Smash IV Data Collection Project Discussion

[Ulevo]

So, basically what this thread is for is in regards to this: http://smashboards.com/threads/proposed-ruleset-for-smash-4-tournaments.339622/page-17#post-15787467

Information and knowledge is useful, and as it pertains to our community I think it would be valuable if we were able to begin a project that spearheads this goal come the Smash Wii U/3DS's launch. Character results, stages used/won on/lost on, tournament results with banned stages legal, and other types of information would be valuable when discussing things like tournament rules and stagelists, character match ups, controversial topics like character bans, et cetera.

I am not a datasheet guy. I do not have the time nor the passion to do this myself, or to lead its direction. I do think it should be discussed by people who can do this for our community though, so this is what this thread is for.

Let's get talking. What do you think should be collected? How? Discuss.

 

[Overswarm]

/thread

We would need bracket information and pool information as per normal.

 

[Ulevo]

/thread

We would need bracket information and pool information as per normal.

Would you require the information on which stages were banned, specifically? I think that could prove useful. Unless I am reading this spread wrong.

Also, how does anyone feel about collecting data on money matches? Would they have to be high profile ones? Maybe with a specific $ amount? How much is really on the line if you have say a $1 money match?

Should there be an entree limit before collecting data? Surely data on a tournament with under 5 people isn't worth recording. So where's the line? Should the prizepool also be a consideration, like the question I posed with money matches.

Just some more questions to throw out there to talk about. What other information do people think is worth collecting that is reasonable to obtain?

 

[LiteralGrill]

Glad to see this here.

Currently, I am involved in programming a database system to keep and present data collected from smash tournaments. In a month or so, I would be able to have it so that if you submitted match slips to me, I could enter in the data manually with almost no effort. If you let me do a tiny bit more work, I can make a program that might be able to scan sheets and put the data into the system automatically even.

The main question really is what data you want kept. Tell me and it's done.

Heck, design me a slip for the info you want filled out, and tell me what data you want to be allowed to be kept too. VERY detailed in that list please, programming isn't too hard but I want to make sure everything is done right.

 

[Overswarm]

I banned FD, Dazwa banned Rainbow Cruise.

Money matches are not indicative of tournament play and are, by definition, isolated incidents. Isolated data points can rarely be crammed together to make something meaningful.

You can check this thread for limitations I've used and what I've done with just face data:
http://smashboards.com/threads/character-ranking-list-project-m-updated-4-4.334291/

I will not use tournaments that

• Have less than 10 entrants
• Have less than a $5 entry fee
• Have anyone in the money split (not play out their set/forfeit to exchange money)

The first is to prevent small nobody tournaments from producing odd results and inflating points.
The second is to prevent extremely large free tournaments / $1 tournaments from affecting results.
The third is to prevent people from altering results by being asshats. If they hide it well I don't really care, but switching to random off characters in the finals alters data.
The biggest issue with collecting data is that if I hold a tournament where FD is banned and you hold a tournament where Rainbow Cruise is banned, our data is fuzzy. We can still get some useful data, but even the slighest bit of rule changes can make things confusing.
The easiest way would be to just use a ruleset where absolutely nothing is banned prior to proof being shown. This is unlikely, but if this happened we'd probably have a perfect ruleset within a year. As it stands, the data would have to be segmented based off of what tournaments were used.

 

[Overswarm]

Glad to see this here.

Currently, I am involved in programming a database system to keep and present data collected from smash tournaments. In a month or so, I would be able to have it so that if you submitted match slips to me, I could enter in the data manually with almost no effort. If you let me do a tiny bit more work, I can make a program that might be able to scan sheets and put the data into the system automatically even.

The main question really is what data you want kept. Tell me and it's done.

Heck, design me a slip for the info you want filled out, and tell me what data you want to be allowed to be kept too. VERY detailed in that list please, programming isn't too hard but I want to make sure everything is done right.

Want to make the perfect program?

Allow manual entry of everything on that slip.

Have tournaments categorized as separate entities and be able to manually add what stages were banned for each tournament, so in the future you can filter out tournaments based on what stages they have legal.
Do the same for starters.

Allow TOs to create brackets and pools similar to Tio and be able to add characters to individual sets.

Be able to upload this all into a database or export it into a spreadsheet so it can be data mined.

 

[LiteralGrill]

Alright, not undoable.

Now, what data do you want me to keep? BRUTAL details as the programming must be hyper specific.

