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 Post subject: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:01 am 
One of The Ones
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The old DCI tie-breaking system was awful. Just atrocious. Might as well flip a coin (actually that would have been better).

What we have now is better, but I still believe it can be improved upon.

Wisconsin regionals highlighted exactly how vague "head-to-head" is currently, and the need to clarify it, as well as perhaps add more tie-brekers.

Currently, the tie-breakers are as follows.

1. Score (3 pts for full win, 2 pts for time running out and being ahead but not achieving full vicotry, 0 pts for loss)

2. Record (Win/loss ratio)

3. # of full wins

4. "Head-to-Head" (More on this later)

5. Strength of Schedule (Take all your opponents for the day's records, and average them out)



So, 1-3 are very clear.

In fact #3 (Number of full wins) is meaningless, since that is already accounted for between #1 and #2. Mathematically it is impossible for anything to ever change between steps 2 and three, so to streamline I suggest we simply drop #3.

#4 - "Head-to-Head". Here's where the fun begins. If there are only 2 players left tied at this step and they played, it's very straight forward. It's when there are more than 2 that it gets tricky. What happens if they all haven't played each other? Do we ignore this step or somehow elevate players (perhaps unfairly?) that have beaten others at the same point and record level? What if someone beat a player at a higher level? It gets complicated quickly.

#5 - Strength of Schedule - This one has always been sticky. If someone drops it effects things. If someone plays a newb early on it effects things. It needs to remain at some point to be a tie-breaker, but other factors should be considered first.


Last edited by TimmerB123 on Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:20 am, edited 1 time in total.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:14 am 
One of The Ones
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So - here's MY suggestion (I have thought about this quite a bit)


(Edited slightly based on thread discussion)

1. Score

2. Record

(Drop # of full wins, since it is already covered in #1 and #2)

3. Head to Head - ONLY IF A PLAYER HAS BEATEN ALL OTHER(S) AT THIS LEVEL. (IE - if a total of 2 players are tied here and they played, the winner. If 3 players are tied here and 1 beat both the other 2, etc)

4. Record ONLY vs players with your same record or better. (How did you do against the best?)

5. Re-check Head to Head (Same criteria as #3 above)

6. Strength of Schedule ONLY vs players you lost to (Further exploring #4 with a similar principal; holding players accountable to who they lost to is very valid.)

7. Re-check Head to Head (Same criteria as #3 above)

8. Strength of Schedule ONLY vs players with your same record or better. (This eliminates the factor of beating the guy in the first round who ended up 0-5, or beating someone who dropped, hurting you in this step. It's basically saying we don't want to punish you for being paired against and beating players with lesser records. Also - note that YOUR record vs the best (step 4) is above SoS of who you lost to (step 6) and SoS against the best (step 8). I think it's more valid what you did than what they did. But they are different, and can further sift out tie-breakers.)

9. Re-check Head to Head (Same criteria as #3 above)

10. Full strength of schedule (gotta have it somewhere)

11. Re-check Head to Head (Same criteria as #3 above)

12. Roll off (it sucks, but will VERY rarely happen. Better than the current alphabetical or whoever was entered in the computer first). You HAVE to have a final tie-breaker in the very unlikely event that players are still tied after 10 steps)


Last edited by TimmerB123 on Mon Jun 20, 2011 11:58 am, edited 5 times in total.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:15 am 
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I really think you guys overcomplicated things, Saturday. Maybe I'm just not looking at it in the same mindset.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:18 am 
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The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
I really think you guys overcomplicated things, Saturday. Maybe I'm just not looking at it in the same mindset.


I think there just was too must vagueness on how to interpret "head-to-head" when they didn't all play each other. At very least - we need to clarify exactly how we will handle that.


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:20 am 
Big Bad Brad
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TimmerB123 wrote:

#4 - "Head-to-Head". Here's where the fun begins. If there are only 2 players left tied at this step and they played, it's very straight forward. It's when there are more than 2 that it gets tricky. What happens if they all haven't played each other? Do we ignore this step or somehow elevate players (perhaps unfairly?) that have beaten others at the same point and record level? What if someone beat a player at a higher level? It gets complicated quickly.


If no players have played each other, then they get arranged by SoS.

If they haven't all played each other then, as in the case Saturday, this step takes precedence over any step after it.

I'm all for adding another step or two (removing MWP) into the tie-breaker system, further pushing SoS's importance down the chain.

Anything other than that, it has to be really impressive (and simple) to get me over to your side.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:23 am 
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The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
I really think you guys overcomplicated things, Saturday. Maybe I'm just not looking at it in the same mindset.


