Swiss -> Single Elimination Discussion

[GOTM]

Firstly, for anyone that doesn't know what Swiss is, please give this a quick read. The rest of this won't make much sense without a background on the subject.

So I've had this discussion with a couple of smashers in the last couple of days, notably Scar, Pakman, and Wesley. I wanted to throw this out here and start to get some feedback before I just decide to implement something that I like, and not pay attention to how the community feels. Also, I'd like to see if anyone can make me aware of any specific reasons why this sucks (if it does), that differ from the ones Scar has already brought to my attention, lol.

Here's what I want to do:

Run a tournament with a Single Elimination Bracket seeded by Swiss

• Number of Swiss rounds will be equal to (Log base 2 of # Entrants; e.g. 30 entrants - 5 rounds of swiss)
• First round of Swiss will be pre-seeded by location only
• Will let Swiss software seed remaining rounds using built in ELO calculations from each round.
• After all rounds are complete, I would choose the top x players to participate in a full single elimination bracket (30 players in swiss->16 in bracket; 33 players in swiss->32 in bracket; etc.)
• Single Elimination will be seeded by Swiss results.

Determined Pros

• Creates much more hype for tournament matches.
• Pre-bracket stage becomes much more important than it was for pools.
• Runs quicker than doing pools->double elimination.
• Overall, the level of play in the tournament would have to improve, as there are no matches to fool around in. Your swiss sweed is much more important than your pool seed used to be.

Determined Cons

• Less accurate than doing swiss->double elimination, depending on results, and for obvious reasons.
• More of a possibility for a player with one very good matchup to achieve a placing higher than that of a player who might be consistently better against everyone else. This is the main point of disagreement. I feel that the chances of this happening are not high enough to cause concern. Others will disagree.

How do you guys feel about this? Also, Scar, Pakman, and Wesley, feel free to comment as you did when I spoke with you, because I didn't feel like re-writing your opinions, at the risk of misinterpreting them.

 

[Mogwai]

I like double elim after swiss. It takes a little more time but people feel better after a double elim bracket than they do after a single elim bracket. I just think it sucks when you can go X-0 in swiss, then lose 1 match to a bad matchup and be out of the tournament.

 

[Scar]

To summarize my opinion, single-elim is better for the audience, and double-elim is better for the players. I value the player's tourney experience slightly more than the audience's experience, and even if I didn't, I think the marginal benefit for the audience is much less than the marginal cost to players.

 

[Pakman]

The reason I like this is that it has the same advantages for new players that pools had. The beauty of pools/swiss is that it seeds the tournament while giving players a decent number of guaranteed tournament matches.

The advantage of swiss is that the seeding is much more precise. Pools require a fair amount of prior knowledge for seeding. (Throwing Mango Armada and PP in one pool is a bad idea.) In Swiss, your skill is re evaluated each time you complete a match and you are then matched up with a person with an equal record (or close to equal). Because of the higher precision, a Single Elimination tournament gives accurate results and make the matches and the swiss rounds much more important (read: hyped).

In my opinion, one of the biggest struggles of smash tournaments in general is how long they take. Having a single elimination bracket would make things run much faster.

 

[GOTM]

I just think it sucks when you can go X-0 in pools, then lose 1 match to a bad matchup and be out of the tournament.

The only thing with this is that, in double elimination, you could also go X-0 in Swiss, lose in winners, and then lose in losers bracket to a bad matchup as well. The point in bracket that an X-0 swiss player would have to play someone they can lose to would be late enough in single elimination to still achieve a high placing even with a loss.

If you're playing any earlier than that, you won't lose even if it is a bad matchup, because chances are that other player is just not good enough.

To summarize my opinion, single-elim is better for the audience, and double-elim is better for the players.

I think it depends on the player, lol.

Double elimination might be better for a player that has one bad matchup, or for a player that basically has one match he wishes he could skip (or redeem), but I think single elimination, seeded correctly, is just as suitable for players, they just don't really know it yet because we've been doing pools->double for a while, which is ********. Pools offer absolutely nothing to the integrity of a bracket, unless you're at a tournament big enough to have multiple rounds of pools, which is still even then just trying to achieve what Swiss does naturally.

 

[Pakman]

I have this crazy ideal of getting to a 30-40 person tournament at noon and being out of there by 7.

I have drove home from NYC to Philly at 1 AM way too many times. Am I the only one who thinks that Smash Tournaments take WAY too long in their current format?

