You must play a different game, or suck at chess. When I play, I try to check the KING, not the queen.
Possible Change to APA Scoring...
- Thread starter Banger101
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You must play a different game, or suck at chess. When I play, I try to check the KING, not the queen.
Without actually going through a match with two teams playing with these rules, it's not really possible to accurately assess what the affects will be.
The idea has some merit though. If the concept was created to enhance the handicap system in place and make the evening more enjoyable, then it is certainly worth exploring.
It seems to me a few simple focus group studys would tell the APA whether or not to proceed with this. Heck, I'm sure any APA operator could get a few volunteers together on a Saturday afternoon and give it a shot.
Anything else is just speculation.
The idea has some merit though. If the concept was created to enhance the handicap system in place and make the evening more enjoyable, then it is certainly worth exploring.
It seems to me a few simple focus group studys would tell the APA whether or not to proceed with this. Heck, I'm sure any APA operator could get a few volunteers together on a Saturday afternoon and give it a shot.
Anything else is just speculation.
Well to start with i dont like the idea of the team that lost 3 of their 5 matchs being able to win the night. You shouldn't get a prize for second place in a 2 person race. The APA is a just for fun league. It doesn't help players get better it says if u do get better we will break your team up.
nope .
I play by American Chessplayer Associaton (ACA) rules .
The game LOOKS just like Chess , the pieces MOVE just like in Chess , but there's a totally different way to win the match . . . . .
Points are awarded for the numbers of pawns captured . . . . to make the losers feel useful .
Does that seem like a ludicrous idea ??
Then I've made my point .
Thanx for takin' the bait !!!!
Maybe I'm crazy for thinking so simply, but I don't think so...
If there is a possibility that a team can win 3 of 5 matches, but loose the overall, then it's to flawed to even discuss.
If 2 people on a team get crushed, but the other 3 team members are all clutch enough to take down a hill-hill game in their match, they need to be rewarded for picking up their teammates... period.
If there is a possibility that a team can win 3 of 5 matches, but loose the overall, then it's to flawed to even discuss.
If 2 people on a team get crushed, but the other 3 team members are all clutch enough to take down a hill-hill game in their match, they need to be rewarded for picking up their teammates... period.
In a nutshel:
The whole 23 point rule is crap!! I was on a team with a (2) SL3 (3) SL4 and (2) SL8's.
Now sometimes a couple of our guys couldnt make it so we had the 2 SL8's (i was one) that were the only ones could play but we couldnt finish the last match because our numbers would be greater than 23 and had to have makeup matches
If i could i would have a team full of SL7's-SL9's only!!! If people are properly handicapped then who cares who plays what your total match points equal up to right?? SO... That being said i dont play in the ANY-POCKET-AVAILABLE league anymore.
I completely agree (mentioned earlier) that the APA promotes the "everybody wins" attitude that plain sucks!! When i learned how to play i got stomped on for 5 straight years and in those beatings i picked myself up.. dusted the dirt off of me and shot right back at em till they couldnt beat me anymore!!!!
Funny but when i jumped from a SL6 to a SL8 in one week NOBODY would even practice with me anymore because i wouldnt let them win a game. The same people ive been playing with for almost two years turned their backs on me because they didnt like losing?? Sounds to me that they APA has taught them that they like winning without FULLY feeling the venom of a hard loss
The whole 23 point rule is crap!! I was on a team with a (2) SL3 (3) SL4 and (2) SL8's.
Now sometimes a couple of our guys couldnt make it so we had the 2 SL8's (i was one) that were the only ones could play but we couldnt finish the last match because our numbers would be greater than 23 and had to have makeup matches
If i could i would have a team full of SL7's-SL9's only!!! If people are properly handicapped then who cares who plays what your total match points equal up to right?? SO... That being said i dont play in the ANY-POCKET-AVAILABLE league anymore.
I completely agree (mentioned earlier) that the APA promotes the "everybody wins" attitude that plain sucks!! When i learned how to play i got stomped on for 5 straight years and in those beatings i picked myself up.. dusted the dirt off of me and shot right back at em till they couldnt beat me anymore!!!!
