ESOCommunity

Hey everyone! As Season 1 of the ESOC Grand Tour comes to an end, it makes sense to give some more information as to how the the EGT Playoffs will be handled. With that, we've also decided on a number of changes to the format for this event.

Format Change

Instead of only the top 6, to qualify for the playoffs now requires a player to be in the top 8 of the EGT S1 standings at the conclusion of Sup Cup #3. In addition, the Round Robin format proposed at the beginning of the season has been scrapped in favor of a straight-up single elimination tournament. The quarter-finals and semi-finals will be played as Best-of-5's, and the finals will be played as a Best-of-9.

Ideally, we would like the Quarters and Semis to be played on one weekend, with the top bracket streamed on ESOCTV and the bottom bracket streamed on ESOCTV2. The Best-of-9 Finals will be played on the following weekend and casted by _H2O and Interjection.

Map Pool & Civilization Rules

For the quarter-finals and semi-finals, the map pool will be comprised of 7 maps. Similar to the 2v2 Tour, for the first game players will veto maps in alternating fashion until just one map remains. The remaining map will be the one played for Game 1. After Game 1, the winner of the previous match will ban a single map from the map pool. The loser of the previous match will then select a map from the remaining pool to be played and the winner will lock his civilization. The loser will then choose his civilization and the next game will commence.

The finals map pool will be comprised of 13 maps. After each game, the winner of the previous match is entitled to ban two maps from the map pool before his opponent's selection.

[spoiler=Example flow of map rules]Example map pool: Alaska / Bengal / Colorado / Florida / Manchac / Tibet / Wadmalaw

Player A has the higher seeding and vetoes first.
- Player A bans Alaska
/ Player B bans Wadmalaw
- Player A bans Bengal
/ Player B bans Tibet
- Player A bans Colorado
/ Player B bans Manchac
Last remaining map is Florida
Players agree to play Aztec vs China
Game 1 commences as Aztec vs China on Florida


- Player A wins Game 1 on Florida
- Player A bans Wadmalaw from the map pool
/ Player B selects Tibet as map
- Player A selects Russia as civ
/ Player B selected British as civ
Game 2 commences as Russia vs British on Tibet[/spoiler]
There will be no civilization resets during a series. After you've used a civilization, it may not be used again. The full map pool for the tournament will be posted at the beginning of the EGT Playoffs.

Prize Pool

- $300 USD distributed as $150 to 1st place, $70 to 2nd place, and $40 for 3rd/4th place.
- Special forum badge

Thank you for participating in Season 1 of the ESOC Grand Tour, and good luck!

[spoiler=tags]@Mitoe
@dicktator_
@Aykin Haraka
@Kynesie
@knusch
@Hazza54321
@KINGofOsmane
@Lukas_L99
@Kaiserklein
@deleted_user2
@lordraphael
@risi321
@princeofkabul
@Aizamk
@OPTIMUS__PRIME[/spoiler]

Bo7 and BO9 without any civ resets? Isn't that a bit extreme?

Why are we so averse to round robin?

ye bo 7 enough

Goodspeed wrote:Why are we so averse to round robin?

ye round robin wouldve been cool.

umeu wrote:

Goodspeed wrote:Why are we so averse to round robin?

ye round robin wouldve been cool.

although i guess just 1v1 only in the sup format, not the other ones.

I think 2v2 tourney gave to many point : you have twice as many as in other tourney. It is the result of considering the number of player to calculate how many point this tourney would give and then giving it to the teams.
You should either count the number of teams (i.e 5 it's like a 16 player tourney instead of 32 and so you give 7 points to the 1st team instead of 9). Or you considere players and not team for the result : i.e tit and kynesie are 1st and 2nd both si they have 9+7=16 points i.e 8 each and then hazza and king are 3rd and 4th etc.

umeu wrote:

umeu wrote:

Goodspeed wrote:Why are we so averse to round robin?

ye round robin wouldve been cool.

although i guess just 1v1 only in the sup format, not the other ones.