 

[GOTM]

Am I the only one who thinks that Smash Tournaments take WAY too long in their current format?

No, I hate how Smash tournaments run forever. This format won't fix this on its own though. Players and TO's need to contribute TV's (enough to make Swiss successful) and show up on time, but doing Swiss->Single Elimination would definitely be quicker than Pools->Double Elimination is now.

 

[Pengie]

We've been doing something similar to this in Florida for a while now and it's been pretty successful. Time's never really been an issue despite the fact that we do double elimination as opposed to single elimination; From what I've seen, five rounds of Swiss shouldn't take that long to complete, provided the player to set up ratio is about 3:1. If the ratio shifts more towards the players I could see Swiss taking a lot longer because then you can't run matches concurrently which speeds up the process to the point where five rounds of Swiss -> Tie breaker pool for last few spots (kind of a hassle but I think another round of Swiss might eliminate the need for this and save time) -> Top 8 double elim bracket takes about the same amount of time as running a straight double elimination bracket used to take with the added benefit of more matches for everyone. Granted, all of this applies to our local tournaments with 20-30 entrants; I can imagine that on a larger scale things could get a bit messy.

 

[Mogwai]

The only thing with this is that, in double elimination, you could also go X-0 in Swiss, lose in winners, and then lose in losers bracket to a bad matchup as well. The point in bracket that an X-0 swiss player would have to play someone they can lose to would be late enough in single elimination to still achieve a high placing even with a loss.

If you're playing any earlier than that, you won't lose even if it is a bad matchup, because chances are that other player is just not good enough.

It's just a feel thing for me, but again, I just think the potential to lose 1 match and be out sucks.

As for the time concerns, yes, a double elimination bracket requires 2n - 1 matches to complete while a single elmination bracket only requires n - 1 matches to complete. However, assuming you can run losers and winners brackets at the same time and efficiently (I know I know, impossible assumptions with this community...), it doesn't take twice as many rounds (math: http://www.gottfriedville.net/mathprob/misc-dblelim.html).

I know double elim takes longer, but it shouldn't take so much longer and I think the benefit to players feeling good about the tournament results outweighs the time cost.

 

[Pakman]

On a larger scale the logistics of running swiss is a bit harder. But assuming that same 3-1 player to set up ratio, I could see a big event running swiss. I could also see swiss being a LOT faster because there wouldn't be a need for a second or third round of pools.

I could even see some silly thing like an amateur tournament and pro tournament from the results from several rounds of swiss.

Mogwai/Scar what about Smash makes it different from something like Starcraft or LoL who, as far as I can tell, run as primarily single elimination tournaments?

According to the Math that Mogwai posted, the most efficient reasonable ratio you can get from single vs double is 8 rounds for single and 11 for double. That is still a 37.5% increase in time.

 

[GOTM]

Yeah on a much larger scale, say you ran 8 rounds of Swiss for a Apex size tournament of 200 entrants or so, and you had 50 TV's. That's 2 rounds of matches per 1 round of Swiss.

Say each round of matches takes the full 24 minutes (which they wouldn't). That's a total of 6 hours. Usually, pools is split up into a few rounds at these tournaments, and sometimes happen between two different days. Being able to seed a Single Elimination tournament fully in 6 hours would be awesome.

 

[Mogwai]

On a larger scale the logistics of running swiss is a bit harder. But assuming that same 3-1 player to set up ratio, I could see a big event running swiss. I could also see swiss being a LOT faster because there wouldn't be a need for a second or third round of pools.

I could even see some silly thing like an amateur tournament and pro tournament from the results from several rounds of swiss.

Mogwai/Scar what about Smash makes it different from something like Starcraft or LoL who, as far as I can tell, run as primarily single elimination tournaments?

Shorter matches and more variance in terms of matchups.

 

[GOTM]

If your character has one really bad matchup, don't you think it should be the players responsibility to learn one more character just for that specific match?

I understand not every player can be good with every character, and on every stage, but taking the time to practice another character just for your mains most difficult matchup should be considered part of Melee.

If it's not, we might as well just do Double Elimination and have everyone submit their character to the TO in the beginning so they are unable to pick anyone else all tournament long. What's the point of even instantiating counterpick rules if someone is going to say they shouldn't of lost because they had a bad matchup? Aren't counterpick rules specifically there for this purpose?

I don't know, maybe I'm just being really ignorant, but that's how I see it. I could be wrong though.

