UN Sparring League
 

this thread's purpose is to find a good dynamic for hosting any type of sparring league possible within the confines of TCspar. i'm going to try and list out the problems of the past with various leagues, and then i'm going to post a dynamic that i think could possibly work. let's keep in mind that all sparring essentially takes place on UN now - it would be a shame for it to go to waste and continue to be a underutilized part of UN

problems with sparring leagues of the past:

1. timing at which the leagues take place in correlation with when the players are online
   - a few dynamics have tried to compete with the timing of when these sparring matchups actually go down, and none of them has been able to cope with the fact that players log on sporadically, that player's live in different sections of the world, and that disqualifying players for not being on essentially destroys much of the draw. without the correct people on, both in terms of hosts and players, the league simply cannot happen. even when the dynamic was focused around not needing specific players to be online, it still failed from the lack of player-participation. it seems we cannot place the responsibilities on the players to make the league happen because every time this has happened, it has failed
2. lack of support from staff, having the league be completely player run which leads to disorganization and immaturity
   - similar to #1, when players start getting into the heat of the moment, or when the host happens to be a player of the league, it leads to a lot of problems. if you cannot stop players from walking all over the host, nothing gets done. having only the players organize these leagues, given the lack of rights they have and the hot tempers we've seen, the league will ultimately fail. even when the host was not a player within the league, when they cannot control the players from simply words alone, it's very hard to make progress
3. difficulty in choosing the players who compose the league, either by invitation or open play
   - depending on the type of league, it's important that we try to include all the players who wish to take part. almost every single league that has ever been attempted has usually been composed of only the same core-group of sparrers whom make up the upper echelon of the sparring community, and while this is appropriate in some cases (such as a closed invitational) it seems unfair in most cases that some players and simply never picked to participate. that said, problem #1 arises quicker when too many players try to take place
4. no league, aside from the ones hosted by clops, have ever gotten through a full season
   - this is essentially the main problem of all leagues. that no league has ever seen a second season is evidence of the wrong types of dynamics being used for sparring. the ones hosted by clops were, by definition, much smaller and had a much shorter duration than the other leagues being attempted. that something stable and maintainable has not been accomplished is troublesome: we want to give participants another shot at winning the next season rather than having a one shot deal. we wouldn't want to enter the UTC and lose, only to find out that that was the only time the tourney was ever being hosted, because it's demoralizing. why join another 1-time league of a different dynamic when the last ones didn't work? even if the league gets through to completion, it's important that we be able to host it again.

the proposed dynamic i've come up with which is by no means the final way in which i'd like it to work, but i hope is close:

the way i want this to work is to, ultimately, take care of problem 1. i think if we take care of problem 1, above all, the other problems won't really be an issue. i'd like this to be able to be maintained over a period of seasons, something which could be run as regularly as the UTC where the host doesn't really matter. i'm sure i'm far away from this feat, but hopefully we can work something out

1. player composition of the league
   - the first time the league takes place, we can simply have a sign-up form and keep it open: anyone who wishes to participate can sign-up. however, it's better to keep the league small, so if too many player' sign up, a singles tournament can be held where players who make it to a certain round make it into the composition of the league. this can lead to problem #1 if we worried about having all the players who signed up being on for the league. but, disqualifying them if they do not show up for the qualifying tournament solves the problem. if the tourney isn't needed, then we just have a big list of players who wish to participate.
2. decision on type of league, whether it be singles, tag-team, guild-team, captain picks, etc.
   - this is very important in deciding how to organize the league. the dynamic for how the composition becomes organized changes dramatically depending on what type of league is being hosted. since this is a rather large topic, i'll post more about it separately below
3. when the league takes place
   - leagues should take place strictly on the weekends. in the past, coordination of scheduling has been a big issue, and has been handled from disqualifying players who miss their assigned dates, to have no assigned dates and players simply spar when they all happen to be online. this has obviously not worked: if we keep everything on the weekends (saturday and sunday only) then we know, for certain, when the league is taking place
4. how the league takes place
   - this is a pretty large topic, so more about it will be posted below; but a small summary will suffice here. basically, a chosen number of hosts will have to be online at some point during the weekend in order to host the league. player's will play out their turns on a first-come-first-serve basis, where if all the players who need to spar for their round are online, then the spar takes place; a time limit for the amount of weekends a player can miss will be determined before disqualification. the dynamic for the tournament will be like the prequalifier, where players who make it to a certain round will go on to the final stages of the league which will be composed of a round-robin, more on the basis of who beats who. so, essentially, it's a changing format based off of unfinished random-draws until two players arise on top to spar in the finals, which will be a series to 10
5. how the second season will be accomplished
   - once the first season is accomplished, we'll have a better idea of how to go about things, as well as a large list of players who have already participated. things should become much easier once we get through the first season: we can determine seedings, types of changing formats which work better than others, and whether our timing-plan has worked. we can continue to improve the overall dynamic if we simply dedicate ourselves to making the league progress to another season, rather than deciding at some point that the league sucks and isn't worth it like the other ones attempted

