I could reasonably go with a 9-minute timer. 10 no way. 9 = 3/min a stock which at least seems cleaner.
However, whether a tournament is using a unity ruleset, or not, the number that run 8 minute timers are...what? Almost non-existent. 3 stock/8 minute is a staple of the game that will be very hard to convince anyone to change when the drawbacks are minor at best.
No, I'm advocating a two minute extension on the timer so matches at least go to last stock. I guarantee they would would 2 extra minutes.
Umm...what? You are advocating matches have a 10 minute timer so they go down to the last stock and still end in time outs?
Once again, it's because most matches end without time-outs due to the timer running so slow.
That is the timer serving it's function.
I found it very ironic that you said this. The 8 minute timer actually rewards time-outs because of it being so low, so it encourages air camping and such.. not approaching. Yeah, one deserves to lose for being punished multiple times, but do you want me to bring up matches where players have been punished slightly and have gotten timed out regardless?
Pretty sure we are going to see all of these tactics with a 10 minute timer. The difference is we have to watch it for 2 minutes longer.
And you base this assumption.. where again?
1) MLG data pegs 1% of games ending in timeouts of a sampling of over 3,000, which basically means the margin of error is non existent.
2) It is pretty reasonable to assume that adding another minute or two will not decrease the number of timeouts to zero, meaning that the number of timeouts that still exist will be between 0 and 1%. I posited that it would be roughly half the number we see in 8 minute matches. That is my original assumption, but then MK26 posted better stuff looking at the data:
3) According to MK26, 3 of the games (8/100th of 1%)) would likely still have gone to time in a 10 minute timer situation, so that is our minimun threshold. He stipulates also 26 of those 38 games would likely end within a 9 minute timer threshold. So, 3 games not ending in 10 minutes, 26 ending before 9 minutes, and 3 with no data, means extending to your idea of a 10 minute timer would have a whopping effect on 6/3,587 games, or slightly over 1/10th of 1% of all matches.
I fail to see how a 2 minute extension is "absurdly long." That's a maximum of 6 minutes per set, assuming the worst possible scenario.
Meanwhile a TO needs to be planning for worst case scenario, where Bo3's are now lasting 30 minutes instead of 24 minutes, an increase of 25%, or in other words, a tournament that I should be planning to finish in 10 hours now finishes in 12.5, all because of a less than .01% chance that someone, just maybe, possibly, could actually benefit from a 10 minute timer.
As of right now I plan on 30 minute sets, and in a given round that is roughly how long it takes because of factors like stage striking, counter picking, getting to seats, setting ports, finding people, etc. A single set in a given round of the bracket going to game 3, going to 10 minutes, effectively means every single set in that same round could have taken just as long and I would be able to run at the same efficiency. This is why when just one person holds up just one section of the bracket, it causes a cascading effect that ultimately reverberates to every subsequent round because everyone is waiting on the results of previous matches.
Extending to 9 minutes would be a squeeze, but maybe, just maybe possible (probably not really warranted but I digress). 10 minutes is absurd.