 

[CT Chia]

Tournaments do take too long. I actually just wrote about this in a blog I made on AiB: http://allisbrawl.com/blogpost.aspx?id=136229
It talks about Brawl but you can interchange Brawl <> Melee in the argument. The game needs to change, not the tournament format if you want to actually decrease the time. No matter how you look at it and choose Bracket, Swiss, or Pools, a set in Melee is still a potential 21-24 minutes (depending on if the timer is 7 or 8, I don't even know what it is lol). I'm tossing around the idea of Brawl going down to one stock, and I would love to see Melee test at 2 stock. 2 stock 3 min time Bo3 puts the potential set time down to 9 minutes, which is less than half of what it is now. Compare the idea to a fighting game. In SF4 you play a Bo3, and in each match it's a Bo3. A 2 stock match is essentially like a Best of 3. It's the first person to take 2 stocks (games). Then when you do that whole thing in another Bo3 format, you're getting the entire set.

If you do something like this, not only will Pakman be able to leave by 7, he'll be able to leave even earlier. We'll be able to host multiple games and events all in one venue to get larger audiences and better tournaments.

The problem with Swiss is setups. If you don't have an insane ****load of setups, the tournament becomes INCREDIBLY slow. 40 person tournament needs 20 TVs. As soon as you drop below 20 (to even 19) the tournament doubles in time. A normal bracketed 40p event can run as fast (well, faster really) on 16 TVs, and still run competent on 8 TVs. Asking to always have 20 TVs is a bit much.

Rough seeding is also needed for the first couple rounds of Swiss too. GOTM showed me examples the other day where random seeding was used, and I was still able to point out flaws in the results because of how some of the first couple round matchups went. He added an extra round to alleviate it, which helped it some, but not completely.


What is the goal with this anyway?

If the goal is to more accurately determine the winners/results - are we unsatisfied with the current double elim system? I haven't heard any major complaints about it.

If the goal is to make tournaments run faster - this doesn't do it, changing the way the game is played does (ie. the 2 stock system I mentioned earlier).

If the goal is to give people more matches and arguable have a better time - does this do it? There's a few ways it can be done here. Sure, you can offer more matches via Swiss to give players a better time - it works for some. However, Swiss makes tournaments longer, and I guarantee you a ton of people also would enjoy tournaments being faster. Check out Pakman's comment for instance. I know I for one would LOVE tournaments much more if they didn't take up half of my weekend. I mean hell, GOTM and I dipped from our last tournament before Singles happened at 4pm to go drink and eat endless wings but with a 2 stock format we could have been done doubles and singles by that time. You can balance the idea of tournaments going faster by adding more events or things for people to do. A time for a lunch break, draft crews, bring back low tier events??? Now that sounds like an awesome event.

 

[Pakman]

Technically you can run Swiss rounds concurrently if you really wanted to speed them up.

 

[Mogwai]

Technically you can run Swiss rounds concurrently if you really wanted to speed them up.

No you can't

 

[Pakman]

I meant that you don't need to wait for everyone to finish if time were a factor. It isn't ideal but you could still pit winners versus winners even if the longer matches from the previous round are still ongoing.

You lose a bit of accuracy by not pseudo-seeding the matches, but it is still legitimate if you are on a crunch for time and didn't want to waste open set ups.

 

[GOTM]

GOTM showed me examples the other day where random seeding was used, and I was still able to point out flaws in the results because of how some of the first couple round matchups went. He added an extra round to alleviate it, which helped it some, but not completely.

What is the goal with this anyway?

I'll talk to both points quickly.

1) I was wrong. I was doing that by hand. Those results were flawed and now the software I use for Swiss is a million times better.

2) The goal is to increase hype overall, and increase the amount of matches each player gets without sacrificing as much accuracy as you would if you did pools to get more matches instead of Swiss.

 

[CT Chia]

I meant that you don't need to wait for everyone to finish if time were a factor. It isn't ideal but you could still pit winners versus winners even if the longer matches are still ongoing.

It doesn't matter, since the tournament would still take as long as the slowest match. It's best to do it round by round to ensure accuracy of the matchups.

---

GOTM Said: (too lazy to do full quote)
"increase the amount of matches each player gets"

What goal are you trying to achieve with this exactly. Make players enjoy tournaments more?

 

[GOTM]

I meant that you don't need to wait for everyone to finish if time were a factor. It isn't ideal but you could still pit winners versus winners even if the longer matches are still ongoing.

