With the latest DCI Floor Rules, there's the change to scoring, where players only receive 2 points instead of 3 if their game is decided by the tie-breakers (points, gambit, closest to the center, etc.), rather than a full victory.

We are anticipating the DCI Software to be updated at some point to include this option, but at this time, we have no ETA on that.

The Regionals this year, and GenCon, are supposed to be run utilizing this new 3/2/0 scoring system instead of the previous 3/0 system. In order to do that, there are two methods.

First, you use the standard DCI software to track wins/losses, and determine standings. However, you keep a separate sheet of paper with all the players names, and you make a mark/note of some kind, whenever a player would only receive 2 points instead of 3. Then at the end of the tournament, you adjust the standings that the DCI software kicks out as needed. This will oftentimes shift the standings around slightly. For a tournament of 16 players or less, this isn't too difficult. Going higher than 16 is where it gets troublesome.

So, I've created an Excel file to help T.O.'s run their events utilizing the new scoring system. It will require no math. Yay! It does require a little extra work though, as you end up having to enter the player and winner/loser data twice. You would still need a program to do the Swiss Parings, like the DCI Software or some other program (there are quite a few Swiss Pairing programs you can find all over the internet). But you enter the same player/parings/winner/loser data into this spreadsheet, and then when your tournament is over, you just click the 'Determine Standings' button, and voila! You know the standings based on the tie-breakers in the latest DCI Floor Rules.

I would like for some T.O.'s to download this file and test it out at their LGS between now and Regionals. Especially if you have a large event going on where you expect 17 or more players. If you are not able, or don't want to, use the file at the event itself, please feel free to enter the information afterwards and see how it works. Or, I wold LOVE it if some T.O.'s would export/copy the tournament information out of their DCI Software and send it to me. Then I can enter it myself and use those tournies to test the file. I'm not exactly sure if there's an easy way to export the data, but I will check on that this Thursday at my LGS.

So, without further delay (or reading, haha, sorry). The file can be found on the SWMGamers.com homepage, under the Gamers Downloads section, under DCI Resources. There are actually two files there. Version 1 has a bunch of random player and game data entered so you can sort of see how it works. Version 2 is the actual file intended for distribution. I figured I'd throw a test file up there so people can see how I used it, and how it is supposed to work.

Here are the quick-links to the download page: http://www.swmgamers.com/page.php?27

Also, I have the file hosted on my Google Sheets account, so you can get it from there as well.

http://docs.google.com/fileview?id=0B5h ... NjA2&hl=en

EDIT: Also, be sure to 'Enable Macros' when you open the file. Otherwise the sorting won't work.

Did you take into account that in order for this to work properly that after rd 1 you would have to manually pair each set of contestants as Swiss is supposed to pair players by the number of points they have.

Unless DCI does something amazing and updates its software for us we may be stuck using the old 3-0 system until after WOTC is done and we can use our own reporter software.

Hopefully WOTC goes ahead and updates our software (although I am doubting they will give that much support to a game they are giving up on).

I specifically stated that this sheet would be ONLY for tracking wins/losses and points, and that you'd still need a separate program to do the swiss pairings. You can either use the DCI software, or utilize some other free Swiss Pairing program (many are free online for Chess tournaments).

Dean has indicated that the Regionals are to be run utilizing the new scoring system. So, you either do it by hand, or do it using something like the spreadsheet I created. I know it's not terribly simple. Was just trying to give people an option other than doing it by hand/in their heads.

So for regionals we are going to have to figure out pairing ourselves and not rely on teh DCI software?

As I understand it the original pairings can be done via DCI, but after that it all has to be done by hand/excel. This seems like it might be quite the pain in the ass to do if you have a large group of players.

NO

I'm sorry guys, I thought I made this really clear, but maybe not. You need to use something like the DCI Software, or some other Swiss Pairings program to do the pairings. The DCI software works fine for this.

