Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Mar 12, 2017, 9:21 AM
You mean live tournaments?
A good idea, but not easy to do in practice anymore, as you can see from the ongoing one. I might organize more in the future, perhaps focus on live speed tournaments first where the whole tournament can be played in one evening
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Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Nov 2, 2017, 10:59 PM
I actually just created a post in the live tournament forum, but it really should go here since it's more of a general feedback and observation...and in line with both of your comments. -------------------------------------------- in lieu of the "16th Anniversary World Champion Tournament 2015"
so 16 forfeits over 5 rounds with 24 people originally signed up right? I'm just as guilty so I've no complaints for choosing to bow out. Though I was wondering if it is in pente.orgs best interest to even try something like this in future. Live play is fun but doing a tournament with this current format (at 2 years and counting) is probably not beneficial.
I think live play is ideal for that one on one fast play feeling and needs to be around just for the times when folks can meet up here and get that right now over and done with...classic experience of "pente in the tube, with the glass stones". Though if the game room occupancy these days is any indicator, I tend to agree with Dmitri that this site is more turn-based these days so a live tournament aspect seems in review not really feasible (unless some HARD built-in and enforcible time limits are in place...no excuses, you miss the window you're screwed period.)
Something really needs to change in the time limits area in order to enforce a timely completion, Rainwolf shouldn't need to get on individual message boards and constantly nag players to set a time....this is a fail.
That's just my take with this last "2015" Live tournament and some of the things I noticed about playing in it.
Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Nov 3, 2017, 12:16 AM
I'll reply here, since Brf said this forum is a better place for his post, and also, I do not see a "reply" button in the other forum.
In no particular order, here are my thoughts:
1) I agree with everything Brf said. 16 forfeits is absurd and clearly indicative of a problem with the tournament structure. And, Rainwolf already has his hands full responding to various requests for various things. As Brf said, Rainwolf shouldn't have to hassle people to begin a round or a match.
2) I'm not really interested in hearing lengthy explanations of WHY the tournament from 2015 is still going. Instead, I'll offer some suggestions.
Has anyone given any thought to a round robin tournament? Divide the players into 2 or more brackets of 8 to 10 players each. Maybe even 12 players (if we have 24 entrants, for example). Forgive me if the round robin format was already used; I'm just assuming it wasn't, otherwise I figure the tournament would have been over long ago.
This method solves a few problems. For starters, there won't be six rounds. If we have 24 players and set them into 2 brackets of 12 (or even 3 brackets of 8), we'll immediately be reduced to somewhere between 2 and 4 players, at which point a final bracket of 2 to 4 players will begin, again in round robin format.
Oh, I forgot to mention one crucial thing that is essential to making this work: THERE WILL BE NO "DRAWS."
The set-based scoring system is crucial for the overall growth of the game, but, it's a major hindrance to running a tournament. Thus, all games will be played unrated, with each individual game being a win or a loss. Each match-up will still consist of two games, one of each color, but if the two games are split, then each player gets a win and a loss, and that's that.
The player(s) with the most points wins that bracket and advances to the next round.
Also, games in progress should (must, really) be hidden from view by other players. This is actually a change I think should be implemented for all games as soon as possible. I do like the idea of being able to see who is playing whom (It helps with decisions on who to challenge - I'd rather not challenge someone who already seems to be bogged down with a high number of games), but I think that's where it should end. A snapshot of the game position should not be publicly visible. (This probably should be discussed in a separate topic with regard to non-tournament games, but I personally would be disinclined to play a tournament that has the ongoing games publicly visible. In fact, for a tournament, I'd like to see the games delayed going into the database until each round is completed, is possible. I realize this would probably create a lot of work for Rainwolf, and quite possibly isn't feasible, but it would be a potential problem if someone comes up with a great defense, beats someone with it, but then everyone else gets to see the game and study it, which the first victim didn't get to do. In fact, just in general, even without some sort of awesome new defense, players who intentionally play slowly could benefit from slow play by waiting until opponents' matches are in the database and studying those games to use against them.
This round robin format would work best with a short time limit. I'd prefer 3 days, though I can see a case for 5. 7 days is too much. And no vacation time should be allowed.
There are some potential problems. 5 days might be difficult for some to deal with in a round robin structure that will require playing a large number of games at the same time. Oh well. Anyone who has a concern that it will be too much to handle should rethink the decision to enter the tournament. If you're the kind of person who likes to log in only once every 3 or 4 days and make a bunch of moves, the tournament would probably not be a good idea. Anyone who cannot log in every day, or at least every other day, will likely not be able to keep up.