You could if you were doing it by hand. If you were using Swiss software, we'd have to find one that let us do that.

I unfortunately don't feel like running Swiss by hand, lol.

GOTM Said: (too lazy to do full quote)
"increase the amount of matches each player gets"

What goal are you trying to achieve with this exactly. Make players enjoy tournaments more?

Not directly, but I think players overall would enjoy a tournament capable of giving them more matches, still retaining accurate results, and still running on time, more than another that ran a double elimination bracket seeded by a TO's feel for the players.

Look at it this way. When you go to a Melee tournament that is running pools, what happens? You get seeded somewhere in the middle of your pool by who? The TO. The TO has no idea how good you are, all they know is that you've played at a lesser level than guys like M2K, and at a higher level than others throughout your smash career. There's no proof that on that given day though, you're where the TO thinks you should be.

Swiss lets you prove yourself, and achieve the correct seed in bracket. So I think the main argument should still stay around Single vs. Double elimination, post Swiss. I think we've clearly established Swiss is much better than seeding directly to bracket, or seeding pools.

 

[CT Chia]

Are people unsatisfied with the current results in tournaments and think they are innacurate enough to warrant a change?

 

[GOTM]

I'm entirely unsatisfied with pools. If there is not enough people for pools or Swiss, I have no problem with running a double elimination bracket as we do now.

If however, you're contemplating doing pools, there's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't do Swiss instead, unless you are SOL on TV's.

But even still, running a few rounds of Swiss at a small tournament where you would NOT have done pools, still makes sense. 2 pools of 6, or 6 pools of 2 might sound ********, because it is, however 4 rounds of Swiss with 12 people is actually pretty short and sweet, and it gives you a bit more accurate info to seed the bracket on, and doesn't take that long to run.

 

[Pakman]

Pools are easier to TO since you basically don't have to track each individual match.

 

[GOTM]

Pools are easier to TO since you basically don't have to track each individual match.

Yeah that's true. The TO does need to be a bit more focused to run Swiss, but then again, sometimes not being able to track every match can hurt the time, because players taking things into their own hands doesn't always work out too well, lol.

 

[Velocity]

You're still missing a lot of points I have a lot to add, which I'll do when I get home from work.

 

[GOTM]

I can't wait, lol.

 

[Scar]

If your goal is to increase hype then this is a good way to do it, provided good players still attend your tournies (I for one would protest single-elim brackets, but I'm not a great player anyway).

For me, double-elim provides a significantly better player experience. We can run the experiment if you like and measure the actual results, but I am confident that as soon as someone gets bracket-screwed in single-elim they will leave with a very sour taste in their mouth. Their entourage will likely be unhappy too.

If players enjoy their tourney experience they will go back, and the better you can do for each individual to ensure that they have a good experience, the better you are at running a tournament. IMO you're sacrificing the player experience as soon as you tell them that they are at the mercy of a bracket that left out an added layer of security if they have a bad beat.

 

[CT Chia]

I'm entirely unsatisfied with pools. If there is not enough people for pools or Swiss, I have no problem with running a double elimination bracket as we do now.

If however, you're contemplating doing pools, there's absolutely no reason why you shouldn't do Swiss instead, unless you are SOL on TV's.

But even still, running a few rounds of Swiss at a small tournament where you would NOT have done pools, still makes sense. 2 pools of 6, or 6 pools of 2 might sound ********, because it is, however 4 rounds of Swiss with 12 people is actually pretty short and sweet, and it gives you a bit more accurate info to seed the bracket on, and doesn't take that long to run.

I don't mean Swiss vs Pools. I more or less agree with you on that point (though I don't think many events will have the amount of setups needed. For instance the avg Spoc had what, like 60 entrants and 14 TVs? That's less than half of what is basically required for it to run well. And I use SPOC as an example since that series was legit as ****, and hey it also happened to always run pools).

Double Elimination is fine. With more or less ok seeding, it still determines satisfactory results. I doubt anyone would walk into a tournament and go "UHG DOUBLE ELIMINATION WHY WTF." Pools or Swiss is a bonus. Pools gives better seeding to the bracket, and say requires x/4 amount of TVs, where x is the amount of entrants. Swiss can give better seeding than even pools, but requires x/2 the amount of TVs. If you have x/2 amount of setups, then by all means do Swiss, it's better. I just don't think many tournaments will hit that number (ballin if they do though).

