f13.net

It might be good to start thinking about what kind of rules we're going to have in season 5. Most importantly, how will we handle odd numbers of signups? The Qualification Round! gets the job done but doesn't feel very elegant, hinging the newbs' inclusion on a single random matchup. As a player, I'd rather put up with the buggy league implementation with odd numbers than have to exclude anyone, but I've never administered such a league so I don't know if that's realistic from Falc's point of view.

Second order of business is how we feel about the feeder league. From another thread:
I don't think I agree with this. The feeder league has the unintended (?) dynamic that you have to catass a bit in order to start the main league with an optimal team of all doubles rolls or whatever, and as someone who doesn't put much time into BB outside the main league I feel like any increase in the TV limit is just going to put me at an even larger disadvantage than my newb self already is should I decide to roll a new team. I don't think there's a right or wrong answer here, as I'm sure that being able to tailor your team is really nice for people into that, just pointing out that such a change actually makes rerolling less viable for me, not more.

Yeah, I'm also not a big fan of catassing up a perfect 1250 team.  I at least have my 1400ish Khemri to fall back on.  But for Actual New People, should we get any, it seems a bit of a hill for them to climb to get a semi-competitive team going.   Though, I do think inducements are a greater leveler than many of you do.

Some sort of semi-reasonable limit on # of games in the feeder league might be workable, I suppose, though I have no clue what # that would be.  And it's another rule to keep track of, which I am also not a big fan of.  So to sum up, I'm not a lot of help, really.  :grin:

The other thing about the feeder league rules as they stand, they also lead to making weird decisions while playing feeder games instead of just playing the game, because you don't want the wrong people to level etc. I honestly don't have any good ideas for fixing that though.

Honestly I think what slows new people is that a majority of players in the league have over 60 games experience.

An experienced player with an 1100 team plus a wizard and a chef, is a hell of a lot scarier than a 1600 team with a coach who only has a 5 game record.

I like a TV limit for entry to the main league because it prevents 40 game plus feeder teams coming across into the one match per week environment without drastic firings, and basically the TV limit holds back experienced players more than new players.

But I would like to see a Qualification Round that gives losers more than one match.

It wasn't just one match in the Qualification Round, though. If I remember right, it was best of three. I know I played Merusk twice to get in. I think the way it was handled was alright, to be honest, but it's easy for me to say since I actually qualified.  :why_so_serious:

I think I'd prefer a games played limit on the feeder teams than a TV limit, thinking about it. Maybe both, I dunno. I do agree that it's harder on new people to play a perfectly cultivated feeder league team, though, partly because the TVs are going to be a lot closer so they don't even get a lot of inducements to help them out, you know?

There really is no way to stop people from gaming the system if they want to. Firing linemen that level up or someone who doesn't get doubles etc. working around wasted mvps all that jazz. That's the sort of thing that other people just need to make note of and punish accordingly by fouling and generally roughing up teams that do shit like that.

How have things gone so far with =< 1250 teams that xfer'd in from the feeder league so far?

I think the rules as they are right now are fine.

Firing linemen that level up without doubles or are otherwise overvalued can happen in the regular league as well as the Feeder League in order to trim TV, and it's actually an important tactic in the game as teams become bloated with TV from Fan Factor.  That's not something I would ever worry about or change my opinion of a team's eligibility.

Placing a game number limit on Feeder League teams coming into the regular season seems like it would really hurt some teams.  Chaos, for instance, not only need a lot of TV to be competitive, but it takes them a lot of games to get that TV as they actually accumulate SPPs slower than most teams.  The same could be said for a lot of bashy teams, like Dwarves or Orcs.  Elves, on the other hand, can wrack up SPPs in a hurry by scoring like madmen and develop a strong team in a shorter timeframe.

The teams from the Feeder League this season have been competitive with regular teams, which was the idea.  I made it to the post season with mine, but lost in the first round; next season I'll make it further.  AndyDavo's team is doing very well, but he won the championship last season with a team that wasn't from the Feeder League at all, so I think that actually speaks to his skill as a coach rather than the strength of his team and how it developed in the Feeder League.

Honestly, I'd just as soon have no feeder league teams at all, but that ship sailed.

I would say increase the limit to 1300 or 1350, but what's the average TV currently and how much has it increased since last season?

Don't increase the current 1750 limit before expenses starts.

