UK 'Bonus' Points - TOs what are you trying to achieve?
Posted: Sat Mar 26, 2016 10:38 am
Hi there, I’m new and after a couple of years of dipping in and out of Blood Bowl I’m committed to doing as many UK tournaments as possible this year. I’m writing this post because I am genuinely concerned at the number of tournaments in the UK I’ve seen operating a scoring system like this: Win/Draw/Loss = 10/5/0 points plus a ‘bonus’ point for each casualty inflicted up to a max of 3 and a ‘bonus’ point for each TD up to a maximum of 3.
I feel compelled to speak despite being a newbie and having no ‘status’ because the vast majority of Blood Bowlers I have met are smart, conscientious people and I can’t believe that they have thought about the implications and decided “yes this is the best way to score tournaments”. But I want to make it clear I am not attacking any person who uses this system, either now or in the past. It could easily have been me in an alternate universe. I just thought it might be useful for a new person to lay out some really obvious points about the system itself because I feel like they have gotten lost somewhere along the way. I can’t see any rationale for using this particular system but yet a lot of TOs in the UK seem to regard it as ‘normal’ - maybe you can educate me why this system works. Or maybe we can come up with a better system. But anyway apologies if you’ve heard it all before, here we go:
1. First of all I want to challenge the notion that this is a bonus points system at all. To me genuine bonus points systems have 2 features: 1) they don’t mess with the Win>Draw>Loss hierarchy without careful consideration and 2) they have an aim ie a purpose. What is the purpose of this system? As I stated above – what are you trying to achieve? Looking at a real bonus point system: in the Rugby World Cup you get 4/2/0 for W/D/L with 2 bonus points available: one if you score 4+ tries and one if you lose by less than 7 points. You can see clearly what they are looking to reward. And here they actually do make some Losses as good as some Draws – I would guess because in rugby draws are rare so the true hierarchy they need to maintain is Win > Loss. But in Blood Bowl draws are the ‘standard’ result so I contend the W>D>L hierarchy is far more important to maintain. This ‘UK’ system messes with that hierarchy big time – it says that scoring 3 TD in a loss with 3 cas is better than a 0-0 draw with no cas. There is nothing ‘bonus’ about it – it is just better. Similarly a 3-3 draw with 3 cas is a good as a 1-0 win with 0 cas – again nothing ‘bonus’ about it. The Win>Draw>Loss hierarchy is the most fundamental of sporting laws – across all sports, all dimensions and all universes you don’t mess with this – not without very good reason. I don’t see a reason here – and worse – I don’t see any logic to the messing. Hence my question: what are you trying to achieve?
2. Points for TDs – sorry but this is just weird. I mean TDs are how we score the game. If I get more TDs than you my ‘bonus’ points are those I get for winning. If we score the same TDs I lose this ‘bonus’ – it cancels with yours, we call that drawing. Extra points for TDs just says “f*@& defending we hate it”. Really? Isn’t that half the game? Points for TDs also has the truly bizarre effect of ranking all draws. If we leave cas aside: a 3-3 > 2-2 > 1-1 > 0-0. Again there is nothing ‘bonus’ about this – these draws are strictly ranked in this way. If you are doing this then why isn’t a 4-4 draw better than 3-3 or 5-5 better than that? I guess that would just be silly…… But seriously is this strict ranking of draws really what the TOs want? Again - why? Real bonus point systems do things like reward winning by a bigger margin but here a 3-1, 3-0, 3-2, 4-1, 5-0, 5-2, 5-4, 8-0 victories all earn the same for the victor. I would suggest a start point for a genuine bonus point system in BB would be: losers earn a bonus point if they lose by 1 TD, winners earn a bonus point if they win by > 2 TD margin (ie win by 3 TDs or more). Notice that in ‘our’ system there is actually no way to earn 10 points for a win – that alone should tell you something smells. This system means that you get 11 points for a win with 2 ‘bonus’ points available for scoring a second and third TD but with no consideration for the winning margin – why is a 3-2 victory considered better than a 2-1 victory but the same as a 3-0 victory? It’s not bonus I tell you it’s bonkers! The UK Bonkers point system I dub it
3. Bonus Points for Casualties. Here’s the thing about Casualties – the big news about casualties that this system flies in the face of: they already are a bonus. An in game, right there, have that son – BONUS. I knocked him down and what: he’s not coming back after the next turn, not at the end of the drive – no not at all!? BONUS! Getting lots of casualties makes it easier to get TDs and win or draw games. They are the last thing that extra points should be awarded for. Then there is the fact they are lucky. If I have block and I roll a 2 dice block against an unskilled AV 7 bod I have a 0.75*0.42*0.1667 = ~5% chance to casualty them. So 20 such blocks and I might reasonably expect one casualty – but I also might reasonably expect 0 in 40. There is nothing I can do (leaving aside rerolls and mighty blow) to control this except keep taking blocks where I can – which most coaches will do most of the time. So by and large what separates the coach who gets the casualties and who doesn’t? Luck. Given that suffering casualties makes it harder to achieve a positive result you might argue a real bonus point system for BB would say if you lose the casualty count by 4+ but still draw or win or even lose narrowly you get a bonus point. To give you an actual example I played my Wood Elves against Nippy’s dwarves at Bunker Bowl and in the first half I got 3 casualties on him plus a KO. That made the game so much harder for him but in the event he narrowly lost 1-0 having had a chance to draw it – the notion I should get extra points for having had an easier time of it in that game I think is ridiculous. If anything he should have got a bonus not me.
