Field of Glory II - The Alexander Tournament is here

[stockwellpete]

The alternative viewpoint seems to be based on the (disputable) premise that only the positions of the top few players matter. We have been asked to increase the bye score to 85 so that those in contention for podium places won't be disadvantaged if their opponent does not play.

But it's not though, is it, Richard.

The argument for 85 points for a bye/resigned match is that a high proportion of players winning matches score 85 points (or more) in doing so, whichever level they are playing at. To score 85 points you need to win a match by 25% and this probably happens in about half the matches played, and probably more often in the earlier rounds where very skilled players can often be drawn to play against players with much less experience. The "top" players frequently win their matches by 25%, even when they are playing against other "top" players.

So if you are one of the "top" players (the FOG2DL suggests there are at least 20 of these celebrities at the moment ) and your first round opponent is a no-show then you end up with only 150 points, while most of the other "top" players will have won both their opening matches and will have scored anything between 170 and 200 points. So through no fault of their own, a player can already be 50 points down and that is a lot to make up, particularly in a 3-round tournament. If it happens to the same player twice (and it has) then they are effectively out of the running for that tournament, in terms of making a challenge for a podium place anyway.

And that matters because I would think most players like to do as well as they can in a tournament. The "top" players obviously want to try and finish on the podium if they can, while players further down the table will often be trying to set a personal best by finishing as high up as they can. Of course, there will be significant numbers of players who enter just for a bit of fun and are not too bothered where they end up.

Because there seem to be no consequences for players who drop out of the tournament early, this issue is not going to go away. It does make the tournament a bit of a lottery, in my opinion. Perhaps it doesn't matter, but I think players who drop out prematurely should be excluded from the next tournament, and if they offend on re-admittance then they should be excluded entirely.

Also, I don't actually agree either with the "no resignations" change that has been brought in for automated tournaments in today's patch. I think players should be able to resign if they are getting battered in a match. When it happens in a match that I am in playing in I rationalise it as the enemy's morale breaking earlier than the game normally allows for and it means that I have played well (or that I have played a shocker). In terms of automated tournament scoring, I would be inclined to score these matches 100-0 and make the resignation of an opponent the ultimate achievement in a match (a bit like a KO in boxing, rather than a points win).

[Ludendorf]

In case of a resignation, I'd be more inclined to just give the victorious player 100 points minus their opponent's rout score, up to a maximum of minus 15 (to represent a predicted victory by a margin of 25% as opposed to the ultimate victory by a margin of 40% or somewhere in-between). Sometimes, armies break by more than a 40% margin, but crushing defeats on that scale are rather rare in multiplayer. That said, we have seen round scores of 200 points this tournament, so crushing victories do happen.

Thing is, that would kind of inflate the winner's score a bit because it assumes a 25% margin victory was on the cards, while a player might resign at 55%-50% because the writing is on the wall. So, I don't think my suggestion is really good enough for the task. Maybe your victory score (60+Enemy routed-Allied Routed) plus a flat number to represent the extra routs you were likely to get. +8 might do it in the aforementioned scenario.

Also, a player might resign in a round that would otherwise have timed out. There is something to be said for clinging on stubbornly until the sun sets though, so I don't really think that should get in the way of a player claiming victory over a resigning opponent.

[rbodleyscott]

The alternative viewpoint seems to be based on the (disputable) premise that only the positions of the top few players matter. We have been asked to increase the bye score to 85 so that those in contention for podium places won't be disadvantaged if their opponent does not play.

But it's not though, is it, Richard.

It isn't what you intend, Pete, I agree, but I am trying to look at it from other points of view, who might not see it in quite the same way.

The argument for 85 points for a bye/resigned match is that a high proportion of players winning matches score 85 points (or more) in doing so, whichever level they are playing at.

But this misses the point that a player getting a bye might otherwise have lost his battle. Thus, as TheSkirmishLord pointed out, a bye score could make a player jump 30 positions in the final score board, and knock 30 other players down a position, when he might otherwise have lost the battle. Whether this actually matters to anyone is questionable, but it does need to be considered.

So in a nutshell, your argument is that a bye score should never be less than the player would probably have got if he had won the battle (and 85 is certainly not the minimum because battles going to 60%+ usually have lower scores). The alternative viewpoint is that it should also take into account the possibility (however small, because many, but obviously not all, byes are due to losing players giving up) that the player getting a bye would have lost the battle if they had been played out.

The tournament system has no way of knowing what would have happened if the game had continued to completion. Some, perhaps most, would be victories for the non-timed-out player, but others wouldn't.

My remark about the podium was based on the proposition that a place here or there probably doesn't matter much to people in the middle of the table, but it obviously does to those in contention for the podium. And to that extent at least, the proposed 85 points for a BYE is mainly for the benefit of those players, at the expense of the position of other mid-table players who get their position jumped by bye-scorers who wouldn't have won their games if they had been played out.

[stockwellpete]

But this misses the point that a player getting a bye might otherwise have lost his battle. Thus, as TheSkirmishLord pointed out, a bye score could make a player jump 30 positions in the final score board, and knock 30 other players down a position, when he might otherwise have lost the battle. Whether this actually matters to anyone is questionable, but it does need to be considered.

Conversely, it is possible to argue that the player getting a bye has won the battle because the other side didn't turn up and that when you enter a tournament you are actually agreeing to play 6 (or whatever) battles.

So in a nutshell, your argument is that a bye score should never be less than the player would probably have got if he had won the battle (and 85 is certainly not the minimum because battles going to 60%+ usually have lower scores).

See above my reply above, but 85pts seems to be about the average winning score.

[rbodleyscott]

But this misses the point that a player getting a bye might otherwise have lost his battle. Thus, as TheSkirmishLord pointed out, a bye score could make a player jump 30 positions in the final score board, and knock 30 other players down a position, when he might otherwise have lost the battle. Whether this actually matters to anyone is questionable, but it does need to be considered.

Conversely, it is possible to argue that the player getting a bye has won the battle because the other side didn't turn up and that when you enter a tournament you are actually agreeing to play 6 (or whatever) battles.

True, except when it really is a BYE due to an odd number of players still in the tournament.

[shawkhan2]

You can never totally eliminate luck in a tournament.
Luck in the draw or with byes can be reduced by having more rounds in a tournament.
It also might make some sense to have two or more opponents in a round.
In our World Series we can have 7 games to determine a champion for this reason.

[eddieballgame]

Considering all the variables in trying to achieve enough points in garnering the top 3 "trophy positions"; One rule could be, in order to qualify for one of those top places that individual must have played all the rounds...no byes. I get that might appear to be harsh/unfair to some, but no less to the ones who are playing opponents who stall or 'time-out'.
For me, the "play is the thing"; & I have no illusions about finishing very high up regardless of pairings.
The 75 point ruling does seem to be a fair solution to a, probably, unsolvable one.