Opening rounds random then Swiss

[lunchmoney]

At Exiles this year I had the first two rounds be random draw, before splitting into Swiss draw system. It was something I wanted to try and now I'd like to widen the conversation to bring in others that weren't there to talk to people who were there and experienced it.

The draws can be seen on the tourney thread and start here.


What do you think of two rounds rather than one? Advantage to anyone? Disadvantage to anyone? No real difference?

[Purplegoo]

Why two random rounds then Swiss, out of interest? What was the rationale?

I'm an old curmudgeon in some (er, many) ways. For me, while Blood Bowl tournaments are primarily a social occasion, they are still tournaments to some. Adding randomness doesn't help find the best / luckiest on-pitch coach and satisfactorily settle the competition, it just makes it more likely Coach A will get a randomly lucky draw whilst Coach B doesn't.

Not to say there isn't room in the world for all sorts of ideas and innovation, but I'm not much of an immediate fan.

[lunchmoney]

It really was just something I wanted to try. To see if it made a difference. No strong agenda, I had no real thoughts beyond, "let's try this, see what happens."

[lunchmoney]

Adding randomness doesn't help find the best / luckiest on-pitch coach and satisfactorily settle the competition,

I will add that I had in mind a top five seed, just from what I know of the coaches attending. I got 3 right, so I don't think it added too much in the effort to find the best on the day.

[Jip]

Surely it'd be advantage better/more lucky coaches (could draw two inexperienced/less lucky coaches) and disadvantage inexperienced/less lucky coaches (could draw two experienced/more lucky coaches)?

Swiss means, if I get pants'd in round one, at least I'm likely to play someone who's had similar fortunes in round two.

Your suggestion means I could get rolled in round one, then rolled again in round two. I guess it would also impact Strength of Schedule, if a better/more lucky coach smashes two rookies in the first couple of rounds, s/he will be penalised at the end against another coach who's had more challenging wins.

Anything that makes the draw fairer should be the preferred route. My (limited) experience is that the less randomness there is, the less issues there can be at the end.

It really was just something I wanted to try. To see if it made a difference. No strong agenda, I had no real thoughts beyond, "let's try this, see what happens."

Did coaches know you were doing it in advance?

[howlinggriffon]

What was the tournament settings you had in Score? Seems weird that after Round 3 that team in 1st place wasn't playing 2nd place as it's should have been Swiss by then?

[lunchmoney]

Did coaches know you were doing it in advance?

Yep. It was in the first and subsequent posts of the tourney thread. May have even been in the rules pack. I had forgotten until I was reminded by several people as I was about to the round 2 draw

[lunchmoney]

What was the tournament settings you had in Score? Seems weird that after Round 3 that team in 1st place wasn't playing 2nd place as it's should have been Swiss by then?

Same as a lot of tourneys; total points, then random. So everyone on 6 points (two wins) was randomly paired off.

[Dionysian]

While I don't see the point in deliberately making the Swiss less efficient by adding a second random round, the effect is extremely minor with this field size/number of rounds. Even with two random rounds Exiles was significantly more robust than most events on the calendar.

Unless Exiles' field size increases enough that you hit the inflection point where a 2nd random round shifts the sorting efficiency from robust to fragile then it really doesn't matter very much either way.