The biggest problem IMO was that the store said the TO wasn't eligable, but claimed a prize anyway.

Giving the TO the first round bye isn't inherently wrong. For all we know the bye was decided randomly and it just so happened the TO got it. But I'd say if I was a TO and a first round bye made things run smoothly, there's a certain amount of logic involved in having the TO get it.

If the point is to play X-Wing how many people really want a bye rather than play a game?

Also there isn't even a hint of impropriety on the TO's part mentioned here. If he's that good of a player then a first round bye likely meant nothing. MoV is only useful for tie breakers and the TO was undefeated.

The reason a TO shouldn't be eligable for prizes is because that can possibly taint the event, but in this case no one seemed to feel he won 2nd because he was the TO. Although again there is the issue that the store said the TO shouldn't get anything.

But normally I don't think the TO needs to exclude themselves from prizes unless someone has an issue with it.

I'd be more concerned about him ruling you default to a focus if someone forgets to declare an action, honestly. Yeah, it applies to everyone, but it hugely benefits ships that depend on a focus token to do things. And it's completely outside the scope of the rules. I'd never pay $25 to play in a tournament knowing that rule was in place.

OP here, just wanting to clear up a few things as this discussion has taken on a tone that I didn't intend.

First, this isn't meant to be any sort of trial by public opinion for the TO. I think he's generally a good guy, and I at least want to think that he just hasn't thought through all the implications of granting himself they first-round bye. To that end, I really meant to pose the question as a hypothetical: if, in some universe, a TO regularly and intentionally took the first-round bye, would there be reason to be concerned about the ultimate impact on standings?

Second, some respondents seem to have focused on how, if this hypothetical TO is a very strong player, he would likely place highly regardless. While this is true, doesn't the bye still affect where everyone else ends up, at least insofar as pairings go? For that matter, every list has a weakness, and even strong players can lose to more novice players if it's just a particularly poor match-up, right? Isn't that why we actually play the games?

Third, others seem to have focused on the contention that that the TO should have the opportunity to compete if he wants to, and I totally agree with this. What is maybe more concerning, though, is if our hypothetical is making a choice in the way that he organizes the tournaments that consistently gives him an advantage in competition.

Fourth, $25 is a lot of money for a tournament, but I want to remind everyone that this was for charity. We were all happy to pay the entry fee, especially given the outstanding prize support, and didn't have any angst over there still being a very casual environment for a higher stakes tournament. None of us is ready for premier level play, and I don't think anyone believes that they are.

Fifth, and maybe most important, I'm pretty sure the overwhelming majority of players don't even know there might be cause for concern here. I didn't understand how byes worked myself before starting this thread, and I'm one of the more involved players in our area. I think most guys just take it for granted that the TO will place highly - after all, he knows more about X-Wing than any of us, presumably, and that's why he's TO in the first place.

So, all that said, the fact that forgotten actions default to a focus in the tournament in question, as well the fact that the TO in question accepted an awesome 2nd place prize, are actually secondary issues for me. As some have argued, rightly I think, in the hypothetical universe I've described there are grounds for requesting more transparency in the pairings and rankings.

Thank you everyone for your input, it has been helpful.

would there be reason to be concerned about the ultimate impact on standings?

Yes and no, it's a free win so it can have an impact on the standings. Idealy it the bye should be given to a random player. Although I think there is a point in which if there's only one bye having the TO sit out a game may be better than having someone else miss one.

While this is true, doesn't the bye still affect where everyone else ends up, at least insofar as pairings go?

A first round bye should actually make the 2nd round harder, which can hurt your standings. Since you now have a 1-0 record, you're going to be playing someone else with a 1-0 record, and a MoV that's close to yours. Meaning you'll be playing one of the stronger player in the 2nd round.

is if our hypothetical is making a choice in the way that he organizes the tournaments that consistently gives him an advantage in competition.

If that is happening then they shouldn't be playing. But it's a bit like cheating, you really would need some evidence to support the claim IMO.

As some have argued, rightly I think, in the hypothetical universe I've described there are grounds for requesting more transparency in the pairings and rankings.

Idealy the parings should always be completely transparent.

is if our hypothetical is making a choice in the way that he organizes the tournaments that consistently gives him an advantage in competition.

If that is happening then they shouldn't be playing. But it's a bit like cheating, you really would need some evidence to support the claim IMO.

As far as this point is concerned, the TO in question has come right out and said, twice now, that he's taking the first-round bye "to help people get set up." For the time being I choose to take this at face value and believe he just hasn't realized the full implications of his decision. It's getting harder and harder to accept that, though. My reasoning here, however, is based entirely on circumstantial evidence and subjective experiences, and I should not have made some of the points that I did previously for this very reason.

