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TOPL - Brawl For All - Oct 20th

Vengeance

Vengeance

Well-Known Member
Nov 14, 2012
1,990
139
63
Keswick, ON
http://topl.org/events.html

For anyone interested, I'll be hosting a tournament at my place on Sunday Oct 20th.

The format is about as simple an inclusive as it possibly could be.

We will be playing for a set number of hours (5 - 6) during that time you will be playing match play for the entire time.

Who your play and the machine you play on will be random, but you will never play the same player or machine twice (unless we make it all the way through the field)

The format boils down to this, if you win, you get a point, if you lose, you don't, simple.

Top 4 players at the end of the time allotted will be put in a playoff.

Entry fee is $20, $10 of that goes to the host (me) as I will be providing food/drinks for everyone throughout the day.

No one will be eliminated from tournament until the very end! So it is an entire day of pinball playing.

If you have any questions please let me know.
 
Chris Bardon

Chris Bardon

Well-Known Member
Nov 15, 2012
1,342
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Mississauga, ON
Sounds like a cool format, and it should mean that everyone can play all afternoon. Only real question on the format though is whether there's any way to get rid of the random chance element in a reasonable amount of time. If you have 30 players, and have time for 8 rounds, then it's possible that the 10th seed would have to play ranks 1-8, while the 9th seed plays ranks 23-30, meaning that they have a much stronger chance of qualifying for the playoffs. Increasing the number of rounds obviously decreases the chance of this happening, but it's probably not practical to get to more than, say, 10 rounds in a day depending on how long games are going.

What if you started weighting the matches as you went through the day? For example, rounds 1-4 are truly random, which means that by the end all players will have between 0 and 4 points. Then you start weighting matches, where players who are seeded closer to each other are more likely to get matched together, BUT the number of points for winning is based on the number of points that your opponent has? Basically, some way of getting more points for beating higher ranked players. Have other people who have used this format tried something like this? What's the typical ratio of number of players to number of rounds in a format like this?

I guess we'll see on the 20th how it works out. If nothing else, it's a day of playing pinball, so in the end, everyone wins! :)
 
Vengeance

Vengeance

Well-Known Member
Nov 14, 2012
1,990
139
63
Keswick, ON
The software will allow for better players to play vs each other as the tournament goes on, and how many rounds we get in will be 100% dependent on how fast each person finishes their games and submits their results.

The submitting of results will now be up to the player, not the organizer, the winner will select their name from a drop down box on the computer screen and enter they have won, this will remove both their name and their opponents name from the list, once everyone has finished we move onto the next round.

As for weighting the matches for higher ranked players as the day goes on, I don't think that makes sense for a few reasons.

Reason one, all you are doing is stacking the deck for the players who play better, if after 4 rounds you have 6 guys with 4 - 0 records and they play each other for 2 points instead of one all you are doing is making it easier for those better players to keep winning.

The idea behind this format is that everyone should have a chance all the way to the end, a few wins and a few losses for someone else and you can be right back in it.

The other reason I don't like that is there is no Risk for the people involved in playing for more points. If you win you get extra points in your format, but if you lose the result is still the same. So just by playing better you get better opportunities for more points and no more risk then those who are playing for less points.

Your idea sound allot more like the rich getting richer type thing.

We can try and weight the matches but I don't think it's going to make that much of a difference with such a small subset of people. When I played the format in Europe there were over 100 people so yea weighting was 100% necessary to try and keep the field even.

But over enough rounds, the more skilled players will rise to the top regardless of who they end up having to face.

We will see how many people show up and make a decision day of on the Good vs Good type matches



Chris Bardon said:
Sounds like a cool format, and it should mean that everyone can play all afternoon. Only real question on the format though is whether there's any way to get rid of the random chance element in a reasonable amount of time. If you have 30 players, and have time for 8 rounds, then it's possible that the 10th seed would have to play ranks 1-8, while the 9th seed plays ranks 23-30, meaning that they have a much stronger chance of qualifying for the playoffs. Increasing the number of rounds obviously decreases the chance of this happening, but it's probably not practical to get to more than, say, 10 rounds in a day depending on how long games are going.

What if you started weighting the matches as you went through the day? For example, rounds 1-4 are truly random, which means that by the end all players will have between 0 and 4 points. Then you start weighting matches, where players who are seeded closer to each other are more likely to get matched together, BUT the number of points for winning is based on the number of points that your opponent has? Basically, some way of getting more points for beating higher ranked players. Have other people who have used this format tried something like this? What's the typical ratio of number of players to number of rounds in a format like this?

