Does time control influences ELO error bar?

[bob]

Plugging those numbers in and assuming an overall 50% score, and holding testing time constant, you'd get 95% confidence error bars of:

Code: Select all

32,000 games at  28 seconds/game - 0.49%
 8,960 games at 100 seconds/game - 0.91% (+0.42%)
 4,480 games at 200 seconds/game - 1.27% (+0.77%)

If we double the test time:

64,000 games at  28 seconds/game - 0.35%
17,920 games at 100 seconds/game - 0.64% (+0.29%)
 8,960 games at 200 seconds/game - 0.90% (+0.55%)

So it seems the increased draw % isn't enough to counteract the significantly fewer games, but the differences do decrease as testing time increases.

Edit: Marco, from what Dr. Muller said, that is indeed the case -- higher draw % reduces error bars more when all else is equal
Testing 51% vs 49% gauntlet score with 0% draws requires about 5000 games.
Testing 51% vs 49% gauntlet score with 35% draws requires about 3250 games.

But if those 3250 games take 2 hours apiece instead of 2 minutes apiece, you'd still hit the confidence interval faster testing 1 minute games...

Of course if you test 30% vs 70% you discover the "truth" sooner as well.