The point is, as far as "evidence" is concerned, he's totally upfront about taking the bye. If he is intentionally cheating, it's by way of assuming (correctly, in this case) that the rest of us are not savvy enough to understand what's going on.

So that's really what this was all about for me: is there a real advantage to always having the first-round bye?

So that's really what this was all about for me: is there a real advantage to always having the first-round bye?

I would say so. I was lucky enough to win a first round bye in a store championship, and absolutely used it for my regional. I realize this was a "superbye", and not a regular one. However there were some other benefits:

It kept me calm, situated, and able to adapt into the situation better. Having that first round bye let me meld into the feeling of Regionals better than showing up and diving right in. I felt calmer going into my first game.

I played less games. I realize regionals was a far different example, but it allowed me to take a harder list to play, and allowed me to go in the more complicated direction because I had fewer games to play. It wasn't as mentally taxing.

It also let me wander around a little. I didn't specifically note particulars of other's lists, but I got a general feel of what lists were being played. I could go over my plans for each list during the first round knowing what the majority of what I was facing was.

I'm not saying your TO is helping people and noting their lists, forming a plan during the first round, and strategizing the entire round. But if they are, it could be a real advantage in major tournament type play. While it doesn't sound like they are exploiting things, it could easily swing that way even if they don't realize they're playing better because of it. I feel the tournament should be setup before anyone arrives. Game mats out, lists given to the TO, players entered into the computer, etc. There really shouldn't be any reason that the TO should *have* to take the first round bye to help setup. There are lots of ways they could mitigate that.

Lastly: thanks for the clarification on the tournament entry for charity. For me I don't think it would make much difference, but it does put a really good feeling into the tournament right off the bat.

I TO almost everything at my LGS for X Wing. The only thing I do not TO is the Store Championship Kit (though I was the second TO in another stores SC when the TO played). If I didn't TO it, the events would not occur. However, I also play in all of my events that I host. For the most part, everyone knows everyone in the small community, and none of the games are cut throat. Most of the job is based around the pairings and rankings, not so much with the games themselves. There's typically only 1-2 "rulings" that I make in a tourney, and most of them are actually just rules questions.

Now, for the "rulings" in my game, I either call over another player that is familiar with the rules, or I cite the actual ruling from the FAQ. If it's a judgement call, again, I either call over another player, or I give my opponent the benefit. I typically just give it to him, for multiple reasons. First, I don't care to waste people's time, second, I want full transparency that I earned my placement, third, I generally don't care enough to make a big deal out of it, and fourth as one of the better players in the area, I feel I can typically overcome a close situation, and make me a better player because of it.

Everything I do I make fully transparent. For the initial pairings, if it's a small group (<16), I typically hand out target locks to determine who's playing who. For every round, I pair based on record and MOV to remove any bias, and in the rare events of ties (typically for the second round when there are 3 200MOV players) I again bust out the TL trick to figure out who's playing who. As such, I run the events in such a way that there's complete parity and no possibility of favoritism. Actually, that's not true. I do play favorites by never moving my pieces. I use the time that would typically be associated with picking up and relocating to do the next round matches. But beyond that, everything I do is logical and fact based.

And I participate in the prize pool as well. I donate the TO prizes to the pool, and I explicitly state what the prizes are before hand, so I can't be accused of coming in 3rd, and then splitting up the prizes so 1-4 get stuff instead of just 1 and 2. Again, full transparency. At anytime, if anyone is curious about how the pairings came up, I have no problem walking them through it.

I haven't ever been accused of rigging it, or giving myself a favorable schedule or anything. And after every event, most players take the time to thank me for organizing it and running it. Again, this wouldn't be happening if I didn't do so. And more often than not, I walk away with prizes. This isn't because I rig it, but because I'm one of the better more consistent players in my area.

That all said, when it matters (SC+) I would never play and TO, if for no other reason, the time constraints when players do have questions can mean the difference in your personal game.

So that's really what this was all about for me: is there a real advantage to always having the first-round bye?

There is, but it can also make your day harder.

I was at a tournament a month or so ago, it was a small one 6 players, and the winner was whoever had the best score at the end of 3 games.

I won my first game, but had the lowest MoV of all the winners. That meant the other two first round winners played each other and I played the guy with the best MoV of guys with a first round loss. That means my second round was against a "weaker" opponent. Which can be an advantage.

So in that case a first round bye can put you in a worse place, because you'll have a 1-0 record with a decent MoV. Meaning you'll play a stronger player in the 2nd round.

Maybe that's now how your tournament is run, but I think that's pretty standard based on the ones I've played.