In fact, if you run your tournament, and all your players finish their games within the time limit, then you don't even have to do any extra work, as the DCI software would handle all of it.



Yes, you could use the DCI software to do the pairings. Then, while players are playing their games, the T.O./Judge could input the data into this Excel spreadsheet. Shouldn't take more than about 5-10 minutes per round to input this data. Should have plenty of time to do that, and still keep an eye on the players as well.

Yes, doing the math for 2-point vs 3-point wins is a PITA. That's why I put this file together to try and make it easier. Though it occurs to me now that I need to update it to allow for 33 or more players (based on Chicago's turn out last year). But that's not too hard. I just wanted to get this version out there now so people could start finding the bugs in it.

Aaron, I'm not sure you understand the concern being raised (as you didn't address it fully).

The concern is how pairings are done. I know you understand Swiss, where the top rated players face off, and so on down the list every round. But let me give an example of the bug being mentioned. Let's say we are in round 4 (just going to use 5 players at the top in a 25 person event).

DCI software
1. Mike 3-0 .789 SoS
2. Aaron 3-0 .669 SoS
3. Johnny 3-0 .488 SoS
4. Matt 2-1 .645 SoS
5. Bill 2-1 .599 SoS

New update would pair based not on SoS tie breaker, but points first.
1. Aaron 3-0 9pts
2. Johnny 3-0 8pts
3. Mike 3-0 6pts
4. Bill 2-1 6pts
5. Matt 2-1 5pts

Now, in the end, I really don't think it will make a huge difference. So I think overlooking this issue isn't a big deal. I think the best solution is to use DCI to set pairings, and use points in the final rankings. The only real difference would be in terms of SoS as the 4th tie breaker, as point based pairings would change only the SoS numbers, but we can live with that.

However, I think you should be able to adjust the program to set up pairings easily, and I would suggest trying to do so. What it would do, is rank order the players after each round, and you can simply go down the list, 1-2 play, 3-4 play, 5-6 play, etc. The one glitch is making sure people don't play the same opponent twice. That could be a bit of a headache in some situations I suppose. Otherwise, we can simply live with it being slightly off in terms of pairings, as in the end, it doesn't make a huge difference. SoS is not nearly as important as it used to be, so who you play will rarely matter (and even when it did, there was very little control the player had over it anyway, and it was rarely consistent enough to make a difference that it might as well have been random anyways).

Ahhh, I see the concern. I was never under the impression that the new 2/3 point system would affect pairings. I always assumed that 4-0 would play 4-0, 3-1 play 3-1, etc (barring pair downs, obviously). You're saying that the new 2/3 system is supposed to affect pairings as well?

I.E., after 4 rounds, there are 3 players at 4-0. Two of them have finished all 4 games completely, so have 12 points, whereas the 3 player didn't finish one game, and only has 11 points. Therefore, the player with 11 points would be the one to get paired down?

That makes sense to me. But you're right, the DCI software won't necessarily do that on it's own. And trying to program an Excel spreadsheet to do Swiss pairings is an absolute nightmare. I tried to look into it a little bit, but it was really not easy. I can play with it some more, but can't guarantee anything. The situation you mentioned, about making sure people don't play someone they'd already played before is the toughest one. We'll see if I can make it work somehow.

I'd love to have everything all in one file together if we could. Will work on it some more. For now, this file is just for doing the scoring aspect, as I assumed we still just followed normal Swiss pairings, and then the scores were adjusted at the end of the tourney as necessary based on the 2/3 aspect.

Incidentally, as Bill mentioned, SoS is the only thing that is really affected, and I really don't think that will matter all that much. The difference in SoS between playing a person who is ranked higher due to wins vs. someone ranked higher due to points isn't that great, actually. Honestly, you will probably end up with a higher SoS if you play against a 4-0 player with only 8 points, vs. playing a 3-1 player with 9 points. That would actually drag your SoS down I think. So, to maintain the integrity of the SoS matchups, I think we'd want to do it by straight-up Swiss pairings anyways. I think the only time where this would even be a concern would be in the case of pairing down. If a pair down is required, probably would be best to pair the 4-0 person with the 3-1 that has the highest number of points.

