OT2017 Round 5

Samurai Battles Round Robin
www.commandsandcolors.net/samuraibattles...obin-tournament.html

I'd love to play Samurai Battles. If you decide to do that Mark, I'm in!

In a general sense, I plan to have a Mini-Tournament soon, probably after the Quarter Finals are played.

Currently I'm setting up the C&C Napoleonics Open, and I wouldn't mind a Samurai Battles Round Robin either.

Thanks to you Mark. I was wondering, since several players are now out from this OT and four of us will join them soon, do you have any plan for a mini Tournament? There were many players this time and I did not have the chance to play all of them so I for one would be interested.

I thank you all for your gentlemanly handling, and so we are agreed we proceed on the Rankings results.
The Quarter final scenario is now posted, so let the games begin.

Sportsmanship in this little community is at the highest levels. This is why i like it so much. Not that I ever thought differently, but allow me to remark it once more.

Dear Colleagues,

when I started OT2017 I was assuming tie-breaking procedure dependent on strength of opponents you played with. Just like it was in 2016 and 2015. I was aware this is different from Mini-Tournament and accepted this.

That said, as per rules I was aware of, I am 9th and Brent & Tomek advances to quarter-final. Full stop. I hope that will close discussion as who advances to quarter-final in OT2017.

However, the other discussion started by Giulio - what tie-breaking procedure should be - is a different topic and I think we all can share our POV. From my perspective, block count actually is not perfect here as you play with completely different opponents and actually can win more banners with less experienced ones (comparison by Mark above is a good example). Approximation which is given by "relative strength of opponents" is I think quite satisfactory, because it shows that although tied players reach the same level, the path for some of them was more difficult and that ones should be rewarded with won tie-break.

Hmm.. you are correct Guilio, that is the rules. This is the first time I can recall having to break a tie to get the top 8, so I have no experience of implementing these. By recall I took these from the older Open Tournament rules on the Yahoo Group website.

I have 2 issues with using the banners scored tie break;
1. The player that plays a tougher set of opponents will tend to score fewer banners.
2. Each round has a different number of banners, Round 1 was 10, round 4 was 14, and rounds 2,3 &5 were 12.

Banners won R1 R2 R3 R4 R5 TOTAL
Tomek 8 12 12 8 8 48
BrentS 7 12 12 9 11 51
mk20336 9 5 10 14 12 50

so the result of banners won tends towards the inverse of opponent strength,

I'm happy to take advice on this if anyone has any.

I'm a newcomer in these tournaments. If everybody (apart me) understood that the rules adopted were the ones you now clarified I would suggest to stay with them. There's no point in being pedantic and it might well be that some information went lost when the website was changed. But if this is not the case, I think that the best solution is simply to apply the rules as written. After all, this is what people SHOULD have expected. I think everybody agrees that the fact that a different tie breaking rule was applied in the first four rounds can be considered basically ineffectual.

Unfortunately this is not a new ranking system.......it's the one we've been using for all preliminary rounds of this Open tournament and the Open tournaments for the past three years. Swiss is actually a very well established tournament system, used originally for Chess tournaments but now in wide use for a variety of tournament formats where numbers are too large to do a round robin. CCG players may be familiar with it, as it's used for Magic tournaments. The strength of opposition calculations give a statistical approximation of a player's position against all other players in the tournament for pairing from round to round and tie breaking, as if they had done a full round robin. It's not perfect and the margins are often fine, but it's widely used and accepted.

I'm sorry there's been confusion as I didn't publish the tournament rules.....this is how the min-tournaments are run and it's probably an unfortunate cut and paste. There's actually merit in using banner and block counts to tie break as you suggest, Giulio, but it's not how this or other Open tournaments have been ranked for the past several years, and to revert to another method now would actually be breaking the integrity of the system as it's been used in this tournament so far. Maybe the tournament rules can be reviewed and if it's what people want, a different system could be used next year.

Having said all that, i feel awkward being the number cruncher and being in a position where it has an important impact on my ranking, as it does here, and particularly as there's a discrepancy between how the tournament has been run and the published rules. Michal's a great player and very deserving of progressing, and if he's keen to keep playing, I'd be very happy to cede the spot to him.

Brent.

Mark the procedure "Where there are ties for Cumulative Victory Points, the tie is determined by Ranking based upon the strength of the opponents player" is different from what is reported in the published rules of the tournament. The new procedure seems interesting but I believe we have to stick to the procedure "After each round, positions on the Ladder will be adjusted in descending order by points, and further sorted by banners won, banners lost, and blocks lost." reported in the "OT2017 Rules and Conventions". I don't know if it does change something though.

Edit 1: I did the math and something in fact changes.

Edit 2: I have to amend what I wrote: after looking at it more carefully, I don't like the tie procedure you suggest. I prefer the official one. It is simple and it gives straight incentives: even if you are losing, try to capture all medals you can and even if you are winning try to lose the least units (which is by and large quite realistic too!) The suggested procedure is instead rather brainy, opaque and not conducive to any operationalizable strategy, as it is decided "ex-post" based on what the others do. I can see its merits in a handicap based system, but not here.

Ah, that was a close call! Congrats to Tomek and Brent who went to the quarterfinals.

Game 1: Britons (craniumgroup) vs Romans (stormwalker): 6-4
Game 2: Britons (Stormwalker) vs Romans (craniumgroup): 6-4

A tie score for the match. Pretty intense battles in both of them.

Figured it out Giulio - I had to play that game on an old computer and had forgot that is where the log file was from. Everything is up to date on the one I'm on now. Thanks for pointing it out so I can update the other.