1250 is the next best thing.

Firmly against. I see no need to use it as much other than a way to have one offs with one another and get a couple levels if someone wants to switch teams.

I don't think 1250 is horrible now...1350 wouldn't be terrible, but much more beyond that, and people are able to manicure their teams to an unfair degree with meaningless unlimited games when compared to people who've been playing in the league. Lineman didn't roll doubles? No big deal - fire him and level up another. Positional with levels die? No biggie - just grind a few more games.

I think it's good that we have mechanisms to allow people to jump in with teams and be competitive, but there's got to be a limit.

That's one of the advantages of elves/skaven/etc., though -- it helps compensate for the fact that once they get up against higher TV bashy teams, they will be losing players to injury at a higher rate than most higher-AV teams.

I think the 1250 limit is okay. Andy's and Ruvaldt's teams are both fairly ridiculous (Andy's moreso -- two str 4 guard linemen, durrr) but they weren't all built entirely in the feeder league anyways. I would be strongly against raising the limit, and like someone said I think the feeder league is more important for getting new players some actual games than anything.

I do think it would be nice if there was some way to make it less convaluted to trim your team down to the 1250 limit. Allowing people to start with less than 11, but including the Loner merc value in the TV to calculate the limit, would be a good start. Part of the problem now is once you go over 1250 you need a very large amount of money to actually be able to trim your team down -- which means even more games, and is also makes it harder to do so for more fragile teams, since they're less likely to have saved up.

Of course.  I'd never argue otherwise.  That's not an argument against the point I was trying to make though: that a limit on the number of matches would ultimately favor one type of team over another.

As a side note, when making The Ex-Presidents I never fired any player because they didn't get doubles or something.  I honestly just got really damned lucky and rolled a lot of doubles with three of my Chaos Warriors.  You can tell that from the fact that my three blodgey CWs have played in every game that the team has played.  Two of them have -MV also, but I still kept them.  Right now I only have one player on the team with a stat increase; I had two before one of them died, but even he wasn't all that spectacular.  I think people are assuming that there is a lot more min-maxing going on in the Feeder League than there really is.

Hence my "maybe both" with regards to a limit on games versus TV.

I think you guys are missing the point, you need to answer a question about the feeder league before deciding its fate. I think the question is thus,
 
What is the function of the feeder league?
 
My answer;
 
It is two-fold, one, to give F13 members a place to play each other, and only each other, since a great many of you do not want to play "outsiders". Two, it is a place to create a team to play in the main divisions with a competitive team from the get go.
 
Now it does its first function real well, other than maybe having more people able to validate teams so the lag between team creation and activation is lower, this is fine.
 
The second bit however i think it does NOT. Why? Because when people reroll / new people enter, they are at a disadvantage due to TV. I have had a look down all 32 teams that finished this season (viewable if you search F13 season 4) and if you look at the TV's only 3 teams are below 1250 TV.  The average is between 1540 and 1580.  I would not like to advocate a TV cap increase to the average but i  do think that putting it to around 1400 would be fairer  based upon the league as it currently stands.
 
I would also like to just talk about the min/maxing that people have talked about.  As I remember my personal team that I am using this season I was careful to get the team just under 1250 but I only played 6 games with the team. This is hardly time to be making the perfect 1250 team and I don't remember ever firing anyone who didn't get a double or whatever. I think that this issue, as some people see it, can be easily manage by one simple rule. Has the team played more than X number of games (imo 15 is waaaay more than enough), I think that common sense does need to be a rule here because some people physically don't have the time to be playing loads of games outside of the main league so the X number of games could be also based on how many teams do you have in the feeder division. For example, I play a lot and if I was to say have 5 teams in the feeder then picked the best one, that would be more of an advantage than say some one who can only squeek the time to play one team and has to use that.
 
I would just say now that I know my english isn't the best but please, if you going to criticise this post please do so for its conceptual ideas not its bad grammar

I have to agree with Ruvaldt and disagree with Andy.

1. Min/maxing in the feeder league is actually pretty rare (see Ruvaldt and Andy, lucky rolls and only 6 games played.

2. We shouldn't increase TV just because average TV in the main league is higher because of 2 things:
    a: teams in the main league have a set match schedule and can't tune as much
    b: coaches in the main league are not all min/maxers and have bloat


Look at Megrim for example, his HE team this season is a fresh team with no feeder league participation and has done well (obviously skewed from coach ability).

