1. We changed the rule back to 2590 because we just felt that it was becoming too big an advantage to have high rated players. This decision was decided on before the season began, and we expect to keep it at 2590, as this way any 2600+ automatically gets some bonus. At the time our plan was to go down 10 points every year until we felt it was becoming a bit too much.

2. In this type of league its mandatory to have a relatively lax playoff qualification, otherwise too many teams will be out of it at the end of the season, resulting in too many lopsided matches where one team has nothing concrete to play for. It’s not as if the players are getting paid thousands of dollars per game, so there needs to be some incentive. I believe the advantages we have instituted give the top seed a very strong chance of making the finals, probably like 40-45%, all other things being equal. I think this is a pretty serious number, and makes the regular season quite important after all.

3. Katerina Rohonyan now lives in Seattle.

4. Queens can actually play 3 of their top players, especially when they use Ostrovskiy on Board 4, who is probably about 100 pts higher rated now.