Grand Moff Boris wrote:
First, being the "clear winner" is not the only concern, and second, yes pairing same records together is, IMO, the best way to go. But that's not what happens, and thus the biggest part of my hatred about the Swiss style of play. Let me try to explain
Yes it is. The pairings are simply set up by the rankings at the end of each round. Being paired down is the result of being the lowest ranked among your given record currently, and in the future should be based on the new tie breakers based off of your own points scored.
In effect, what typically happens, although extremely rare, is exactly what Boris showed. Everyone who follows Swiss knows there are certain rounds you just don't want to lose in. Losing in round 3 for example can be a death sentence, and it has to do with the quality of opponents you end up facing as a result. For example, in a 26 person tournament:
End of round 1: 13 unbeaten - 1 paired down.
2: 6-7 at 2-0, 13-14 at 1-1, 6-7 at 0-2
3: 3-4 at 3-0, 7-11 at 2-1
The key here is the 3-4 3-0s will now play each other, and only the guys with the best SoS at 2-1 will even have a chance at moving up the rankings. A guy at 2-1, whose opponents have gone 0-3, 1-2 and 3-0 has a SoS of 4/9 or .44. Conversely, a guy who lost in round 2 to a now 3-0 opponent likely has a SoS of something like, 3-0, 1-2, 1-2 for a SoS of 5/9 or .55. Its just the way it works.
Under Dennis' complaint, a guy who is ranked at the bottom of the odd number of 1 loss, has little chance to make up the ground, but only in tournaments where odd numbers happen at his division in record every round. Otherwise, pairing down never occurs. But let's assume it will here for sake of argument. Under the current rules, there is nothing the player can do to move up other than win his/her games, and that won't necessarily get them far. SoS is not at all in their control at this point, and what's worse is that they are artificially being hurt more and more each round by their SoS since they keep playing opponents with records of one less win than that of their equally ranked players' opponents. So their SoS keeps getting hit more and more.
In the new system, SoS is not the first ranking tie breaker any longer. Points scored is (well technically it is this way now, it's just a win counts as 3 no matter what). In this system, you are then almost always awarded your particular matchup based on SoS (which is the first tie breaker in the ranking system currently in place). After that it's based on order of sign up for the tournament and then last name alphabetical. In the new system, the guy who gets paired down early by one of the random factors, can easily move right back up based on getting a full win, which often happens in these situations. Let me show you what I mean.
End of round 1, guy A loses. There will now be 3 divisions of players instead of two at this point. Instead of 1-0 and 0-1s, where SoS is completely tied for each, and pairings are done based on order of entry or last name alpha, we have 0, 2 and 3.
By round 3, instead of the options of 3-0, 2-1, 1-2 and 0-3, we now have something like:
9, 8, 7, 6 for the 3-0s
6, 5, 4 for the 2-1s
3, 2 for the 1-2s
and of course 0 for the 0-3s
That makes 10 different levels of differentiation instead of only 4 in the current system. It does mean pairing down will still occur, but it won't matter nearly as much! Getting a full win against a paired down opponent can actually gain you ground if those above you only get a partial win on tie breakers!
Breaking up the ties of those with the same points scored of course will be done by most wins (likely the same this early) and then SoS which is still out of that players control largely this early in swiss. But look at the differenciation the new system already employs just in determining match ups.
Going back to my example of having 3-4 3-0s at the end of round 3, we see that instead of a 3-0 fast player facing a 3-0 slow player based on arbitrary SoS ranks (per Boris' complaint), we now will have the top game being paired off likely between the 2 fast players instead, and the guy who won only on points each round potentially getting paired down (in the 3 3-0s scenario). SoS doesn't even factor in at this point, until points and then wins are tied. This puts getting the good matchups back into the hands of the players themselves, rather than an arbitrary SoS rank, that at this point in a tournament is not meaningful.
I know some slower players might cringe at this, but I ask you honestly here, you now have some control over the rankings and matchups within your power as a player. Do you not see that as a positive?