The LCQ - Why, Nintendo?

[ZeroWing]

Stop complaining and be thankful there even IS an LCQ... all the hard work these judges put on and not a shred of appreciation... =/

'box

I could not agree more with this sentiment. This was my son and I's first time attending Worlds and he attempted to grind in and almost made it in..then we proceeded to have a ton of fun, hanging out, playing in league, trading...and watching. The work and dedication of the staff was incredible.

I for one, sincerely appreciate all that Pokemon did to make sure we had a fun time.

 

[JandPDS]

I cant imagine anyone was happy with this LCQ

Now this in no way is meant to be taken as a complaint to any of the Judges and Volunteers who ran the LCQ this year, but I do not believe that it ran as it was intended to be by the planners of it.

First of all most players had to wait 4 hours before they could even play and Juniors had to wait for 6. I realize that this was no one’s fault but it was a product of sheer numbers of people wanting to participate, but I know that some people grew tired of waiting and just left and did not play. A friend of mine received two byes to start because his opponent did not stick around for Round 2 to start 4 hours after registration.

And the fact that they took top 16 instead of top 8 was just to bring the thing to an end before 10:00 pm hit. And this was with 45 min rounds of play instead of the normal hour.

It took a lot longer than normal Swiss play would have taken, But that was just because of the format challenges that putting on a 600+ person top cut cause. Thanks to everyone who ran it you all did a great job.

 

[yoyofsho16]

Single elimination may be easier to run, but it is NOT an accurate representation of who is the best player in the tournament. If you look at the results, a crazy number of californians grinded in, more than years before, and I think that has to do with the sheer number of them. Most of them totally crapped in the main event.

When two class-A players get paired against each other, it's not fair that that one loss means you're out of the tournament. Luck played too huge a role in who got in this year, and that alone is a reason not to do this again. AT LEAST do double elimination.

 

[untitled]

^Right I completely agree. While this is unlikely, imagine the tournament tree resulting in a bunch of kids basically playing theme decks all playing each other and one of them getting into worlds. Similarly, the opposite could happen and all of the best 8 players who should have gotten in could play each other first round and be in the same bracket so that by the time round 4 happens all but one of them have been eliminated.

 

[PokePop]

Bear in mind that everyone that made the top 16 was undefeated.
So, if it had been run as a Swiss tournament, with the same starting pairings, excepting the first round which was an odd one, you could have had the exact same match ups in every round among the undefeated players and therefore you would have had the exact same 16 undefeated players at the end of round X. Maybe one or two off based on not having a perfect number in the event.

You could have had the exact same scenario of a bunch of theme deck players helping one of them get to the end and a bunch of elite players in a swiss event knocking each other out.
So your point is meaningless.

 

[Prof Clay]

Single elimination may be easier to run, but it is NOT an accurate representation of who is the best player in the tournament. If you look at the results, a crazy number of californians grinded in, more than years before, and I think that has to do with the sheer number of them. Most of them totally crapped in the main event.

When two class-A players get paired against each other, it's not fair that that one loss means you're out of the tournament. Luck played too huge a role in who got in this year, and that alone is a reason not to do this again. AT LEAST do double elimination.

The Grinder is NOT about getting the best players in the tournament into worlds...it is simply as it is intended...to fill the final few slots for worlds...Nowhere in the ads for it does it say the BEST players only those who are the BEST that day according to tournament record....

 

[Scizor]

The Grinder is NOT about getting the best players in the tournament into worlds...it is simply as it is intended...to fill the final few slots for worlds...Nowhere in the ads for it does it say the BEST players only those who are the BEST that day according to tournament record....

