OK long post. I kind of address a lot of things over the past couple of pages. Sometimes directly. Sometimes not. If you think I missed something... get angry! Kick off!
Well I want to scrap round difference either way. Under the current system, matches could be as short as 9 matches and as long as 16 (before tiebreakers). In the proposed system that changes to 8 and 18 (before tiebreakers). Arguably still a bit long but I think the fact that you don't play rounds after losing will help keep matches interesting throughout. They won't feel like a chore (as they often can, now).
That's the plan anyway.
As for actually getting them scheduled... I think it'll be ok. I'm going to start making it clearer what will be expected of teams scheduling wise, for each tournament. If they can't fulfill the expectations, that'll be that.
My current thinking is to keep the ENL going, at least for another cycle. It is useful to have something providing regular competitive matches. While I think a ladder, where teams could play at their own pace would be preferable, I don't really have the means to set something like that up. All the good ones require a dedicated site that handles all the complex formulae etc. I'm not convinced a big Div C style ladder, with all the teams in it would actually work. Division C takes time to provide an accurate sorting of teams. After 9 match weeks, that's just about done for 10-14 teams. For ~30, that would be a lot more. On top of that, you have a large amount of regular participation from teams demanded by the ladder, with all the picking and scheduling. I'll think about it though.
As for prize money, it would be attached to one person. The team would have to trust them to spread it around. I don't think that's a problem.
. Though seriously, potentially unending>potentially unfair. But yes, for the ENL draws would make more sense.
@Baron: It might be arrogance on my part but I honestly feel like I could make some sort of prize system work. As long as it wasn't too much money and the parameters of the whole thing were set out very clearly before the start, then I don't expect too many complaints. Though, as with everything else, since this is run on a forum things can easily get blown out of proportion (everyone has the same platform to shout from). Either way, I would be very interested in hearing specifics about what went wrong when you attempted a similar thing - either here or via PM.
As for certain teams having difficulty playing... I think firstly, teams could probably play a lot more than they think and secondly, well where's the cutoff? These kind of tournaments have huge merits over those which drag on for months on end. If it's the case that you genuinely can't find 8 reliable players to put in a team, then don't.
I'd argue that the roster situation is pretty good right now. For tournament matches like this, I can't see too many mistakes occurring... perhaps even less if there was some cash up for grabs. Perhaps less dropouts too. Though in my opinion/experience most dropouts seem to come from sustained periods of frustration if a team is underperforming in the ENL or whatever and can't do anything about it, due to the format. In a single elimination tournament, you really don't get the chance to have that. If you sign up for a two week tournament, I can't see many teams not at least playing until they lose.
I also predict the next Mount&Blade game will be big. Everyone must know someone who bangs on about Mount&Blade all the time (except me, I just know people who know someone who bangs on about Mount&Blade all the time) and when the new game comes out, all those people will be giving it a serious look. It will be very saturated at the time of release and as long as things are in place, ready for the boom (they weren't for Warband, it took/is taking ages for us to really get organised), I expect a pretty big scene could emerge.
Nubijuki's suggestion is to basically run tournaments throughout a period of time, which would give you points that enable you to qualify for a final tournament at the end. I like the idea as a whole but the problems with it are twofold.
The first is that it regresses back to a system where players are once again disincentivised to form new teams (due to the persistent nature of the system). The second is that a good team could get enough points to qualify and then have nothing really to do... I don't know I just feel like it's worth experimenting with the fast tournament format first, before we start going crazy with it.
Even then, what I'd be more inclined to do is set up similarly fast tournaments but have 5 a side ones, fight and destroy etc.
Well I want to scrap round difference either way. Under the current system, matches could be as short as 9 matches and as long as 16 (before tiebreakers). In the proposed system that changes to 8 and 18 (before tiebreakers). Arguably still a bit long but I think the fact that you don't play rounds after losing will help keep matches interesting throughout. They won't feel like a chore (as they often can, now).
That's the plan anyway.
As for actually getting them scheduled... I think it'll be ok. I'm going to start making it clearer what will be expected of teams scheduling wise, for each tournament. If they can't fulfill the expectations, that'll be that.
My current thinking is to keep the ENL going, at least for another cycle. It is useful to have something providing regular competitive matches. While I think a ladder, where teams could play at their own pace would be preferable, I don't really have the means to set something like that up. All the good ones require a dedicated site that handles all the complex formulae etc. I'm not convinced a big Div C style ladder, with all the teams in it would actually work. Division C takes time to provide an accurate sorting of teams. After 9 match weeks, that's just about done for 10-14 teams. For ~30, that would be a lot more. On top of that, you have a large amount of regular participation from teams demanded by the ladder, with all the picking and scheduling. I'll think about it though.
