ShawofMordor said:
I think this would be better if we looked at things a little differently.
Don't look at the USA as a whole.
Look at America as another continent, with 50 countries.
That would make things a lot more like Europe, correct?
Each "country" gets a Gym Challenge, which is like a Nationals for Europe.
And these Gyms are more competitive than the European nationals, not because the US players are better, but because they are open to everyone.
Many European Nats are closed. Gyms are open. The same 5 great players can go to 5 Gyms in their area, traveling about the same distance you would need to go in Europe to go to five surrounding countries. But in Europe, those 5 players cannot play in all the Nationals, they can only play in theirs.
This is what makes the USA tournaments a lot harder. There are more players. So making them harder means only the best players can get invites.
People may argue that since ours are open we have more chances, thus making it easier, but think again! Imagine you are from France and you are at your Nationals and all the best players from Germany come over. That doesn't happen because your Nationals are closed. I played in a Gym Challenge in Pennsylvania, and I had to play against players from seven different states. Imagine going to your Nats and facing ALL THAT.
We have more people, of course we have more skilled players than Europe. We also have more bad players, but no one really sees those.
Now, look again at the invite "problem." You say the European Nationals gets 4 invites and only 1 trip, well the American Gyms only get 1 invite, 1 trip. 2nd-4th gets nothing.
It seems to me the problem is that people are viewing America = France = Switzerland = Croatia. All those countries are different. They have different numbers of people. It doesn't mean anyone in any of those countries is better or worse, just that the players in the countries with larger amounts of players are exposed to more competition. Again, this refines the players in the larger countries, making sure that only the best best are allowed in. Because of this they SHOULD do better at Worlds, they have had to go through testing that the people in smaller countries did not. I am not saying this is about the USA, or England or Germany or anything, I am saying that if COUNTRY X has more players than COUNTRY Y, the players it sends to Worlds SHOULD be better, logically.
Shaw I disagree,
USA tournaments HARDER? I doubt it after being present at 3 GC's.
I will totally agree on each state having 1 GC and 1 trip in relation to each EU country 1 trip at this point.
Now imagine USA players would not be allowed to play in any other GC than the ONE in their state.
So no 2or 3 in each state only 1.
I can assure you the trip given that way for Worlds (and thus Playersfield) would look very different.
Not fair?
Why?
in Europe there are countries with many good players and there are with almost no good players.
What does that differ from a state with many or no good players?
If we want only good players at Worlds, than ALL tripgiving events should be open for everybody worldwide.
While the USA structure allowed that, the International structure did NOT.
If you ended 2nd at Nationals you were done.
I can assure you the mix of players at Worlds would have been very different if all EU players could have played each others countries Nationals and winning the trip there.
Just an example, Anna who ended 2nd at our Nationals, was able to play Worlds because of the 2-4place invite structure.
She ended 38th place, which means she was better then the majority of USA players present.
Also most other Dutch players who came with only an invite ended relative high.
But it's all old cows now, new season and new changes. Nobody knows what will happen.
All I want to say, even with the terrible OP management we had for over 3 years, we performed very very well at Worlds.
On top of that you also got in 15+ a total of 8 trips, Why not a EU challenge with 8 trips?