I agree with this, and I by no means have any sour grapes about the LCQ, but how do we know the Grinder is intended to fill the final few slots at Worlds? If that were true, we would have a set number presented to us before Worlds for Worlds. Instead, we had 123 Masters playing in Worlds, and not a round number like 128, that would have made things a lot easier. It is because of that, that I stand by my comments on the possible disaster that the LCQ could have caused. I was right that the LCQ would take longer the format they did it in, I was right that it would be Top 16 invites, and I was right that it was possible that there could be a situation where they would want to let a non-power of two players in. Just because they let 16 in, does not mean it was optimal, nor does it mean it wasn't the best number to let in. You have to look at the season as a whole, because outside of the LCQ, there were obvious problems. The LCQ isn't 100% responsible for the lack of numbers as far as Worlds invites used go.

 

[PokePop]

I agree with this, and I by no means have any sour grapes about the LCQ, but how do we know the Grinder is intended to fill the final few slots at Worlds? If that were true, we would have a set number presented to us before Worlds for Worlds. Instead, we had 123 Masters playing in Worlds, and not a round number like 128, that would have made things a lot easier. It is because of that, that I stand by my comments on the possible disaster that the LCQ could have caused. I was right that the LCQ would take longer the format they did it in, I was right that it would be Top 16 invites, and I was right that it was possible that there could be a situation where they would want to let a non-power of two players in. Just because they let 16 in, does not mean it was optimal, nor does it mean it wasn't the best number to let in. You have to look at the season as a whole, because outside of the LCQ, there were obvious problems. The LCQ isn't 100% responsible for the lack of numbers as far as Worlds invites used go.

You're making a lot of assumptions here that have no basis in reality or TPCi's desires.
How many slots are open is not necessarily how many slots they are willing to fill.
If that were the case, they would have let more Juniors in, right? 32 JRs would have still been under the 128 cap.

Just because a Swiss would have allowed a non-power of 2 number of entries does not mean that TPCi would have wanted to award any different number of entries.

You assume that a swiss tournament would have taken less time, but why?
Where would you have held this 900+ player event?
What space would have used?
There was no 900 player event space available to run this. There was barely a 500 player space available to run it! This was a record size for the LCQ. So, where would you have run it? Or, more likely, how would you have told the extra 400 players that couldn't fit that they couldn't play?

Logistics. These large tournaments are ALL about logistics and you're not even thinking about it.

 

[Cyrus]

All right, so the number of invites didn't disappoint me (sixteen is very generous), and even the 45 minute time limit - while undesirable - is certainly doable (I finished 2 full games and 2/3s of the third in my final match before being knocked out). So for the most part, I was content with my LCQ experience, even if it lasted a mere five games.

However, my one and only real issue with the Grinder is that the pairings weren't randomized after every round; instead, it was treated as one massive top cut tournament...The whole way. This may be a minor thing in the long run (it is), but given how a swiss didn't determine who were the "wheat from the chaff" competitors, it's a bit troubling that you can figure out your next opponent's entire list prior to playing.

Couldn't this be avoided almost entirely if they just mixed up the pairings for each round? Doesn't policy every year make a big deal about players gaining an unfair advantage over this? If this is really the line that P!P holds, then why did they basically hand us our competitors' lists on a silver platter? Sure, you can make the argument of "this always happens in top cuts," which is true, but when your entire event is a top cut, the player with the luxury to sneak a peak is going to have a huge advantage in the long run.

I had a great time in the LCQ, but this was my one major issue with it. If anyone has a good reason for why we can't just do single elimination with consistently randomized pairings, then I'm interested to hear.

 

[sdrawkcab]

I heard a rumor which Im not sure is true. The players who had to play first round were those who had the lowest raiting.

 

[Articjedi]

Not true, I heard the rumor myself and did several checks among other players to see how true it was. Quite few highly ranked players had to play the first round

 

[untitled]

The Grinder is NOT about getting the best players in the tournament into worlds...it is simply as it is intended...to fill the final few slots for worlds...Nowhere in the ads for it does it say the BEST players only those who are the BEST that day according to tournament record....

If this is the case then why even have the grinder? Why not just have the ranking invites and the nationals invites? Because I thought the purpose of worlds is to showcase the best players in the world and not to showcase the best players in the world plus some fillers. You might be right, but how do you even know that? Have you actually talked to the people who organized the grinder and worlds?

