Slitherine

Hammy, I don't think anyone has a problem with LH armies. My problem is when such armies meet armies mainly of foot troops, paticularly those that cannot shoot. There are other threads discussing how to push LH off the table and how many points this should be worth. However, these are still dull games, especially for the players with the foot armies. I just want to avoid these games. However, I do not want to restrict army choice or create some sort of bias in army selection.

Logically there are only two ways to allow a wide choice of armies and still get good match ups:
1) Themes that force players to bring similar armies. Unfortunately this is restrictive on those with fewer arnies or a dislike of particular themes. A terrain theme has not been done. Book and date themes being common.
2) Change the way the draw is done and keep incompatible armies apart.

I am advocating (2). It has not been done before. It will differentiate the Northern League, which people seem to like to do. It does not match player ability like Swiss Chess. It does not favour those who like to play skirmishers against armies that are unlikely to catch them.

Why must we persist with restricted troop types and classes? This was a system that worked well with DBM. It has little, if any, relevance in FoG, where the points system is better balanced. The object of any system is to produce good games,. Nothing elese really matters.

Because there are other game systems in the Northern Doubles this is required for the overall winners of the Northern Doubles. i.e. if DBM and DBMM players can get 38 points and FoG'ers can only get 32 it is not really fair!

Change the way the draw is done and keep incompatible armies apart.

The problem is that there really aren't that many LH armies being used - there was only two at Derby. It is a bit tricky to do.

I have no problem mixing the format up a bit, but still haven't heard a format that I am entirely comfortable with to be honest.

It may be worth doing a completely random draw at the beginning of each round rather than doing Swiss Chess from the overall scores.

I didn't know we were even playing to get an overall winner. Does it matter that some DBMM singles player scores more than a FoG doubles team? How much is this comparison worth?
Good games on the day is what matters.

Shouldn't we poll the league FoG players first, is there really a definite desire to change the format? I don't have any qualms regarding facing LH myself...

rogerg wrote:I didn't know we were even playing to get an overall winner. Does it matter that some DBMM singles player scores more than a FoG doubles team? How much is this comparison worth?
Good games on the day is what matters.

In theory that was the case last year but I don't think that happened in the end.

I was going to email all those players who have attended the league this year and see what they want for next year. Since we haven't finished this year yet and not all players are subscribed to this forum then it may be a bit premature, but the ideas are always good so I can give people options.