No Dan. That's the correct reference. But when I load your log file I get the list of warnings below, suggesting you are using an old version of the extensions. I wrote you because I observed a few strange behavior in your log file and I thought that maybe the old extensions were the cause.

- Game saved with version 1.0 of extension 'CCA_C3iScenarios', you are running version 3.3. Please upgrade to the latest version of this extension.
- Game saved with version 2.2 of extension 'CCA_Expansion2', you are running version 3.3. Please upgrade to the latest version of this extension.
- Game saved with version 2.0 of extension 'CCA_Expansion3', you are running version 3.3. Please upgrade to the latest version of this extension.
- Game saved with version 1.2 of extension 'CCA_Expansion4', you are running version 3.3. Please upgrade to the latest version of this extension.
- Game saved with version 1.0 of extension 'CCA_Expansion6', you are running version 3.3. Please upgrade to the latest version of this extension

Is there something different than what is on the Vassal page for C&C Ancients Giulio? I'm on Vassal 3.2.17, C&C module 3.3, and all the extensions listed below that module on that page. Let me know. Thanks.

Dan,
I suggest to update your CCA VASSAL module and extensions. Apparently you are using a lot of old extensions and this might create troubles. In fact, I had trouble viewing your log.

G.

Had trouble with the attachments and have to repost my results (for the game above).

Cavie (Roman) - 6
Paul (Britons) - 2

Britons used their chariots early on to attack the Roman right. Most of the chariots were lost and the Romans survived most of the attack. Battle switched to the opposite side of the field where the Romans pressed and got some good strikes (including a first strike) to win the battle.

Game 1
MichalK (Britons) 6 banners won
GregO (Rome) 3 banners won

As Britons I had perfect cards whole game to move my chariots - and I played to have possibility always to move them. Not surprising, they scored 5 banners. Of course MC in first turn for Britons is a no-brainier (I had it), but then couple of other cards allowed me to continue the push - despite steady advance of MI and HI. One miracle occurred (HI attacking my lonely leader and not scoring a hit) and game was finished by 3 Warriors ganging up on some Roman figures. To some extend I had more luck then wisdom (see leader situation).

Game 2
Player 1 (Rome) 6 banners won
Player 2 (Britons) 3 banners won

Again decent cards for my side - MFM allowed to to quickly reform and avoid majority of chariots. steady downpour of HI and Mi was checked at one moment by colossal build-up of Britons they had really taunting two-units-deep line, move by Line Command. And here my dumb luck again woke-up - Greg rolled on Spartacus only one unit, which inflicted 1 hit taking 3 in battle back. Successive Double Time should finish game, but was not so effective - that allowed Greg to grab couple of precious points. Last turn was just finishing some 1 blocks for final 6--3 victory.

I do not remember when I had so much luck (well, maybe yesterday - Mark can say something about our TGW game finished after 4 cards). Anyhow, thanks to Greg for both games, high spirits despite my lucky dice and time well spent.

Carthage Vs. Stonewall Game 2
Carthage Romans 6 to Stonewall Britons 3

The Briton chariots hit the Roman auxilia and severely damaged 1, but did not eliminate any. The Roman missile fire rolled 2 flags on a chariot and killed it by retreat.

The Briton Warriors Doubled Timed into the left flank of the Roman heavy and medium infantry line, eliminated a medium, a heavy, and Vespasian. The Roman line hit back with a Double Time card, eliminating 2 Warriors and Togomundus, making the score 4-3 in favor of the Romans.

A Briton attack against the medium and heavy infantry using 2 wounded warriors severely damaged a medium, but failed to kill any, and 1 Warrior was lost. A Briton attack with a Warrior and 2 chariots against 2 auxilia severely damaged one, but failed to kill any. The Roman attack eliminated a chariot for the win, 6-3.

Caspar (Carthage) was a great opponent and a great player, winning both games. I filled out the report and posted it, because he lost connection to the server at one point.

Joe (Stonewall)

Carthage Vs. Stonewall Game 1
Carthage Britons 6 to Stonewall Romans 3

The Briton chariots hit the Roman light troops on the right side of the board with a Mounted Charge card that eliminated 3 auxilia. The next turn the Briton Warriors on the left side of the board hit the Roman heavy and medium line with a Double Time card that eliminated a heavy and killed the leader Vespasian (significantly altering history by killing a future Emperor). The score was now 5-0.

The Roman line was able to hit back with a Line Command card that resulted in 3 Warriors being eliminated, but Togodumnos survived. The next turn the Briton chariots, with an Inspired Left Leader card, surrounded a medium infantry and eliminated it for the win, 6-3.

Game 1 Gonzo 6 banners as Romans, Mark McG 3 banners as Brits
The Brits got initiative and their chariots pounced without mercy. romans did a fighting withdrawal there, mostly withdrawal, losing a couple of units but taking a couple of chariots with them. A Roman Darken the skies went particulary well. A nucleus of 6 Roman inf and 2 leaders then took the center and with their movement dodged the warriors and killed chariots, 5 chariots died in this game.

Game 2
Mark McG as Romans 6 banners, Gonzo as Brits 4 banners.
Mark again go t initiative and The Roman legionairies flooded across the river and set up a strong line over whole front. Chariots sat on their as with no orders. As the Romans line advanced and missed with missiles, the Brit barbarians charged and killed nothing. As the Romans cleaned up the next turn, he was not able to protect 2 damaged legions from a wandering chariot. Finally the chariots entered the game and got the 4th banner to cinch the match.
Thanks to Mark for an exciting match.

You're right. My mistake.