Basically what I was getting at with that last paragraph is that Swiss > Pools > Only Bracket. Running pools isn't bad, it's still a bonus. Swiss is an even better bonus, but requires more resources (double the amount of TVs pools requires).

Though since I think the overall goal seems to be with Swiss is that it's to make for a better tournament, I think using fewer stocks accomplishes that more, since tournaments end faster and you can not waste a full day and/or do extra events.


---


As for the single vs double elim after swiss argument, here's my take on it... I'm becoming a time stickler for events, and that mindset is leaning me towards single elimination. I don't think players will feel cheated for this, especially coming out of swiss. If you do single over double, just do an extra round of swiss so it's more accurate and players get an extra match. The time it takes to do single + one extra swiss round is a lot less than swiss and doubles. What's great about double elim is that you aren't out after losing a bad matchup. You already have that safety net with swiss. In fact, you've got like 3 safety nets or so. And going to double elim after that? A fourth safety nets. At that point you're just coddling players.

 

[GOTM]

As for the single vs double elim after swiss argument, here's my take on it... I'm becoming a time stickler for events, and that mindset is leaning me towards single elimination. I don't think players will feel cheated for this, especially coming out of swiss. If you do single over double, just do an extra round of swiss so it's more accurate and players get an extra match. The time it takes to do single + one extra swiss round is a lot less than swiss and doubles. What's great about double elim is that you aren't out after losing a bad matchup. You already have that safety net with swiss. In fact, you've got like 3 safety nets or so. And going to double elim after that? A fourth safety nets. At that point you're just coddling players.

This is my exact argument, lol. We agree 100% on this.

 

[Scar]

Two different kinds of safety nets exist, you are conflating the two:
1) Getting into bracket
2) Placement

If you're using swiss for seeding it doesn't serve as a safety net for placement, it serves as a safety net for making bracket. There is a high degree of accuracy with regards to what players will make bracket.

Once you make bracket and you're in single elim you have no safety net for elimination for the tourney, and hence placement. There is a low degree of accuracy with regards to what players will place where.

So now I ask the question, which is more important?

 

[GOTM]

If you're using swiss for seeding it doesn't serve as a safety net for placement, it serves as a safety net for making bracket.

I honestly think this is not 100% correct. I think the whole point of Swiss is to yes, serve as a safety net for making bracket, but also establishing correct seeds based on your skill in relation to other players.

Chess runs entirely on Swiss, no bracket at all, and they only run the same # of rounds. With that argument, how does this make any sense?

 

[Scar]

If you run the entire tourney in swiss and do no bracket, you will get the most accurate results of all. But you aren't doing that, so you lose all of the safety that Swiss established with respect to placement as soon as you throw people into single-elim.

 

[GOTM]

If you run the entire tourney in swiss and do no bracket, you will get the most accurate results of all. But you aren't doing that, so you lose all of the safety that Swiss established with respect to placement as soon as you throw people into single-elim.

How is that true if your argument was that a player might not ever play someone else in Swiss? lol

Round Robin gets you the best results of all, not Swiss.

 

[CT Chia]

You need to change that mentality when dealing with Swiss.

Placement with pools is there, but it's a little awkward. Swiss on the other hand, is all about ranking players.

Don't consider that final bracket as just "making bracket." Think of it more as making finals. For instance, say someones goal is to make top 10 at a tournament. Say the final bracket at Swiss is a 8p bracket. There will still be a 9th and 10th place player according to Swiss. I would also imagine (well, hope) that results from event will be past the final bracket and go into the full Swiss standings. That's one of the best positives I think to Swiss.

For time and excitement reasons, there needs to be a point where swiss needs to change to bracket. It needs to change to that for scheduling purposes (like what goes on stream), excitement to know what the true finals are, etc. Swiss is tournament and bracket is tournament. They are the same tournament. The thought barrier of qualifying to the bracket needs to be erased when running Swiss. GOTM already brought up a positive of how Swiss overall makes each match much more important than pools. That record is going to carry with you, determine your next matches, and your overall rank in swiss standings.

 

[Mogwai]

I honestly think this is not 100% correct. I think the whole point of Swiss is to yes, serve as a safety net for making bracket, but also establishing correct seeds based on your skill in relation to other players.

Chess runs entirely on Swiss, no bracket at all, and they only run the same # of rounds. With that argument, how does this make any sense?

I can't remember the last time I had to play Falcon vs. Falco in chess...

Why are we even running a bracket then if this is the argument you want to make? Just run swiss and after X rounds give top 3 the prize money and peace out.