The only "hard part" is hosting the database on a server mostly for the cash costs. But I bet some smash love and donations could keep us afloat there.

Edit: All of what you said OS was kinda planned for already. I'm on top of things! My biggest concern is forcing a TO to put in data match by match to advance brackets would be a giant pain...

But, I have NO life. I'm disabled and can't hold a normal job. It sucks and I get very bored. I'd be insane enough to enter data from slips by hand myself if it would make things better for TOs so they want to run the system. I just need to know what you all want to look at so I could present it in a good way with spreadsheets or graphs.

 

[Ulevo]

I banned FD, Dazwa banned Rainbow Cruise.

Money matches are not indicative of tournament play and are, by definition, isolated incidents. Isolated data points can rarely be crammed together to make something meaningful.

You can check this thread for limitations I've used and what I've done with just face data:
http://smashboards.com/threads/character-ranking-list-project-m-updated-4-4.334291/

I will not use tournaments that

• Have less than 10 entrants
• Have less than a $5 entry fee
• Have anyone in the money split (not play out their set/forfeit to exchange money)

The first is to prevent small nobody tournaments from producing odd results and inflating points.

The second is to prevent extremely large free tournaments / $1 tournaments from affecting results.
The third is to prevent people from altering results by being ******s. If they hide it well I don't really care, but switching to random off characters in the finals alters data.
The biggest issue with collecting data is that if I hold a tournament where FD is banned and you hold a tournament where Rainbow Cruise is banned, our data is fuzzy. We can still get some useful data, but even the slighest bit of rule changes can make things confusing.
The easiest way would be to just use a ruleset where absolutely nothing is banned prior to proof being shown. This is unlikely, but if this happened we'd probably have a perfect ruleset within a year. As it stands, the data would have to be segmented based off of what tournaments were used.

I agree with all of these points.

I also agree with the approach to stage lists. However, I do not believe allowing 100% of the stages would be an efficient form of data collection. While there are some stages that are controversial, and thus should be left open for data collection because they are in fact controversial, there are stages that are fairly night and day illegitimate tournament worthy material. 75 M, Warioware, Flatzone 2, et cetera, come to mind. Otherwise, allowing these stages would skew the consistency of the results.

If this is going to be a means to collect information for item based tournaments, since I know those advocates are out there, then those tournaments should be separate and logged as such. I also think working out the specifics for that would be worthwhile.

 

[Zonderion]

I think the one thing I am iffy on is prevention of large free tournaments. I know people who refuse to play in Smash tournaments because they just don't have the money or don't want to lose the money. Stingy I know, but the truth is, those people are out there. Should the data collection refuse that information? Typically the hardcore players will be the ones to go to tournaments with $10+ entry fees and not the casuals. Personally, I would want as much data recorded as possible.

If we make a field in the DB that we can filter "free" or low cost tournament entrants, then we can still evaluate data based on higher profile tournaments. At that point, we could compare the "free/low cost" to "higher cost" and analyze the differing data.

I don't think there is really a valid reason to NOT collect data. If entered correctly into the DB, we can filter the data any way we want.

 

[Chiroz]

Have tournaments categorized as separate entities and be able to manually add what stages were banned for each tournament, so in the future you can filter out tournaments based on what stages they have legal.
Do the same for starters.

He doesn't technically need to separate them on the database.

Edit: He could create a new entity that would be a linked table between "Stages" and "Tournaments" and then linking every Stage to each Tournament and having a third value field which would denote if the Stage was "Banned", "Starter" or "Counter-Pick" .

This way he could still do a search filtering out Tournaments where a stage was legal or where it was banned or where this set of starters was used or the other set of starters was used.


This way it is much easier to input data (as you wouldn't have dozens of Tournament categories) and although queries would be slightly more complicated, on the application layer you could make a code that would seemingly do any needed query or input the information of each Tournament without much hassle of knowing what type of Tournament it was. You could even do it so it was added automatically (like Capps said) without having to check personally what the data sheet says.

Just trying to put in my 2 cents.

 

[Overswarm]

I think the one thing I am iffy on is prevention of large free tournaments. I know people who refuse to play in Smash tournaments because they just don't have the money or don't want to lose the money. Stingy I know, but the truth is, those people are out there. Should the data collection refuse that information? Typically the hardcore players will be the ones to go to tournaments with $10+ entry fees and not the casuals. Personally, I would want as much data recorded as possible.