So to sum up; this system is the worst of all worlds. It’s kind of, sort of W>D>L but messed with big time and arbitrarily – arbitrarily favouring certain outcomes that a coach cannot control. Outcomes which don’t represent any greater skill and in many cases would be less skill in fact. And to what end?
By way of contrast let me give you a genuine bonus point system that I alluded to in this post. It would run W/D/L = 6/3/0 with bonus points available for a) losing by a 1 TD margin b) winning by > 2 TD margin. You can see clearly I am trying to reward people who push for bigger wins and those who keep games tight even when losing. But I would say do we even need a bonus point system? Here I can see the aims and I respect them but is it really needed?
In the absence of reasoned arguments (which might be on their way of course!) I would urge all TOs using this system to ditch it completely and see what happens. Use W/D/L only and then work out what it is that you don’t like. Maybe we can come up with something to address it. Apart from anything else in the new “Golden Gauntlet” era this stuff now really matters – I don’t think it’s fair that coaches get ranked differently at different tournaments. For me the ranking should be a standard and then tournaments add flavour from the team selections, weather rules etc.
But fundamentally I would like to know - if you are not going to use W>D>L then why? What are you trying to achieve? Please educate me cause right now I can’t see any logic to this system and I am genuinely concerned that it is used so widely in the UK.
Cheers
I feel compelled to speak despite being a newbie and having no ‘status’ because the vast majority of Blood Bowlers I have met are smart, conscientious people and I can’t believe that they have thought about the implications and decided “yes this is the best way to score tournaments”. But I want to make it clear I am not attacking any person who uses this system, either now or in the past. It could easily have been me in an alternate universe. I just thought it might be useful for a new person to lay out some really obvious points about the system itself because I feel like they have gotten lost somewhere along the way. I can’t see any rationale for using this particular system but yet a lot of TOs in the UK seem to regard it as ‘normal’ - maybe you can educate me why this system works. Or maybe we can come up with a better system. But anyway apologies if you’ve heard it all before, here we go:
1. First of all I want to challenge the notion that this is a bonus points system at all. To me genuine bonus points systems have 2 features: 1) they don’t mess with the Win>Draw>Loss hierarchy without careful consideration and 2) they have an aim ie a purpose. What is the purpose of this system? As I stated above – what are you trying to achieve? Looking at a real bonus point system: in the Rugby World Cup you get 4/2/0 for W/D/L with 2 bonus points available: one if you score 4+ tries and one if you lose by less than 7 points. You can see clearly what they are looking to reward. And here they actually do make some Losses as good as some Draws – I would guess because in rugby draws are rare so the true hierarchy they need to maintain is Win > Loss. But in Blood Bowl draws are the ‘standard’ result so I contend the W>D>L hierarchy is far more important to maintain. This ‘UK’ system messes with that hierarchy big time – it says that scoring 3 TD in a loss with 3 cas is better than a 0-0 draw with no cas. There is nothing ‘bonus’ about it – it is just better. Similarly a 3-3 draw with 3 cas is a good as a 1-0 win with 0 cas – again nothing ‘bonus’ about it. The Win>Draw>Loss hierarchy is the most fundamental of sporting laws – across all sports, all dimensions and all universes you don’t mess with this – not without very good reason. I don’t see a reason here – and worse – I don’t see any logic to the messing. Hence my question: what are you trying to achieve?
