Tournaments should no longer have civilization rules

[chronique]

I will vote againt this rule because its my only good reason to not play in tourney.

[Cometk]

I will vote againt this rule because its my only good reason to not play in tourney.

what do you mean? shouldn't no civ restrictions (the ability to play spain as much as you want) be a reason to play in tournaments?

[chronique]

I will vote againt this rule because its my only good reason to not play in tourney.

what do you mean? shouldn't no civ restrictions (the ability to play spain as much as you want) be a reason to play in tournaments?

Yea but i don't want play in tourney, so now i can said "i don't like the rules", but if the rule change, I'm gonna need another excuse

[Goodspeed]

The excuse still works. The prospect of playing nothing but mirrors was never very appealing to me, anyway.

[Kaiserklein]

It would never be only mirrors lol. We both know people go for comfort picks most of the time. Also plenty of players dislike / aren't confident playing mirrors so they'll find something else

[Goodspeed]

It was not uncommon for top level series pre-EP to be all or almost all mirrors, but we've been out of the mirror meta for a while now so it would take a while to get back to that I suppose.

Also plenty of players dislike / aren't confident playing mirrors so they'll find something else

The thing is, if you have to agree on a match up it becomes very easy to force a mirror. Some players, who prefer mirrors, will abuse that.
If you're in a long drawn out civ dance and you want to play a mirror, you have an easy time getting your way because a mirror is always "fair". So all you need to do is suggest match ups that are bad for your opponent, make no attempt to compromise, then throw your hands in the air and go "I guess we have to play mirror, then".

The difficulty of solving civ disputes in a fair way was another reason we went for the new ruleset. You can still sometimes see this issue in the first game of free pick.

Example: Samwise12
viewtopic.php?f=63&t=2308
viewtopic.php?f=64&t=2477
viewtopic.php?f=64&t=2619

[Cometk]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

and wow those samwise' series are really somethin to behold

[Goodspeed]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

Did they end up mirrors? What is the mirror rate of the free pick game?

[kaister]

Just don't think there's a format better than NWC rules right now. Like for Kaiser/Mitoe with NWC rules you get 1 German mirror always, but then the MUs are almost always different right? If they could pick civs multiple times I think wed get ~3-4 German mirrors in a 7 game series. Maybe mItoe goes china on a livestock map or Kaiser otto on HP or something but with NWC rules and different map sets think the series would play out completely different each time.

Also game 1 the stakes are pretty low, Id be a lot more picky greening into a slightly worse mu G7 than G1

[Cometk]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

Did they end up mirrors? What is the mirror rate of the free pick game?

in the two "problem" series, a 50% mirror rate

Problem Series 1
GoodSpeed vs Wossack on Gran Chaco (India Mirror)

Problem Series 2
Samwise vs Wossack on Arkansas (Germany vs Dutch, and if I recall correctly Wossack was quite unhappy with this civilization matchup)

[Kaiserklein]

Well I can tell you for sure that most current top players wouldn't even be able to mirror that much. Maybe players would play more civs back then or something, but most people I know atm can't really play more than 4-5 civs confidently in a tourney, so I can't see that ending up being all mirrors, unless you're up against someone with the same civ pool as you somehow.
Btw I'd rather see more mirrors than some civs being basically unplayable because of the picking rules / unfair counterpicks.

@kaister no one really wants to have no pick limit though. I think basically everyone agrees you shouldn't be able to play a given civ more than once (or maybe twice, with the reset) in a series.

[Riotcoke]

The problem with the no pick limit is it kills the lower end of the bracket, you'll get a bwinner for every civ going to the ro8 because of it.

[Goodspeed]

Well I can tell you for sure that most current top players wouldn't even be able to mirror that much. Maybe players would play more civs back then or something, but most people I know atm can't really play more than 4-5 civs confidently in a tourney, so I can't see that ending up being all mirrors, unless you're up against someone with the same civ pool as you somehow.

People played more civs, yes, but that's because we were in a mirror meta which meant that you didn't have to know a civ all that well in order to play it in tournaments. You only had to know 1 match up per civ.
Change the civ rules and you're on a fast track back to that. So yeah, maybe at first you wouldn't get a lot of mirrors but over time, you would.

[Cometk]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

Did they end up mirrors? What is the mirror rate of the free pick game?

To answer the second question generally, I did a quick tally using the data from the Winter Championship 2020 (can also reference the tournament map pool here).

In the 25 matches of the Advanced Division, the mirror rate in Game 1 was 20%. Players freely chose a mirror matchup to lead off the series in 5 out of 25 series. Compare this with the overall mirror rate for all Advanced Division games which was 11.3% (12 mirror games out of 106).

In the 24 matches of the Pro Division, the mirror rate in Game 1 was 12.5% (3/24). Players freely chose a mirror matchup to lead off the series in 3 out of 24 series. Compare this with the overall mirror rate for all Pro Division games which was 11.1% (14 mirror games out of 126).

[kaister]

Yeah the NWC system isn’t perfect. You see almost no Dutch in tourneys now since they’re easily counter picked, while there’s still a good amount on ladder games.

But it does ad some strategy for setting up a plan for the series. Someone using your best civ to win game 1 actually hurts your chances of winning the series overall.

