6 Round Swiss for 2014 Worlds

By KineticOperator, in X-Wing

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I was discussing this with the FFG guys this weekend. They did not want to add an additional game to an already exhausting day, which is a completely reasonable position. They also did not want to play on Friday (because those from out of town would find that hard to attend) and/or play more games on Sunday.


My suggestion was to have a six round swiss with the "Qualification Round" on Friday night operating the same way the first round did this year. Regional Champions (and whatever other event winners FFG decided to add, such as the Gen-Con winner/etc.) would receive a full points bye for the Friday night round. On Saturday there would be an additional 5 rounds of Swiss like we had this year, with all players playing in all 5 rounds (no scheduled byes on Saturday).


This would give us a 6 round Swiss, allow major tournament winners an important bye, and make the final 16 much clearer. Since a very large number of those travelling long distances for the tourney would be doing so because they won their Regionals, and they would have a bye on Friday, they would still be able to fly in Friday night/Saturday morning exactly the way they did this year. The only people who would need to be there Friday night are those people who did not win a Regional but still want to compete in Worlds. Arriving a day earlier in order to earn your spot in the World Championship seems like a reasonable request, especially since that round could start relatively late (say 9pm) and win or lose you would still be playing the next day.


A win Friday night would give you a great start, the boost to strength of schedule with a full points bye would be a reasonable advantage provided to winners of tournaments compared to those who only win the one game on Friday, and even a loss Friday night is recoverable by winning out. 6 rounds of Swiss would ensure that every undefeated and one loss player could make the top 16 (and probably a few 2 loss players as well). The last is important because even those who lost on Friday night would still be very much in the running if they win out, so they would have no reason to drop because they lost their first game.


The fellows seemed to think this idea was worth further consideration. Does anyone here have thoughts on it?

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It seems an elegant system for a more civilized age.

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God damnit Aaron... I can't like what you come up with more. this is really good.

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Great idea. Can think of one potential downside, which is one more day of hotel fees for folks with a tight budget.

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Why not split the group in two? Then take the top whatever from both. it would be a smaller group. So it should still work with the current format? I'm not a math guy so I'm not 100% on this. Also I know we started late because there were still people signing up at noon. I don't know, I don't have an answer.

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I think they should start earlier in the day, and have registration go throughout the event so those with byes can sleep in a little bit.

I know they're trying to arrange 'premier' times for their other game's finals - but starting at noon is just too late for a 120 person event that requires 75min rounds IMO. That, at minumum is 7.5 hours with 15 min between rounds... not counting an hour break, round of 16 match, etc. Add in a 30 minute late start, a few rounds that had 20-30 minute buffers, and it quickly becomes 10 hours without the round of 16 match. That's also only a few players before what I would presume is their 6 rounds of swiss cut off for a T16 cut (128 players)... which pushes the event back another 1.5hr.

Stretching out the event to three days seems like a logistical/communication nightmare, and only adds to the complications.

Also, I don't know if there's really going to be much room for expansion if they want to keep having this at their games center... (or is there a lot of dead space/room for expansion back in the play area?)

One can also argue the practicality of byes in a 5 round event... that really skews the results creating some hairy endings... 3 20 pointers (4-1 record) didn't make the cut (after discounting the one 20 point mistake). This really creates a situation where pairings make a difference every round. Letting in a few x-2s with really tough opponents is far favorable to eliminating a few x-1s with some less challenging opponents (I didn't even catch how many 18 pointers there were). I would have personally liked to see the proper 7 rounds of swiss for 114 players and then cut to top 8 for Sunday.

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In my opinion, I think there shouldn't be byes at Worlds for winning a regional. All of the other goodies that came with winning one are enough. The byes seemed to create more problems for the organizers. I will be sending a long email to Steve about my thoughts.

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In my opinion, I think there shouldn't be byes at Worlds for winning a regional. All of the other goodies that came with winning one are enough. The byes seemed to create more problems for the organizers. I will be sending a long email to Steve about my thoughts.

tbh it doesn't make much sense if all the rounds are all on one day.. it just means you sleep in while everyone else is playing. And you have to make any announcements twice as you have staggered start times... If there was an extra match on the Friday it would make a bit more sense.

Edited by Rodent Mastermind
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I feel bad for the x-1's that didn't make the final cut. Going to a 6 round would help. Either the early start Friday or simply not playing the first elimination as the last game Friday night and swapping it with a 6th round would work from my point of view.

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I agree with Doug on this one. Cut out the byes all together and give more Swag to the regional championship winner at the regional site. One of the problems that will come up at regionals will be the store champion winners that get a bye at regionals. The byes skew the system too much which causes either more rounds added, or screw up who should make the top16/8/4 depending on regional size. Since regionals are store sponsored events, I am sure the TO's would rather have easier than harder while running the events.

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Also some regionals are harder than others. That's a real thing. I'm sure the ones in Chicago were really hard.

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I am going to agree with adding a game on the friday but I do wonder if it is only a temporary fix. As the game grows this problem will arise again.

Being a UK player i would love a bye obviously but am happy to forego it. I would only ask that if the game gets big enough to limit players that winning a regional would garrentee entry.