2 replies to this topic

[INKBALL]

Hey guys,

For further tournament i suggest that PGI think of making divisions:

Division A with best teams going to D as less competitive teams (or for fun). Max 20 teams or so per division.

A - top 5 places in finals
B - top 2 Places in finals
C - top team in final
D - no finalist
E - If needed

A1 vs C
A2 vs B2
A3 vs B1
A4 vs A5

Could rate teams with grading players from this season in their final position ( lets say top 5 team's player worth 20 points and top 10 10 points, then top 20, 8 and on and on), so stacked up team cant get easily on tier B-C, and Bad team cant get to tier A without serious team/score.

So everyone could have more fun. Playing against their level or ''having matches'' without ''wasting'' so much time playing non-competitive matches,

[R 13]

I'd like to see (and have-seen) more of a "world cup" format.

With 150 teams (close to accurate for NA) you could have 30 groups of 5 teams each. Each group of 5 teams plays round-robin. Two best teams come out of each group (with wild-cards as necessary). This populates a standard double-elim bracket.

This accomplishes several of the good aspects of the current format while also alleviating several of the pain-points.

Like the Current format:

• There is no need to seed teams based on perceived skill relative to one another / avoids accusations of favoritism by organizers. This was definitely a positive of the pure RR format.
  
• All Entrants are guaranteed to play multiple matches. The number of matches you want to guarantee can be tuned via group size in the group phase. No one likes to go through the trouble of organizing a team and practicing to be one and done (even teams who are already organized).
  
• There will be measurable anticipation with how the round robin phase pans out....but a much quicker payoff.

Negatively Unlike the current format:

• As with the soccer/futbal/fußball tournament, there exists the potential for one or more "groups of death" due to the random nature, such that you could end up with EMP, SJR, SRS,Lords, etc. all in a single group. This would potentially detract from later-round hype, but could also open the door for other up-and-coming teams (witness D5 this tournament) to shine.
  
  • This could be avoided by using the current tournament results to partially seed a number of the groups with the top regional teams being spread out, and then randomly filling in the rest.

Positively Unlike the current format:

• The schedule would be significantly condensed (~300 matches for opening round(s) vs. literally thousands for current format)
  
  • This would keep MWO-related divorce rates low, maintaining dual income and leaving less money for lawyers and more money for mech packs
    
  • This would also keep relations between teams and organizers more fresh and lead to less community contentiousness in-general
    
  • This would leave calendar space open for other official leagues/tournaments aside from just the World Championship.
• Teams that were there to have fun, but who didn't have a realistic chance of making it to later rounds still have fun, but are not taxed with keeping their team together for literally half a year.
  
  • This would also reduce work for organizers having to keep track of who's dropped out and who hasn't.
• Scheduling of matches becomes easier. Each group of 5 teams would play a total of 10 matches, which could be accomplished in a day or two at most.
  
• Hype/Publicity would gradually increase in later rounds of the double-elim bracket as higher profile match-ups came to the fore. I feel the current tournament had an initial hype spike, that tailed off significantly with the grind of RR matches before creeping back up with the imminence of the regional finals...but not to the same level as the first few weeks of play
  
  There, that's just me spit-balling now that my team is all-but-finished with the qualification phase.
  
  I think the roughest part of the current tournament has been the work-game balance. 6+ months is a long time to take a game seriously and a lot of "life" can happen in that time. We've fielded pilots playing from laptops in their cars on phone hotpots outside of business deals; playing from the back-room of dance clubs party-in-progress; logging in from the bathroom while on a date..... I've personally moved across the country, bought a house, sold another one, and managed to only miss like 3 match nights...My wife is a saint.
  
  So last recommendation: maybe a little more roster redundancy. 16 on the roster for an 8v8 tournament would probably have kept several teams in it who "barely" had to forfeit or drop-out.

[justcallme A S H]

INKBALL, on 16 September 2016 - 06:58 AM, said:

Could rate teams with grading players from this season in their final position ( lets say top 5 team's player worth 20 points and top 10 10 points, then top 20, 8 and on and on), so stacked up team cant get easily on tier B-C, and Bad team cant get to tier A without serious team/score.

How do you work that out effectively? Plenty of good teams/players have/had to pull out because of the insane commitment level and the elephant in the room, they wouldn't make top 5 and thus pulled out because - why waste their time?

It's a good idea but it's flat out impossible to work it out from this tournament. Just run it like a tennis "bracket" knock-out with a best of 3 games or do random leagues of 5-10 teams like soccer worlds. Far less commitment, people know where they stand and you run the luck of the draw.

Edited by justcallme A S H, 27 September 2016 - 05:20 PM.