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Comment by joelfolksy | Hacker News Reader

Indeed. Pity the culture is so... unfriendly? Rematches are basically non-existent - even in bullet! It's bizarre, and I have to assume it's going to limit the site's growth.

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Yesterday I played a classical game vs an opponent rated higher than me and lost. Afterwards I analyzed the game in a lichess study, and my opponent was nice enough to share his thoughts in the study. It was an awesome experience. There are great parts of the community as well.

That's pretty cool, but it's probably best to think of classical as a whole different game/community that happens to be accessible from the same homepage.

I played the classical game on lichess.

I know. I'm saying that the lichess classical culture probably diverges wildly from the lichess blitz culture.

I analyze every game, win or lose, so I often ignore the immediate rematch request. I accept more rematch requests on chess.com because... analysis is not free! Essentially the ease of use and free availability of high quality analysis tools on lichess outcompetes my desire for a quick rematch.

You can copy your PGN from ChessCom over to the Lichess analysis board

You can go back to your game history and analyze any game...

I just got hooked on lichess after not playing Chess since I was a kid, it's a lot of fun, I also spend a fair bit of time in analysis...

I have a theory on this. Is it possible that rematch is a very "American" thing? On chess.com where player nationality is shown in the interface I've noticed (I think) disproportionate rematch requests from American players if they lose. I am pretty relaxed and tend to accept such requests, but I never ask for rematches myself. So game theory allows a closely matched player to always beat me in a match by simply continuing to request rematches while they are behind on the match score. This actually happens quite often (anecdata I know). Summarising my theory is that rematch requests are often a reflexive response to a loss, but more so in America than Europe. Furthermore lichess tends to be a more European site, chess.com more an American site. Hence more rematches on chess.com than lichess. Just a theory.

I play at a pretty decent level and have played hundreds of games on lichess. They make it very easy to send a friendly comment to your opponent. For example there's a WP button that sends "Well played". Every time I am outplayed and well beaten I press that button. I have never once seen that message in my direction, despite "deserving" it (partly a subjective assessment admittedly) in perhaps 30 percent of the games I play. I find this .... disappointing.

The button is not on the iPhone/iPad version of Lichess.

Thanks, I didn't know that. Presumably the same for Android. I've never tried to play chess with my phone.

Good you mentiond this. I never saw this button. I thought 'gg' is sufficient...

I think gg is the winner's feel good button, wp is the loser's feel good button.

Which is weird knowing that in Starcraft scene 'gg' is a residing note because there was no option in SC1 other than leaving the game. IIRC this is written in KeSPA rules.

I get rematches regularly. And probably 20% of my opponents will chat a little.

I'm just a single data point, although I've seen others complain about it online. I would love it if the major sites would release stats on this. As frustrating as it can be, especially in bullet, I'm more curious than anything. If the phenomenon is real, it could hold some surprising lessons for how design affects user behavior.

I rematch with people all the time. I literally rematched with someone in my last game just a second ago playing 10/0. Are you the sort who refuses to resign even when you have a hopeless material disadvantage?

I have won a couple games after being down with a seemingly hopeless material disadvantage. I'm not a grandmaster, and they don't play me (I suppose they might to laugh at a bad player, but that is unlikely). Until you get to the very high levels you should not assume your opponent knows how to convert even an easy endgame.

At my low level, in 5/0 (so a reasonably short time control), that gives opponents an opportunity to practice converting their advantage to a win.

It is good etiquette to request a resignation in chat?

Lichess matches people by rating, so on average, if I blunder my way into a large deficit, my opponent may just as well blunder me out of it.

> It is good etiquette to request a resignation in chat?

Not a chance. People at lower ratings screw up what should be wins all the time. Your opponent may be hoping for a stalemate or to run out the clock or waiting for you to blunder.

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