If we increase the TV it just makes min maxing even easier which doesn't help the true beginners. If TV was increased to 1350 or higher I could get a pretty monster team which obviously doesn't fit spirit of f13 main league.

So keep the feeder league entry and keep it as it is.

1. TV is 1250
2. Have at least 11 players
3. Have 0 gold

Simple (Falc you are a genius for coming up with it in the first place!)  :awesome_for_real:

Just for clarification, what do you mean here when you say a "competitive" team? Are you just referring to equal TV? Are leagues more competitive when all teams have similar TVs going in? The attitude around here seems to be that a good coach can even up all but the most severe TV disparities through proper use of inducements. I guess my issue is that I don't understand what problem a TV limit increase would be trying to solve.

My thoughts were that it would be good for the less experienced coaches to have better teams coming into the main league.  Me personally would be ok with giving a tv1000 team a whirl. But I like a good challenge!

That makes sense actually, since it seems to be the newer players that balk at the big TV differences. Which also makes sense, since newbs are less likely to use inducements correctly.

Still, for me it doesn't outweigh the "I built my team one game per week, uphill, butt naked in the snow, and you should have to as well!" :drill: factor. Heck, maybe I'll roll a 1000tv team next season just to see what it's like now.

This is very true.

i suspect that the 1250 limit was put in place a while back however, when the average tv of most teams was lower. It would make sense that it moved with the times. I would just add that i am not really thinking of rerolling so to me this is a moot point. However it will make the league harder from my perspective (thus better) if everyone were using better skiled teams. Looking at my results this season does tell me that the more challenging games were vs people with similar / higher TV than me, the TV 1000 new people got raped.

Have we ever discussed the idea of declaring everyone plays a new team in season X? Or if we are steady around 30 or even grow, move to multiple leagues with promotion and relegation?

edit: Or what about something like a team ought to be retired after x(5?) seasons? make a new f13 old and busted league for teams retiring out of the main league and have one off tourneys or treat it like a high TV feeder league.

Since I brought it up, I'll explain my reasoning.

I have two feeder leagues teams bumping right up against the TV limit for next season - Chaos at 1220 and Skaven at 1210. At best I can get maybe one more game in with each team before I have to put them on hiatus to keep from bumping up against the TV limit if I decide to use either for an F13 season. I built both teams (and created a Necro team) for the purpose of joining the league - or at least seeing if I want to play that particular side in the league.

We talk about coaching skill making a huge difference and it does - especially familiarity with your team AND with the play style of other teams. That's only done by playing your team and playing lots of games against other teams. Chaos plays so differently from Skaven which plays way differently than High Elves, etc. TV is only part of bridging the gap between really experienced coaches like AndyDavo and noobie coaches like Paelos (or me when I started the f13 league last season). Experience with the team your playing and against other teams makes a world of difference, probably a lot more than TV. Adding TV limit would give me another 3-4 games with those teams. And since teams that return to the league for future seasons will have a higher TV because of their participation in the league, the disparity between feeder league's 1250 TV and the most experienced teams will be greater - something I don't think inducements adequately bridge especially with inexperienced coaches vs. experienced.

Hey, I'm fine if it stays at 1250 - but I think a bump to 1300 for Season 5 and 1350 for season 6 isn't a big deal. Min-maxing is much less of a deal to me than coach experience.

I think a hard reset on the league could be interesting, but honestly it is a bit of a kick in the nuts to the people who have been struggling with slow-starting teams, or who are just in general fairly attached to their team.

On the other hand nothing would stop us from having a brand-new-team season and then afterwards reverting back to our old teams, etc., if we ever feel the need for greater variety in the league.

As someone with an if-not-bloated-than-certainly-pretty-crappily-developped mid-high TV team I am perhaps a little biased about raising the feeder league TV cap. But I agree that if the goal is to keep the league competitive, a slight raise to the cap or some other concessions to make it easier to squeeze a team in might be a good idea.

There is nothing stopping you from playing those teams in the Feeder League though. If the purpose is to learn how a team plays, there is little difference (insofar as most players and most teams are concerned) between scheduled league play and free matchmaking. You are still able to face a variety of opponents, in a spread of team value relationships. If anything, it is probably better for learning a new team given that one can play more games in a given space of time opposed to a scheduled league.