You definately need to pair by points IMO as a 3-0 (6pts) shouldn't be playing a 9 pt player but should be playing another 6 pt (2-1?) player. Not sure exactly how DCI software calculates SOS (either wins/matches or pts/possible pts) but if it is the latter it could certainly affect SOS. Also we still haven't resolved how the H-to-H tiebreaker is supposed to work when not everyone has played each other.

How do you rank these 3 players assume all players earned the same pts and completed the same number of games
Jonny .666 SOS beat Suzy didn't play Frank
Suzy .750 SOS lost to Jonny didn't play Frank
Frank .725 SOS didn't play Suzy or Jonny

I just want to know what is expected of us at regionals so that we can have an good time judging/playing and don't get into any arguments about standings.

Also not sure what of this has been discussed on any of the private regional threads so please remember that most of us cannot see those discussion.

See though, this is a matter of opinion, and I honestly have no idea what Dean intended when he suggested the new scoring system. Will have to ask him tonight when I have a chance.

IMO though, a 2-1 person should never play a 3-0 if at all possible. Granted, doing as you suggest would encourage more and more people to finish their games for the full 3 point win, so I can see it from that angle. But IMO, if you have two 3-0 people, and 4 people at 2-1 (typical for a 16 player tournament), would you want both 3-0's playing 2-1's? No, I don't think so. That's not actually representative of who is the better player. Pairing a 3-0 against a 2-1 means another win for the 3-0 player, probably 75% of the time. Sure, there are times where the 2-1 had a tough game early on or something. But you want to do whatever you can to have only 1 undefeated player by the end of your normal swiss rounds, right? And most of the time, I find that if I'm playing a paired-down game (where I was 3-0, and new opponent was 2-1), I can typically win the game, AND do it for the full win. IMO, that artificially inflates the scoring as well, as now (if we follow my example above), both players might be 4-0 with 9 points to their names. I think it just causes more confusion to do it that way.

I honestly don't care one way or the other. And it's easy enough to do pairings based on either if you tweak the coding I'm sure. In a quick review of just the SWM DCI Floor Rules, I don't see anything to indicate one way or the other how it's supposed to be done. However, in the section about the new scoring system, it does have the phrase "Standings in a tournament, for declaring a tournament winner, shall be determined by match points" which indicates to me that it might be pointed out that way to indicate that it's different from how the pairings are done.

Don't know. Will ask Dean.

As for the SOS rankings...



This is quite simple. If none of the players faced off against each other, then they would be considered 'tied' under the Head to Head column, and you would move onto the SOS column. If there is a head to head matchup, then you evaluate that first. In your example above, it would go like this:

Frank - Highest SoS, no Head to Head (considered tied then)
Johnny - Beat Suzy in Head to Head column, but gets ranked below Frank due to SOS
Suzy - Lost to Johnny in Head to Head column, so must go below Frank. You don't even consider the SOS column until you've sorted out the Head to Head column

The problem is all three have a legit claim to be the winner.

Jonny beat suzy so should be ahead of her
Suzy has higher SOS than Frank so should be ahead of him and they didn't play
Frank has higher SOS than Jonny so should be ahead of him and they didn't play

so Jonny ahead of suzy ahead of Frank ahead of Jonny?
It is circular so a clear cut winner can never be determined. That is why SOS is/was the tiebreaker.

You still didn't really answer how you think they should be ranked. You just stated you should sort the H2H first. What if not everyone tied at a point level played H2H? Do you penalize those players who didn't play each other and maybe lost to someone with a higher rank?

Not trying to cause any sort of arguments just trying to determine how things need to be done to have a successful regional.

You sort things according to the tie-breakers on the Floor Rules. So you check against H2H first, and then check against SOS.