I guess we'll see on the 20th how it works out. If nothing else, it's a day of playing pinball, so in the end, everyone wins! :)
Click to expand...
 
frolic

frolic

Member
Nov 19, 2012
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I like the idea and think this will be a big improvement over double elimination. My only concern with this format is that it can bottleneck waiting for a handful of players to finish their games each round.

The only solution that comes to mind is since the software is tracking who has played who, why not match people up as games are ending. The catch with this is you would have to determine how many rounds the entire tournament is in advance so if someone burns through all their matches quickly they'll max out, so everyone plays the same number of rounds.

That would also avoid the bottleneck of eating. If people are taking a break for food, the whole tournament stops. Matching players as they are ready would allow everyone to eat/take breaks in their own time.
 
Vengeance

Vengeance

Well-Known Member
Nov 14, 2012
1,990
139
63
Keswick, ON
My machines are setup in such a way that I'm not to worried about ball times.

The only longer playing games would be LOTR, TSPP and maybe AC/DC if you get a good game going, but I can try and harden those up before the 20th.

As for food, I think everyone will have opportunity to eat, there will be some down time between matches, especially if you are a player that say ended up on an EM that round, chances are you will finish much faster then the players on the DMD machines. So you'll get a chance to get some grub, it all works out pretty well.

But we will see how it goes, this is a pilot project, so there will be some growing pains, but I still think it's a format that promotes fun competitive play, rather then just straight competition.

frolic said:
I like the idea and think this will be a big improvement over double elimination. My only concern with this format is that it can bottleneck waiting for a handful of players to finish their games each round.

The only solution that comes to mind is since the software is tracking who has played who, why not match people up as games are ending. The catch with this is you would have to determine how many rounds the entire tournament is in advance so if someone burns through all their matches quickly they'll max out, so everyone plays the same number of rounds.

That would also avoid the bottleneck of eating. If people are taking a break for food, the whole tournament stops. Matching players as they are ready would allow everyone to eat/take breaks in their own time.
Click to expand...
 
bstock

bstock

Active Member
Apr 1, 2013
325
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Montreal, Quebec
I just found and joined the group on facebook. I'm hoping to attend this event if work allows. Sounds like a lot of fun! With all of Adams tournament experience, competing and organizing, I'm sure this event will be a lot of fun!
 
Chris Bardon

Chris Bardon

Well-Known Member
Nov 15, 2012
1,342
182
63
Mississauga, ON
The other reason I don't like that is there is no Risk for the people involved in playing for more points. If you win you get extra points in your format, but if you lose the result is still the same. So just by playing better you get better opportunities for more points and no more risk then those who are playing for less points.
Click to expand...

The original idea I was toying with is awarding points for a win proportionally to the score of your opponent. So if you're tied, you get 1 point, but if someone who's 0-4 beats a 4-0 player, maybe they get 3 points or something (but the inverse case would be one point). The idea here is that while there's inherent risk in playing someone ranked better than you, the reward for winning is greater than beating an easier opponent. Again, randomness becomes a problem though-there's no way to choose who your opponents are, so there's no way to control what happens. Another thing to try would be a divisional/pinburgh format, where after the first few rounds, you split into divisions, reset the scores, and have people play others closer to the same ability (although this might be more relevant for a TOPL playoffs than a one off like this).

In any case, I'd guess we'd get between 25 and 35 people for this event, so it should work out that you play a decent number of people through the day. Looking forward to seeing how it works-I can only imagine trying to balance things with 100 in this style.
 
frolic

frolic

Member
Nov 19, 2012
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Ok, cool. Well I know this is an experiment and we'll learn from it. I will be there.
 
DRANO

DRANO

Super Member
Nov 15, 2012
2,827
519
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Mississauga
Too bad I'll probably be recovering from Expo. This sounds like fun... and I still have yet to see your place Adam.
Enjoy guys.
 
Vengeance

Vengeance

Well-Known Member
Nov 14, 2012
1,990
139
63
Keswick, ON
Just to add a little more information:

Doors will open at 11:30, tournament check in will be closed at 12:20, 12:30 the first round of play will start

Anyone can enter or leave the tournament at any time, so if you show up late you can still participate but obviously playing less rounds means less opportunity to get points

There will be an A and B Division, there will be no restrictions on either division choose which one you want to play.

A will play for the WPPR points and cash prizes
B will play for some prizes we will have avaliable, translates, pinball parts that kind of stuff

Qualifying will end at 5:30

At that point top 4 players in A and Top 4 players in B will have a PAPA style playoff on 3 randomly chosen games.

For any necessary rulings we will follow Pinburgh rules from a malfunction or interface type situation.
 
movingpictures

movingpictures

Active Member
Nov 29, 2012
552
31
28
Mont-Real
Would have liked to make the trip, but can't justify a 12 hour drive for a $10 tournament.

But then again ... mo money, mo problems .. right?
 
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