The concern here, by the sounds of it, is that people don't like playing against higher-valued opponents when they come into the league with 'low' value teams. Players still equate team value with team power, which while representative to an extent, is not entirely accurate. It is intimidating to have to face an opponent stacked with skills and 500+ value higher than you - but this is a psychological barrier, moreso than a game-mechanic one.

Furthermore, learning how to use Inducements correctly is actually (at least in my view) a very important skill to have, and this goes hand-in-hand with learning correct team value management. The amount of times I've seen people going into a game with ~400 in bonus cash and blowing it all on Morg when they could have spent that difference so much more effectively, is depressing.

Finally, keep in mind that matching by TV is not actually a good idea, and the system was not designed with this in mind. There is supposed to be a certain flux within the team value structure of a league, and the power of teams waxes and wanes depending on those differences.

Teams in the feeder leagues are rarely going to have much in inducements to use, especially teams being built for the 1250 TV limit because often those teams will be the same TV level or close enough to not matter. The last 4 or 5 matches with my Skaven I didn't have enough in inducements to buy broodweiser babes. The only place to get that kind of disparity is currently the league.

Are we now at the point of needing divisions between High TV and low TV teams, or probably better, High Win teams in one division and Low Win teams in the other division? We've got teams about to pass 2000 TV (which as they say, is right when Chaos starts to get interesting). The play-off's would then be the meeting of the divisions.

I've never been a fan of making divisions that were high TV or high win and its opposite.  Ultimately it leads to a lot of good teams not making it to the playoffs and some others making it to the playoffs when their performance didn't warrant their berth.  No Seattle Seahawks in the f13 league.   :awesome_for_real:

Also, I think that coaches truly do improve by playing other coaches that possess greater experience and/or skill.  I, for one, have learned most of what I know about the game by playing people who either tied or beat me.  If my division was lacking in those one or two hardened veterans in previous seasons I wouldn't be as good as I am now.

TV is in no way an indication of actual effectiveness, which varies wildly between teams. I didn't fully buy that when I was advocating for a cap last year; I was completely and totally wrong.

Why are we wanting to micromanage this further? I don't feel as though anything is busted. You're always going to hit the cap, no matter what you set it to. So we raise it to 1300 now. Then we need to raise it to 1500 because a couple people are at 1270 and need to get higher. It makes the entire enterprise fruitless. Keep it 1250 or lift it altogether, and I'd prefer it at 1250. No half-measures.

Re: Butting against the limit. If it's a matter of needing more hands-on experience with a given team/race and your team is at 1220 or whatever (as my goblins are) then... make another team of the same race. Play them in perpetuity in the Feeder League.

Yes, what he said. I think the comment about experience counting for more than TV is accurate -- but you don't need to raise the TV cap to let you play more games with a new team, assuming you have the time to play those games otherwise. Just run a few teams up the TV ladder -- maybe the second one will end up with extra-awesomer skills!

I didn't find it too bad. Hell, having a million in inducements against IainC (and then winning) was probably the highlight of my season.  :why_so_serious: However, it's one of those things that's gonna depend on what team you pick, probably. Chaos is (apparently) pure shit at 1k TV, for example.

Since TV cap has been discussed and we probably need a poll or executive decision from Falc we should probably discuss the selection process on odd team numbers.

I don't have an opinion on this but are the ones knocked out (Merusk?) interested in trying again?

Also will we stick to playoffs and failoffs? (it seemed like a success actually).

Finally is top 4 in each division too much or fine for playoffs?

I like picking the top 4 in each the divisions if we continue having failoffs otherwise top 2 for playoffs only

I think this last season was the best yet.  The playoffs are large enough to not seem overly difficult to break into and it offers a chance for wild cards that are still good teams to advance.  No teams got through that I thought didn't deserve a playoff berth.  The Failoffs allow teams with lesser records to develop further, which should help them in later seasons, and more importantly it keeps everyone playing and having fun.  Everyone has something to do in the post-season this way.

I thought the Qualification Round! was fair.  As long as people play more than one game, I'm fine with it continuing if it is needed, and it serves the dual benefit of giving new teams/coaches a few extra games to develop their team if they make it through.  This is the point of view of someone who hasn't gone through it though so I would give more credence to Dusematic and Merusk's opinions on the matter.  I think those were the two eliminated during the last Qualification Round!

