The MARP battles

greenspun.com : LUSENET : MAME Action Replay : One Thread

For who (like me) don't find interesting the tourneys at all, I have a proposal: change the system completely. I mean, building a tournament roster (yes, like e.g. in Virtua Striker) where two players each battle to reach the highest score in a game chosen randomly (obviously every game is different for each couple of MARPers), and then the winner advances to the next turn, until the finals...

How do the players battle? They simply upload their scores within a short period of time (3 days, for example), adding a prefix as used in the actual tournaments. The player with the highest score wins and advances to the next turn. Fairly simple.

I think this is more fun and addictive, anyway I'm waiting for you guys to express your impressions... first of all Gameboy9 (if you like this idea, shall we change the old tournament with this one or just add it?)!

Thanks for your attention....

-- Vaz (mrvaz@inwind.it), July 21, 2000

Answers

I think I tried this once - and failed dismally - although this idea seems slightly different than mine. Let's see what others think first - cause I'm game to go with the flow :)

GB9

-- Gameboy9 (goldengameboy@yahoo.com), July 21, 2000.


Full credit to those still putting an effort into the tournaments, I keep getting bored part way through. T4 has certainly been better than the last two, but why do I keep feeling like I'm playing the same game over again? Rally X and Solar Fox aren't even as exciting as the T1 flops, Lock n' Chase and Us vs. Them. Arkanoid 2 doesn't have the same immediacy as Pang!3 (panic), Green Beret is so easy it makes Combat School look like Navy Seal Training. One Galaga for another is a trade-off. That leaves SF2, Bubble Bobble, and Pnickies stacked up against games like Mr. DO's Wild Ride, Discs of Tron, and 2020 Baseball, games where you could continually make new progress and which showed continual back-and-forth improvements by players. In the past 3 tournaments, that kind of play seems to have been absent. One player takes over a game and dominates it for the tourney; the others fight over 2-3-4.

Gawd, I know this sounds whiny, but I'm not having fun with the tourneys any more. They seem more like work I should be doing to prove that I can keep up with the other players. I know getting smacked around for 5 minutes by a rail car could be awfully damn frustrating, but it was really fun to see who was going to finally break level 11, or if you could make the next step up in zzyzzyxx.

Still don't agree with me. Consider two of the most popular games from each tourney, Pnickies (T4) and Money Puzzle Idol Exchanger (T1). Now look at the play on each. In T1, we had about 6-7 players trying for that Perfect 64. In T4, we have one player trying to make Level 100 on Pnickies.

Feel free to disagree with me, I'm certainly not trying to sell this idea to anyone, and I'll probably still participate in future tournaments. But I think we should consider doing a completely random selection of games (and then have players vote to narrow down the list (and by vote, I mean choose good trounament games, not tournament games that they are good at)) for the next tourney (as specified in a much, much earlier post by me), just so everyone is on a completely level footing, and up the number of games to 10 or 12 again, so that players don't burn out on games so fast. Failing that, do something like what Vaz is saying, and make it head-to-head.

It just seems like we've lost a lot of tournament interest since we first started. We haven't even managed to up the numbers of people playing them.

Something to consider. Best of luck to those of you playing in T4.

QCN

-- Q.T.Quazar (qan@home.com), July 21, 2000.


I think that is an excellent idea Vaz. It would be a knockout competition and those wishing to participate would have to sign up at the beginning. Then the players would be paired randomly and each pair given a randomly chosen game, some players would have a bye of course in the first round. I love it!

-- LordGaz (garyjlee@hotmail.com), July 23, 2000.

I like the idea too. To avoid the byes of the first round and to improve the competition, we could imagine groups of 3 or 4 fighting on one game chosen randomly. Then only the first two would qualify for the next round. The two last ( or the last one if it's a group of 3 players ) woudl qualify for a special round where they could gain another chance to continue the competition with the 1st round winners. I hope I'm clear :-)It's a system often used in some sport competitions.

Lagavulin.

-- Lagavulin (darre@cybercable.fr), July 23, 2000.


OK - more from the tournament coordinator :)

I think this idea can easily work - again - I'll mention that I'll go with the flow - but this has a very good base.

