Proposal: Timeout for Correspondence Games

I suggest a "time-out" (vacation, ....) for correspondence games - a time, which doesn't count against the move time and where the game is de facto adjourned.

Especially for longer timed games (i.e. move/14d) the games could well last a year or more. Over such a long time it would be natural to go on vacation and/or to be unavailable for other reasons. This possibility to adjourn temporarily would counteract having to give up/time out a longer-running game in such a case.

Solution: Bank the unused time, by playing faster then the expected move per day. The banked time is a count down time that shows when the move per day will start. So on sick days, if you have banked some time, you will not lose.

Correspondence could behave like any other clocked game except it can bank the unused time.
Banking the time is playing faster than the settings agreed on.

If you have said you would move 1 move per week, and you play the first move in one day, then you banked 6 days.

Think of the bank time as a count down before the next move per week can start. As the game progresses you may have banked enough time to go on vacation for 2 weeks without playing a move.

Once the banked time is used up, plus that move per week, then the game ends by a flag.

Max banked limit cannot exceed 30 day. You cannot accumulate time beyond 60 moves.

A player can bank more time than their opponent. All they have to do is play faster than their opponent, until the limit is reached.

I hope it reaches the eyes of a programmer and gets adopted as a feature change for lichess.

You're suggesting the vacation feature that is present in chesscom. I think that if Lichess wanted it in their site they would have implemented it already.

The idea in post #2 came out of my head after reading the first post. It's easy for me to brew-up ideas from an idea.
Now, all we need is someone to submit it the github and someone to accept the challenge to code it.
Can it be considered an issue?
github.com/lichess-org/lila/issues

#4 I think anything can be considered an issue, then it's up to who manages that page to decide whether it's a useful and promising issue or not.

Well it's been 7 hours and it doesn't seem to catch on. The only way to get it really looked at, is if someone different keeps the idea alive. Brainstorming happens when people participate. If someone puts it in the github, then there is hope.

@Deadban said in #3:
> You're suggesting the vacation feature that is present in chesscom.

As it is: no. I am suggesting a feature present in the first chess server i ever was a member of - www.caissa.com. It is probably defunct now, but 25 years ago they (and FICS) were the only chess servers of relevance there.

@Deadban said in #3:
> I think that if Lichess wanted it in their site they would have implemented it already.

You are right and in fact this answer should be put automatically under each and every new thread in "Lichess Feedback" - and then the thread should be automatically closed. It would make for a greatly improved feedback forum.

@Toscani said in #2:
> Solution: Bank the unused time, by playing faster then the expected move per day. The banked time is a count down time that shows when the move per day will start. So on sick days, if you have banked some time, you will not lose.

This would be a possibility but i think it would accumulate way too much for longer games and too little for shorter games. My idea would rather be something like: "14(?) days per year, where one can pause ALL his running correspondence games (in units of 1d)". I don't think pausing individual games would make sense, because either one is unavailable for some reason or not. Either way this would affect all his games, not individal ones.

Or you just make enough conditional premove.

When on leave of absence, we will probably not be accessing the lichess account.
So adjourning an account temporarily for X number of days, might be more useful.
All games unfinished would be lost games, because waiting say 53 days for the correspondance game to continue is going to be long wait. Waiting 14 days seems fair enough. If you have a lot of opponents taking leave, you might end up waiting on a lot of games. @Nomen-Nonatur

Minimum, not maximum days for leave of absence ....
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_minimum_annual_leave_by_country

Coding wise: A legal move will need to be done before adjourning the games and the opponents must not see the move. So it has to be like a pre move. That makes lots of premoves for many players playing multiple correspondence games at once. Adjourn of games can be complex, including coding it.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adjournment_(games)#:~:text=A%20player%20adjourns%20the%20game%20by%20recording%20their%20move%20secretly%20in%20an%20envelope%20and%20sealing%20it.%20Upon%20resumption%2C%20the%20arbiter%20makes%20the%20sealed%20move%20and%20the%20game%20continues.

Feature Request Solution: Correspondence games need a forecasted end date.

The time that was originally accepted (1 move / 5 days) could show an estimated end date. As we playout the game, it does an estimate of when the game will end (estimate based on 60 moves). As we see the game progress and we see it will fall on our planned leave of absence, it would be up to that player to play faster to finish the game on time.

The timebank feature on dailychess/redhotpawn.com site works really well - I used to play 1 day per move + 7 days timebank. If you didn't keep up with the 1 day per move you started using your 7 day timebank. The timebank doesn't reset during the game so I could use 2 or 3 days on a couple of occasions during a game but little more.

The advantage is that it enables you to play faster time controls (like 1 day per move) to keep the game moving along, whilst still being able to take a few days off if life otherwise got busy. I rarely move on Fridays, for instance, as I have other commitments.