So, the order I posted above would be accurate, because Suzy would be required to be ranked below Johnny, and Johnny would be required to be below Frank. It doesn't matter that Suzy has the same SOS as Frank. You check the H2H tie-breaker first, and because she lost a H2H to Johnny, it automatically drops her down in that category vs. other people who have the same Match Points, Match Wins, and Complete Victories.

And I did state how I thought they should be ranked. Exactly as I posted it: Frank - Johnny - Suzy. As for other examples, in all the trials I've done with my software so far, I have never found an instance where players are tied in the first 3, did not play H2H against each other, AND are also tied in SOS. If that does happen, it's going to be well down the list, and certainly nowhere near the top, so it should have little-to-no impact on standings/prizes.

But beyond that...I have no idea how they should be ranked beyond that, because the SWM DCI Floor Rules don't specify beyond the Opponent's Match Win %. I would assume you move onto the Opponent's Opponents Match Win %, but I don't know. Actually, I just asked Dean and he said that he thought if it got that far, that we'd just flip a coin.

Seriously, I have not seen all 5 levels be a tie at every level yet. Granted, I've only tested up to 21 players. Thus, why I'm asking others to help. Heck, just the 5 levels of tie-breakers we have are going to be more fair than the current DCI software, so, be grateful for that at least.

Hey, does anyone still have the data from the GenCon Championships from 09 or 08? Just the match-ups/winners/pairings for every round would be awesome. I could input all the data and use that to test my file. I mean, I can come up with 65+ names on my own to work with it, but thought this would be the easiest way.

This isn't at all about the people at the top.

This is about the 3 people that are tied with 11 pts for 4th place in a cut to t4 (or whatever cut) with a random number of points. I am not sure how we can justify telling the person with the highest SOS that they shouldn't be the 4th place person. I know I sure would be mad if I lost to a 6-1 and another 5-2, and ended up missing the cut because some random made it who hadn't played any of the 5-2s.

I guess I really just don't understand the reason behind switching away from SOS as the main tiebreaker (after points earned)?

It's almost like we are making it more complicated. We are double penalizing a loss to good players. O you didn't win? you don't get points AND you have an unfavorable H 2 H matchup against everyone else who ends up with your points (but only if the person who you lost to also has the same number of points). It just seems like it complicates things way more than it needs to for the rare instance where it will actually provide a better solution than just straight up SOS.

So we are basically saying that it really breaks down

x-pts (winning record vs x-pt players) then SOS

x-pts (didn't play any x pt players) then SOS

x-pts (losing record vs x-pt players) then SOS?

If you didn't play any of the people that you're tied with in the first 3 categories AND you have the highest SOS, you will ALWAYS get ranked higher. That's just how it works.

The only reason it seems screwy is because in your example, one of the higher SoS people also happened to have lost a H2H matchup. That automatically bumps you down.

Think of it this way.

You have 4 people who are all 5-1. Out of those four people, only one of them lost a game to another 5-1 player. Now, on that merit alone, who should be ranked the highest? One of the people who didn't lose to the others. So, you rank them based on that FIRST. Then, if you still have trouble figuring out who should be above who, you look at the strength of schedule.

In addition, if you have 4 people at 5-1, and 1 of them has a H2H loss, well, then that means their 1 loss was to someone else who was also 5-1, whereas you can bet at least one of those other 5-1 players had their only 1 loss to someone who is 6-0. So, it really doesn't matter all that much, because the SoS AND the H2H matchup will typically rank people in the same order. That's what I've seen with my testing so far.

Besides, this really isn't the thread to be discussing this anyways. The rules are what they are now. We sort first based on H2H, because that's what the rules say. Then we do SoS. There's no point arguing about it, honestly. If you feel that strongly about it, go chat with Dean. Personally, I think it's correct the way it is.

Don't worry so much. We've got 2 months till Regionals still. Plenty of time to work the bugs out. I made some good head-way on the programming for performing pairings today.