more on...

#2: the type of league being hosted can change depending on the season. if we host, say, a singles league one season and a tag-team league the next, then we might have to change the overall format. it's harder to get a large team of players online than it is to get two players online, and we must take this into consideration when we decide which type of league to host. we may also decide that it would be a good idea to host several types of leagues at once, thus giving more incentive to be online during the weekends since various types of sparring will be taking lace for the league, and players can try and win multiple events rather than just one. remember: it takes about 10 minutes tops to get through a 2 out of 3 spar, perhaps 15 minutes if it's a larger 5 vs 5 tag-team spar. so, it seems logical that we could host various rounds for various types of the league all on the same day: this isn't like sports where players need resting time in-between tournaments. this should ultimately be decided by chosen hosters, with public opinion in mind

(i broke the character limit, hence the double post)

#4: the first task is choosing a committee of staff on UN who have the ability to help host the league during the weekends. we don't want to have unobserved rounds of the league going down, as that can lead to obvious problems. this shouldn't be limited to the events team: even a FAQ, to a degree, could be able to help host this league given the rights they have. we want the hosters to be able to control the players without just talking to them. we also don't want to bottleneck the amount of hosters, as it's obvious that in addition to player's not making it online during the weekends, hosters are also unable at times to be on graal on the weekends. that we can also host multiple rounds at once can also help push the league forward

the first-come-first-serve basis is one that should help take care of problem #1. it might seem weird to host, say, the 3rd round of the tournament when some players have not progressed past the first round, but any progress we can make at the time when the correct players are online is better than telling them to wait for other rounds to finish. however, we cannot let player's just never log on for weeks at a time and expect them to still participate. i think a limit of missing, say, one weekend (without any notice to the hosters) should result in disqualification. we want to let as many player's take part as we can while being sensitive to the real world and people's schedules, but let's also not allow the league to be postponed for over a month because some player's don't log on enough on the weekend. working with the hosters, we can also host some rounds during the weekdays to help push things forward: the weekend time frame is only for simplifying when things should take place

the way the league takes place, in my mind, is a series of qualifying in which the final player's make it to a more subjective round-robin tournament. one of the problems player's have with the current ranking system on UN is that it doesn't matter who it is you beat, so long as you beat them you get points towards your ranking. the league should be much more personal: it should matter that you beat certain players. the changing format can also keep things interesting: making it to "round 3" in the first tournament is not as prestigious as making it to "round 2" of the third tournament and given entry into the final round-robin. certain thresholds should make players strive for more: if you only make it through the first tournament one season, then next season you can aim to make it into the third tournament

the amount of spars taken place for each round will also change depending on how deep into the tournament players are. we don't want to continue a 1 win move-on throughout the entire league, because consistency is what makes a player good: anyone can fluke beat someone once, and i don't want that to be how things go throughout. for the prequalifier, 1 win move-on works. for the main draw, 2 out of 3 move-on should suffice. for tournament 2, 3 out of 5 win move-on seems appropriate, up until the end where players can series to 10. making things progressively harder as the league goes on should keep things interesting. i'm sure there are players who will wish to watch the league play-out as it goes, and to see two top echelon sparrers take each other out in the first round by 1 win is simply boring and uninteresting. watching them battle it out in a 3 out of 5 is more interesting, and fairer to the players


holy crap i'm finished typing, this was a lot longer than i wanted it to be, but hopefully you read it all:

sorry for the long post on something that shouldn't be so complicated, but i really do want to get a league of some sort going so sparring can be less boring and mundane than it currently is. this obviously isn't a system that is problem-proof, or even perhaps intriguing to the players. any suggestions to how we can make this happen, or how we can make it happen smoother and "better", i will try and take into consideration. i haven't presented this to any of the staff on UN, so my interest is to create a stable and workable system that we can present to the admins of UN so they can approve it being staff-run, and perhaps make it apart of their regular events such as UTC and TTUTC (both events which have been being taken less and less seriously as the months roll by)

your thoughts?