Bracket creates hype, there's not as much hype if people are duking it out for 9th place in the last round of swiss while the "finals" are going on (since everyone's playing out their last round). But brackets also can lead to bad beats where a player runs into a stupid matchup or something that can make them lose. Now I get your whole argument of "that's their fault for not knowing the matchup" but frankly I don't think the community gives two ****s that that's what you think and they'd rather feel like Javi can come back through the losers bracket even if he lost Fox dittos to Lovage. Basically, bracket is hype but single elimination can lead to 1 bad beat = bad placing and double elimination brackets are a way to keep bracket hype without compromising safety nets against variance in results.

 

[Scar]

Round robin wasn't on the table. When comparing these three:

Swiss,
Swiss seeding for single elim,
Swiss seeding for double elim,

Swiss is the most accurate.

@Chibo You need to make the distinction between accuracy for making bracket, and accuracy for placement. Swiss *to seed* is a tool *to seed*. There is no way around this.

Imagine doing Swiss for seeding 100 people and then throwing everyone in a single elimination bracket. Is that just as accurate as Swiss for seeding and then throwing everyone into a double elimination bracket? Is it just as accurate as using Swiss for results? If there's any difference, then the distinction must be made.

 

[Pakman]

Double elimination is always going to be more accurate than single elimination.

The advantages of single elimination are more hyped matches and faster tournaments. There are a lot of people who leave tournaments before they are over because they need to take an X hour drive home. To combat bad beats I could see having a larger portion of the bracket best of 5s.

The disadvantages are less accurate placements. I, however, am not terribly certain the majority of players would feel cheated by losing in a single elimination bracket.

I like the idea because it still gives pretty legitimate results (although not as legitimate as double elimination). It still gives a lot of hype. It allows time for alternate events. It frees up tvs for friendlies faster. People who want to leave earlier still get to witness matches that are later in the tournament. Barring some shenanigans, there shouldn't be a lot of downtime waiting for matches to finish (no waiting for winners bracket to dump in your next opponent). I mean it kind of sucks for the top players who might go out a little earlier but I feel like your average player would appreciate the advantages.

 

[GOTM]

I think at the heart of this discussion is the scenario of a player being introduced to one of their worst matchups early in bracket, and not getting a chance to stay in the tournament after a loss. To this, I say, who cares?

1) Players have to think of this single elimination bracket as sort of the money bracket, after the "Swiss Bracket". Swiss is a HUGE part of the tournament, if we choose to do it that way. Yes we are using it to seed another side bracket that happens to pay out top 3, but when placings are determined, Swiss placings are included. It's not only for seeding, we just also happen to use it that way for a subset of the TOP players at the tournament.

2) It's a players own fault if they lose a best of 5 set to someone in this game. It's a players own fault if they do not do the things necessary in order for them to beat another character in Super Smash Brothers Melee. If you have CHOSEN to play a character that is not "S" tier, you are immediately entering each tournament with a disadvantage, obviously.

If your argument is you shouldn't be out of the tournament if you play one of your worst matchups, why even practice against your worst matchups? You're assuming you're just going to lose to them anyway and get another chance, so why even try and get better at them?

This game provides every single player with the same character list. If you feel a certain match is unfair, pick the same character and ditto that person, and outsmart them. I will never in a million years accept a john about a character, stage, or matchup, EVER, for a reason to do a double elimination tournament. All you have to do is pick the same character, and everything is equal. If you choose not to do that, well, sucks for you.

This game happens to favor technical characters pretty heavily, this game - meaning Melee. Now it might be an unbalanced game, but that's the game. If you say, "well it's not fair because I don't have the technical ability to get good with Fox/Falco" - then you are basically saying you do not have the technical ability to compete consistently in Melee without learning that character - aka - you do not have the technical ability to be good at this game.

With that being said, if we did things this way, the single elimination bracket would be best of 5, and finals would be best of 7. This is not to give players chances they do not deserve, this is to give players who HAVE practiced another character or another stage, like they are supposed to, the ability to put that practice to good use and show off their skill.

 

[Mogwai]

I thought the entire point of doing single elimination was to speed things up. If you're solution here is to make the matches 67% longer aren't you losing the entire reason you opted for single elimination in the first place?

 

[GOTM]

That was Chibo's preferred result of Single Elimination. Mine was to increase hype first, do Swiss which I really like, and possibly have it run faster than doing pools -> double, but that would just be an extra plus for me.