2. Points for TDs – sorry but this is just weird. I mean TDs are how we score the game. If I get more TDs than you my ‘bonus’ points are those I get for winning. If we score the same TDs I lose this ‘bonus’ – it cancels with yours, we call that drawing. Extra points for TDs just says “f*@& defending we hate it”. Really? Isn’t that half the game? Points for TDs also has the truly bizarre effect of ranking all draws. If we leave cas aside: a 3-3 > 2-2 > 1-1 > 0-0. Again there is nothing ‘bonus’ about this – these draws are strictly ranked in this way. If you are doing this then why isn’t a 4-4 draw better than 3-3 or 5-5 better than that? I guess that would just be silly…… But seriously is this strict ranking of draws really what the TOs want? Again - why? Real bonus point systems do things like reward winning by a bigger margin but here a 3-1, 3-0, 3-2, 4-1, 5-0, 5-2, 5-4, 8-0 victories all earn the same for the victor. I would suggest a start point for a genuine bonus point system in BB would be: losers earn a bonus point if they lose by 1 TD, winners earn a bonus point if they win by > 2 TD margin (ie win by 3 TDs or more). Notice that in ‘our’ system there is actually no way to earn 10 points for a win – that alone should tell you something smells. This system means that you get 11 points for a win with 2 ‘bonus’ points available for scoring a second and third TD but with no consideration for the winning margin – why is a 3-2 victory considered better than a 2-1 victory but the same as a 3-0 victory? It’s not bonus I tell you it’s bonkers! The UK Bonkers point system I dub it
3. Bonus Points for Casualties. Here’s the thing about Casualties – the big news about casualties that this system flies in the face of: they already are a bonus. An in game, right there, have that son – BONUS. I knocked him down and what: he’s not coming back after the next turn, not at the end of the drive – no not at all!? BONUS! Getting lots of casualties makes it easier to get TDs and win or draw games. They are the last thing that extra points should be awarded for. Then there is the fact they are lucky. If I have block and I roll a 2 dice block against an unskilled AV 7 bod I have a 0.75*0.42*0.1667 = ~5% chance to casualty them. So 20 such blocks and I might reasonably expect one casualty – but I also might reasonably expect 0 in 40. There is nothing I can do (leaving aside rerolls and mighty blow) to control this except keep taking blocks where I can – which most coaches will do most of the time. So by and large what separates the coach who gets the casualties and who doesn’t? Luck. Given that suffering casualties makes it harder to achieve a positive result you might argue a real bonus point system for BB would say if you lose the casualty count by 4+ but still draw or win or even lose narrowly you get a bonus point. To give you an actual example I played my Wood Elves against Nippy’s dwarves at Bunker Bowl and in the first half I got 3 casualties on him plus a KO. That made the game so much harder for him but in the event he narrowly lost 1-0 having had a chance to draw it – the notion I should get extra points for having had an easier time of it in that game I think is ridiculous. If anything he should have got a bonus not me.
So to sum up; this system is the worst of all worlds. It’s kind of, sort of W>D>L but messed with big time and arbitrarily – arbitrarily favouring certain outcomes that a coach cannot control. Outcomes which don’t represent any greater skill and in many cases would be less skill in fact. And to what end?
By way of contrast let me give you a genuine bonus point system that I alluded to in this post. It would run W/D/L = 6/3/0 with bonus points available for a) losing by a 1 TD margin b) winning by > 2 TD margin. You can see clearly I am trying to reward people who push for bigger wins and those who keep games tight even when losing. But I would say do we even need a bonus point system? Here I can see the aims and I respect them but is it really needed?
In the absence of reasoned arguments (which might be on their way of course!) I would urge all TOs using this system to ditch it completely and see what happens. Use W/D/L only and then work out what it is that you don’t like. Maybe we can come up with something to address it. Apart from anything else in the new “Golden Gauntlet” era this stuff now really matters – I don’t think it’s fair that coaches get ranked differently at different tournaments. For me the ranking should be a standard and then tournaments add flavour from the team selections, weather rules etc.
But fundamentally I would like to know - if you are not going to use W>D>L then why? What are you trying to achieve? Please educate me cause right now I can’t see any logic to this system and I am genuinely concerned that it is used so widely in the UK.
Cheers