Lagavulin's idea to place 3 or 4 people at one time in the early rounds instead of byes is a very good idea indeed. This would probably be how I would do it without objection.

I would probably go one week for a round with either (3 to 4) or 7 days break in between rounds. Also - probably keep everyone playing for at least 2 rounds to keep everyone playing.(I mean who would want to play risking only playing 1 week?) So that would mean a consolation bracket and what have you.

I would probably seed the first instance of this tournament type by either current MARP regulation leaders(in other words, BBH would be seeded 1st), or by 4th MARP Tournament rankings.(in other words, Renzo Vignola would be seeded 1st if the tournament ended now) New players who sign up would be ranked at the bottom when they signed up. The quicker the new players come in, the higher the seed.

I'm planning to keep the 2 month break in between tournaments - this will give everybody plenty of time to sign up.

We might think about bigger and better things. Yeah - prizes. If we're lucky to get people who are willing to donate them. A neat thought though :)

Thanks for your attention :) GB9

-- Gameboy9 (goldengameboy@yahoo.com), July 23, 2000.



Ah, a double elimination type competition. That would definitely heat things up. You've got another vote for it here with the Llama (The Llama? Boy, where yo mind at, fool?). Although I like the thought of it being only a couple of days, thus making the players rush even more for games. Besides, if we kept all rounds lasting for a week, it might run for longer than expected; that could be a plus or a minus, depending on the player.

Sincerely,

J.D. Lowe

-- J.D. Lowe (jedidrunkenllama@hotmail.com), July 23, 2000.


D'oh! I forgot about the prizes. Count me in for getting prizes *joking*. If Chris Parsley can back me up, he mentioned once in mIRC about a possibility with a money prize; however, I'll wait for him to verify :)

Sincerely,

J.D. Lowe

-- J.D. Lowe (jedidrunkenllama@hotmail.com), July 23, 2000.


So, does this mean that the tournaments will be stopped? That would be a shame I think. Maybe because T4 is my first tour, and I'm not sick of it yet :-) I really like the tournament idea with 2 months running time. This gives not so good players like me the chance to improve in the games, while a knockout tournament would be a quick exit for me. How about this:

August/September - Knockout tournament Round 1 & 2 October/November - T5 December/January - Knockout tournament Round 3 & 4 Februar/March - T6 April/May - Knockout tournament Round 5 & Final June/July - T7

and so on.

How's that? Please, don't stop the Tournaments. Please.

Bye.

-- Michael Bruhn aka Frankie (frankie@image.dk), July 23, 2000.


The week would be flexible depending on how many participants there would be. Second - I think we can do a combination like Michael said - do 2 months doing knockout, then 2 months of the tournament we're used to - and probably establish the 2 months in between each. Or maybe we should go back to the 1 month break. GB9

-- Gameboy9 (goldengameboy@yahoo.com), July 23, 2000.

The CMP Network (the same group that host the MARP tourney roms atm) will host the first MARP grand tourney (in conjuction with MARP), to start September 1, 2000. All players will be paired into either a 2 or 3 player group (depending on players in the competition), and will play against their group only for advancement into the next round, where winning players will be paired up again. Each round of this competition will have it's own game, and all players of the round will be playing the same game. Signups are currently being taken at cparsley3@yahoo.com until someone else can be arranged. If you want to play, join today!!! Note: ALL BANNER CLICKS FROM NOW UNTIL THE END OF THIS TOURNAMENT WILL BE POOLED AND PAID TO THE WINNER (SO, THERE IS A PRIZE TO BE WON ON THIS TOURNAMENT). The site receives ten cents per click, so if you want to build up the prize, keep clicking. There will be updates on the CMP Network tourney page as to the current size of the prize pool.

Chris

-- Chris Parsley (cparsley1@hotmail.com), July 23, 2000.



OK. I'm going to try to keep this brief, which, for me, in itself is quite an accomplishment. :-)

I am vehemently opposed to this idea. Here's a sketch of my thoughts:

(1) Tournaments are more fun the more people participate. (2) Tournaments yield higher scores the more people participate on more than one game. (3) Are we interested in who wins or are we interested in seeing great performances? Under the current rules, we are MUCH more likely to see great performances. (4) Aren't the tournaments supposed to measure overall skill? Wouldn't someone who beats everyone else on 9 games be the best, regardless of what he'd do on the 10th? Combined with (1): A tournament using only Pac variants is not nearly as interesting as a tournament with a wide variety of types/styles of games.