If we make a field in the DB that we can filter "free" or low cost tournament entrants, then we can still evaluate data based on higher profile tournaments. At that point, we could compare the "free/low cost" to "higher cost" and analyze the differing data.

I don't think there is really a valid reason to NOT collect data. If entered correctly into the DB, we can filter the data any way we want.

All data will have to be put in manually at some point. Free tournaments don't really tell us anything, so I just leave 'em out.


Also to the previous post, I don't mean "leave 100% of the stages legal". I mean leave everything legal until we see some evidence that it needs to be banned. We can test something like Fox circle camping on Hyrule Temple pretty early on and extrapolate from that. There are only going to be a few stages so easy, but it can be done.

 

[Zonderion]

All data will have to be put in manually at some point. Free tournaments don't really tell us anything, so I just leave 'em out.

Yes, but determining when that data is put in, I think is the key. Take something like Tio. As the TO advances the bracket, what if we collected the data at that point? After a match is finished, the TO enters who won on what stages and with what characters. We now have that data.

Think about the ranking system that could be done with this info too! We use a rating system similar to Chess, or Table Tennis. You get a certain number of points (added or subtracted) based on the other player you play.

We could not only record win/losses but who wins and who loses. We then collate that data to make a ranking system. All of it could be entered by the TO (multiple TOs if the tournament is big).

So if EACH TO is willing to take on a little extra work, then all the data could be recorded and would be a huge weight lifted off the few volunteers who would do the DB entries. Even the the large free ones (providing the TO will enter that data).

 

[Ulevo]

As it pertains to free tournaments, I am siding with OS on this. With monetary incentive, it is much less likely that we will have players entering and doing 'random stuff' just 'cuz since there isn't anything to lose in doing so. Also, as pointed out, free tournaments are more likely to include casual players which, while not negative in its own right, will add variables to the data that don't necessarily reflect what should happen in a competitive tournament environment. Collecting this information and organizing it will take work, so while I'm an advocate of learning all we can, I'd like to do it as efficiently as possible and without having to include unnecessary information.

 

[Chiroz]

As it pertains to free tournaments, I am siding with OS on this. With monetary incentive, it is much less likely that we will have players entering and doing 'random stuff' just 'cuz since there isn't anything to lose in doing so. Also, as pointed out, free tournaments are more likely to include casual players which, while not negative on its own right, will add variables to the data that don't necessarily reflect what should happen in a competitive tournament environment.

You could always just have a Field for "Entry Fee" and another for "Entrants" and you could easily filter your analysis for all ("Entry Fee's" > 5 & "Entrants" > 10). It takes no hassle for the DB programmer to include that field or query. I mean if we can have more information without it causing any problems or trouble, why not have it?

 

[El Duderino]

I think it's time everyone takes a step back here, this exorbitant emphasis on the data is getting a bit out of hand. I'm not saying it doesn't have a place or purpose, it absolutely does, but try to remember rules are primarily about providing the best competitive experience possible, not creating the widest spread of data to plot.

Tournament data is just one factor that can help inform the rules, but alone it does not determine them. To state what should be obvious, everything we gather in the first year will be scattered and inconclusive. I see the early days going much smoother if TO's stick to using basic common sense.

 

[Mormon Mammoth]

As it pertains to free tournaments, I am siding with OS on this. With monetary incentive, it is much less likely that we will have players entering and doing 'random stuff' just 'cuz since there isn't anything to lose in doing so. Also, as pointed out, free tournaments are more likely to include casual players which, while not negative in its own right, will add variables to the data that don't necessarily reflect what should happen in a competitive tournament environment. Collecting this information and organizing it will take work, so while I'm an advocate of learning all we can, I'd like to do it as efficiently as possible and without having to include unnecessary information.

If there was a separate field like Raykz and others suggest, the variety of characters played in free tournaments would likely be greater because of some people wanting to try a new character. This, in turn, would allow for a larger amount of data from some characters that would be mid-low tier. As for the number of entrants. It should be more than 10 because such a small sample size for a tournament would produce very skewed results.

 

[Ulevo]

I think it's time everyone takes a step back here, this exorbitant emphasis on the data is getting a bit out of hand. I'm not saying it doesn't have a place or purpose, it absolutely does, but try to remember rules are primarily about providing the best competitive experience possible, not creating the widest spread of data to plot.