That all said... If think something isn't quite fair about him taking first round byes, ask that he let it go to some random person.

As far as this point is concerned, the TO in question has come right out and said, twice now, that he's taking the first-round bye "to help people get set up." For the time being I choose to take this at face value and believe he just hasn't realized the full implications of his decision. It's getting harder and harder to accept that, though. My reasoning here, however, is based entirely on circumstantial evidence and subjective experiences, and I should not have made some of the points that I did previously for this very reason.

The point is, as far as "evidence" is concerned, he's totally upfront about taking the bye. If he is intentionally cheating, it's by way of assuming (correctly, in this case) that the rest of us are not savvy enough to understand what's going on.

So that's really what this was all about for me: is there a real advantage to always having the first-round bye?

You know, I could see a TO getting a bye the first round for administrative purposes. The thing is this "administration bye" should not carry the full value of a standard bye (5 tournament points and 150 point MOV) and certainly not be the same level as the super bye (200 point MoV) earned before going into some tournament. Granted modified wins are hard to get these days and their tournament value isn't much better than a loss to many that is what I believe this administration bye could be counted as. If the bye was worth 2 tournament points and counted as MoV 101 that may be a lot easier to live with although it is still an advantage.

At the risk of flogging a dead horse, I thought I'd post the List Juggler and see if that sheds any light on the situation for those who know a little more than i do about how tournament ranking/pairing works.

http://lists.starwarsclubhouse.com/get_tourney_details?tourney_id=812

How significant is it that third place went 3-1 but has higher MoV than second place? Note that, at least in our theoretical universe, second place player's record is really 3-0 with the first round bye making him 4-0.

What can we say about average MoV here, and is there any relevance for our hypothetical situation?

As far as this point is concerned, the TO in question has come right out and said, twice now, that he's taking the first-round bye "to help people get set up." For the time being I choose to take this at face value and believe he just hasn't realized the full implications of his decision. It's getting harder and harder to accept that, though. My reasoning here, however, is based entirely on circumstantial evidence and subjective experiences, and I should not have made some of the points that I did previously for this very reason.

The point is, as far as "evidence" is concerned, he's totally upfront about taking the bye. If he is intentionally cheating, it's by way of assuming (correctly, in this case) that the rest of us are not savvy enough to understand what's going on.

So that's really what this was all about for me: is there a real advantage to always having the first-round bye?

You know, I could see a TO getting a bye the first round for administrative purposes. The thing is this "administration bye" should not carry the full value of a standard bye (5 tournament points and 150 point MOV) and certainly not be the same level as the super bye (200 point MoV) earned before going into some tournament. Granted modified wins are hard to get these days and their tournament value isn't much better than a loss to many that is what I believe this administration bye could be counted as. If the bye was worth 2 tournament points and counted as MoV 101 that may be a lot easier to live with although it is still an advantage.

Maybe this really answers my question and I'm just not quite grasping it yet? Obviously the List Juggler doesn't tell us what MoV the second place player received for his bye, but it does show that he got the full 5 tournament points for the victory.

I appreciate any explanation of insights that I'm not yet comprehending.

Bye gave him an advantage and he took a rather large prize for himself. Pretty big difference in the step from 2nd to 3rd prizes seems to be the biggest injustice. If it was the first time he did it, it would not be as questionable. Best approach might be to share your concern with him openly and see what he says.

Personally i don't like the idea of TOs playing and winning prizes.

Conflict of interest us too high and not worth the trouble.

Looking at the tournament result I'm a bit disappointed that the TO decided to join when there were already 16 participants. That seems to me like a great number for a tournament and after four rounds would leave a clear winner. It looks like 3 dropped to complicate things but seeing full points scored for 32 games. I see 2@4-0, 3@3-1, 5@2-2, 3@1-3, 1@0-4 and drops at 2-8 although those losses include the byes.

List Juggler actually DOES tell us that byes are being treated as super byes and awarding 240 point MoV. As I mentioned the tournament points indicate 32 wins/games including 5 points for each bye victory. MoV sums to 7560 points which then averages just over 236 points per game which is about what you would expect playing against another player.

Slightly off-topic- I came up with this BYE list, any suggestions to improve it would be welcome!

Keyan Farlander (B-Wing) (29) + Opportunist (4) = 33

Gold Squad Pilot (Y-Wing) (18) + Ion Turret (5) = 23

Corran Horn (E-Wing) (35) + R2-D2 (4) + Fire-Control System (2) + Push the Limit (3) = 44

Played it once against a list of TIE fighters and Advanced and had a win.

