New Improved

Introduction

After many years posting at least once a month, it's been six weeks since my last post. That's a long gap for me. It was brought about by quite a few factors. Some, like the Christmas & New Year holidays, were expected, but others were not (DIY for example).

Back in mid-November, I mentioned I was taking a break from ADLG for at least a year. The plan was to start fresh in 2026. That gave me about six weeks to wrap up all the ADLG posts I’d been planning (plus one that wasn’t). I managed to get the final post done just after Christmas. Since then, I’ve been keeping busy, but mostly behind the scenes.

With the weather grey and overcast, painting was out of the question - one of the drawbacks of relying solely on natural light. Looking for a way to fill the dark days, I turned to a bit of archiving. That small task soon led to some weeding, which in turn became a full-blown project lasting several weeks.

What follows is an account of that venture - a post about blogging and technology. You have been warned!

Analysing ADLG Player Numbers

Introduction

This carries on from the previous post with a much more detailed analysis of the data from the BHGS and ADLG rankings.

It is a more structured analysis using database techniques to correct the data (where possible) and tackle the quirks of the two data sets.

It aims to quantify the number of regular players, those attending infrequently, those who stop playing and also how many players haven't played since Covid.

ADLG: Global Rankings And Player Numbers

This is the last of my planned posts on ADLG. It's a postscript to my November post in which I announced that I was taking a break from ADLG for at least a year and follows on from my post about the BHGS ADLG rankings.

ADLG: A Wishlist For Version 5

Now that I've stopped playing ADLG I thought I'd write a "manifesto" of things that I would like to see changed in any future version. Please note I have no idea if a new version is planned and don't want to start any rumours.

Why?

ADLG has reached the stage where it can be considered a mature set of tournament rules, but the pool of UK tournament players hasn't changed markedly since 2018.¹ So, I would like to see changes focused on reducing the barrier(s) to adoption and tournament play.

From a strictly UK perspective, text clarity and improved online support would help both casual players and the large number of occasional tournament players.²

I don't think the small group of frequent tournament players are clamouring for change. They are more than likely confident in their understanding of ADLG's finer points (or they should be).³

However, a new version might combat groupthink where (regional or national) groups develop different interpretations of "how things are played".^{4, 5}