9th (and 10th?) Official Tournament -- D7 (and others?) Format Change?

[TC_Halogen]

Re: 9th (and 10th?) Official Tournament -- D7 (and others?) Format Change?

You guys are really taking this a bit too bluntly. Saying "why the hell should things change now" is extremely close-minded. Why should the tournaments have been changed from combo scoring to raw scoring? Why should we have added a seventh division? Why should we have dropped the tournament from 10 rounds to 8 rounds?

This thread is open for discussion, but there's absolutely no need to be rude about it.

[omega_grunt666]

Re: 9th (and 10th?) Official Tournament -- D7 (and others?) Format Change?

Elimination is how the officials should ALWAYS be. The point of it is competition.

Reasons?

How does switching the scoring system make it less competitive? If anything it would make it more competitive because even players who aren't fighting to get first in their division still have people to compete with (and form rivalries with) as well as making the first few rounds more interesting for the higher placed players because EVERY. ROUND. MATTERS. (You CANNOT snooze past the elimination line in the first few rounds without jeopardizing your final placement)

Why the hell do we need to change it now? All of the others have been very successful with elimination.

Its a system that has worked, I'm not arguing it doesn't. But there are systems better suited to the game format. Elimination tournaments are very much suited to VS style competitions. They work well for 1v1, Team vs Team, everyone competing on the same level. Because of the variance in skill between divisions and even within them a more ladder like system has much better results. Comparisons can be made to the way LoL or Starcraft handle bronze/silver/gold etc. There is a need for more than one goal however as very few people compete at the highest tier, so its similar to having a prize pool for top bronze/silver/gold players to make sure everyone in the competition has a reasonable goal to shoot for.

As for why now, you're posting in a thread discussing changing the format of the tournament. Obviously there are some people who think there are improvements to be made for people who aren't in the top 3 of their division. Which can be accommodated for without affecting the experience of the people competing to win in a negative way.

Yes we added another division, yes people in that division will get eliminated in the first round but thats how it is for every division...
Its not like they wont get another shot in D7 next year or whenever they want to sign up again.

The point of mentioning divisions is we could have 2, we could have one for every 10 players. Ultimately in an elimination tournament like this you are saying sorry, you can't play because our system places you at the bottom of D-x- instead of the top of D-y-.


What I'm really looking for is someone here to sell me on the idea of why an Elimination format is the best choice. Refute some of my points, give me some example scenarios. If I wanted to hear "because its always been this way" I would go start a religious debate.



Numbers

Though I doubt many people are still checking this thread, I had some numbers flying around in my head keeping me up all night. So for the sake of my own sanity I put them to paper.


I ran a very small tournament on paper, 5 players on 3 songs. I gave each of the players random ratings in four categories (Stream, Jump, Chaos, Speed) that totaled 100, and then gave similar values to the songs. (Two focused on 2/4 different attributes with 100 points, and a perfectly balanced finisher out of 120)

Each player could earn up to as many points in each category as the song would offer, If the player rating was too high they perfected the section and extra points were wasted potential (AAA), and if they were too low they lost points(Goods/Boos)

Players (Stream, Jump, Chaos, Speed)
A. (25, 25, 25, 25)
B. (18, 32, 27, 23)
C. (36, 14, 21, 29)
D. (17, 18, 33, 32)
E. (28, 19, 26, 27)

Songs (Stream, Jump, Chaos, Speed)
1. (30, 20, 30, 20)
2. (20, 30, 20, 30)
3. (30, 30, 30, 30)

I then tried with 3 different scoring formats and 4 different song orders.

Results:

Cumulative Scoring (All Song Order Variations)
(Each players best score is added up)

1st A 280
2nd E 275
3rd B 274
4th D 265
5th C 262

Result: Consistent regardless of number of players in the tournament, song order, etc. Gives a very clear meter on improvements and weaknesses.

Pros: Ties are virtually non-existent, Everyone gets to participate, Everyone can see where they stand in relation to everyone else precisely.
Cons: Less Exciting(?), More pressure to AAA early songs instead of just "doing well enough".