Examples: (1) BBH is the easiest example since he holds the most number one scores on MARP. Take Jr. PacMan as the first game of the knockout system, then take nine games BBH easily beats everyone else at. Result: BBH is out in the first round and so won't win the tournament, even though he easily is the best overal on the 10 games in this tournament.

(2) More concrete: Renzo Vignola will beat me in T4. Of that I have no doubt. Yet, his current Pnickies score is something I can beat while drunk, and while using only one hand, so to speak. So... make Pnickies the first game of the tournament, and Renzo will be eliminated. Is that fair? I don't think so.

People want to see great performances. Eliminating people who could have given us great scores and great new tricks and world standard skills in later rounds, but never got there because they were eliminated early on severely brings down the overall quality of the scores.

Some people learn games quite fast. Others take longer. But those others could well surpass the scores of the fast ones. I'd rather see a world class performance than a bunch of mediocre scores.

Bottom line: In my opinion, a knock-out system is even worse than a percentage system.

Cheers, Ben Jos.

-- Ben Jos Walbeehm (walbeehm@walbeehm.com), July 23, 2000.


Personally, I am against the alternate tourney idea. Mainly because I think this whole "random game" thing is not a fair way to determine who wins.

Giving each pair of players a different random game to play could lead to disaterous results. Think about it - how would you feel in the 1st round, having to play against Steve Krogman on Galaga? or Mark Longridge on Joust? Bubble on Bubble Bobble? QT on Discs of Tron? Me on Shock Troopers? etc, etc... I know, these are probably unlikely scenarios, what with MAME supporting over 2000 romsets. But there's always the chance that you're going to have to play against somebody that knows the game a lot better than you, and chances are you're not going to have enough time to learn the game in a few days or a week.

Which brings me to my next objection - the time limit. Yeah, keeping it within a week may "speed things up". But what if a player just doesn't have enough time to get on the computer that week? Maybe he's going on vacation with no access to a computer with MAME, maybe "real-life" things like spouses or working overtime keep him from getting much time on the game, maybe his hard drive crashes. In either case, things beyond the person's control can wreck your chances of doing well in the tournament whether you like it or not. The current tourney format gives two months of play, which is sufficient time for a player to get a chance to play the games... they can work on the games slowly throughout the two months, they can upload everything in the first couple of weeks and then suffer from burnout (like me), etc.

The current tournament system is not perfect. But they utilize a variety of games so it's a better way of determining player skill. The knockout tourney might "seem" more exciting, but when it comes down to it it'll just be luck of the draw. Also, with double-elimination a player can end up only playing two different games before they're eliminated (I'll assume we're not using single-elimination, because that would be extremely retarded, one game you suck at and you're out). With the current tournies, everyone has to play 8 games to qualify no matter what. When you're playing more games, you're more likely to discover a new game that you like (like Ben Jos has with Rastan and now Pnickies apparently, heh)

finally, I'm most opposed to this because it would really wreck my chances of consistently placing 6th :P heh.

-BBH

-- BBH (lordbbh@aol.com), July 23, 2000.


I have proposed this alternate tournament because I think the offical one it's s**t.

It's useless.

I don't understand why play it.

So I NEVER participate.

If you don't like this new one, simply DON'T JOIN.

I don't want to force anyone to drop the actual tourney; I think it's not a bad idea to let both of them to exist, so Ben Jos, BBH and all the others who have the same idea can play all the times they want. I don't want to, so I'll sign up the other one.

I still think my idea is a good idea (even if I had it in a toilet room :-)) and I still think the tournament as it is now it's just a smaller version of normal MARP, so why participate? I prefer to keep my score and upload it in the regular site, at least I'll have more chances to beat off A.D. Sakuragi from his place :-) About the prizes: they're not necessary after all, but money is always welcome!

-- Vaz (mrvaz@inwind.it), July 24, 2000.


