Question about scoring in Tourneys

Tricen · Joined: 28 Nov 2005 Posts: 5

This forum isn't EXACTLY right for this question, but this is probably the closest it will get. Question: Everyone seems to know exactly what win/loss ratio will get them into top 4/8. How on earth do they know this? Also, whats all this about tie breakers? I note 3 different percentages on the chart. Can anyone explain any of this?

niknight · Joined: 14 Oct 2004 Posts: 148

The way that tournaments are structures is to have only 1 person with a perfect record. Based off of past history, it is shown that in a sufficiently large swiss tournament, X-1-1 (basically 1 loss and a draw) should get you into the top 8. This is only a general solution, and in order to determine the specific record needed takes some skill. Also, not all X-1-1 records will make it in all the time. There have been situations where 2 or 3 were left out.

To explain the tiebreakers, the first number is your opponent's match win percentage. Basically take the win percentage of your opponents combined, and average them. If any of your opponent's win percentages is less than 33%, it becomes 33% (this is to avoid you getting screwed by early round sucky opponents).

Example: in a 4 round tournament, you go 3-1 losing in the last round. Your opponents have the following records:
1-3 --- 25%, rounded up to 33%
2-2 --- 50%
2-2 --- 50%
4-0 --- 100%

This means that your opp match win percentage is the average of these, or 77.666%.

The second number is your game win percentage. This is simply calculated by dividing the number of games you won by the games you played. So if your wins were all 2-0, and your loss was 0-2, you would have a game win % of 75%

The third number is your opponents game win percentage, which is calcualted the same as the first tiebreaker.

The first and third tiebreakers have the 33% rule, so that's as low as they can be.

Let's assume that it's the last round of a tournament, cutting to top 8, and we are looking at 2 tables of players at 6-1. Table 1 has players with a first tiebreaker of 77 and 64 percent. Table 2 has players with 50 and 45 percent tiebreakers. Since the players at the first table have good tiebreakers, they will probably draw and both make top 8.

The players at table 2, however, don't have that luxury necessarily. If the potential exists for some 6-1-1's not to make it in, their low tiebreakers mean that they cannot draw, and have to play it out.

kendiggy · Joined: 30 Nov 2004 Posts: 366 Location: not here

I've always been under the assumption (and this has been confirmed by several other people I know) that your opponent's game win percentage is more important than your own. I've been told it's better to win 2-1 than 2-0.

Memnarch · Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 22

no, that is not true
the order of scoring goes like this
1. match points (3 for a win, 1 for a draw)
2. opponents win percentage
3. your game win percentage
4. opp game win percentage

Laplie · League Staff Joined: 31 Aug 2004 Posts: 547