They've already shown they don't care about having an even number and top 32 cut in worlds, but they didn't completely get rid of the grinder. So that would imply that the grinder isn't just to find some fillers. Because if they really wanted fillers it would save a lot of time and resources to just draw names out of a hat.

@Pokepop you're right, but then only one or maybe two of them gets into cut. Then they'd be eliminated right away; they wouldn't go on to win the tournament or get to the final point of the tournament. Also I don't know a lot about how swiss is run but isn't there less of a chance that happens because of the random repair each round? And then on the lower tables the theme deck players would probably lose a lot ruining the 1-2 players' resistances and chances at making the cut. This is assuming we're talking about the same number of players in each tournament, because there's more rounds in swiss than in the top cut/grinder.

 

[Prof Clay]

If this is the case then why even have the grinder? Why not just have the ranking invites and the nationals invites? Because I thought the purpose of worlds is to showcase the best players in the world and not to showcase the best players in the world plus some fillers. You might be right, but how do you even know that? Have you actually talked to the people who organized the grinder and worlds?

They've already shown they don't care about having an even number and top 32 cut in worlds, but they didn't completely get rid of the grinder. So that would imply that the grinder isn't just to find some fillers. Because if they really wanted fillers it would save a lot of time and resources to just draw names out of a hat.

.

I do know this...I was Masters Head judge at US Nats this year , I was Head Judge for the Masters division Grinder in 2009 and 2011. I have been a PTO since 2006. I have been to every world championship held as a parent, a volunteer, and judge.

I have even had a daughter grind in when they only took 8 players in seniors (and made top 32). Check my daughters record in my sig.

In multiple years I have seen the Undefeated grinder player...#1 in the grinder...scrub out at 0-5 drop in the main event.

I will admit to not knowing how they decide to handle the top cut. I would think a standard top 32 would be good for everyone but I have no pull in that department.

 

[JandPDS]

Bear in mind that everyone that made the top 16 was undefeated.
So, if it had been run as a Swiss tournament, with the same starting pairings, excepting the first round which was an odd one, you could have had the exact same match ups in every round among the undefeated players and therefore you would have had the exact same 16 undefeated players at the end of round X. Maybe one or two off based on not having a perfect number in the event.

You could have had the exact same scenario of a bunch of theme deck players helping one of them get to the end and a bunch of elite players in a swiss event knocking each other out.
So your point is meaningless.

Well I dout that eveyone was Undefeated, only that none of them lost two out of three games to the same opponent. It would be nice to know if anone did go 2-0, 2-0 2-0 all the way though the LCQ.

 

[PokePop]

Match-wise, they were undefeated.
But that is a point. If it had been Swiss, it wouldn't have been match play.
However, the point that it could have been scrub vs scrub passing on or elite vs elite knocking each other out remains.
The only thing that would vary is which scrub moves on and which elite got knocked out.

 

[yoyofsho16]

Match-wise, they were undefeated.
But that is a point. If it had been Swiss, it wouldn't have been match play.
However, the point that it could have been scrub vs scrub passing on or elite vs elite knocking each other out remains.
The only thing that would vary is which scrub moves on and which elite got knocked out.

1 loss doesn't knock you out in a swiss LCQ...

 

[NoPoke]

1 loss doesn't knock you out in a swiss LCQ...

It probably would this year...
616 masters
R1 308 at 1-0
R2 154 at 2-0
R3 77 at 3-0
R4 39 at 4-0
R5 20 at 5-0
maybe let all 5-0 in but no 4-1s at this point or
R6 10 at 6-0
again let all the 6-0s in but none of the 5-1s


Fairly sure that just the X-0s have qualified at some of the previous LCQs too.

 

[sdrawkcab]

2005 San Deigo they did swiss and only allowed the 8 5-0's in.

 

[yoyofsho16]

didnt they abruptly stop it to much outrage?

 

[sdrawkcab]

I wouldn't say it was abruptly stoped. They never said how many rounds, just how many got in. And most of the hate was back here on the gym.