Yeah for the playoffs only. Everyone plays each other twice, both getting the civ counter and map pick once. This also makes it perfectly balanced.

They use this format in chess and I enjoy it much more than single elim. It is the fairest format because you don't run the risk of having a potential final played in an early round, and one of the players losing in that round when they would otherwise have been in second place. Double elim is like a band-aid solution to that, and round robin is an actual solution.
You also get to see every player against every other player.

You could still have a BO7 final between the top 2 finishers of the RR.

It's disappointing because people seemed into it when it was suggested but they seem to have come around for some reason. I'm wondering why

bwinner1 wrote:I think 2v2 tourney gave to many point : you have twice as many as in other tourney. It is the result of considering the number of player to calculate how many point this tourney would give and then giving it to the teams.
You should either count the number of teams (i.e 5 it's like a 16 player tourney instead of 32 and so you give 7 points to the 1st team instead of 9). Or you considere players and not team for the result : i.e tit and kynesie are 1st and 2nd both si they have 9+7=16 points i.e 8 each and then hazza and king are 3rd and 4th etc.

Yeah 2v2 tourney should essentially give the same amount of points but split between both players of each team. I also don't understand why the mono civ tourney gave more points.
It's anyway pretty much a fucked up format because if you're not available to play on some week ends you just get fucked at the end

Someone tell J R Smith the score next time

Goodspeed wrote:

umeu wrote:

Show hidden quotes

umeu wrote:

Goodspeed wrote:Why are we so averse to round robin?

ye round robin wouldve been cool.

although i guess just 1v1 only in the sup format, not the other ones.

Yeah for the playoffs only. Everyone plays each other twice, both getting the civ counter and map pick once. This also makes it perfectly balanced.

They use this format in chess and I enjoy it much more than single elim. It is the fairest format because you don't run the risk of having a potential final played in an early round, and one of the players losing in that round when they would otherwise have been in second place. Double elim is like a band-aid solution to that, and round robin is an actual solution.
You also get to see every player against every other player.

You could still have a BO7 final between the top 2 finishers of the RR.

It's disappointing because people seemed into it when it was suggested but they seem to have come around for some reason. I'm wondering why

Dont you run into the problem of having lots of unimportant games? The farer you get into rounds, the more games you get where there is nothing at stake, since there is no reward for placing in midfield and also there is no such thing like demotion for players who are at the bottom. Plus, the players themselves who dont have a chance at winning the whole tournament, will gradually lose motivation to keep on playing serious.

Not every game will be seriously competitive, but is that a problem? You might actually see some interesting builds.

Besides, arguably, a round of 8 series between the worst player of the tournament and the best one, or between the worst 2 players of the tournament, is just as "unimportant". In single elim, the challenge is getting as far as possible. In round robin format, the challenge is getting as high of a score as possible. So, you say there is nothing at stake but this is untrue. Other than the satisfaction of winning, in every game played there are points at stake. I didn't go into any of the recent tournaments expecting to win. With your logic, there was never anything at stake for me there, either.

If you're still worried about people losing motivation, you can reward points by making them count towards next season.

Why not the make the prize pool motivating for all players?
For example:
1. 120 usd
2. 60 usd
3. 35 usd
4. 30 usd
5. 25 usd
6. 20 usd
7. 15 usd
8. 10 usd (only if playing all games)

I think its a bit more than 300 total but you get the point

There is still the possibility of an upset from the "worst one" vs the "best one", so ppl are probably rather inclined to watch the series in a elimination bracket format than in round robin.

Also we have seen sometimes that players quit/forfeited the tournament when they for example had to play in the loser finals for 3rd place. Im just worried that it might happen, too, in a round robin format.

I would argue that a elimination format would be better for the viewer experience, while round robin shows who really is the best player in terms of consistency.