When discussing TV, you have to remember this is a Games Workshop game. Some teams are just goddamn better than others. Chaos at 1000 TV sucks monkey ass. At 1250, they are BARELY able to hold their own with a few skills. After having gotten beaten in the Failoffs by a Norse team with every player on the pitch having at least one skill, if not 3 or 4, those extra TV do make a difference. It's not like I'm saying raise it a great deal. 50 points? That's at best 2 skills or 1 really good damn doubles roll. It's not like I won't play if we don't raise it, I just think a rise after another season of experience for teams carrying over isn't a bad thing.

Qualification round is a very good idea, and I say keep it as is. I also say keep the top 4 teams going to the playoffs and keep the Failoffs going.

I definitely think the Failoffs should be here to stay, so thank you, AndyDavo, for suggesting them. It was a nice consolation prize ... especially for me, as I could reassure myself it was fine I just missed the playoffs, I would kick ass in the Failoffs ... and promptly choked like I was IainC or something. (I say that with love, IainC! :why_so_serious:)

Also I feel like top four to the playoffs was a good thing. It kept my division interesting all the way through the last day, top two would've made it cease to be a concern much earlier. It's hard for me to say for sure, of course, as this was my first season and I've not had to play the Other Way.

I don't mean to be constantly self-deprecating, but with a record of 2-2-3 and a season of fairly average play I never saw myself as standing much of a chance. I think playoffs would be more special and exciting if they were limited to top 25%, though I won't complain too loudly about this one.

One of the advantages of keeping playoff qualification at top 4 is that -- assuming we have similar numbers next season -- it makes for symmetrical Playoff/Failoff numbers.

I think having the top 4 out of 8 go to the play offs was good - most people had a chance right up to the second last round, and even the last place was up for grabs on the last round. Not to mention I wouldn't have got in without it.

And all the play off's have been very close and tense, no matter what the TV difference.

I'm about of the mind of Haem's position. If I were entering with a new team, I'd want a few skills and I think allowing a couple extra skill-ups would help those who need it. And those who don't, well, they'll stomp us anyway.

I know it's been a long two-season road just to get some skills on my Black Orcs, str4 doesn't go far without any skills. And I still have one level 1 BO!

I liked the failoff idea for this season and I'm looking forward to Eld's swiss experiment.

I think you either want people to start each season with fresh teams (which makes a lot of teams frankly unplayable) or you accept that some level of twinking is inevitable. There's not really any rules you can put in place that will stop determined twinking that won't also make slow-burning teams like Chaos worthless.

As for the playoffs, I like the  four up/four down playoff/failoff divide but I'd like to see them (or at least the failoffs) as a regular tournament rather than a knockout so that every one gets the benefit of a bunch of extra post-season games.

That's why I like Eld's idea. Too late to implement this play/failoff season, but something to think about. The losers probably need the TV more than the winners :) The failoffs gave a BO block and my thrower accurate, so I'd say mission accomplished as far as having them at least close a bit of the gap for non-playoff teams.

Couple more years and we should have this down to a science!  :grin:

In terms of the feeder league transferring to main league I don't mind what TV is set, the main point for me is people enjoying their matches and  while being at a TV disadvantage for a brand new coach can be intimidating it shouldn't be so much of an issue for an experienced player, so unless the admin was a major headache I would be in favour of people who have partaken in the league being restricted to a 1250 TV limit if they change teams but anyone who joins fresh and wants to take the time to level up a team via the feeder league is allowed a higher limit but for their first team only.

I think the main issue is the fact that in the current format it can take a long time to level a bashy team in the main league since you are really limited by the randomness of SPP accumulation plus the fact that you only get 1 match every 10 day period so with only 7 games guaranteed plus however long you last in the play-offs in a regular season it will most likely take 2-3 seasons of games to get something that will be a real threat in the playoffs. The passing teams have a slightly different issue with the fact that trying to level a team with such fragility can mean that they run into money issues trying to keep pace with the rate of their injuries if they get unlucky but that's the name of the game in my eyes.

So I would like to see Eldaecs' idea for a round of matches being played for teams in the fail offs giving them more chance to grow while the playoffs proper remain a straight knockout since in theory the coaches and teams who managed to make the play-offs obviously don't need the team development so much and one off winner take all matches are always more exciting in my own experience.