Tournament data is just one factor that can help inform the rules, but alone it does not determine them. To state what should be obvious, everything we gather in the first year will be scatted and inconclusive. I see the early days going much smoother if TO's stick to using basic common sense.

I think you miss the scope of this thread and project. It's application isn't just for the production of a good ruleset, nor should a good ruleset rely on strictly data. I'm not sure where you got that impression. It's goal is to be there in case we need it for assessment for anything. Character match ups, how certain characters do on specific stages, how dominant X character is and how unused Y character is. There's a lot of benefits to having this sort of knowledge.

 

[Zonderion]

As it pertains to free tournaments, I am siding with OS on this. With monetary incentive, it is much less likely that we will have players entering and doing 'random stuff' just 'cuz since there isn't anything to lose in doing so. Also, as pointed out, free tournaments are more likely to include casual players which, while not negative in its own right, will add variables to the data that don't necessarily reflect what should happen in a competitive tournament environment. Collecting this information and organizing it will take work, so while I'm an advocate of learning all we can, I'd like to do it as efficiently as possible and without having to include unnecessary information.

Like I said earlier, I don't feel there is a valid reason to NOT collect data. Here's the thing. If we design the software so that a person who hosts a $10 dollar tournament and one that hosts a free tournament are using the same software, why would we just decide to not include the data for the free tournament?

Raykz put it best. You can always filter the data to obtain what you are wanting. By using that simple line of code, we just excluded the free tournament scene. You have the exact data you want. To take it a step further we could run another filter like this: ("Entry Fee's" <= $5 OR "Entrants" <= 10). Now we could compare both sets of data against themselves and we could accurately see how much people just goof off at random tournaments. As of now, all you're doing is assuming, which is warranted because we haven't collected that data.

If we continue to not collect the data, then all we can do is assume. That's my argument for data collection. Take it for what you will.

I think it's time everyone takes a step back here, this exorbitant emphasis on the data is getting a bit out of hand. I'm not saying it doesn't have a place or purpose, it absolutely does, but try to remember rules are primarily about providing the best competitive experience possible, not creating the widest spread of data to plot.

Tournament data is just one factor that can help inform the rules, but alone it does not determine them. To state what should be obvious, everything we gather in the first year will be scatted and inconclusive. I see the early days going much smoother if TO's stick to using basic common sense.

I think I agree with this. If we are to set up the software so that the TO enters the rulesets he wants for the tournament, I think that would be best. There may be tournaments that only allow one specific stage. All others could be banned. The TO should have the ability to structure his tournament that way, and still have the data recorded.

TOs are going to run tournament players want. If the players want items off, the TO will run the tournament with items off. So regardless of what we do to collect the data, the TOs will run it as they see fit. What we need to do, is enable the TOs to record the most data efficiently. Once we have the data, we can identify the outliers and then examine the data we want. If we exclude data, we are only hurting ourselves.

 

[Ulevo]

Like I said earlier, I don't feel there is a valid reason to NOT collect data. Here's the thing. If we design the software so that a person who hosts a $10 dollar tournament and one that hosts a free tournament are using the same software, why would we just decide to not include the data for the free tournament?

Raykz put it best. You can always filter the data to obtain what you are wanting. By using that simple line of code, we just excluded the free tournament scene. You have the exact data you want. To take it a step further we could run another filter like this: ("Entry Fee's" <= $5 OR "Entrants" <= 10). Now we could compare both sets of data against themselves and we could accurately see how much people just goof off at random tournaments. As of now, all you're doing is assuming, which is warranted because we haven't collected that data.

If we continue to not collect the data, then all we can do is assume. That's my argument for data collection. Take it for what you will.

And all that is fine, I am just making a note of the fact that while excluding certain variables will be easy within any given software we use to present the information once we have it, it will still be more work to collect that information and enter it manually in to the database. Is it worth it the extra time and effort? That's the question that needs to be asked. My impression is no, but I suppose that's up to the individuals doing the record keeping.

I think I agree with this. If we are to set up the software so that the TO enters the rulesets he wants for the tournament, I think that would be best. There may be tournaments that only allow one specific stage. All others could be banned. The TO should have the ability to structure his tournament that way, and still have the data recorded.

TOs are going to run tournament players want. If the players want items off, the TO will run the tournament with items off. So regardless of what we do to collect the data, the TOs will run it as they see fit. What we need to do, is enable the TOs to record the most data efficiently. Once we have the data, we can identify the outliers and then examine the data we want. If we exclude data, we are only hurting ourselves.