The issue was, that the tie breaker put Jonny behind Jason, but they never played each other. Jonny's SoS was better than Jason's. Jason's best win was against me 3-2, and Jonny's was against Matt 4-1, but since Matt wasn't in our 9pt tie, that head to head was irrelevant, and Jason's head to head win against me put him ahead of Jonny, who he did not play. It should have gone to SoS to determine between the two of them in theory, but the rules do not currently allow that to happen. For further comparison, they both lost to Tim 5-0, Jonny lost to me 3-2 and Jason lost to another 4-1. Head to head cannot be used to determine between people who did not play, that is not fair. Transitive properties do not work.

The real screw up was because I lost in the last round to Tim, had I won, we would have had 4 4-1s in the top 4 and no controversy. With that said, it was good for this to come up so I could see it personally, and so we could address it before Gencon.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:26 am 
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The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
TimmerB123 wrote:

#4 - "Head-to-Head". Here's where the fun begins. If there are only 2 players left tied at this step and they played, it's very straight forward. It's when there are more than 2 that it gets tricky. What happens if they all haven't played each other? Do we ignore this step or somehow elevate players (perhaps unfairly?) that have beaten others at the same point and record level? What if someone beat a player at a higher level? It gets complicated quickly.


If no players have played each other, then they get arranged by SoS.

If they haven't all played each other then, as in the case Saturday, this step takes precedence over any step after it.

I'm all for adding another step or two (removing MWP) into the tie-breaker system, further pushing SoS's importance down the chain.

Anything other than that, it has to be really impressive (and simple) to get me over to your side.


I agree that Head to Head should take precedence over SoS, but it's only clear-cut in situations where all tied players actually played each other (or rather, if one has beaten all others - ie if 3 players are tied, and Bob beat Sam and Phil, it doesn't matter whether or not Sam and Phil played - Bob is the winner).

The system is actually quite simple - Jason, Bill and I figured out the theoretical rankings if we used this system in our heads in 2 minutes.


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:28 am 
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TimmerB123 wrote:
The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
I really think you guys overcomplicated things, Saturday. Maybe I'm just not looking at it in the same mindset.


I think there just was too must vagueness on how to interpret "head-to-head" when they didn't all play each other. At very least - we need to clarify exactly how we will handle that.


As I explained to Jason via PM; the steps all are all codependent of each other; not independent, but the step before takes precedence over the step after. So H2H outweighs SoS.

Jason beat Bill beat Jonny. It's irrelevant (currently) that Jonny and Jason never played nor did the "other guy" play any of the others.

So a ranking has been established for 3 of the 4 players. You move to step 5 to determine the "other guy's" placement. Since his SoS was so low it was easy. Now, Jason asked if his had been 650 (lower than Jonny but higher than everyone else). He would have been placed between Jonny (680) and Bill 600, but not Jason because H2H is a higher tie breaker. Had his been the highest SoS of all 4, then yes, he would have been elevated above Jason. Statistically though, the higher SoS a player has the more likely it is that he played someone in the top 4 + tiebreakers.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:29 am 
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We always went by Record, Full SoS, Roll Off (on all SoS ties). Worked for us.

I know its not official or anything, but if you have to have a 12 step program to figuring out who won a tournament where you play with Star Wars themed army men, then your doing something wrong, lol.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:31 am 
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The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
TimmerB123 wrote:
The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
I really think you guys overcomplicated things, Saturday. Maybe I'm just not looking at it in the same mindset.


I think there just was too must vagueness on how to interpret "head-to-head" when they didn't all play each other. At very least - we need to clarify exactly how we will handle that.


As I explained to Jason via PM; the steps all are all codependent of each other; not independent, but the step before takes precedence over the step after. So H2H outweighs SoS.

Jason beat Bill beat Jonny. It's irrelevant (currently) that Jonny and Jason never played nor did the "other guy" play any of the others.

So a ranking has been established for 3 of the 4 players. You move to step 5 to determine the "other guy's" placement. Since his SoS was so low it was easy. Now, Jason asked if his had been 650 (lower than Jonny but higher than everyone else). He would have been placed between Jonny (680) and Bill 600, but not Jason because H2H is a higher tie breaker. Had his been the highest SoS of all 4, then yes, he would have been elevated above Jason. Statistically though, the higher SoS a player has the more likely it is that he played someone in the top 4 + tiebreakers.


I see what you are saying, and the real addition that my suggestion adds is factoring in the fact that Jonny beat a 4-1. None of the other 3-2s did that, so he should be awarded for that. Or at least it should be factored in.


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:32 am 
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Replacement for the useless step.

