Nope - I'm standin' on the hill lookin' down at the swamp ! I'm not headed down that slope , 'cuz I know what's at the bottom . . . . teams that take a player with 'potential' , let him play that way to establish his 'skill level' , qualify for the LTC , and then put him through a compressed coaching session right before the LTC so he can perform above his rated level there (where they will use a coaching in every rack) . This is why you DON'T catch them and correct their skill levels before LTC - and if you aren't personally watching every match , don't catch it AT LTC !
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.
The desire and need to improve at any given endeavor exists within all of us . LOSING FEELS BAD - no one likes that feeling - and the only way to prevent it is to improve to the point where you STOP LOSING (are you with me , RunoutJJ ?). If a team doesn't care if anyone on their team wins , then what is the point in COMPETING ? People care - inside- they just don't always ADMIT to their feelings of inadequacy.
And if they don't care whether or not they win , why would they NEED a point system that "makes them feel as if they're contributing" ?
Your argument up until now is that lower-skilled players have been leaving after 1 session because they FEEL they can't win , because they FEEL they aren't contributing .
Nothing would take that FEELING away faster than improving to the point where they CAN WIN and CAN CONTRIBUTE .
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.
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 . . .
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.
Did some research - turns out this was tried before , in Front Royal , VA .
National Office wasn't impressed with the result there . . . .
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.
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"
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.