Tips for Enrolling in an Online Tournament
Want to try an online tournament? Here are some steps on how we can "sign up" for a tournament online.
First, we register in a chess website. Then we're given a homepage. In most homepages there is a button for opting to play, compete, or participate in an online tournament. We click on it and wait for the page where we are offered to choose a regular or special tournament. Regular tournaments are open for all, members or guests. Special tournaments are often exclusive for members only.
Then we decide whether to play against humans, or pit our chess software against other software, or play against advanced players with the help of software. Just click on whatever option we please. Then we choose the skill level to play on. Or we may choose to have a little adventurous challenge and join a skill level slightly higher than ours. We may enroll in any skill level we want.
Well, if we want less fuss on how to join a tournament online, we simply look for an automatic enroller—something like "enroll at once" or "automatic enrollment" and click on it. It will alert the site software and look for a tournament game appropriate for us. Once enrolled we are expected to take part in them until we finish the games. We cannot opt to renege on our enrollment.
It may help us to opt for the right tournament type if we know the 3 basic types of tournaments—slow-pace, fast-pace, and very fast-pace. Slow pace may take several weeks to finish because we can make one move a day. Fast pace takes days to finish. Very fast-pace games may take one sitting to finish. As beginners we should opt for slow-pace tournament games.
As we win games on a slow-pace skill level the site will promote us and urge us to join in fast-pace tournaments. As we win here we will again be promoted to play in very-fast games. The site promotes or demotes us, depending on the results of our games. Remember, all games are permanently recorded so we must aim to limit our defeats. It would be awful to start on an advanced level and be demoted to our skill level because of our losses.
A tournament online will test and hone our chess skills. It will help us a lot if we start on our skill level and be promoted from there. This way we ascend the ladder of success gradually and at our own pace.