tldr

You're right this could be a great idea if you explained it in point form instead of inserting what I'm guessing is a ridiculous amount of fluff. TLDR

this

Version TL;DR:

Problems

1) Timing, not everyone is online at once because of timezones etc
2) Lack of support from staff = in the hands of UN players. Gg
3) Difficult to select players – do we go all top tier or let more people in? If more people join, problem 1) becomes more apparent.
4) No league has actually gone all the way through (apart from the one hosted by Clops)

Proposed Solutions

1) Open signups: the first time the league takes place there will be some special filtering if too many people apply (like making them spar for a place or something)
2) What kind of spar will the league be? (singles, tag, cherry zerging, etc)
3) Timing – take place on weekends for optimum turnout. Because we all know Graalians don’t have lives.
4) Chosen number of hosts host it. Hosts are selected amongst Hiro’s group of elite hosters as well as staff so they can observe it incase ppl like Torrent swallow the other player with his gigantic ping.

Rounds are hosted without waiting for others to hold the tourney back. So if Rufus and Luda are sparring and Luda doesn’t show up because he’s just trollin the league, they’ll just skip that and move on to the next pair. Then they’ll eventually go back but of course Luda can’t be AFK forever which is why a player can only miss out on so much before being dq’d.

Have pre-qualifiers and stuff to see who makes it to the finals. Not best of one, prob best of 3 or smth. Final spar will be to 10 so if you’re sparring someone like Crono don’t worry, 1-2 spars and you’ll get his pattern just fine.


5) Future events will be easier to do because of experience. I am dead serious.

did i do it rite hiro?

no it's TL;DR still..

ok

Version TL;DRv2:
Problems
1) Timing, cuz different timezones.
2) No support from staff => UN players hosting = gg
3) Difficult to select players due to numbers and skill levels
4) No league has finished cept Clops'

Proposed Solutions
1) Open signups. If too many people, restrict by having them spar.
2) What kind of spar will the league be? (singles, tag, cherry zerging, etc)
3) Timing – take place on weekends for optimum turnout. Because we all know Graalians don’t have lives.
4) Some hosts are selected. Staff too just incase. Rounds are hosted without holding others back. If Luda trollin the league by bein offline, skip his spar and go to the next one. If a player is gone for too long then d/q'd. Prequalifiers and stuff to see who makes it to finals. Best of 3 or smth. Finals are first to 10.
5) Future events = ezier cuz of experience. Dead serious.

NOW?

ts;dr.

everything hiro posts is tl; so i dr.

well i'll just wait for people who aren't completely retarded to post, aside from crono; but even you didn't say whether you liked the idea or not

honestly, why even post "tl;dr" just don't read it and move on. post if you want to add something to the thread, not that you didn't read it

What is the point of a sparring league and how it is different from the current tournaments?

Why have a sparring league? Spar for fun, tournaments at odd intervals, problem solved.

the current tournament is a one day event that takes place once a month, where only the finals are a 2 out of 3 match

the league is an ongoing event that takes place over the course of (perhaps) multiple months, where only (in this dynamic) the qualifying matches are decided by one win

so it's more flexible in that it takes longer, it's based more around consistency of sparring, and more than just singles/tag-team types of sparring can take place

ty

This has my thumbs up, I'm all for it.

So it's a round-robin tournament where every participant fights every other participant?

If that is the case then I support it.

not exactly. the round-robin is a type of dynamic we could use for certain rounds of the league; it might be too difficult to host a giant round robin the entire way through, as that has failed in the past. we can use it during certain sections of the league however, once a narrower group has made it past a certain amount of rounds

it'd be very hard to make much progress in a round robin of over 30 participants or more

my post wasn't spam at all and a guy with the name "pooper" shouldn't be a forum mod anyways, i find that name highly offensive

lol ok "heroin"