Opponent's match win percentage of players at or above your own point level. In otherwords, at the end of an event, you take all of the opponent's who were either tied with you, or better than you and compare W/L ratios. With this in place, Jonny and Jason would have each been 12-3, and I 11-4, removing me, before H2H is considered. Thus taking a 2 person tie to H2H (the 4th guy was removed as well by this), and they didn't play each other, so it would go on to SoS finally, as they really were tied quite closely in this event.

H2H should be rewritten to specify that it is only used in cases where 1 player has beaten all other tied players.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:33 am 
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Whoops, I kept thinking Jonny was in the middle. The other guy would have been between Jonny and Bill only if the H2H put jonny before bill, my mistake.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:37 am 
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I just dont think you should be out of a tournament if you have a strong SOS half way through a tournament.


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:39 am 
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TimmerB123 wrote:
I see what you are saying, and the real addition that my suggestion adds is factoring in the fact that Jonny beat a 4-1. None of the other 3-2s did that, so he should be awarded for that. Or at least it should be factored in.


Ummm, that's SoS which you all wanted to avoid being a factor a few years ago. Now you want it to be a factor again????

No matter how you do it, someone gets screwed. A year or two ago, you were all worried about the guy who played a bunch of people who dropped, now its the guy who beats the higher ranked players. Or is it really, whatever affects Player X at any given moment is the one we should be concerned about?

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:40 am 
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Another quick and easy way to do it is just look at records of who you lost to. Presumably anyone at this step has more wins than losses, so who did everyone lose to?

At Wisconsin
Jonny lost to me (5-0) and Bill (3-2)
Bill lost to me (5-0) and Jason (3-2)
Jason lost to me (5-0) and one of the (4-1) guys
Tristan lost to ??? and ???

Edited in two of the ??? - Bill


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 9:45 am 
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The_Celestial_Warrior wrote:
TimmerB123 wrote:
I see what you are saying, and the real addition that my suggestion adds is factoring in the fact that Jonny beat a 4-1. None of the other 3-2s did that, so he should be awarded for that. Or at least it should be factored in.


Ummm, that's SoS which you all wanted to avoid being a factor a few years ago. Now you want it to be a factor again????

No matter how you do it, someone gets screwed. A year or two ago, you were all worried about the guy who played a bunch of people who dropped, now its the guy who beats the higher ranked players. Or is it really, whatever affects Player X at any given moment is the one we should be concerned about?


No - it's only the upper half of SoS. It completely takes out of the equation (for this step) players dropping or being paired early against players who end up with awful records.

Regardless - I say check H2H first (with the criteria that one has to have beaten all others at the same tied level), then move on to SoS vs same record and above. Then re-check H2H.

This means (theoretically) if Jonny and bill had the same SoS vs same record or better opponents, and were ahead of Tristan and Jason, then Bill would be the winner since he beat Jonny. You have to re-check H2H after each step.


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 10:15 am 
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In all reality I argued against H2H the whole time. SOS is a fine way to do it. If you end up with a 3-2 record against opps that have a win % of 70 then that is more impressive to me than someone who goes 3-2 with a 60 SOS. Maybe it is my long years of MTG that lead me to this.

But it seems kinda unfair to say o hey you went 4-2 in a big tourney and you beat 3 of the top 8 but you were their only loss on the day so because one of your losses was to joey who finished with the same record as you, you get knocked out and joey who played all chumps except for his win against you gets to be t8.

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 10:16 am 
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I do see the value if one person has beaten all others at his point level for H2H (or the other person if it is only 1 person tied)

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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 10:20 am 
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urbanjedi wrote:
I do see the value if one person has beaten all others at his point level for H2H (or the other person if it is only 1 person tied)


FYI "(or the other person if it is only 1 person tied)" is unnecessary in your sentence because if there are only 2 players tied, then one player has beaten all the others, it's just that there is only one other. ;)


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 Post subject: Re: The tie-breaking system, and how to handle "head-to-head"
PostPosted: Mon Jun 20, 2011 10:22 am 
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billiv15 wrote:
Replacement for the useless step.

Opponent's match win percentage of players at or above your own point level. In otherwords, at the end of an event, you take all of the opponent's who were either tied with you, or better than you and compare W/L ratios. With this in place, Jonny and Jason would have each been 12-3, and I 11-4, removing me, before H2H is considered. Thus taking a 2 person tie to H2H (the 4th guy was removed as well by this), and they didn't play each other, so it would go on to SoS finally, as they really were tied quite closely in this event.

H2H should be rewritten to specify that it is only used in cases where 1 player has beaten all other tied players.


That would put it before H2H, which is bad if there are only 2 tied and they played each other. I think we just need to only consider H2H when there there is a player who has beat all other players at the tied level. Otherwise, move onto your suggestion, then re-check head to head.


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