As for prize money, it would be attached to one person. The team would have to trust them to spread it around. I don't think that's a problem.
Seem to remember hearing someone say the same thing about the tiebreaker system in the NCLord Rich said:
. Though seriously, potentially unending>potentially unfair. But yes, for the ENL draws would make more sense.I would like to start thinking about having proper rules on this. I was cautious about it before but I think a fixed system could work half decently. Perhaps something like allowing insant restarts at spawn swap (no subs) and an unplayed round at map change (i.e. you let the timer run out for one round and that constitutes the break - 5 mins).Lord Rich said:
A lot of people share this sentiment. However, what I think is that when it's clear the toughest competition (i.e. the best teams, not just the best old teams are all competing) then people will start taking the tournaments more seriously than the league. We might even get some very tough new teams popping up, just because there is less waiting around. I think the long term waiting perhaps keeps players tied into situations longer than they might do otherwise, since it would take so long to get to that level if they moved teams.Lord Rich said:
I don't expect it to be quite so stagnant in competitive play. Tactics will probably force it into a battle situation quite regularly... that's my theory anyway.Lord Rich said:
@Baron: It might be arrogance on my part but I honestly feel like I could make some sort of prize system work. As long as it wasn't too much money and the parameters of the whole thing were set out very clearly before the start, then I don't expect too many complaints. Though, as with everything else, since this is run on a forum things can easily get blown out of proportion (everyone has the same platform to shout from). Either way, I would be very interested in hearing specifics about what went wrong when you attempted a similar thing - either here or via PM.
As for certain teams having difficulty playing... I think firstly, teams could probably play a lot more than they think and secondly, well where's the cutoff? These kind of tournaments have huge merits over those which drag on for months on end. If it's the case that you genuinely can't find 8 reliable players to put in a team, then don't.
Well in theory they could be chosen by teams. That just wouldn't be my preferred method of doing it and I don't expect that's how I'd do it for any tournament I'd run. What I might do is pick some specific setups to ensure balance and interest throughout the competition. Though only if I wasn't competing.ModusTollens said:
No, there's much more admin involved in the league than tournaments like this could ever offer up. I'm certain of that.ModusTollens said:
I'd argue that the roster situation is pretty good right now. For tournament matches like this, I can't see too many mistakes occurring... perhaps even less if there was some cash up for grabs. Perhaps less dropouts too. Though in my opinion/experience most dropouts seem to come from sustained periods of frustration if a team is underperforming in the ENL or whatever and can't do anything about it, due to the format. In a single elimination tournament, you really don't get the chance to have that. If you sign up for a two week tournament, I can't see many teams not at least playing until they lose.
I disagree. The game has a hell of a lot going for it. For starters, it's good. Loads of games absolutely suck, even competitive ones, and that's a realisation that will slowly come about. The other thing is the melee system. I mean Starcraft 2 is good to watch because it's clear what's happening. Same with the DotA clones (if you're into that sort of thing) for the same reason. Warband has that aspect but it's also vastly different from those sort of games, since it's action based. Other action games are mainly shooters and watching those can be incredibly tedious. There just isn't much fun in seeing people randomly getting headshots. It's not really clear what's happening beyond the kills that pop up on screen.ModusTollens said:
I also predict the next Mount&Blade game will be big. Everyone must know someone who bangs on about Mount&Blade all the time (except me, I just know people who know someone who bangs on about Mount&Blade all the time) and when the new game comes out, all those people will be giving it a serious look. It will be very saturated at the time of release and as long as things are in place, ready for the boom (they weren't for Warband, it took/is taking ages for us to really get organised), I expect a pretty big scene could emerge.
Well there's taking matches seriously (which most teams do) and there's taking competitions seriously (which a lot of teams don't). The idea behind prizes is to try and drive teams to get to a top level and start taking competitions seriously, going into them with the intention of actually winning.ModusTollens said:
Nubijuki's suggestion is to basically run tournaments throughout a period of time, which would give you points that enable you to qualify for a final tournament at the end. I like the idea as a whole but the problems with it are twofold.
The first is that it regresses back to a system where players are once again disincentivised to form new teams (due to the persistent nature of the system). The second is that a good team could get enough points to qualify and then have nothing really to do... I don't know I just feel like it's worth experimenting with the fast tournament format first, before we start going crazy with it.
Even then, what I'd be more inclined to do is set up similarly fast tournaments but have 5 a side ones, fight and destroy etc.