BBH and BenJos both have valid points (that is, when they're not correcting each other :) ), but if I may make one (or) more point(s).

The suggested new way for tournies is a great way to socialize with other players. Think about when you first got into MARP, and how you barely knew anyone, but after time went by, you started challenging other players, and formed a rivalry/friendship (WARNING! WARNING! The preceding sentence was far too cheesy! ack!). So what if you go up against Steve Krogman in Galaga, or if you go up against Mark Longridge in Joust; in fact, that's how I got started in games in general, by challenging Krogman at Tetris DX (hint hint, Krogman :) ). Having the chance to go face to face against a master at a game is the perfect opportunity to meet new humans (sure, you can do the same in mIRC, but talk is cheap :) ). There's nothing wrong with losing to them; I have lost many times to anything thrown at me *cough* gng *cough*

If you want to go on with the normal tournies, that's just perfect. Since this is my second tourny, I'm still not tired with it (just the games :( ), so I've got no beef with it. All I'm saying is this: WE'RE PLAYING GAMES. We're expected not to be social. With the new format for a side tourny, it gives us a chance to have some contact with the 300+ other players in MARP (that is, if they haven't retired yet *cough*Fossil*cough* :) ).

As for money, all I can say is wow! 10 cents! Man, if I win the next 400,000 tournies, I could pay for DeVry! *joking, of course; yes, I know that 10 cents a click can and will pay up, but explaining that would ruin the joke* :)

Sincerely,

J.D. "That's why I can't wait until my vasectomy" Lowe

-- J.D. Lowe (jedidrunkenllama@hotmail.com), July 24, 2000.


I dont think we have to replace our old good tournament, when we finally reached something that satisfies a lot of players. But we could try to organize, just to see, another competition, based on a knockout system, in parallel with future classic tournaments.

Cheers, Lagavulin

-- Lagavulin (darre@cybercable.fr), July 24, 2000.



WARNING: This is a long letter :-)

How about this:

We keep the tournament and adds the new knockout compo with one months breaks between them.

2 month knockout (as many players are still involved it takes longer time) - one month break - 2 months T5 - one month break - 1 month knockout - one month break - 2 months T6 - one month break - 1 month knockout finals.

So, why not do the knockout compo like this:

All players that sign up will be placed in groups of 4 or 6 players who have to fight in 4 games. The 4 games are the same in all groups and will be randomly picked. The 2 top players of each group qualifies to the next round where the head against head knockout system begins.

Now the winner of group 1 will meet the second placed player of let4s say group 4 and they fight over 3 games of the original 4, with the benefit for the group winner from group 1 that he can pick 2 of the games while the second placed from group 4 can pick one and must pick one of the 2 left, so that it makes 3 games. That way you get awarded for winning your group.

After those matches are played, the players left will meet up one against one. But in what game? I suggest the players who have qualified to this round vote what of the 4 original games they like to play in and the game that gets the most votes will be played in all matches. And so on, until the final.

This does however mean that it's the same 4 games throughout the entire tournament, but that makes it possible to improve and it should not be allowed to take your scores from earlier group plays or knockout rounds with you.

However players might change there vote throughout the compo depending on there own progress in the games and on who is still in the compo. So, a little bit of tactics are also used.

I also believe to do a huge knockout tournament in 2 months would become to difficult, so there should be a break between rounds where we play the normal tournament.

About seedings, I believe it would be best to seed depending on your leaderboard placing, as players shouldn't be forced to play the normal tournament if they don't like to, just to get a good seeding. Maybe we should seed after who have improved the most on the leaderboard since the start of the last knockout tournament which would be a period of one year or so.

Is this a silly way to do it?

Remember, I think a knockout tournament would be great, but NOT if it means to drop the momentary tournament.

Bye.

-- Frankie (frankie@image.dk), July 24, 2000.


My question is: you think the current tournament style is crap, and "useless". Tell me, how would a knockout tournament be any less useless? Seriously, I'd like to know what advantages this style would have over the current tournaments.