I wouldnt mind it if the tournament is in the round robin format, but there is a chance that it backfires.

If you're still worried about people losing motivation, you can reward points by making them count towards next season.

Alternatively, what Somppu said. It really isn't hard to think of ways to keep people engaged.

For the viewers it's great because there is always at least one high level series going on and they see much more player variety. The games would be played at the same time, and you can cherry pick the ones you cast. Besides they would still get their final if you have the top 2 play a BOx series after RR.

somppukunkku wrote:Bo7 and BO9 without any civ resets? Isn't that a bit extreme?

Quarters and Semis are Bo5. The finalists will have over a week to prepare a strategy for the Bo9.

Goodspeed wrote:Why are we so averse to round robin?

While this format would be cool and engaging, it is extremely difficult to schedule for, especially going into the summer. A single-elim tournament is easy to play out and easy to understand.

bwinner1 wrote:I think 2v2 tourney gave to many point : you have twice as many as in other tourney. It is the result of considering the number of player to calculate how many point this tourney would give and then giving it to the teams.
You should either count the number of teams (i.e 5 it's like a 16 player tourney instead of 32 and so you give 7 points to the 1st team instead of 9). Or you considere players and not team for the result : i.e tit and kynesie are 1st and 2nd both si they have 9+7=16 points i.e 8 each and then hazza and king are 3rd and 4th etc.

2v2 Tour gave basically the same payouts as the 1v1 tournaments. 1st place team got 9 points each (if it was a 1v1 tour they would've been 1st and 2nd place, 11 and 9 points respectively), 2nd place team got 7 each (basically a Ro4 finish payout for two players), 3rd/4th place teams got 5 points each (Ro8 finish payout for four players). There's nothing wrong with the way it was scored.

Kaiserklein wrote:Yeah 2v2 tourney should essentially give the same amount of points but split between both players of each team. I also don't understand why the mono civ tourney gave more points.
It's anyway pretty much a fucked up format because if you're not available to play on some week ends you just get fucked at the end

Not at all a fucked up format. You are scored based on your top 3 performances. You only need to perform well in 3 events to make it to the playoffs. There are 8 events. If a player can't make it 75% of the time then that's on him.

I don't understand your question about the Mono-civ tourney. Have you checked the scoring system?

somppukunkku wrote:Why not the make the prize pool motivating for all players?
For example:
1. 120 usd
2. 60 usd
3. 35 usd
4. 30 usd
5. 25 usd
6. 20 usd
7. 15 usd
8. 10 usd (only if playing all games)

I think its a bit more than 300 total but you get the point

That would require a lot of additional games. A 3rd/4th place match, and then a whole playoff series of its own between the bottom bracket.

CometK wrote:

Goodspeed wrote:Why are we so averse to round robin?

While this format would be cool and engaging, it is extremely difficult to schedule for this especially going into the summer. A single-elim tournament is easy to play out and understand for everybody.

Wouldn't you just play it all in 1 weekend? Or even 1 day?
With the original 6 players you are looking at a total of 30 games, 3 of which can be played simultaneously so a total of 10 "time slots" of about a half hour each. 5 hours seems perfectly doable to schedule, especially if you spread it over 2 days.

With 8 players it's 56/4 = 14 time slots so about 7 hours, even that is still doable over 2 days.

Cometk wrote:

somppukunkku wrote:Bo7 and BO9 without any civ resets? Isn't that a bit extreme?

bwinner1 wrote:I think 2v2 tourney gave to many point : you have twice as many as in other tourney. It is the result of considering the number of player to calculate how many point this tourney would give and then giving it to the teams.
You should either count the number of teams (i.e 5 it's like a 16 player tourney instead of 32 and so you give 7 points to the 1st team instead of 9). Or you considere players and not team for the result : i.e tit and kynesie are 1st and 2nd both si they have 9+7=16 points i.e 8 each and then hazza and king are 3rd and 4th etc.

