25th World Championship- Final Schedule & Information

[Hazardville]

Since we are still two weeks out, I'd like to visit one point:

•Decks will not be posted for any day until the conclusion of Day 3

This is a huge disadvantage to anyone who is streamed--everyone has a week to watch that game and glean info from the deck.

Further, it's a huge advantage to bigger teams, as they'll have more replays to analyze.

If a team has 7 entrants, the odds that one of them plays top player X on either or both sides is pretty good. They will have a replay with ability to see what was in the deck via verifies, etc.

This is even worse than in person, where you'd have to remember "I don't think I saw monnok" to where you have a week to actually look at and analyze a deck.

I understand players can change their deck, so please don't come back with "well their opponents can change their deck." It's still a huge disadvantage to have your deck known to a big chunk of the field but not know their decks.

There's already a push for decklists to be available between days 2 and 3 of worlds (on Sat night, which, disclaimer, I AM against), but this feels like an even more magnified scenario of this, and the more fair thing to me would be to publish all decklists for everyone between the weeks.

Someone who has no team, or maybe a very small one where most were at the bottom tables but that person goes 4-2 or has a great 5-1 run is at a huge disadvantage versus the field that has maybe a half dozen replays across the days from them and/or teammates who played people who qualified to a team who has a half dozen+ members and has a replay vs nearly everyone who qualified.

I don't like having a disadvantage to anyone, especially a little guy.

I'm sure this was an item discussed before it was chosen, so some rationale would be nice, and perhaps reconsideration. I do hope this is not dismissed just because it is Joe Olson who is posting, and that's fun to do. I'm not trolling, this is a genuine comment that I think would make the event more fair.

Cheers!

I'm in agreement with Joe. As long as we can change decks between days, the lists should be posted (and yes, we SHOULD be able to change decks between days). Joe already highlighted the reasons, so I'm just x2 on all of it.

[dillen]

I agree too, lists should be posted for the reasons mentioned.

[Jedicon]

If this is going to be changed, players should probably be notified ASAP, as I could see it impacting deck selection.

[imrahil327]

I suppose I'm not completely opposed to the discussion, although it's a bit of an open question as to whether it's better to leave a less-than-ideal but known answer, or a possibly-better-but-last-minute answer. I believe this was in the tentative scheduling as well, so it's a bit of a bummer that it didn't come up then, but water under the bridge I suppose.

Assuming it's agreed that this should be changed, what's the proposed solution? I assume something like Day 1 lists posted after all Day 1 heats are complete, but the scheduling for Day 2->3 gets a little more complicated.

[arebelspy]

The gap between day 2 and 3 is like 11 hours. Can't gain a ton of advantage. No decklists there seems fine.

The one week gap exacerbates the advantage of bigger teams with replays (and the disadvantage of being streamed) with no decklists posted.

I also think it's more of a burden to get lists posted that quickly between days 2 and 3 (one day) versus days 1 and 2 (one week).

For both of these reasons, posting them after the first weekend, and then after the event, makes sense to me.

Still gives people some secrecy between days two and three, if they want that.

Anyways, barring a change, would be willing to negotiate now future replay swaps with people. PM me.

[Hazardville]

The gap between day 2 and 3 is like 11 hours. Can't gain a ton of advantage. No decklists there seems fine.

The one week gap exacerbates the advantage of bigger teams with replays (and the disadvantage of being streamed) with no decklists posted.

I also think it's more of a burden to get lists posted that quickly between days 2 and 3 (one day) versus days 1 and 2 (one week).

For both of these reasons, posting them after the first weekend, and then after the event, makes sense to me.

Still gives people some secrecy between days two and three, if they want that.

Anyways, barring a change, would be willing to negotiate now future replay swaps with people. PM me.

Agreed, the replays thing is what swayed me. If you're on stream (or play members of a big team) it's easy to see how a big team could reverse engineer your deck, or see tech card choices you made, whereas a person playing alone or with a smaller team probably couldn't do that past the really broad strokes. With only one day between day 2 and day 3 (and the Day 3 Top 8 being an effectively separate match-play event where you might be teching for a different format/set of opponents anyway), it feels less important to do for that. A week in between is also enough time to develop another deck that was close but maybe not ready for a fully unknown meta, so a team with the resources to work out the meta could get such a deck ready where a smaller team still couldn't, but possibly could if the meta were on display without them having to go through all the streams and replays to figure it out.

[imrahil327]

Sorry, it was pointed out to me that this question wasn't answered from the 'tentative' thread:

Was a round time agreed upon?

