I have noticed that the top seed after swiss rounds often doesn't win the elimination rounds. Sometimes they get a bad match up in terms of a hard counter. What do you think of allowing the top seeds after swiss rounds to choose their first opponent in elimination? For example, with top 8, the #1 swiss gets 2 minutes to pick their 1st opponent. That player automatically becomes #8 seed. Then the next highest uncommitted swiss finisher gets 2 minutes to pick, and their choice becomes #7 seed, and so on. There would be 3 picks, the 4th would have only 1 choice.

This rewards great swiss play, it reduces anybody wanting to tank their last swiss match in order to manipulate the elimination pairings. It also makes ID much more potentially costly for players to use. It should only add 5-10 minutes to total tournament length.

Thoughts?

It's an interesting idea but teams in the NCAA tournament don't get to cherry pick their first round opponent.

In theory, playing the lowest seeded player in the cut is a reward in and of itself for your performance.

In order to be crowned "Champion", you kinda should be the Champion and not be worried about who you are paired against. This is what separates truly good players from those that just had lucky pairings.

The NCAA is very different. Its based upon months of playing, 30 plus games. At the end of the season, unlike swiss, the games are not less important. Also, the seeds in the NCAA are not based upon W-L records, but a myriad of inputs. Here it is strictly W-L and MoV. I think many tournament players will tell you there are those lists, which they are glad they did not face. Sometimes the best list/player does not win the tournament. To suggest a "champion" is equally likely to defeat any player/list in a tournament is untrue.

More significantly the change would make people really hesitate to take IDs. Which apparently is a problem.

The NCAA is very different. Its based upon months of playing, 30 plus games. At the end of the season, unlike swiss, the games are not less important. Also, the seeds in the NCAA are not based upon W-L records, but a myriad of inputs. Here it is strictly W-L and MoV. I think many tournament players will tell you there are those lists, which they are glad they did not face. Sometimes the best list/player does not win the tournament. To suggest a "champion" is equally likely to defeat any player/list in a tournament is untrue.

More significantly the change would make people really hesitate to take IDs. Which apparently is a problem.

True but there is not enough time to run a tournament that would truly determine a "Champion"

The closest thing we had in that respect(in my area) was a series of 12 tournaments that resulted in a top 16 being generated. That top 16 played for the coveted Title of Season champion. I happened to win it this year(Season 2). We had over 70 participants and it was run by 6 LGS'. I finished 2nd for the 12 tournament run, made the top 4 cut of the top 16 tournament and won it overall.

I played 1 list twice and another list 3 times and then 3 other lists for the remaining games. I actually only got to attend 7 of the 12 tournaments.

Anyway, this type of long term tournament is probably better at picking an overall champion than just the tournament of the day like FFG runs since you have to consistently play well to make the top cut and then play well again to win.

Congrats on being the season champ. I agree with your observations. I was mainly trying to address the last round of swiss being less meaningful. If FFG is trying to shorten swiss rounds by one with ID then they may have succeeded. If that wasn't the intention of ID, then I was suggesting a line of thought for a solution. Give an added reason to play the last round. Getting guaranteed to make the cut by taking the ID is the "carrot", being worried about a bad match up in the first round of elimination is my proposed "stick".

While I don't disapprove of the idea in theory, I think it would complicate tourneys even further and potentially set up collusion scenarios where friends in the top cut agree not to play each other. Anything you can do to keep it impartial and fair is the way to go.

I think the "Perfect Storm" happened to bring all of this to light. They started with a high number and then due to dropouts it meant the last swiss round was a perfect top 8 cut which also happened to be the top cut for the tournament. This was all highly unfortunate. If the 6 folks that dropped out, hadn't, we would never be having this conversation. Its just that their action of dropping out meant that the tournament played out differently than the total rounds and cut should have.

It's an interesting idea, but I honestly think that it would be better to get rid of the elimination rounds altogether and play a full Swiss tournament.

ID's in the last round would only ever happen if the two players at the top table couldn't be caught points wise by those below them.

Cheers

Baaa

Interesting idea.

But, no, I wouldn't want to see that.

• NFL, NHRA, cub scout pinewood derby, ATP, NCAA hockey, etc all use brackets for a reason ... the #1 seed plays the lowest seed, etc so that the better teams are more likely to advance and face each other. Yeah, sometimes they have a bad matchup using that system. Every year, the NFL has a higher ranked team play a lesser one that they'd rather not face. But that adds interest. If you want to be the champ, you have to be able to win all games. Cherry picking to get there diminishes that accomplishment.
• Tournaments would go longer and they are long enough now. Yeah, it's only two minutes per pick. But it's multiple picks over multiple rounds.
• And it puts more emphasis on the meta and the luck of which squad you brought that day and less on the players' skill.

Interesting idea.

But, no, I wouldn't want to see that.

• NFL, NHRA, cub scout pinewood derby, ATP, NCAA hockey, etc all use brackets for a reason ... the #1 seed plays the lowest seed, etc so that the better teams are more likely to advance and face each other. Yeah, sometimes they have a bad matchup using that system. Every year, the NFL has a higher ranked team play a lesser one that they'd rather not face. But that adds interest. If you want to be the champ, you have to be able to win all games. Cherry picking to get there diminishes that accomplishment.
• Tournaments would go longer and they are long enough now. Yeah, it's only two minutes per pick. But it's multiple picks over multiple rounds.
• And it puts more emphasis on the meta and the luck of which squad you brought that day and less on the players' skill.

I was thinking only for the 1st elimination round. So in the case of a top 8, 6 extra minutes. (Probably not even, the top seed can pick from 7 options, which may include 2-3 obvious picks. The next seed would have only 5 options, and the 3rd seed would have 3 choices. The 4th seed gets 1 choice, so I assume it wouldn't take 2 minutes)

It might put less emphasis on the meta. Currently I can pick a strong list which has strong counters. If I get lucky, I may never face my hard counter and cruise to victory. In this setup, I can figure that my hard counter will seek me out. This puts pressure on players to have more "well rounded" lists.

As a thought experiment, check out list juggler for a tournament that cut to 8. Think how the top seed might prefer to face one list over another. It might end up the same overall winner, who knows. But, thanks for your input.

OK so the number 1 finisher gets to pick, he picks the number 2 finisher. The number 2 finisher does not get to pick, because he has already been picked, but the number 3 would get to pick even though he finished lower than the number 2?? Seems a bit unfair? Don't see how it rewards great Swiss play.

What if you protect the top half? I.E. in a top 8, the top 4 get seeded 1-4. Then 1 gets to choose their opponent from the 4 players ranked 5-8.

Is it really that much of a difference then, now you already have 1-8, 2-7,3-6,4-5. Plus right now it seems the fairest is the way it is done. Maybe number 1 had an easy schedule(or maybe he was the hard counter to whom he played) and number 8 was already hard countered. When you don't have long term results to work with you use what you have in the fairest way possible. The only other way maybe would be a random draw for the final rounds.

1 playing 8 and 2 playing 7 is already fair. The 2 players expected to play the final game get the least likely 2. If 1 and 2 don't win, then they weren't the best 2 players in the end. Keep it simple and don't drag a long day out any more than it already is.