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Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?

Posted By: phil simborg
Date: Sunday, 3 April 2016, at 4:03 p.m.

In Response To: Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments? (Casper Van der Tak)

Any tie breaker, even a 1 pointer, is very time consuming and holds up the tournament and as we know, a 1 point match isn't a whole lot more skill than flipping a coin if the players are fairly equal.

Looking at head-to-head is fine if you have 2 players, and if there are 3 and you happen to have one who beat the other two, that works also. But it may well have to come down to a roll of the dice or a coin flip.

There are two things that keep that from feeling like a tough way to lose. First is to realize that you are in that position because you didn't win the right to move on by winning enough. So it's not just bad luck that you are in a position to be eliminated.

The second thing that tournaments can do in this kind of event is, I believe, even more important. Have the losers play a consolation tournament and have some decent prizes for the first and second place finishers. That way, even if you happen to be one of the people who didn't make it to the main event because of a coin flip, you still have a reasonable chance to win a decent prize.

Yes, when you pay more places or pay more to consolation and other places you are taking some of the money away from the top, but I have always believed that the first and second place prize money for most tournaments is too high, and that by spreading it out more you will have more people enjoying the tournament experience and walking away feeling happy. The first and second place finishers will be plenty happy anyway.

Part of my argument that the money is too top heavy is look how many people hedge. Yes, I know, there are some people who don't hedge..people who think they have a big edge over their opponent and some people who simply like to gamble and don't like to hedge...but they are the exception.

Also, I know that some very top players feel they have less incentive to go to tournaments if the top place money isn't higher. Again, that is very few people, like Mochy or Akiko who walk into every tournament with a reasonable chance to win, but I wonder how much more or less they would have made if there was a little less money to first and second and a little more for semifinalists and consolation? I know they often only get to that level themselves. They might actually come out ahead!

So back to the main question....if there is more money for consolation, then ending up tied for 3rd in your group and losing a flip isn't such a bad deal, because your equity in the consolation won't be that much worse than if you had won the flip.

Messages In This Thread

• Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
  sebalotek -- Sunday, 3 April 2016, at 2:58 p.m.
  • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
    Casper Van der Tak -- Sunday, 3 April 2016, at 3:05 p.m.
    • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
      phil simborg -- Sunday, 3 April 2016, at 4:03 p.m.
      • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
        niuniuch -- Sunday, 3 April 2016, at 4:48 p.m.
        • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
          phil simborg -- Monday, 4 April 2016, at 2:35 a.m.
          • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
            garyo -- Monday, 4 April 2016, at 7:02 a.m.
            • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
              sebalotek -- Thursday, 7 April 2016, at 3:57 p.m.
      • Fairest order of tie-breakers for backgammon round-robin tournaments?
        Casper Van der Tak -- Sunday, 3 April 2016, at 7:12 p.m.