Talk Fantasy Football

As pointed out in the other thread re: bonus points, Strength of Schedule (SOS) as a tiebreaker doesn't work as well further down the rankings.

ie 2 players on 1/1/4 are probably separated by chance depending on who they draw R1/2.

How about only including wins and draws and calculate mean SOS?

Is this:
a) Rubbish because of x
b) Rubbish because of the time it would take to work out, but otherwise great.
c) An improvement...

I suspect it's a), but thoughts...?

I don't see how this is a problem at all? If two players on 1/1/4 are separated by who they drew in R1 (everything else being equal) then the one who has a weaker SOS had an easier R1 game. Thus they had more opportunity to win or draw that game and so the person with the stronger SOS is being rewarded for having a harder draw. That is the way SOS works right? If you lose to a coach who is not going to contribute much to your SOS then you have a higher chance of scoring actual points (infinitely more valuable than tiebreaker points).

But perhaps the answer is really, who cares? SOS is designed to determine a tournament's top places and prizes. I care not one jot whether I finish 31st or 32nd (yes I have gone 1/1/4).

I think you are building on my thread in which case - thanks! If not let me know the other BP thread

I am not sure how to improve SoS. I am not sure if you saw but Geggster did answer Glow-worm's concerns about SoS to that person's satisfaction so if you didn't see it on my thread maybe worth checking out. For me I am less bothered about what tie breaker people use because as long as 2 people are sitting on identical records in terms of W-D-L then there has to be some way to separate and none is likely to be entirely satisfactory. I think SoS seems the strongest because it seems the fairest available. But to me the battle - and I can't believe it is a battle - is getting buy in that we should 100% respect the W-D-L record by dropping bonus points and using 2/1/0 with a tiebreaker. With the possibility of much more limited bonus points - ones that make sense - coming back later. For example Waterbowl has a single bonus point for a win of >= 2 TD - which obviously doesn't mess with W>D>L and has a clear point too.

Yeah, thanks for the responses. I thought it was worth discussing... rather than derailing an already active (and successful) thread.

I think one of the big criticisms of SOS is that it makes people feel as if the tiebreaker is out of their hands. Also I thought that a perception of SOS making more sense at the top end of tournaments rather than the bottom (maybe) was worth addressing.

I figured that it would be better to reward people for the results they get rather than punishing them for the results they didn't, but appreciate it's a pretty lazy distinction. As it stands I think SOS is a pretty solid tiebreaker, and the best we have for sure!

I think it as a fair point that SOS works better on the top tables than further down the list. But then as was pointed out; does it really matter if you get 31st or 34th place? I suppose the biggest "issue" then would be the Stunty Cup where we could possible see the winner decided between two 1-2-3 records, in which SOS might be seen as a bit arbitrary. Not that I can think of any better ways to do it...

Yeah, I think this has been said before, but SOS is just the 'least worst' option rather than some shining example of perfection.

Here's a radical idea. Don't use tiebreaks of any sort. Have players with equal record? Then declare them joint 1st/2nd/31st place.

straume wrote:I think it as a fair point that SOS works better on the top tables than further down the list. But then as was pointed out; does it really matter if you get 31st or 34th place? I suppose the biggest "issue" then would be the Stunty Cup where we could possible see the winner decided between two 1-2-3 records, in which SOS might be seen as a bit arbitrary. Not that I can think of any better ways to do it...

Indeed stunty cup was my thinking, which people really want to win, so should be taken seriously. SOS is the best way for this I think.

Moraiwe wrote:Here's a radical idea. Don't use tiebreaks of any sort. Have players with equal record? Then declare them joint 1st/2nd/31st place.

If someone ran a tournament like this, would be fine by me!

Are you sure? I thought all the super-cool 'non powergamers' didn't care about winning and were just there to have fun? That's what I keep reading anyway.

Moraiwe wrote:Here's a radical idea. Don't use tiebreaks of any sort. Have players with equal record? Then declare them joint 1st/2nd/31st place.

The more I get into thinking about (and God I have ended up thinking about it a lot more than is relevant for the midtable likes of me!) a system is worthy of respect if it respects W>D>L as much as possible - and where it breaks that it does so with some kind of logic. So your suggestion is fine with me - in fact it might be a stroke of genius. I'm new though so haven't really seen how this would work in practice. You would also need to account for the Golden Gauntlet scoring although a solution which immediately suggests itself is that people on the same W/D/L share the GG points. Eg if 2 people share 1st place - then the next ranked person would need to be 3rd and the 2 at the top would have to share the GG points for 1st and 2nd - the total divided by 2 and rounded up or down (not sure which is best). Of course that does mean that in the GG it becomes better to have a won a tournament outright - but perhaps that is a good side effect rather than a bad one. Given you would have the Swiss system essentially unmessed with you'd hope it would be ok. In my view it's definitely better than ranking wins contrary to common sense and strictly ranking draws 'just cause'.

...but surely someone should take home the trophy (and glory) for first place?

And then we get (back) to "what happens to the trophies that people win" - I imagine lots end up in drawers etc.

sann0638 wrote:And then we get (back) to "what happens to the trophies that people win" - I imagine lots end up in drawers etc.

[off topic]
All of mine and Fern's are on display on every available bit of shelf space (and there are a few; I may have one NAF shield to my name but I have plenty of CAS & TD awards, a Glowworm, Stunty Cup and a Runner Up award )
[/off topic]

Hi,

@trophies: let's not derail this thread. I think there are sufficient players who care about winning and winning tournaments, independent of what they do with the trophies.

@no tiebreakers with same W/D/L : don't like it. We need a ranking and winners, so I want tiebreakers (and yes I think sos is ok)

@sos : yes I also get the feeling it is not under my control, so initially was not a fan. But well it's a dice game called bloodbowl, anybody knows there is nothing really under full control by the coach.

@ initial post:
Actually I would like to come back to this.
I really did not understand the proposal, so can not even judge if it is rubbish
So what is this intermediate win loss sos???

Oventa wrote: @ initial post:
Actually I would like to come back to this.
I really did not understand the proposal, so can not even judge if it is rubbish
So what is this intermediate win loss sos???

SOS is calculated on the sum of *all* of your opponents' final placings in the tournament.

I thought, it might be an idea to calculate SOS based on the players that you beat/drew with only. That way, you get rewarded for beating someone good, but not punished for failing to beat someone less good. Although, it was just a very quick thought based on the other thread, so please don't spend any significant amount of time worrying about it...