You say you want a "real" tournament with brackets and all. That's how Street Fighter tournaments are run to this day. But the big difference is, everyone is playing one game the whole way through, in matches that are over in a few minutes. When a variety of games are utilized, it's not fair to all players since everyone is not playing the same game. Holding a bracketed tourney over one game makes a little more sense, but you'd get less signups from people who don't want to play the game, and whoever has the #1 score on MARP would probably end up winning it.

If you think you can hold a random multi-game tourney without any problems, well, I look forward to seeing it. From the sidelines, anyway.

-BBH

-- BBH (lordbbh@aol.com), July 24, 2000.


I'll abstain from this vote; I feel sorry for Gameboy9 as it is, having to revise the tournament structure for every single tournament. My suggestion is to go back to T1 format, but just change a few things.

1) Game selection, completely random. Lists organizing and dividing the games have already been made. Make a randomizer, pick one from each category, for a total of either 10 or 12 games, and one backup for each, that can be alternated in if there's a problem putting a game in the tourney.

2)Tournament length, 10 weeks, and therefore ten updates TOTAL. This gives the tournament coordinator and the stats maintainer a timetable to work with and deadlines for when information is supposed to appear. We could even set things up so that judges update the .inp confirms once a week (instead of some 6 times a week, and others once a month), prior to the news page standings and stats being updated.

Just my 2 ruples.

Q.T.Quazar

-- Q.T.Quazar (qan@home.com), July 24, 2000.


With a knockout system, half the players will be knocked out after the first round. 75% after the second round. So after a few rounds, the tournament will be over for MOST of the participants. Fun tournament indeed...

Cheers, Ben Jos.

-- Ben Jos Walbeehm (walbeehm@walbeehm.com), July 24, 2000.


YOU ALL MISS THIS TOURNEY'S RULES...

One, all you have to do is NOT BE LAST PLACE IN YOUR GROUP.. So, it wouldn't like having Krogman in your group, and the game being Galaga, so you might as well kiss yourself goodbye. All you need to be is NOT TO BE LAST... So just beat any one player to advance. The games will be perfectly random, as to not allow anyone to stack the deck with games they are good in. The prizes, JD, can be done if everyone wants to commit to it. THIS TOURNAMENT WOULD BE IN ADDITION to, NOT TAKING OVER, the current tourney structure, as this would be a ongoing tournament, which will weed out weak players until we come up with the ULTIMATE CHAMPION!

-- Chris Parsley (cparsley1@hotmail.com), July 25, 2000.


Leave MARP tournament as it is right now: 2months-8games-1month break- voting for games, thank you. I skipped T4, but am waiting anxiously for new games in T5. No need to change tournament rules all the time.

If people want(and someone has energy to arrange that), why not have a knockout tournament too, in addition to current tournament. Randomizing games without voting is a bad idea, having over ???? games on MAME right now, how many of them are crap... That way all the knockout games would propably be "s**t".

-- Tommi (tiihoto@hotmail.com), July 25, 2000.


Allow me to put some minds to rest :)

First of all, the knockout tournament will be IN ADDITION to the current tournament we're using now. The current tournament format will not change except for that 95 % speed rule, which I've mentioned previously, instead of 90 %. It will also NOT go away and be REPLACED by the knockout tournament.

Think about this: if the vote to put in a knockout tournament was for example 14 - 13 in favor - and I'd say "knockout tournament in, other tournament out" - that wouldn't be fair and it wouldn't be for the complete benefit for the MARP players.

So I'll mention again - the current tournament will STAY regardless of wheather or not the knockout tournament takes place. The knockout tournament will be a complement to the current tournament for those who would like to participate.

If you want to play in the knockout tourney and don't want to play in the current format - kewl. If you want to play in the current format and don't want to play in the knockout format - kewl. If you want to play in both - kewl. If you want to play in neither... well that's a different story :) j/k - that's kewl too :)

Thanks for your attention. GB9

P.S. For the record - there's a two month wait in between tournaments right now - though I'd really like that to be back to one.

-- Gameboy9 (goldengameboy@yahoo.com), July 25, 2000.


Just a couple of considerations: I have noticed that unfortunately, as usual, the ones who attend at this message board are always the same. This discussion is a clear example; even if Gameboy9 broke the news in the main page and invited everyone to express his opinion, how many guys replied his call? Very little, I think ten.