This is strictly a database project, nothing else. We're not producing/using tournament software. All we would need to do is have TO's be aware of specific information that needs to be kept, have the players keep track of it (kind of like having slips for each match they play in the tournament), and have them submit it to the TO staff after each match. The TO staff then in turn PM/Email/send it to whomever on these forums is doing the data entry. At least this is how I would see it being done.

 

[Chiroz]

And all that is fine, I am just making a note of the fact that while excluding certain variables will be easy within any given software we use to present the information once we have it, it will still be more work to collect that information and enter it manually in to the database. Is it worth it the extra time and effort? That's the question that needs to be asked. My impression is no, but I suppose that's up to the individuals doing the record keeping.

Just leave that responsibility to the TO's, this way if a TO wants his tournament to be recorded he will do the job of recording it.

This could potentially be exploitable but you can also do this in a way that is not exploitable (So that TO's don't just start making up fake tournaments in order to skew results).

You distribute the exact same application used to input the information but you link it to a secondary Database that is a previous mirror of the original Database. Once an input from a tournament arrives, Capps staff can just check the validity of this Tournament and once proven they can just update the Database with that new info.

I am not trying to start a debate here, just provide ideas that may help.

 

[Zonderion]

And all that is fine, I am just making a note of the fact that while excluding certain variables will be easy within any given software we use to present the information once we have it, it will still be more work to collect that information and enter it manually in to the database. Is it worth it the extra time and effort? That's the question that needs to be asked. My impression is no, but I suppose that's up to the individuals doing the record keeping.

This is strictly a database project, nothing else. We're not producing/using tournament software. All we would need to do is have TO's be aware of specific information that needs to be kept, have the players keep track of it (kind of like having slips for each match they play in the tournament), and have them submit it to the TO staff after each match. The TO staff then in turn PM/Email/send it to whomever on these forums is doing the data entry. At least this is how I would see it being done.

I think you are definitely right in the aspect that if we put the labor on a few volunteers, then it should be left up to the community as to which tournaments should be recorded. But I'm not advocating for that. I'm also not advocating for only a database project.

I'm advocating for a tournament software that collects the data into a database project. If a TO is going to use any kind of software to run his tournament, and then on top of doing that, keep up with slips and make sure he emails them to someone to be put into the database, that is completely on him. I want to take the step out between the data entry and the software used to run the tournament. I think we would collect so much more data that way.

Lets put it this way: Each TO that uses software to run his tournament, may or may not send those results in. (On a similar note, the TOs who don't use software to run his tournament may or may not send those results in to be entered.) If that software the TOs use automatically enter that data for them, that is one less step that each TO has to do, and it promises more data for the database project.

 

[Zonderion]

Just leave that responsibility to the TO's, this way if a TO wants his tournament to be recorded he will do the job of recording it.

This could potentially be exploitable but you can also do this in a way that is not exploitable (So that TO's don't just start making up fake tournaments in order to skew results).

You distribute the exact same application used to input the information but you link it to a secondary Database that is a previous mirror of the original Database. Once an input from a tournament arrives, Capps staff can just check the validity of this Tournament and once proven they can just update the Database with that new info.

I am not trying to start a debate here, just provide ideas that may help.

That's all good and well, but with what criteria will Capps staff determine if it is a legit tournament or not? If I ran an actual tournament with weird things such as extremely high damage, but I do want that data recorded, it could be potentially thrown out, because its "different"

 

[Overswarm]

I think it's time everyone takes a step back here, this exorbitant emphasis on the data is getting a bit out of hand. I'm not saying it doesn't have a place or purpose, it absolutely does, but try to remember rules are primarily about providing the best competitive experience possible, not creating the widest spread of data to plot.

Tournament data is just one factor that can help inform the rules, but alone it does not determine them. To state what should be obvious, everything we gather in the first year will be scatted and inconclusive. I see the early days going much smoother if TO's stick to using basic common sense.

Data is more important than "common sense". Common sense is merely a collection of biases you've accumulated, and I'm not particularly interested in anyone's "common sense" anymore than they're interested in mine.

