Rules of the Lichess Bots Championship

This is a double elimination tournament. You have to be a lichess BOT to participate. The bracket can be seen at http://challonge.com/w0w7oxy9. Ajile is the arbiter.

Please only join the tournament if you're willing to complete it. Players are encouraged to contact their opponents and make arrangements that both players agree to (based on when they can play). If this doesn't work, the white player can use "Play with a friend" exactly 5 days after the round has started and send the link to both the black player and Ajile. Ajile will also send the link to the black player (without opening it). Each round has to be able to start exactly one week after the previous one, so the results have to be known before then (otherwise Ajile will choose the winner based on who did the most to make the match happen).

During each round the players do the following to determine who has won the match:
1. Play two standard 15+45 rated games (one with white and one with black), the first mentioned player starts with white. Post the results on the Lichess Bots Championship Forum.
2. If the result was 1-1, play two standard 5+15 rated games (one with white and one with black), the second mentioned player starts with white. Post the results on the Lichess Bots Championship Forum.
3. If the result was 1-1 again, play two standard 5+15 rated games (one with white and one with black), the first mentioned player starts with white. Post the results on the Lichess Bots Championship Forum.
4. If the result was 1-1 again, play two standard 1+3 rated games (one with white and one with black), the second mentioned player starts with white. Post the results on the Lichess Bots Championship Forum.
5. If the result was 1-1 again, play one standard 1+3 casual game, the first mentioned player starts with white and has to win, otherwise black has won. Post the results on the Lichess Bots Championship Forum.

Tournament seeding is determined by (excluding ratings with question marks behind them):
1. The Classical rating of the lichess bots.
2. The Correspondence rating of the lichess bots.
3. The Rapid rating of the lichess bots.
4. The Bullet rating of the lichess bots.
5. The names of the lichess bots (alphabetically).

At the end statistics will be created so you can see how well you did (in general, but also in comparison to other bots that use similar hardware or that are of a similar type: lichess.org/forum/general-chess-discussion/types-of-bots-on-lichess).

While I generally like increment, is there a reason why to play with so much increment?
Also, not a big deal but shouldn't White get a time advantage in the final armageddon game? Maybe 1:30 + increment vs 1 min + increment.

The idea is that each bot will have at least that amount of time (the increment) for each move. A time advantage is often given in armageddon games (and maybe it would be an improvement), but it is very uncommon on lichess and I'm not sure how much of a time advantage should be given in games between bots. Either way hopefully the winner is decided before point 5.

As said, I do agree with increment however it does seem like a lot. Typical time controls are e.g. 15'+10'' or so.

I (human me) have played an armageddon (rapid) game before on lichess: lichess.org/zM37GYDR/black#0
Bots usually don't scale as well with more time as humans do. (or maybe one should rather say, they don't do as poorly with less time, for various reasons e.g. calculating 100000 engine moves vs 1000000 engine moves is less impactful as e.g. 1 human variation vs 10 human variations in a hypothetical 10x time odd) So they should be compensated significantly for having to win, thus my suggested 30s bonus.

Furthermore, once we reach the final games there will probably be a lot of Stockfish vs Stockfish which could mean loads of draws so it's not unlikely to reach that stage.

I understand your reasoning, it's something to consider for the next Lichess Bots Championship.

If the first eight games don't provide a winner, then both bots are very equal. Unfortunately we can't leave it at that.

I don't like drawing of lots, but I also don't really like the armageddon game. Even though the player with less time often has a bigger advantage (only having to draw), I don't really like that you can lose a championship in a winning position because you started with less time. With the current rules the color you get is sort of a drawing of lots because you probably want to be the one who only has to draw. But you still have to play a 'normal' game to decide who wins the match.

This only happens at point 5 and the tournament is double elimination to make sure the winner of the tournament deserved to win it.

Why would you lose a winning position though because of the less time? It's played with increment and even if it wasn't, bots have no problems with playing really fast.

Besides, is there a reason not to play a Swiss or even an RR with that small number of players? The point of something elimination based is because it takes less rounds, however with this few players you could easily play a RR tournament. (especially since like that you can schedule much easier because you know all opponents in advance)

A round-robin tournament would also have been good (especially with a small amount of participants). I decided to describe the rules before bots chose to participate and to use those rules regardless of how many would join.

Round Robin is good but we should find an hour that we can play, small time controls. About the first statement I mean to play all the matches one after another and if a bot doesn't come it will not play.

I think the best bot should always be mentioned first. What do you think?