Rank in China

pashley (a foreigner living in China): I have no real idea of my current rank. Chinese players do not mention rank. In the local club, the weaker players give me 4 stones and usually beat me. The strong ones give me 6 and invariably obliterate me. This is despite me getting about two stones worth of advice from spectators in almost every game.

Bildstein: What you say about rank in China is really interesting. I wonder how my attitude towards go would change if I never gave a thought to rank. I'd still want to improve, but...

unkx80: Indeed. Many mainland Chinese players only "play for fun" and never bothered to get their strength assessed. Besides, it costs money to perform the assessment. It often turns out that a random unranked player from China who steps into some Go club has a strength of a strong 4 dan.

Malweth: I think I would like a place where everything is unranked, (or only relative ranks), but this is nearly impossible online... it only works for close communities of players without much variance. As an aside, the Go club I went to in Taipei had a number of people who all knew their approximate ranks. The majority were very young, however, and probably had significant access to the internet.

Sbetsho?: What kind of ranking is actually used in China? And especially in Shanghai? I'm lucky to study at the same place with a very good Go-player from Shanghai, but due his rather poor English it is not easy to communicate with him. He says something that the lowest is 60 something and then go up to 1; after that 1 to 7 or 8 yuan (or something like that) him being 5 yuan and the best Chinese player can give him 3 handicap stones. Does anyone know more about this ranking system and how does it compare to systems used in other countries?

Qian: The Chinese use the same system as Japanese. It goes from kyuu (ji) to dan (duan).

Icareus?: Sbetsho: I think he means "duan" and not "yuan". As Qian mentioned, "duan" is dan in Chinese, while "yuan" is the name of the Chinese currency.

Zalfor: Chinese have a testing service where u have to test from 9ji(kyu) to 1ji then from 1duan to 6 duan. They award certificates like that.

mdm: I think Chinese amateur players only get promoted above 4dan, based on results in (national?) tournaments.

kb: All of the above is correct... Chinese amateur ratings go to 4-dan until you win tournaments, where you can get 5-dan ratings and above. 4-dan amateurs will be very strong players, though, just like Korean 1-kyus. In addition, Chinese ranks tend to be a little stronger than the rest of the world's.

Pashley: That sounds about right. In the Chinese club I played in most (Fuzhou) there was only one guy with good English. He played even against most people in the club, with mixed results against most & consistent losses against the strong guys. He gave me (SDK) four stones and a lot of advice in teaching games, & won them all. He was not rated in China but when he moved to New Zealand, he was immediately rated 3 dan.

Sam: You can actually get 5-dan from testing services too. 6-dan is still limited to national tournaments. Usually the number of 6-dan certificates awarded per tournament is limited to a maximum of three. However, often fewer than this are given out as you need to finish in the top 12 and these positions are often all occupied by 6-dan+ players. 7-dan is awarded for winning certain national tournaments and 8-dan is an honorary rank for winning the World Amateur Go Championship. Currently China has a dozen or so 7-8dan amateurs and several hundred 6-dan amateurs. Also, Chinese ranks are often unreliable (e.g. some 5-dan players could give other 5-dan players four stones).