 

[Chiroz]

That's all good and well, but with what criteria will Capps staff determine if it is a legit tournament or not? If I ran an actual tournament with weird things such as extremely high damage, but I do want that data recorded, it could be potentially thrown out, because its "different"

By legit I meant it actually happened . If you just distribute software that can affect your original Database without any limits or restrictions such as this people might just make up fake tournaments to make a character look worse or better than his results really show.

About the damage thing, even though I understand your point, there are some things that are a bit ridiculous. Our data shouldn't go as far as recording special modes such as Lightning, Giant or Handicap. I think we should limit it to Stock only, maybe allow for Timed matches if there's a demand for it.

 

[Zonderion]

By legit I meant it actually happened . If you just distribute software that can affect your original Database without any limits or restrictions such as this people might just make up fake tournaments to make a character look worse or better than his results really show.

About the damage thing, even though I understand your point, there are some things that are a bit ridiculous. Our data shouldn't go as far as recording special modes such as Lightning, Giant or Handicap. I think we should limit it to Stock only, maybe allow for Timed matches if there's a demand for it.

I gotcha. Yeah that makes sense. Data validation will be something to consider regardless of how the data is collected.

My vision may just not be achievable, I guess. This is what I envision:

To create a software product that enables the creation, hosting and recording of tournaments. All the data entered into this software can be analyzed to benefit the smash scene. On top of that feature, any player that wishes to be ranked (world-wide) could create an account with this software. As the players play in tournaments, they are ranked based on the people they play, not the amount of games they play.

By having the software that creates, host and records the tournaments, I see more data being efficiently collected more than any other method. By using the software to record the data, that alleviates all of the work being put on a few people (enter a type of data validation here).


Too much to ask?

 

[Overswarm]

By legit I meant it actually happened . If you just distribute software that can affect your original Database without any limits or restrictions such as this people might just make up fake tournaments to make a character look worse or better than his results really show.

About the damage thing, even though I understand your point, there are some things that are a bit ridiculous. Our data shouldn't go as far as recording special modes such as Lightning, Giant or Handicap. I think we should limit it to Stock only, maybe allow for Timed matches if there's a demand for it.

That's basically the same way I feel about free tournaments. Sure, it might be interesting to see the difference between free and money tournaments, but I don't really want to even have that data. It's junk data that doesn't show anything meaningful. Free tournaments would be the same as "giant" tournaments.

 

[Chiroz]

To create a software product that enables the creation, hosting and recording of tournaments. All the data entered into this software can be analyzed to benefit the smash scene. On top of that feature, any player that wishes to be ranked (world-wide) could create an account with this software. As the players play in tournaments, they are ranked based on the people they play, not the amount of games they play.

By having the software that creates, host and records the tournaments, I see more data being efficiently collected more than any other method. By using the software to record the data, that alleviates all of the work being put on a few people (enter a type of data validation here).

Most of this can be done, but someone at some moment will have to input information, even if it is written and then scanned into the program like Capps suggested, it will have to be written sometime.

You can however have a software which does record all tournaments with their given rulesets on stages, items, etc, all the matches with which players were fighting, what characters were they using, who won the first game, which stage was picked on the second game, how many stocks/time was left and all those things and even calculates a sort of ranking depending on who you fight like you suggested (although we would have to come up with a fair formula).

But in the end, someone will have to input said information into either scan-able sheets or the software itself.

That's basically the same way I feel about free tournaments. Sure, it might be interesting to see the difference between free and money tournaments, but I don't really want to even have that data. It's junk data that doesn't show anything meaningful. Free tournaments would be the same as "giant" tournaments.

I understand your point. I have no real opinion on whether free tournaments should be allowed or not.

I do believe though that Free Tournaments would be hard to validate as even a decently-sized Smashfest could be viewed as a free tournament (at least the ones that do hold tournaments just for fun) which might just cause undesired effects to the data if we do include any gathering of Smash players.

 

[Zonderion]

Most of this can be done, but someone at some moment will have to input information, even if it is written and then scanned into the program like Capps suggested, it will have to be written sometime.

You can however have a software which does record all tournaments with their given rulesets on stages, items, etc, all the matches with which players were fighting, what characters were they using, who won the first game, which stage was picked on the second game, how many stocks/time was left and all those things and even calculates a sort of ranking depending on who you fight like you suggested (although we would have to come up with a fair formula).

But in the end, someone will have to input said information into either scan-able sheets or the software itself.