The round timer will stay at 50 minutes/person for this event. The entire slate of online events in 2020 has, to my knowledge, been run using this timing and we felt it wouldn't be right to change it specifically for the biggest event of the year. We are interested in discussing it for future events, but don't intend to change it for this one.

[gogolen]

Doesn't having all the lists posted benefit the bigger teams more though? They can comb through the lists easier, create copies of the top players lists, and actually develop in-game strategies against each new deck simultaneously.

So while it may help make things a little easier for Rando Cal, it makes things even easier for bigger groups.

[imrahil327]

I think the counter-argument to that would be this:
Being on a team is always going to be >> not being on a team when it comes to advantages. That's unavoidable. It is likely of comparatively less value for both teams and non-teams to have all the information (and then teams still be better at extrapolating) than teams having 80% of information and non-teams having 20% of information.

[rhendon]

I think the counter-argument to that would be this:
Being on a team is always going to be >> not being on a team when it comes to advantages. That's unavoidable. It is likely of comparatively less value for both teams and non-teams to have all the information (and then teams still be better at extrapolating) than teams having 80% of information and non-teams having 20% of information.

What Schoe said. I think this was almost exactly MTG said when giving the top 8 deck lists after the cut. The big teams were bringing people in to scout, to watch coverage, to watch games, to talk to people, etc. They were able to figure out enough information that wasn't keeping things hidden anyways and it was putting the smaller teams, or individual players at even more of a disadvantage.

[mrfahrenheit7]

As a member of a smaller team, I would prefer that decklists be made available after day 1 is complete, rather that waiting for the entire event to finish.

[JarJarDrinks]

against posting any of the decklists at any time.

[Jnapolit31]

I don’t want day 1 lists posted before day 2.

With day 2 being Swiss and seemingly at least 25 players, at this point, prefer them not posted.

[arebelspy]

against posting any of the decklists at any time.

To be clear, for JJD that means even after the event.

[imrahil327]

against posting any of the decklists at any time.

To be clear, for JJD that means even after the event.

This is not a position we are considering, in case anyone is concerned.

[Hayes]

Was there a final decision regarding [intentionally ambiguous] decklist errors?viewtopic.php?p=1319253#p1319253

Or is the hope that making players submit deck on Thursday (i.e. prior to 12:01 AM on 12/04) will give everyone a chance to catch any mistake and then bombard gogolen w PMs?

[imrahil327]

We are still finalizing the policy regarding decklists- this includes posting time (Joe's concerns), deck checks, and errors like the one you mention. That said, I do hope everyone takes the extra time to do as you suggest

[itcouldbewirfs]

Are there rules somewhere about showing up on time and any penalties for being 10 minutes late to your game?

Are we basically following the OCS rules?

[Death Star]

Day 1: December 5 & 6
•Players will play a 6-game SOS tournament on Day 1, and anyone who finishes 4-2 or better will advance to Day 2.

Day 2: December 12
•Open to Day 1 qualifiers
•4-game SOS tournament starting at/around 10am EST
•Players will start the tournament with their record from Day 1 intact (for example, if you went 6-0 in Day 1, and won Game 1 on Day 2, you would be considered 7-0). Players will also retain their SoS scores from Day 1 play into Day 2. NOTE: Players MAY play the same person with the same side of the Force during their Day 1 pod and during Day 2 Swiss play. This will be mitigated by the players' ability to change to a different deck for Day 2.
•The top 8 players from Day 2 after 10 total games will move on to Day 3

Can I please get a confirmation or correction on how the top 8 are determined? It says that both your record and your SOS carry over into day 2 but I hope its in 2 different ways.
I imagine the following:
- At the end of day 1, you have a score, for example 10 points, 46 SOS. This score is published and locked in.
- You start day 2 with 10 points, therefor your first opponent will also have 10 points (pair ups/down nonwithstanding)
- At the end of day 2, you have a score that consists of a cumulative point total but a SOS from only day 2, for example 14 points, 58 SOS.
- For your final score to determine top 8 players, you add the SOS from day 1 with the SOS from day 2 and use this total as tiebreaker. So in this example, 14 points, 104 SOS.
- I got my fingers crossed that we do not end up with 8/9 having the same SOS

In theory, you could continue counting SOS from your day 1 opponents that also advanced but I hope thats not whats happening.

Thank you.

[arebelspy]

In theory, you could continue counting SOS from your day 1 opponents that also advanced but I hope thats not whats happening.

That wouldn't come out "even" for people who had more opponents advance, or not. Plus people change decks, etc. so the situation is different a week later; I agree that the SOS's should be combined, rather than "continued."

All 4-2s on day 2 should start at the same place, ditto all 5-1s, etc., with 0 SOS on the day. Then later combine it with their previous one.