Funny but when i jumped from a SL6 to a SL8 in one week NOBODY would even practice with me anymore because i wouldnt let them win a game. The same people ive been playing with for almost two years turned their backs on me because they didnt like losing?? Sounds to me that they APA has taught them that they like winning without FULLY feeling the venom of a hard loss
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Right now , this is the ONLY PLACE to debate the issue . It's the only place it's being discussed . I can guarantee you that if I brought this up at our regional Captain's meeting , no one there would have the slightest idea what I was talking about . . . .
As far as referring to it as BS , I also refer to spades as 'spades' . The early 8 reference was SARCASM , which is a tool which some people use to illustrate a point they are trying to make .
Perhaps I should have added an icon so you would understand . . .
Actually, it wasn't SARCASM, it was SARDONICISM. The difference is that SARDONICISM is an attempt to mock or insult. You've done that probably a half dozen times in this thread already. Funny way to try to help...
Had I said you should probably make your attempts to improve the APA without mocking or insulting them, then you probably would have understood.
If you need an example of SARCASM, look at post #55. Funny, sarcastic, with no attempt to ridicule or belittle anyone.
Or no coach at all. Some teams choose not to coach the beginners. They have no desire for their beginners to improve. Nothing wrong with that, but in post #46 you refer to a NEED to improve. I simply ask why there has to be a NEED to improve?
There's an important distinction to make here. Not helping a player improve is NOT sandbagging. Helping them stay low when they do improve IS sandbagging.
I frequently start 18 year old girls on my team who have never stroked a ball properly in their lives . Now I'm no Scott Lee , I'm not a world-renowned instructor , but by the end of one session , they're almost always competitive s/l 3s .
How do I know ? Because my L.O. ALWAYS raises all my new players as soon as I walk in the door of the LTC . . . . .
I do that with teams that have a history of sandbagging. I'm just sayin'...
Actually, you have (see sardonicism vs sarcasm). You can engage in serious debate without attempting to insult the intelligence of others here. You can attempt to improve the APA without attempting to paint APA as a bunch of greedy idiots. Others here have expressed opinions that are different from mine, and they do so in a respectful manner.
Besides, the troll comment wasn't directed at you. It was directed at the trolls, who feel the need to hijack this thread simply to bash APA. As I stated, I tolerate them. I actually engaged you.
Your problem is that the scoring system can change your game strategy. I'm saying there's nothing wrong with that, and if we called it Straight Nine your issue would go away. So from now on just think of it that way - the rules are the same but the strategy is different.
Exactly. And it's different from what you might think of as traditional scoring. That doesn't make it wrong, or BS, just different. Consequently, your match up strategy is different.
In scoring, they do not. The effect they have on handicaps may or may not be the same. I'm not at liberty to discuss that any further, I'm simply pointing out here that the sandbagging strategy may be flawed.
A rose by any other name . . . still smells . . .
My complaint isn't so much with the flawed system of 9ball scoring as it is with the idea of bringing a similar system to 8ball .
The "we won 3 out of 5 matches , we won the overall match" point scoring system isn't broken.
It doesn't need fixing.
My complaint isn't so much with the flawed system of 9ball scoring as it is with the idea of bringing a similar system to 8ball .
The "we won 3 out of 5 matches , we won the overall match" point scoring system isn't broken.
It doesn't need fixing.
You're starting down a slippery slope there. The team could also coach up the player on the sideline when they're not shooting - if they don't do that are they sandbagging? They could also have practice sessions outside of league - are they sandbagging if they don't do that? These things also give them a better chance of winning, so are they morally obligated to do them?
Clearly, you have to draw a line somewhere. We draw the line at overt actions intended to hide true ability. If you dump, or if you coach someone to dump (even if that person doesn't know you're doing it), it's sandbagging. If you let your player make a mistake instead of stopping and correcting them, it's not. Their skill level will reflect their true ability.
By the way, you still haven't told me why you think all beginners NEED to improve. Some teams don't care if their beginners (or anyone else on the team, for that matter) ever win or ever improve. What's wrong with that?
I openly admit to doing my best to make the league fair for everyone. That includes assigning higher skill levels to players on teams with a history of sandbagging. My right (and obligation) to do so is described on page 31 of the Team Manual. These players are likely to have manipulated their performance to hide their true ability.
Usually this happens before a team gets into my LTC, though.
Ok, what if we used the multi-point system for weekly play and the race to three matches in playoffs/tournaments?
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I like it. I think they also need to be able to mark down ball in hands for matches as well.