Right. And those people entering the information will be all of the TOs. Here are the steps:

• TO logs into software
• Creates a tournament with ruleset (TO decides) - This info is now stored into the database (will be removed if event doesn't happen)
• TO clicks a button to begin hosting a tournament
• Players register with the host (each player is added to the bracketing system) - This info is now stored into the database
• Players play their matches and report the results to the TO
• As the players report the results, the TO enters this information into the software - This info is now stored into the database
• As the TO enters the results, the software automatically advances the brackets
• At the end of the tournament, the TO closes it out. The results can now be viewed online (ideally)
• We now have data we can analyze

So rather than creating so much overhead for a few people to enter the information, each TO is given the ability to enter the data themselves. Then Capps and his staff can verify the data. If it looks to be bad data, they can remove it from the database.
That may be a good way to do it, it may be a bad way.

 

[El Duderino]

I think you miss the scope of this thread and project. It's application isn't just for the production of a good ruleset, nor should a good ruleset rely on strictly data. I'm not sure where you got that impression. It's goal is to be there in case we need it for assessment for anything. Character match ups, how certain characters do on specific stages, how dominant X character is and how unused Y character is. There's a lot of benefits to having this sort of knowledge.

Like I mentioned, data collection does have it's place. I just find it's being overly emphasized in the rules debates.

Data is more important than "common sense". Common sense is merely a collection of biases you've accumulated, and I'm not particularly interested in anyone's "common sense" anymore than they're interested in mine.

Haha, conclusions people draw from the data are hardly impartial either.

Look, you can gather attendance data, characters played, stage odds, etc. That's all valuable to have, but numbers are never going to paint a complete picture. It's highly impractical to rely on them exclusively for making decisions on these matters. There's really no way around it, data doesn't circumvent the need for TOs to use their better judgement when defining the rules, especially before the scene has settled on an official ruleset.

 

[Overswarm]

Haha, conclusions people draw from the data are hardly impartial either.

Look, you can gather attendance data, characters played, stage odds, etc. That's all valuable to have, but numbers are never going to paint a complete picture. It's highly impractical to rely on them exclusively for making decisions on these matters. There's really no way around it, data doesn't circumvent the need for TOs to use their better judgement when defining the rules, especially before the scene has settled on an official ruleset.

This is the exact opposite of true. You're like the baseball coach saying "We don't need analytics! It don't do no good, bunch of mumbo jumbo. It'll never replace a good ol' fashioned Coach. We've been doing it this way for years and years and it's worked out so far."

 

[El Duderino]

This is the exact opposite of true. You're like the baseball coach saying "We don't need analytics! It don't do no good, bunch of mumbo jumbo. It'll never replace a good ol' fashioned Coach. We've been doing it this way for years and years and it's worked out so far."

Think you're mistaking my argument for someone else's. Not once did I say these raw numbers useless. They make a good addition to the many considerations that go into determining a rule set.

 

[Ulevo]

Well, regardless El Duderino. It sounds like you're trying to emphasize that this project or its direction are almost bad in a way, when there are literally nothing but positives to gain from accumulating this information outside of possibly the time and effort it takes to gather it. I agree there is truth to what you say, but it seems meaningless for the topic of conversation in this thread. It's sort of irrelevant, which ponders me to wonder why you mentioned it.

Anyway. As Raykz said, someone at some point is going to have to put the data in to a data sheet manually, unless you were to somehow create a program that syncs it all up like a cloud and puts it in to a database. That seems like a huge endeavour to wrestle with, and I don't think anyone here has the time, expertise, and money to make that happen. I think having this as a free, do-it-yourself project with a simple data spread sheet like with what OS showed be used where a few Back Roomers, TO's, and other volunteers enter the data and keep it somewhere either on a personal computer, publicly on the forums, or in some other fashion. As long as its publicly accessible and we are able to try and promote it to TOs.

What I think would be a great idea is if you took something like with what OS showed for his spread sheet but made a printable sheet that had fill in the blank slots, and you could print these out for tournaments to give to your players for each of their matches. I'm sure not everyone would do it since it'd cost money to print them out, but not much, and it could be taken out of the pot much in the same way venue costs do. And they'd just fill them out kinda like how players fill out pieces of paper for pools to keep track of.

 

[ぱみゅ]

Welp, so it comes down to this. Great job.
Still don't know why money has to be a perquisite, but I'll gladly help with this.