2v2 Tour gave basically the same payouts as the 1v1 tournaments. 1st place team got 9 points each (if it was a 1v1 tour they would've been 1st and 2nd place, 11 and 9 points respectively), 2nd place team got 7 each (basically a Ro4 finish payout for two players), 3rd/4th place teams got 5 points each (Ro8 finish payout for four players). There's nothing wrong with the way it was scored.

No, because with all the forfeit there was definitly not more than 40 players, which means 9 points for the 1st. Furthermore you didn't do like this because look :I made the sum of points distributed and 2v2 tounrey is the tourney thaat gave the most points while there wasn't the most player in it for sure (I had 1 point even if I didn't win a single match for example).

bwinner1 wrote:

Cometk wrote:

somppukunkku wrote:Bo7 and BO9 without any civ resets? Isn't that a bit extreme?

bwinner1 wrote:I think 2v2 tourney gave to many point : you have twice as many as in other tourney. It is the result of considering the number of player to calculate how many point this tourney would give and then giving it to the teams.
You should either count the number of teams (i.e 5 it's like a 16 player tourney instead of 32 and so you give 7 points to the 1st team instead of 9). Or you considere players and not team for the result : i.e tit and kynesie are 1st and 2nd both si they have 9+7=16 points i.e 8 each and then hazza and king are 3rd and 4th etc.

2v2 Tour gave basically the same payouts as the 1v1 tournaments. 1st place team got 9 points each (if it was a 1v1 tour they would've been 1st and 2nd place, 11 and 9 points respectively), 2nd place team got 7 each (basically a Ro4 finish payout for two players), 3rd/4th place teams got 5 points each (Ro8 finish payout for four players). There's nothing wrong with the way it was scored.

No, because with all the forfeit there was definitly not more than 40 players, which means 9 points for the 1st. Furthermore you didn't do like this because look :I made the sum of points distributed and 2v2 tounrey is the tourney thaat gave the most points while there wasn't the most player in it for sure (I had 1 point even if I didn't win a single match for example).

There were 42 players for Sup Cup #1, 45 players for the Mono-civ Cup, and 50 players for the 2v2 Tour. Even with forfeits, the 2v2 Tour likely had more places paid. It's semantics.

Cometk wrote:Not at all a fucked up format. You are scored based on your top 3 performances. You only need to perform well in 3 events to make it to the playoffs. There are 8 events. If a player can't make it 75% of the time then that's on him.

Except there's also the fake events (deathmatch, king of the hill and blitz). No one signs up in these, plus they're not competitive because almost no one plays these gamemodes. Then there's the 2v2 tourney that doesn't count because 2 laggers who should anyway be disqualified from the whole event (and are currently taking the spot of 2 legit players in the playoffs btw) made it to the finals. So at the end of the day only the four 1v1 tourneys are left, and if you can't participate in some of these (or if you lose because of the dumb bo1 format) you're pretty much fucked

Well, it's still cool.

It's the first such event so of course there are things to improve on. Overall it's great, I'm enjoying it a lot so far. Hindsight there could have been more points awarded in the standard 1v1 sup events since that is the game mode played in the playoffs, but the fact that they did more than one of those also works for that.

Also I would, rather than playing different game modes like DM, KOTH and Treaty, introduce interesting rules instead like they did in the smackdowns of old. Some examples:
- No crate shipments
- No attacks until industrial age
- No ranged units
- Start in colonial age
- Fast speed
- etc

You would have been in the current top 8 players if you didn't lose like a noob as you are in the 2v2 tourney,
but anyway, if you can't send mercenaries in game, you probably have no chance to win

Moreover, I remember when you played vs diarouga, you said a wild word ... ! "lag"
Again and again of course ( should have a special taunt lag for you ), but then in reality you were just bashed, then you left the game

xD

oh and don't try to speak about the summer tourney I had other things to do

peace

I forget, 1 point pro it seems

bo1 is awesome.