[kaister]

Also looking at the quarterfinals on for the pro division I think the player with the better civ Mu went 8-0 in game 1 (this is debatable, but think most people would say the civ with advantage won more than they lost

[Kaiserklein]

Well I can tell you for sure that most current top players wouldn't even be able to mirror that much. Maybe players would play more civs back then or something, but most people I know atm can't really play more than 4-5 civs confidently in a tourney, so I can't see that ending up being all mirrors, unless you're up against someone with the same civ pool as you somehow.

People played more civs, yes, but that's because we were in a mirror meta which meant that you didn't have to know a civ all that well in order to play it in tournaments. You only had to know 1 match up per civ.
Change the civ rules and you're on a fast track back to that. So yeah, maybe at first you wouldn't get a lot of mirrors but over time, you would.

Well idk why you'd think it's easier to play mirrors. Depends on the civ I guess, but some mirrors are very rough if you're not experienced with them. Anyway I'd rather play one of my main civs any day instead of a mirror where I'm not 100% comfortable.

I do agree there will be more mirrors of course. I just don't think it's gonna be too many. It's worth a try imo. Btw keep in mind the balance has improved, which means more civs are viable, so that should lead to less mirrors

[Goodspeed]

Well I can tell you for sure that most current top players wouldn't even be able to mirror that much. Maybe players would play more civs back then or something, but most people I know atm can't really play more than 4-5 civs confidently in a tourney, so I can't see that ending up being all mirrors, unless you're up against someone with the same civ pool as you somehow.

People played more civs, yes, but that's because we were in a mirror meta which meant that you didn't have to know a civ all that well in order to play it in tournaments. You only had to know 1 match up per civ.
Change the civ rules and you're on a fast track back to that. So yeah, maybe at first you wouldn't get a lot of mirrors but over time, you would.

Well idk why you'd think it's easier to play mirrors.

I didn't say that. It's not that mirrors are easy, it's that the mirror is only 1 out of 14 match ups. If you know you can force a mirror you only have to learn that 1 match up. If you want to play 5 civs on a top level in the mirror meta, you have to learn 5 MUs. In the counterpick meta, you have to learn closer to 50. So the point is it's much easier to play many civs in a mirror meta.

[Mr_Bramboy]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

and wow those samwise' series are really somethin to behold

There are a few reasons for this. With the current rules there's less pressure to settle on an 'ideal' matchup G1 because you know there are counter picks later in the series. If you know you have to agree on a matchup every single game this dynamic changes. I can vouch for GoodSpeed's experience from tournaments in 2015 and the Samwise recs (among others) prove this experience too.

[Kaiserklein]

Then I guess let's not try it and instead have some unplayable civs and garbage match ups

[WickedCossack]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

and wow those samwise' series are really somethin to behold

Wickedballsack I assume? No relation ofc.

I think I would have been DQ'd if I played in more tournies. What was the other one btw? Just the really long pick with GS?

Also didn't help it was EPL instead of another event.

[[Armag] diarouga]

@kaister no one really wants to have no pick limit though. I think basically everyone agrees you shouldn't be able to play a given civ more than once (or maybe twice, with the reset) in a series.

Are we sure about that ?
@Mitoe

As I said multiple times, I wouldn't mind a tournament with only free picks, but no civ rule is a big no.

[Cometk]

tbf the game 1 free pick, in my 2 years of administering, has only been an issue in 2 series, both involving one particular user whose name starts with w and ends with sack

and wow those samwise' series are really somethin to behold

Wickedballsack I assume? No relation ofc.

I think I would have been DQ'd if I played in more tournies. What was the other one btw? Just the really long pick with GS?

Also didn't help it was EPL instead of another event.

Yeah, I had in mind your game vs GoodSpeed on Gran Chaco (India Mirror) and the one vs Samwise on Arkansas (Germany vs Dutch). I think I recall you not being too happy with the MU vs 'Wise, am I remembering correctly or is that just fantasy?

[samwise12]

bring back the mirrors

[[Armag] diarouga]

Show hidden quotes

Well I can tell you for sure that most current top players wouldn't even be able to mirror that much. Maybe players would play more civs back then or something, but most people I know atm can't really play more than 4-5 civs confidently in a tourney, so I can't see that ending up being all mirrors, unless you're up against someone with the same civ pool as you somehow.

People played more civs, yes, but that's because we were in a mirror meta which meant that you didn't have to know a civ all that well in order to play it in tournaments. You only had to know 1 match up per civ.
Change the civ rules and you're on a fast track back to that. So yeah, maybe at first you wouldn't get a lot of mirrors but over time, you would.

Well idk why you'd think it's easier to play mirrors.

I didn't say that. It's not that mirrors are easy, it's that the mirror is only 1 out of 14 match ups. If you know you can force a mirror you only have to learn that 1 match up. If you want to play 5 civs on a top level in the mirror meta, you have to learn 5 MUs. In the counterpick meta, you have to learn closer to 50. So the point is it's much easier to play many civs in a mirror meta.

Ye, and you didn't even have to learn some mirrors. Back in the free pick days, it was jap, india, china, fre, ger and brit mirrors, sometimes aztec and dutch but that's it. So you basically had to prepare 8 MUs for your tournament.

@Cometk Although admin decision has only been necessary twice, many players had to give up and take a MU they didn't want to play.
For instance, I remember a series I played against _H2O in winter 2015 where my strategy was to force either China vs India or India vs China while he wanted to force China mirror or India mirror, and after a few minutes of civ dancing he eventually gave up because he knew I wasn't going to stop until random pick.
The same happened to me in other series, and it's actually quite usual.