uowned, yes, one of the ways. I also thought about that:
http://en.lichess.org/forum/lichess-feedback/request-possibility-to-deduct-timeNow there is a possibility to do Berserk in tournaments, so you can play 30 sec against 1 minute.
It's a good way to train your skills playing with weaker opponents.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rt3bVyTKv2UThis is how Magnus Carlsen does it. :)
Anyway, creating a thirty-seconds game is very important when you playing against same-level opponent, want to play really fast (when both sides has 30 seconds, they really accelerate).
I find such very fast games a good training for time trouble in bullet. Often, especially in the end you need to play unbelievably fast. If you are trained in games I offered (even if you mostly don't play it) you can then easily solve any time troubles in minute bullet. Also it trains your reaction very well.
I think the minus button should be. In the same time, when you want to play a rated game when you want to have only 30 seconds, you want probably your opponent, which is same skilled to have also 30 seconds on his clock. So you need, when creating rated game, official 30 seconds time control.
Let's discuss your offering anyway in this theme:
http://en.lichess.org/forum/lichess-feedback/request-possibility-to-deduct-timeAs it's closer to it. Actually it's the same.
And yes, Lichess is the best site! If it will have thirty seconds mode also, it will be then the most perfect of all perfect, greatest, outstanding, incredible things ever were created by humanity!!!
Just have tested the 30sec game and it brings a lot of excitement.
You got my full support
I'd do 30 secs (if we can call it the "half minute" as it sounds cooler!)
I like the solution offered in #10 with a minus next to your own Time control, but I think it should disappear after the match starts in the same way that the berserk button disappears in tournaments after both sides play their first move (maybe if casual it can stay indefinitely). I feel like 0:30 v 0:30 would not be any better than 1 v 1, I usually only get to an endgame in 1 v 1 with 20 seconds left on my own and my opponents clock (40 seconds at most if the position really rushed it but that's rare). Therefore this would basically be bullet that seldom exceeds midgame and I don't know how that would feel.
EugeneJudo, the idea with creating minus button is very good. There are situations where you do play with lower rated opponents and to develop your skills you want to handicap the game. It will be helpful in training casual games. And it's better than to handicap artificially or play in your full strength, when you know that you win anyway even playing lightly.
Still there is a big obstacle for using it in rated games. Because if you decrease your time playing against worse player, that will influence unnaturally on elo rating. But rating system is created to reflect the real rating of chess players.
So the minus button is good, as I think, only for casual training games.
Also (should whether it stay indefinitely or appear only in a starting position) you can't sometimes say in the beginning, how game will evolve. Might be, you play against same skilled opponent but somehow you've got forty seconds against his twenty, so you want to discard from the spare fifteen-sixteen seconds on your clock. I guess, accordingly, it should stay during an all game.
It's really, as you say, is usual that endgame in bullet unfolds after thirty-forty seconds. This is how you win a bullet. If you try to play too fast, you will leave an open possibility for your opponent to punish you (even if he had fifteen seconds less). It's an average practice to spend the first two thirds of the game in bullet on opening and middle-game.
It seems it will turn into a clipped game without the finishing part, if it will be two times shorter. But, as my practice shows, players accelerate, compare to the usual minute bullet. If you do not do this you will be just won on time. And as you speed up, your game will turn into the end part, analogically to 1+0, after twenty seconds of the whole thirty. And in the same time the necessity to exchange pieces (making best of possible and fastest moves) promotes the beginning of endgame very much in such game.
If you will just move pieces thoughtlessly in a half-minute game, you probably will be able to win a player who's elo is four or five hundreds lower than yours. But this tactics is mistaken, because it's possible to checkmate having only thirty seconds on your clock (though in average, of course, you need to be, probably, at least 1500 rated player). But same is in bullet. If you play with a weak opponent you can win just moving your bishop insanely.
Playing half-minute game, though it requires very fast moves, still as well requires making good moves (or you will be checkmated or put in a bad position, as in usual bullet game).
That's why I stand for half a minute games. They are exiting and need your chess/bullet skills. :)
I want to provide some statistics also:
I opened the advanced search, took the period of time for the last five months.
What I've got (for the last five months):
The amount of games that are less than one minute is 4,685,124 (4,425,866 if we take only standard chess).
The amount of atomic games (all time controls) is 275,311.
Antichess: 472,685.
Chess960: 235,955.
Horde: 127,833.
Three-Check: 163,230.
King of the hill: 220,548.
As we can see (for the last five months), the variants separately are twenty-thirty times less popular than games within one minute itself.
But we definitely can say that this variants are worth its implementing.
What I want to say is that, as we can indefinably imagine, half-minute games even if they will be thirty times less popular than usual 1+0 and 0+1 still are not less worthy than Horde chess or Three-Check (as it's seen from the statistics).
But what do you think, how popular can be thirty seconds games compare to present bullets to the minute? As we can see, people like this idea, so, probably it could be that every eleventh-thirteenth game within a minute will be half-minute game. If it would be compared to the aforecited statistics it must be 350,000-450,000 (almost the popularity of antichess).
I think, if my thoughts are right about the possible popularity (though I come to this conclusion intuitively) of half of a minute games, then such games are worth to bring them to the site.
:)
I just had some interesting 30sec games with mr Chesstroll and I fully support this idea. An option to play games with more detailed time controls (minutes and seconds) as well as an option to be able to give one player a time handicap/bonus both seem relatively easy to implement and could only be beneficial to this site. I understand that priorities in developing the site may lie elsewhere, but it would be great to have this implemented in the long run.
I support implementing this time control too. It's very good for premove training, when both sides have to premove most of the moves... Moreover, it's just fun :)