We have a player on our team who is a good 3, but no where near a 4 (hasn't won as a 4 yet) get moved up to a 4 basically because of a ball in hand win. She got ball in hand 2-4 times per game and won her 9 ball match 19-1. The girl she beat protested and they moved her up to a 4 sight unseen. I'd imagine if they knew she got ball in hand that many times during the match she wouldn't of been moved up.
We have a player on our team who is a good 3, but no where near a 4 (hasn't won as a 4 yet) get moved up to a 4 basically because of a ball in hand win. She got ball in hand 2-4 times per game and won her 9 ball match 19-1. The girl she beat protested and they moved her up to a 4 sight unseen. I'd imagine if they knew she got ball in hand that many times during the match she wouldn't of been moved up.
This is a little off-topic, but there are a few things in this post that are classic examples of misperceptions about how things work in the APA.
First, I don't know you or your league operator, and events very well may have transpired exactly as you describe them here. I doubt it, though.
To begin with, there's really no such thing as a good 3 who is nowhere near a 4. A good 3, by definition, is almost a weak 4. Maybe you were thinking "average 4" when you typed that?
I don't doubt that the match happened as you describe (you were there, I was not), or that the opponent protested. Please, correct me if I'm wrong, but the protest went to the office with the paperwork and the following week your player was a 4, right? You assumed a cause-effect relationship between the two, but the protest may have had nothing to do with it at all. Maybe, since she was a "good 3", she got a score for that match that was enough to nudge her to a "weak 4".
Nearly ALL skill level changes happen "sight unseen", and most of them are not "they moved her up", but rather "she moved up". I get it all the time - someone will protest a player, and after the match that generated the protest is scored, the player goes up on their own. People make the mistake of assuming the protest caused the skill level change, when in reality the change would have happened regardless.
Now, about that "hasn't won as a 4 yet" part. I have two questions here. First, how many times have you told her she's "nowhere near a 4"? Second, how many times since she went up has she scored 25 points or more?
I'm sure your player benefitted from all of the ball-in-hands, and MAY HAVE gotten a better score for the match because of them. It's also possible that the score she received would have been the same no matter if the match was 19-1 or 12-8. There's also probably a score or two on her record from matches she LOST by giving up ball-in-hand a lot. These things tend to even out over time.
I'm not saying it's not a good idea to track BIH received. At the very least, it might prevent a league operator from manually raising a skill level. However, we haven't found a good way to incorporate it into the handicap formula itself, since the effect of BIH is different from player to player and situation to situation.
I agree new players should be gradually eased into the system and patted on the back after their first few matches until they get the hang of it. Whatever happen to just straight up beating someone... I mean just.... I break 5 times in a row and your opponent is punching a wall or something.
A win is a win. 9ball is done differently because of the fairness to all players. 8 ball is already fair IMHO. I hope the APA doesn't dumb everything down to the whole...."I know you lost johnny boy but you got us a point instead of none".... crap.
"IF IT AIN'T BROKE"...... and everyone said....:wink:
A win is a win. 9ball is done differently because of the fairness to all players. 8 ball is already fair IMHO. I hope the APA doesn't dumb everything down to the whole...."I know you lost johnny boy but you got us a point instead of none".... crap.
"IF IT AIN'T BROKE"...... and everyone said....:wink:
Well , that might not have as much of an effect in your playoffs , or even your LOCAL Team Championships , because they'd be playing against other teams that got there the same way - earning points for losin' .
But those teams will be in for a shock when they get to the NTC and meet up with teams that are used to winning 3 & 4 times per night . . .
Did some research - turns out this was tried before , in Front Royal , VA .
National Office wasn't impressed with the result there . . . .
Why is a test market even necessary ? Playsheets from the previous year can simply be rescored with the new system scoring system , and see how it would have affected the standings . . . . .
Somehow I'd bet that mid-pack teams would suddenly be the "VICTORS"
<Not to be confused with APA League Operator, as I believe I am much cuter!
>I actually did as you suggested and went back through an entire division. What I found in my own little test was that the standings really didn't change much at all.
However, rescoring already played matches that weren't played based on a different point system probably isn't the best way to gauge how the proposed point system might adjust the standings. If you are down in a match, you might go with a different match up to try to get 3 points instead of 1. You might not play a player that night if the difference might be a 3-0 loss instead of a 1-0. That's why a test market with people playing to the new point system is going to give more accurate results.
