With 684 players, the rules state that a minimum of 171 make A. Also, players forced in do NOT increase the size. That means you have to find out where the tie-line that made it grow 4 spaces higher (since 175 were in A) is.
The cut-line was 26 players at 34 wins. 34 wins means you were tied for 134th. That means the 6 in the basement had absolutely no effect on the size of A whatsoever. It would’ve been a different story if there were only like 9 or 10 tied at 34, but that wasn’t the case.
Edit: I was a little wrong in my initial conclusion, sorry. I guess there would’ve been room for the 33.5’ers, but that’s it. Not the 33’ers.
Right. My point is that their floor for finishing position is set after day one, if I’m understanding correctly, and I didn’t earn the chance to finish ahead of them. That’s on me to play better and get another win.
(None of this is a complaint — it seems fair to me.)
Splitting the divisions in advance into quartiles is no good since some B players are “rapidly ascending” and are really A players who haven’t got enough quality events in yet to point their way there. Plus some of the better B players can have a good day / weekend and deserve to give A a shot if they want to. Same goes for lower divisions.
Ultimately, I think just like everything else with Pinburgh, everything evens out in the end. I had some very stinging losses especially on day 1, but had just the opposite on day 2 (twice in round 10 if I’m honest). In general, even though it’s a relatively low statistical sample, actual lucky events tend to even out even just over 40 (120?) games. There will be outliers, and they will hurt more if you wound up losing a byebreaker, missing a division, whatever, but for the most part, IME, luck is generally a non-factor.
Oh, well, there you go. I was initially correct for the wrong reason (looked at the wrong number). So, don’t feel too bad about getting screwed out of A by the basement dwellers, B guys!
To carry out the full corrected math based on Bowen’s insight, that means minimum A size is 167. Size of the division (175) minus the basement (6 players) is 169, which is still 2 larger than the minimum size. And the 169 comes from 26 tied at 134 (with 34 wins), don’t forget.
What are your thoughts of player distribution matching pot distribution?
If A gets 50% of the pot then 50% of the players should be in A. My rough breakdown for player distribution on Friday would be:
A=50%
B=24%
C=16%
D=10%
For Friday it was actually about 25% each division
This was legitimately considered 2 years ago, but was rejected because it was not an equal opportunity for all players. Giving $50 to any player who qualified for A didn’t seem like a good idea either, as it might be seen as an effective discount to top players (obviously this wouldn’t be given to players who were bump-forced into A).
The other reason not to do this is paperwork: more payouts mean more form-filling.
But I like it.[quote=“ZenTron, post:132, topic:754”]
If A gets 50% of the pot then 50% of the players should be in A. My rough breakdown for player distribution on Friday would be:A=50%B=24%C=16%D=10%
For Friday it was actually about 25% each division
[/quote]
Absolutely not. This would encourage more sandbagging, because the money-per-player in each division would then be equal.
If A & B is 74% of the participants and people have restrictions I’m not sure how more sandbagging can occur. I also think having more folks in A which gives more people the opportunity for the top prize can shake things up a bit.
I assume I’m missing some important details which is usually the case
For average-to-good players who don’t think they have a chance of making the A playoffs, your scenario would lend itself to aiming as low as possible to face the weakest possible opponents for the same person/$ ratio.
EDIT: Or anyone who’s worse than average. Pretty much anyone other than people with a strong shot to make the A playoffs.
I thought Bowen made a good point, which not a lot of people paid much attention to (or maybe I just misunderstood his point)- when people are talking about sandbagging in this thread, they’re mostly talking about changes to money as a fix (and thus assuming money is the motivation), but that may not be the main motivation. It sounded like what he was saying was that some of the sandbagging is players who are on the cusp of A are saying “ok, so, I could really push in this last round, scrape into A, and then spend tomorrow getting my butt handed to me because I think of myself as a B- or C- division player”, and then, maybe not even consciously, playing a little bit lazier/worse than their best effort so they’ll have a fun day in B instead of a sad day in A. The motivation is fun, not money.
I’m honestly not sure what, if anything, you can do about that- but I do know that changing the money around won’t change that at all.
If people are doing it subconsciously, so be it. It’s reasonable for this to happen and I don’t think any format or prize change will completely solve this. What is not reasonable is having players walk away from a ball, deliberately drain, or deliberately tilt in order to achieve anti-competitive outcomes. That sucks, and that is what has been happening.
I went into day one, round 5 as the 76th seed and 30 points and am ranked in the mid to high 700s. Sadly I finished with 31 points as I hit that exhaustion wall and was grouped with far better consistent and skilled players. Mostly I was just surprised at myself to have had a shot at A division and I decided that I certainly wouldn’t sandbag, though I felt like I had a stronger chance at winning money in B than A. At the end of day two, I wasn’t anywhere close to qualifying for finals and didn’t play anywhere near as well as I had the first day. I personally think that I would always want to do as well as I possibly can since sandbagging into a lower division to take money from those who belong in said division seems like a lame move to me. Don’t get me wrong, I absolutely would have loved to recoup some of my Pinburgh costs, but mostly I was there for the challenge, experience, fun, and social aspects of the event. I had an absolute blast. Maybe I’ll get a chance to play A next year.
Totally agreed! I think the point still stands, though, is that if the motivation is having more fun on day 2, money changes won’t actually change the behavior.
At this point we’re in the realm of what really motivates people and how can organizations affect change based on human motivations, at which point we all read Daniel Pink books and cry in our whisky I guess.