I'm ok with the TV limit being bumped a little. Though I'm unconvinced that it will have a huge impact. The more important rule is the zero cash rule. I don't see great value in limiting match count.

On playoffs, the thing I dislike about conventional playoffs is that half the teams only get one match, plus it is a lot of fuss to determine 1st place, which usually is not the most interesting thing going on. Maybe if we just make a particular point of kicking off close season activity as soon as people start getting eliminated it won't matter so much.

Swiss failoffs make a lot of sense though, looking at the failoff quarter and semi finals, it is almost entirely well developed teams that didn't quite make the playoffs, the teams that need matches are almost all out of it. With a swiss failoff system you could even have the playoff losers fall back into the failoffs as they are eliminated, treat the prior rounds as wins for pairing. The point being to get people playing matches.

Loving the discussion.

At the moment, I would go this way:

- The Feeder Team limit to join the Main League will be raised to 1300TV for Season #5. This does not mean it will be raised to 1350 or anything else for Season #6.

- The Main League will stay at 32 for Season #5. This is, of course, assuming we can gather 32 coaches again, and assuming we won't have 50 total applicants. If we can't make it to 32 some rethinking will be necessary, and if we get a lots more than 32 we'll see what to do in order to give everyone a fair chance to participate.

- Assuming things will stay at 32, priority to join Season #5 and skip the Qualification Round! will be like this, from first to last:
* All those who participated in S#4.
* f13 Regulars who participated in S#1, S#2 or S#3.
* f13 Regulars who didn't participate in any previous Season.
* Non-regulars who participated in any previous Season (except S#4, of course. That bumps everyone in the first bracket).
* All non-regular new applicants.

- So yeah, The Qualification Round! will stay (if needed) and the formula will depend on the number of players involved. The formula has to be quick, but the more chances we can give to players to prove their value the better it is for everyone. Teams can apply to the Qualification Round! from the Feeder League the same way they apply to the Main League. The Qualification Round! is by all means part of the Main League, just not as cool.

- While I like promotions and relegations in some professional sports, I don't see why we should change a formula that has worked fine so far for our League. I like that everyone has a shot at everyone else, and while there's very few chances a low TV team with an unexperienced coach will be able to score much against someone with a very high rating, Blood Bowl always has room for upsets, unexpected killings and comedy in general. Also, I like to preserve a bit of the "American Football" tradition that is obviously at the root of Blood Bowl. Removing the playoffs would just feel wrong to me. So...

- The Playoff/Failoff formula is succesful, so it stays in, untouched. Assuming a 32 teams Season #5, it will be our traditional 4 Divisions, with best 4 to the Playoffs and worst 4 to the Failoffs.

- Finally, and in order to keep some sort of balance, the sortings for Season #5 Divisions will be arranged according to the Official f13 Ranking (http://forums.f13.net/index.php?topic=21065.msg956256#msg956256) , same way I dealt with Season #4 (so no change here). But it is important to notice that each coach will be sorted according the Coach ranking, regardless of his or her team. So, if Strazos wins Season #5 and decides to start over with a 1000 TV team of noob hobbits, he will be still Top Tier. DO NOT FORGET THIS.

- I think we'll change the way tiebreakers are decided too:
* As of now it is TD Difference >> TD For >> Head to Head >> Best TV >> Most Casualties inflicted >> coin toss.
* New rule will be: Head to Head >> TD Difference >> TD For >> WORST TV considering one team's eleven bests including injured ones >> coin toss.


Sorry for all the colour coding.

Ick, head to head.

We'd better clarify what happens when three or more teams are inevitably tied.

Best points in the matches between the teams tied?

If a 2 of 3 teams in that situation are tied on points in matches between the 3, do we go to head to head on the match between the 2?

If a three way head to head is even on points do we go to TD diff or TD for within the cluster of tied teams?

Someone is going to do themselves an injury attempting to work out the permutations in Stormbringer.

(I dislike head to head but the rest is fine)


Also number of casualties inflicted ON ELVES should count before coin toss.

I dislike the top 4 finals as they don't really reward finishing higher in the group all that much, and knockout is sometimes a lucky dip.

If we want more games in I'd go to larger groups with only the top couple in playoffs. But I don't really care much, if things stay the same I'll still be happy playing.

