Question About Leagues

After promotion, are you immediately entered into a division?

If not, it seems a good strategy to get promoted would be to wait until the last day or two of the week to play, because your new division will be full of people who haven't been accumulating trophies, so you'd only have to grind a day or two instead of all week.

i mean after promotion its always a different division but you start new without old points

That's not what I'm asking.

No because the leagues start as soon as you go online chess.com

well you are immediately entered into a division, thats what they do

I wasn't in a wood league until I played a game.

So that isn't the case for non-wood leagues i.e. I'll always be entered into a division?

And maybe I was also in a wood division but I couldn't see it until I played a game?

Another question, the button "leave league" implies you're not leaving your division, you're leaving the league and will start over either at wood or the league below your current one. Is this accurate?

Because if you can leave and rejoin into the same league (just different division) then it would be a good idea to keep track of the current leaderboard near the end of the week, and then next week if you're promoted, you can quit and rejoin if any of them are in your division.

Of course a strategy like this is pretty pointless most of the time, but chess.com is offering cash prizes so...

Anyway, it may not be the case that you're automatically entered into a division, because they mentioned divisions needing to "fill" up to 50 before they start.

But since promotions all happen at once there's no point in mentioning this unless after promotion you're not entered into a division until you play a game.

Divisions reset on Sunday, unless it started on or after Friday, when it resets the following Sunday. After the reset, your first qualifying game will put you in a new division.

Leaving the league does not reset your tier, just the division. If you later join, you'll be placed in a new division on the same tier you were on.

Ok, so it's possible to start a new division with 3 days left. That seems to be an easier way to pass lower leagues (it may be a risky strategy in higher leagues considering they may not fill to 50 people in time).

Ok, thanks.

It seems kinda obvious to not name the button "leave league" but whatever, they didn't ask me.

just to be clear, lets say you decide to leave your league. if you join a new league like 5 days later, are you gunna be put into the same league as before, or are you gunna have to start all the way back from wood league?

Apparently there are no demotions for any reason.

"Leave league" only changes your division.

Just be warned that if you join a new division 5 days later, you'll be out of sync with the latest divisions i.e. you wont have a chance for promotion until 1 week after them.

Most of the time that wont matter, but if you're trying for money then it's good to know (the first people into champion win diamond memberships, and the top trophy earners win money).

It's possible only people active in the first week will make it into the first Champion league. There's less than 2.5 million people in the running, so depending how ties end up impacting things, there might be some from the second week needed to get it to fill up, with a chance that will fill up an additional division.

Will be interesting to see how it plays out.

Out of curiosity do you have any estimate for how many of the initial total will be in champion league? You mention 2.5 million, so I'm just wondering.

Wait, the top 40% advance, then the top 30% and so on...

To roughly estimate the dropout rate, let's say after each promotion, 1% of players disappear (don't play a game so never enter a division, account closure, etc). So we have 1 in roughly 120,000 will make it to champion league. Starting with 2.5 million, we can only expect 20 of this initial batch will make it. Seems you're right.

Meaning it's not too late to close your current account and set up your initial ratings and RD to where you think they might be best

I estimated 39 making it to Champion the first week it is possible, but that was also assuming a lot higher numbers getting in before Friday this week. Will have to see how many Wood and Stone there are in week two to guess further.

you could play all of your games on the last day. in the end, it's just about AMOUNT of playing. as you can only WIN points when winning or drawing, amount of games lost doesn't matter. even if you lose like 500 ELO in the process, only your wins are counted, so...

There's absolutely no way, outside of the lower leagues, you could make up the needed games if only one day was played.

If i dont play for 3 days and week 43 started 2 days ago how do i join now.