as obsessed with chess as I am. It would be like for a bodybuilder if suddenly the gym changed all the numbers on the weights or something. It's confusing and annoying.
My problem as has been for a long time now, is that the ratings are inconsistent when compared to each other.
The standard rating is way higher than all the other profile ratings which shouldnt be the case. There should be weighted average between the ratings to get a balanced number.

Another issue which I dont think will goaway (perhaps similar to what seaturtle is trying to say)...
I know there are still many people who like when ratings somehow compare similiarly to other organizations (websites, FIDE, USCF). This will always vary because its different player pools.
Using myself as example, my 1+0 pool and training ratings seem more in line with what I would expect my rating to be (in real life) as compared to the "inflated" standard rating and somewhat "inflated" bullet/blitz/classical ratings. I put it in quotes because it will vary. Again its relative and different group of players than say FIDE so you will never be able to 100% compare.

And finally, about the average opponent rating, that was a good thing too which we lost. I liked to make sure my avg opp rating was close to my rating.
I'm equally as obsessed with chess. I'm really psyched to possibly top 2100 on here in the next couple of days if I play well. When the redesign happened, my rating inflation went from 2017 to 2030. That was it. The same as winning one game around the same level as me.

Perhaps, then, you were just very unlucky and had your rating deflated against cheaters? The rating system used is still the same - Glicko2 with a deviation, but minus lost points.

When you discuss adding 300 rating points on - so people started at 1500, not 1200, that was done because decent players with actual ratings - USCF, FIDE, ECF - all noted a disparity between their actual rating, and their rating here (it was deflated here, by about 300 points). Now, in the highest echelons, it makes unlikely ratings (2700+), and similarly inflates the lowest. But for far and large, the average player is probably fairly well served by their rating here.

Lichess has less casual users than chess.com (who just type "chess free" into google), less cheaters than flyordie, and costs less money than ICC. As such, the people lichess attracts are usually already in the chess loop, and decent themselves. Anyway. Hopefully you feel better about this.

Though saying "This is why I'm about to be done with this site" did come across a bit teenagery.

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