At this point I ask myself if every decision taken here would be in some way just an "elitish will", if the ones who will pronounce about this thread will be anyway neither the 10% of the total. If it is true that we MARPers are 300+, my question is: how can we decide for everyone?

Second issue: after thinking for a while about it, I feel not to advise the employment of a prize in money. Maybe some of you does remember JGustavo: last summer (if I remember correctly) he uploaded a lot of stunning scores, and not a few guys had suspects on them, at the point that JGustavo decided to remove them all, or the quarrel with Ben Jos who accused Game Guru to cheat in I don't remember which game. Now, in the case of a prize in money, it doesn't matter how little, I'm sure there would be infinite discussions upon the recordings of the players getting first.

After all money isn't so important (here), the spirit of challenge should suffice!

-- Vaz (mrvaz@inwind.it), July 25, 2000.


Vaz, the word 'elite' is a very bad idea on this message board. It tends to provoke problems every time it comes up. You might want to find a synonym.

Just FYI.

QCN

-- Q.T.Quazar (qan@home.com), July 25, 2000.


Call it what you want, it's still an ilite. Why to hide the truth? There can't be any misunderstandings, we all know it's like that. We're always the same, we make the proposals, we accept them - anyway, if the others don't whine about this, I don't see why I should. OK, problem solved! What about the prizes then? THIS is a bad idea, as I can see. Now I'm waiting for Chris Parsley's word...

-- Vaz (mrvaz@inwind.it), July 25, 2000.

Well, excuse me. I was only offering it because some people wanted it. If it is going to cause trouble, then fine. BUT I WILL STILL HOLD THE TOURNAMENT, regardless on whether or not prizes are awarded. And yes, I do have participants that have all ready signed up for the competition, the deadline to signup is currently Aug. 15th... cparsley3@yahoo.com to sign up today, and NO, the games won't suck, but will determine a final champion. (The games have been selected at random, but placed to make sure the winner has skills of all necessary games out there, and there are no sucker games like Capcom bowling, etc.)

-- Chris Parsley (cparsley1@hotmail.com), July 26, 2000.

Hmm after reading all posts on this thread, i must say that there are many sides to see this "problem".. My opinion is to split it into two tournaments.. and the problem is solved alright?

I agree with Ben Jos about his view of the "knockdown" version of a tournament.. A "fun" tournament with only 25% of the marpers after a week BUT on the other hand why not? You will get the ULTIMATE CHAMPION in a tournament style that is VERY common in sports etc.. So why not at MARP??

And with the ordinary tournament we can play them both if we want.. (or none)

I don4t think this is a problem at all folks.. new ideas is the beginning to the ultimate way of a tournament..

T4 is my first tournament, and i like it, (but not the games haha) But it would be fun to try another ways of competing!

Just my 2 cents....

QRS

-- QRS (qrs@telia.com), July 26, 2000.


I haven`t taken part in any MARP Tournaments yet, mainly due to time restrictions, but a 'knockout' scenario as proposed by 'Vaz' does appeal to me. BenJos et al do have some very valid points, but as this new format ( at time of writing ) will run side-by-side with the regular Tournament, I see no problem here. Take part if you want to, if not, well don`t.

I`ll have a go anyhow.

AL

-- AL (alexweir@indigo.ie), July 26, 2000.


one question.who is the ELITE??

-from NEVER ELITE (rank 87)

-- non-elite (weavuspert@yahoo.co.jp), July 27, 2000.


ive been playing galaga since i was a kid. im now 29 and we have the game at my place of employment (eddies bar and grill, in dunedin, Fl.) i play on a regular basis, and i kind of wondered if i could make some money off of this past time, since everyoune thinks im so good. My high score(without really trying)is 752,800? stage 78? something like that. its not difficult for me to get there, the problem is when people swarm around and jinx me... anyways, if anyone knows how i could make a buck at embarassing some boys, please let me know... Hee heee.... i dont usually play video games anymore, but i am really good,naturally at the ones that i grew up with....

-- anna theo (www.frappe1073@aol.com), December 02, 2002.

Moderation questions? read the FAQ