Stalling is a possible problem, which I hope we can eliminate by simply requesting that players not stall. I've encountered a few stallers on here, and it's frustrating. To be clear - taking a long time to make moves in a difficult, unclear game is not stalling. When I say "stalling," I'm referring to taking 5 days to make a single forced move, and then waiting another 5 days and making a pointless extension, and so on. This is annoying in regular games, but in the tournament, maybe it should be considered an infraction of some sort. I'm really not a big fan of stalling and pointless extensions, all in the hopes that, what, the opponent will misclick or time out or something? I think such techniques go against the spirit of the game and are something of an abuse of the turn-based format.
One other possible concern, and I'll use hypothetical players here to illustrate: Two top players, rated 2800. Let's call them Bobby and Garry. 7 low-rated players, rated 1000. And a middle to top tier player rated 2300. We'll call him Josh.
Bobby and Garry will likely split with each other and sweep the low rated players. Thus, the entire bracket (or tournament, if it's a single bracket) could hinge on the games That Bobby and Garry each play against Josh. It's very possible that Bobby, for example, will sweep Josh, whereas Garry might, despite his best efforts, be able to earn only a split against Josh. Bobby would then advance or win, and Garry wouldn't, possibly because Josh played a strong line as player 1 against Garry players but a dud against the Bobby.
Oh well. That's the way it goes. It just puts more pressure on the title contenders to make sure they win as player 2 and as player 1. A set-based scoring system, especially in a heads-up format instead of round robin, allows for laziness in the sense that a player can just decide, "All I need to do is hold as player 1 and I can never lose and never be eliminated, and eventually my opponent will blunder in one of his games as player 1." Or something to that effect.
This is, basically, the way IYT used to run turn-based tournaments - and those finished relatively quickly; in fact, they had 4 or 5 a month (They started once a week, on Wednesdays, if I recall). They used smaller brackets of 4 or 5, which we could do if enough players express concern over larger brackets. Though, I think the brackets should have a minimum of 6. The goal should be to have the brackets be as large as realistically possible, to decrease the likelihood of a tie, and to decrease the likelihood of the tournament going too many rounds.
Either way, it's possible for the tournament to reduce to a single bracket of 2 players, which could drag on for months or longer. I had some IYT matches in the past (Gary Barnes, Ilurath, Virag, Snut, Ksackett, just off the top of my head)that became heads-up, and were one split after another; sometimes not ending until both players wrote to IYT requesting they be declared co-champions. That's a possible issue with any format, so it's not worth worrying about at the moment.
I'm interested in hearing other thoughts ideas and opinions and suggestions.
Message was edited by: dmitriking at Nov 3, 2017 12:17 AM
Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Nov 3, 2017, 3:04 AM
I think Dmitri has a good idea with switching the tournament over to a round robin format, though I think that having no draws and unrated games isn't strictly necessary for the round robin format. If each player plays two sets against each other player in the section, the player or players with the top point scores advance to the next round, with more than one person advancing if two or more people end up with the same score. Winning a set counts as one point, drawing a set counts as 1/2 point.
Retired from TB Pente, but still playing live games & exploring variants like D, poof and boat
Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Nov 3, 2017, 3:20 AM
That's a good point about sets and draws, and at the moment, I'm pretty sure I agree. If the format is round robin, we could still play in sets, since a draw will still penalize a player relative to a competitor who was able to sweep that same opponent.
And in that scenario, we could still have the games rated, since set-based ratings adjustments would still be made.
Watsu, just to clarify something you wrote - "If each player plays two sets against each other player in the section"
Did you mean to say "two sets" against each player? or two games? I would assume 2 games (and therefore 1 set), but I wasn't sure. If 2 sets, that would really bog things down, with 4 games going simultaneously against each of anywhere from 3 to 7 opponents. (And of course, many players would be overwhelmed by that workload, probably even including the high volume players.)
STREET SIGN CAPTCHA UPDATE (Since I know you're all highly focused on this "issue.":
For the first time ever, I solved the "street sign" captcha. But it took EIGHT "verifications" to do so. I think I preferred when it gave me 3 chances and then moves on to the "cars" one.
Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Nov 3, 2017, 5:01 AM
Well, I was thinking 2 sets, but if that seems too much I'm open to 1 set per opponent in the section as well. I just recall a BK tourney I was in had each player playing 2 sets. One set per opponent would definitely make everyone's work load easier. I wonder how come you end up with so many street signs? I was getting them for awhile, but I figured it was because I was posting links. On a post like this, I'm just required to check the box to prove I'm not a robot.
Message was edited by: watsu at Nov 3, 2017 5:01 AM
Retired from TB Pente, but still playing live games & exploring variants like D, poof and boat
Re: tournaments in general
Posted:
Nov 3, 2017, 5:42 AM
1. 4 day time limit 2. no vacation days 3. maybe different formats every so often (single elim, double elim and round robin) 4. rating ranges ie above some number and others bellow some number 5. I'd prefer rated in 2 game sets