Golf/Par Scoring (All Song Order Variations)
(Just a simple stand in for a non-direct score based system. Players gain points by position on the leader board, 1st is 1, 5th is 5. In this instance I decided for the sake of simplicity to divide points for ties, a three way tie occurred between 3rd and 5th so everyone received 4 points. Lowest wins)


1st A 5
2nd E 6
3rd B 7
4th D 12
5th C 14

Pros: Everyone gets to participate, rough estimation of how well you stack up.
Cons: Less Exciting (?), Might have trouble with tie-breakers but ultimately depends on the final system, number of players/songs, and many other factors. Not very clear compared to cumulative scoring.


Standard Elimination
(Bottom two of round 1 eliminated, Then just the worst, and finally the winner in round 3. Ties were determined by which player would have scored the highest in the next round.

Song Order/Results

(1-2-3)
1st A
2nd B (Was in danger of elimination in round one, three way tie)
3rd E

(2-1-3)
1st A
2nd E
3rd B (Would have scored better than E in finals)

(1-3-2)
1st A
2nd E
3rd B (Could of beat A in finals)

(3-2-1)
1st A
2nd B
3rd E (Would of beat A in finals)

Keep in mind this was a very small sample size, and everyone had equal "skill". In the end the most well balanced player (Perfectly balanced) won, but everything else was a toss up dependent on which songs were played in what order. Also if a different method was used as a tie breaker, Second and third place might have ended up C or D, The least balanced players.

Pros: More exciting (?), Getting placed low in a division means you don't have to play through when you know there is no prizes for you.

Cons: Not every player/song match-up is utilized, outcome is determined by song order. An increasingly large portion of players are left out as rounds progress.



Now its fully possible that all this is garbled nonsense and the only reason it makes sense to me is because A. it reinforced what I had been thinking from the start and B. I haven't been able to sleep all night. But hopefully it was somewhat helpful or insightful to some one out there.

In any case its certainly not happening this tournament, that would be a headache for the staff. But it should definitely be something to look into for next years.

[benguino]

Re: 9th (and 10th?) Official Tournament -- D7 (and others?) Format Change?

Unofficial solution

http://www.flashflashrevolution.com/vbz/showthread.php?t=132600

[RARAWR]

Re: 9th (and 10th?) Official Tournament -- D7 (and others?) Format Change?

The ideas of cumulative doesn't sound feasible for this game.

It reminds me a lot of my love for racing games and well, racing.
During my days playing Burnout Revenge. I would have to enter PvE "Grand Prixs". 5 rounds, 5 tracks. I hardly loss my competitive feel if i didn't nail 1st. There was always a chance to make up for it in future races and that fact made me end up winning all of them. Generally a consistent second place beats abrupt 1st's in cumulative scorings.

I also have frustrations with the scoring system at a place I go-kart. They go by Best Lap Time. Which is cool. Until I race 16 laps, consistently getting 20seconds and on the final lap someone doing 25's nails a 19. If it went by cumulative I would've won hands down.

I also play a game known as Track Mania, and I mainly play the mode Time Race. All the racers (it can vary greatly) are given a good amount of time to beat the course. We all have unlimited restarts, and none of us can physically affect an opposing player (we just phase through them). Most times I am introduced to a track I've never played before, but I give it a few goes, figure out my mistakes and end up passing with a decent time, or I end up hitting the same curb 15 times and I lose. This is mode is scored like elimination, best score in X amount of time wins. I like to call it perfection under pressure.

So I have won/lost/felt-utterly-cheated with both methods of scoring. Then there is FFR. Nothing in front of you but the keyboard, and the screen. You have 168 hours to achieve your best score, there is no variation out of your control, there is no force preventing you from achieving your best score other than you and your ability. You are up against an extensive number of opponents, but your ability isn't physically affect by any of them, so really if there were only 10 you'd play just as well if there were 110.

The Tournament should remain elimination because it isn't a on-the-spot one try event, with unpredictable factors in every individual play. It's an extended challenge that wants to know your best score possible in a week, you can restart (the song) as many times as you need. You can even lower the rate to practice, and view replays to see your mistakes. It's a lot different than almost every cumulatively scored game where the same mode can change extensively due to players and the additional factors they create. Not to mention said games goes by your rounds score, not your best one out of possibly hundreds of attempts.

To sum it up we are given too many attempts (and possibly handicaps) to require a cumulative scoring system.

[popsicle_3000]

Re: 9th (and 10th?) Official Tournament -- D7 (and others?) Format Change?

only for d7 for reasons OWA mentioned. improvements at that level are a lot smaller