 

[LiteralGrill]

I already had plans to fund the database by myself if needed, money is no object unless you expect me to pay hundreds a month, which with current estimates me and the programmer have taken should not be needed, especially if we go with a more simple system.

If TOs will send in slips to me, I will enter them all. No problem here, being disabled this would be a GREAT help in giving me stuff to do with my day.

I can also make the data viewable by the public, I already planned to. All I need to know is what filters you might want when looking for data and how to present it and it will be done. we already have the beginnings of a system to let us manually enter info into the database for keeping, a few small adjustments and we'd be almost done, could maybe finish in under a MONTH.

Do not worry about this guys, I have this end covered. I LOVE the smash community and want to invest some good time and skills into it. Let me do my part, just tell me what I need to do.

 

[Ulevo]

Well its nice to see some volunteering hands already. I'd be cool with making up a sheet that could be printable, and we could just host it on mediafire or something for public download and put it in a sticky. Unless someone wants to do a better one than I, because mines going to be pretty plain. Mind you that might be best for ink purposes.

 

[El Duderino]

Well, regardless El Duderino. It sounds like you're trying to emphasize that this project or its direction are almost bad in a way, when there are literally nothing but positives to gain from accumulating this information outside of possibly the time and effort it takes to gather it. I agree there is truth to what you say, but it seems meaningless for the topic of conversation in this thread. It's sort of irrelevant, which ponders me to wonder why you mentioned it.

I suppose you're right in the context of this thread. I initially saw this as a reaction to the rules debate (which lets not beat around the bush, it is). You're right though, there nothing wrong with an additional organized effort to present all the info clearly. I just hope there's not an underlying motive here, but I guess we'll see what happens.

 

[Ulevo]

I suppose you're right in the context of this thread. I initially saw this as a reaction to the rules debate (which lets not beat around the bush, it is). You're right though, there nothing wrong with an additional organized effort to present the all the info clearly. I just hope there's not an underlying motive here, but I guess we'll see what happens.

It wasn't a reaction to the rules discussion thread, the discussion in that thread just helped me come up with the idea. As far as I'm concerned, there is no underlying motive.

 

[El Duderino]

It wasn't a reaction to the rules discussion thread, the discussion in that thread just helped me come up with the idea. As far as I'm concerned, there is no underlying motive.

I'll put it this way, I don't doubt your good intentions.

 

[Dr. James Rustles]

Some information I'm interested in gathering, off the top of my head:

Event Information:
Platform
Ruleset
Round Format
Entry Type (Monetary, Free, or Other)
Entry Fee
Payout
Number of Participants
Date

Location Information:
(Only Region Required)
Region
State/Province
City/Area
Venue

Local Rule Variations/W3BR Deviations:
Starter/Neutral stages
Counterpick stages
Items
Other Rule Changes

Matchup Information:
Round Number
Ranked/Power Ranked Player(s)
Ranked/Power Ranked Level of Player(s)

Starter and counterpick characters, stage and outcome for each match and/or set, and round.

Ranked participation and outcomes are an optional interest to me. It might be able to give us a little more insight into how much character and player contribute to overall strength, at least on a local level.

Printable form example:

 

[LiteralGrill]

Some information I'm interested in gathering, off the top of my head:

Event Information:
Platform
Ruleset
Round Format
Entry Type (Monetary, Free, or Other)
Entry Fee
Payout
Number of Participants
Date

Location Information:
(Only Region Required)
Region
State/Province
City/Area
Venue

Local Rule Variations/W3BR Deviations:
Starter/Neutral stages
Counterpick stages
Items
Other Rule Changes

Matchup Information:
Round Number
Ranked/Power Ranked Player(s)
Ranked/Power Ranked Level of Player(s)

Starter and counterpick characters, stage and outcome for each match and/or set, and round.

Ranked participation and outcomes are an optional interest to me. It might be able to give us a little more insight into how much character and player contribute to overall strength, at least on a local level.

Printable form example:

All good stuff, I think the one thing I'd like added is stage banned, it's VERY useful to know.

And it'd be cool to keep track of everything else you mentioned to, and probably possible.

Well its nice to see some volunteering hands already. I'd be cool with making up a sheet that could be printable, and we could just host it on mediafire or something for public download and put it in a sticky. Unless someone wants to do a better one than I, because mines going to be pretty plain. Mind you that might be best for ink purposes.

I've been around saying I'd do this for months, been working on the system itself for months too, just figured it's about time to lay my claim XD