Looking at the tournament result I'm a bit disappointed that the TO decided to join when there were already 16 participants. That seems to me like a great number for a tournament and after four rounds would leave a clear winner. It looks like 3 dropped to complicate things but seeing full points scored for 32 games. I see 2@4-0, 3@3-1, 5@2-2, 3@1-3, 1@0-4 and drops at 2-8 although those losses include the byes.

List Juggler actually DOES tell us that byes are being treated as super byes and awarding 240 point MoV. As I mentioned the tournament points indicate 32 wins/games including 5 points for each bye victory. MoV sums to 7560 points which then averages just over 236 points per game which is about what you would expect playing against another player.

Sorry, I might be a little dense, but I get exactly 180pts difference between TO's MoV for the rounds he actually played in and his final MoV. And actually, if I'm calculating MoV correctly, he scored 180, 182, and 182 in the matches he played, so the 180 MoV from the bye does end up looking a lot like the probable result if he had actually played the match, right? Is that a reasonable argument for the other guy to make?

Not even close to sure I'm doing this right and just trying to play devil's advocate to make sure I fully understand before I start trying to explain the situation to the other guys in our community.

Slightly off-topic- I came up with this BYE list, any suggestions to improve it would be welcome!

Keyan Farlander (B-Wing) (29) + Opportunist (4) = 33

Gold Squad Pilot (Y-Wing) (18) + Ion Turret (5) = 23

Corran Horn (E-Wing) (35) + R2-D2 (4) + Fire-Control System (2) + Push the Limit (3) = 44

Played it once against a list of TIE fighters and Advanced and had a win.

I'd say it's more than a little off-topic, but I'll give my advice as a guy that plays a lot of B-Wings: on the subject of named B-Wing pilots, let me quote Adm. Ackbar (and other commenters) by saying, "it's a trap!" Not worth it, man. I'd drop Keyan to a Blue Squadron Pilot and drop PtL on Corran in favor of VI to give you the points for a Z-95.

Sorry, I might be a little dense, but I get exactly 180pts difference between TO's MoV for the rounds he actually played in and his final MoV. And actually, if I'm calculating MoV correctly, he scored 180, 182, and 182 in the matches he played, so the 180 MoV from the bye does end up looking a lot like the probable result if he had actually played the match, right? Is that a reasonable argument for the other guy to make?

Not even close to sure I'm doing this right and just trying to play devil's advocate to make sure I fully understand before I start trying to explain the situation to the other guys in our community.

I added up the number of tournament points scores and then divided by 5 (everyone seems to get full wins these days) to determine how many games were played. With 32 games played and 120 points squads each game should have had about 240 MoV points to win. I then add up the total MoV figures listed and divided that by 32 games which came to that 236 points per game; being low can be because some squads are below 120 points and weren't completely destroyed although doing a little more math I see that losing 60 points in a game would drop the average -1.875. Looking some more I see that for 32 games the MoV is 120 points short which can point to two games against a bye that awards 180 points.

It really isn't that hard:

-Random bye

-TO can play outside of premier tournaments, also based on digressions. Meaning depending on the area's frequency of tournaments and if it is an even/uneven and amount of players.

-TO can play for prizes IF he did not award himself something from the prize kit already (When I TO if I already have the item or if the kit has extra for myself, it is passed on)

That's it, that should solve all your problems. If the TO is a "good guy" you shouldn't even be having this discussion. If you talked to him about randomizing the bye, this discussion wouldn't of happened either. TOs are usually players as well so why penalize them for having fun? This game, unless they are altering the end score, is kinda hard to cheat the end result. If there is a rule dispute have that second TO or the FAQ on hand, or to help speed things along just roll it off.

It really isn't that hard:

-Random bye

-TO can play outside of premier tournaments, also based on digressions. Meaning depending on the area's frequency of tournaments and if it is an even/uneven and amount of players.

-TO can play for prizes IF he did not award himself something from the prize kit already (When I TO if I already have the item or if the kit has extra for myself, it is passed on)

That's it, that should solve all your problems. If the TO is a "good guy" you shouldn't even be having this discussion. If you talked to him about randomizing the bye, this discussion wouldn't of happened either. TOs are usually players as well so why penalize them for having fun? This game, unless they are altering the end score, is kinda hard to cheat the end result. If there is a rule dispute have that second TO or the FAQ on hand, or to help speed things along just roll it off.

Look chief, I'm just trying to make sure I understand everything before I talk to the TO and and FLGS - why is that a problem for you? I'm also trying to give this guy the benefit of the doubt, so I'm not sure where you got the idea that I think the TO should be penalized. I fully understand that it dry clearly says in the tournament rules that the bye should be randomized, but it wasn't. I'm trying to be drvil's advocate and understand how that could ever be okay. I get the impression that this discussion annoys you - why contribute at all?