And how is that different from coaching him to dump during the session? If the team is going to put him through a compressed coaching session to raise his ability, then he should be certifying himself at the higher ability at the beginning of LTC. That is an overt act intended to hide the player's true ability.
We both agree that cheaters will cheat, and that they can get creative at times, and that it's sometimes hard to catch them. I'm not talking about cheaters. I'm talking about honest teams who want that three to be a three and play like a three and never get any better. That way, the six and the seven on the team can both play. This team clearly wouldn't put the three through a compressed coaching session.
Good points, but you're mixing two groups now. There's the first group, players who are true beginners, who want to win but can't and for whatever reason don't improve enough that first session or two. For them, the choices are improve or quit. We want to reduce the chances that they will choose to quit.
Then there's the other group, the one I brought up in response to your comment that people who can't learn from coaching must have terrible coaches. These people don't need to feel they are contributing. For them, it's a priority choice - improving and winning are not priorities for them. Yes, they try their best every time out, but the priority for them is having a good time.
When I typed "we", I meant all of APA. All teams at NTC would have used the multi-point system in the regular session, and the race-to-three system in playoffs, tricups, and LTC.
And it's not like teams would suddenly start trying to lose three matches but score more points to advance. It can happen, but the vast majority of teams will still be winning three matches, even if we use the multi-point system in playoffs and tournaments.
Really? That's Lee Tiani's area. Why would he be test marketing this if he's tried it before? I would be surprised if it was this exact system. It may have been two for winning and one for getting to the hill. I'm pretty sure three for a shutout is new.
We did exactly that in the analysis stage. Several of us re-scored a division to see what the impact would be. In the twelve-team division I re-scored, there were no changes in the top four teams or the bottom four teams. The ones in the middle changed order a little. The results were similar for the others - the playoff teams still made the playoffs (but maybe with a different seeding). That's what we found promising.
But that's not enough. In those divisions, the match-up strategy was based on one-pont-per-match. We recognize that the new system would likely change the match-up strategy in some cases, so we decided that a test market is needed. We'll do the same analysis at the conclusion of the session for the test market divisions. We will also be able to get real feedback from players and teams.
We may in fact find out that the players hate it and it doesn't work, in which case we certainly wouldn't implement it. That's why we're doing the work.
I'm actually surprised that nobody here has taken a stab at a multi-point system that doesn't suffer from the win-three-matches-and-lose syndrome. Really, it breaks down to a simple mathematical formula if you assume one bonus point for getting to the hill and one bonus point for a shutout. What would you have to assign for a win so that you can't lose if you win three matches?
Clearly, you want to minimize the margin for the three wins and maximize the margin for the two losses. So the three wins would be hill-hill and the two losses would be shutouts. To guarantee a win with three matches, you would have:
3x >= 3 + 2(x+1)
3x >= 2x + 5
x >= 5
This means if we assign 5 points for winning the match, and give one point for a shutout or for losing on the hill, we wouldn't have the win-three-and-lose syndrome. A match could end 15-15, but the tiebreaker would be three matches.
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<Not to be confused with APA League Operator, as I believe I am much cuter!
I'm cuter than APA League Operator, too...
Mmmm Hmmm - so the new scoring system isn't , as APAOperator has been aguing , "just a scoring system" - it will require teams to develop new strategies , new styles of play , to stay competitive . No longer will simply BEING ABLE TO WIN A GAME OF POOL be sufficient . . . . . those new strategies will be much like my 'Chess' analogy above - the game will look the same , but the players will be playing it differently , looking for a different end result .<Not to be confused with APA League Operator, as I believe I am much cuter!
I actually did as you suggested and went back through an entire division. What I found in my own little test was that the standings really didn't change much at all.
However, rescoring already played matches that weren't played based on a different point system probably isn't the best way to gauge how the proposed point system might adjust the standings. If you are down in a match, you might go with a different match up to try to get 3 points instead of 1. You might not play a player that night if the difference might be a 3-0 loss instead of a 1-0. That's why a test market with people playing to the new point system is going to give more accurate results.
Thanx for jumpin' in , and I'm certain that you're cuter than EITHER of them . . . but you could always PM me some pictures so I'd be sure !!
here's the link that takes you to Lee's forum - which has the info I mentioned . . .
Did none of you League Operators think to ASK if this had been tried before , or did you just ASSUME it was brand-spankin' new ??
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