Just got to say this is a testament to the great job not only Falc has done in setting the league up, but in the way we've all been playing - i.e. very little drama, bullshit, whinging or other annoying public snit shit fits. The f13 league has lasted longer than any f13 Bat Country guild as a going concern.

What's the reasoning on the tiebreaker change? I thought we had a majority against head-to-head as first tiebreaker in a previous discussion, and the new TV thing seems arbitrary. Other than that, everything looks good. Even if almost none of it is the way I would do it. :grin:

Damning with faint praise, but yeah -- congrats and thanks to Falc for the great job.  :heart:

I like head-to-head for tiebreakers only because it can add drama to individual matches, not because I think it's actually the best tiebreaking notion.

I'm fine with head to head but I can see why its stupid.

Playoff > Promotion/Relegation, that was a landslide vote when we did it waybackwhen.

Instead of Head-to-Head, what about TD difference + Casualty difference?

I am somewhat biases in this because I wouldn't have made the semi-finals as head-to-head, but I prefer a value that's been built up through the course of the season, rather than just a single game.

Casualties being part of the tiebreaker would make me  :awesome_for_real:.

EDIT: Also I still prefer head-to-head as a tiebreaker personally but I think I'm in the minority.

The problem with the failoffs being a regular tournament Idea is that those who have had frankly miserable seasons (like me) still have to go on an on getting hammered for longer. I was really glad I had just one more game to play and it helped a lot with my relative good humour during that game despite the dice mashing my ass as usual. (What, you thought I felt for a single second I could win? heh) If I had yep more crap to look forward to I could have potentially just conceded all my games and dumped the team.

Sometimes you just want to get a bad thing over and done with. I know people who nave occasionally won game or scored 2 touchdowns a season might disagree but...

Obvious to people who've only vaguely heard that Americans have their own version of a game called football, maybe.  :why_so_serious: Actually, that might be my favorite thing about Blood Bowl. It was obviously created by people who sort of, kind of know American Football exists, but have only seen soccer and rugby.

Fixed it for you.

I used "soccer" specifically because using "football" for two very different sports within two sentences is idiotic.  :oh_i_see:  Plus I am pretty sure most people know what "soccer" is.

FIGHT

I might.

You have to set things up with the assumption that everyone who says they wanted to play Bloodbowl actually, y'know, wants to play Bloodbowl. I know you didn't enjoy playing but most of the rest of us signed up to play some Bloodbowl.

Making league rules to accommodate people who don't want to play any more is missing the point of the exercise.

A better way of making SirT's point is that we don't want to commit people to too many matches with the same team. 7 round robin matches and 4 failoff matches is probably on the limit of what we want to ask people to commit to.

Also in practice, people are much less bothered by Failoff dropouts than round robin dropouts.

Yes, that's important and that's the argument that led to fairly short seasons, and I'd say it worked well so far. Short Attention Span is a beast we'd prefer to leave asleep.

Yeah thats a much better way of saying to tbh.

On that note, I actually wanted to (gently) put forward the idea regarding dual rotation rounds in the League. Instead of having a single rotation whereby everyone plays each other once, what do people think about having two rounds, with everyone having a second go. This would not only help clear-up any "how do we deal with tie-breakers" affairs, but also give the slower teams some more time to ramp up their game, while also giving everyone another shot at the guy who beat them last time.

Obviously for players like Sir T who aren't enjoying themselves, playing for twice as long would be a detriment, so I don't really want to push this forward very strongly, but I do think it's worth mentioning.

I'm not bothered by it but it would make for really, really long seasons unless we went to 8 divisions of 4 teams.

To be honest I think its fine the way it is. Everyone gets a game with everyone else and things move along at a fairt clip. If you are doing 2 passes it also is more of an administration headache to remamber who has played who. I cant see much advantage to playing twice as such, the only reason they do it in real life is that the team playing at home is percieved to have an advantage, so playing twice negaters that, and lengtens the season. Thers no advantage to playing "at home" in the computer game.

Me not enjoying the season is kind of outside the point, really. you cant legislate for people not enjoying something and a person always has a choice to just walk away.

Yes of course, but we want to be inclusive so that people don't walk away like that.

Anyway, it's not a big thing as the system is working fine as it is.

I feel like with the pace we complete days, it would make the seasons way too long to play everyone in your division twice. But maybe that's just me.

Playing twice is a terrible idea.