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Fairer Method When Exactly Three Players Remain In Draw

Posted By: Colin Owen
Date: Sunday, 12 June 2011, at 2:04 p.m.

In Response To: Fairer Method When Exactly Three Players Remain In Draw (Phil Simborg)

A round robin of the three players is certainly the fairest method of resolving the tie, though I'm not sure about using PR's as a tiebreaker. Better than drawing lots though, that's for sure. But the length of the matches has to be reconsidered.

In our weekly little £5 tournament, six players is quite a common number. To avoid the huge chunk of luck that byes create, we have a preliminary round of 5 points, then a three player round robin to 3 points. If each player wins one match - which should happen, of course 25% of the time (assuming equal skill) the pot is shared. But this is no good if you need to attribute a trophy and title. In the case in point, a major tournament, a further round robin of shorter matches could be played, perhaps also combined with faster time controls.

If 11 points is the standard match length in the tournament then maybe the original round robin should be to fewer points, to take into account that two or three rounds will be required. If you also want match results to ultimately decide the issue, rather than PR's, then you should make the matches a bit shorter still to allow for another round robin if there is a tie. Ultimately, you could have one or two point matches, perhaps with blitz time controls. At some point of course, a halt has to be called.

The order of playing needs to be considered. The three players might mutually agree that one player sits out the first round, and even then agree who plays in the second round. Fine. But if there is no agreement a random draw decides the first pairing. If you want to resolve the issue as quickly as possible, the winner of the first match would play in the second. If he wins that then the third match is superfluous with regards to 1st place. (Whether 2nd place is then automatically shared is another issue.) But if each player is to be guaranteed two meaningful matches then the winner of the first match must not play in the second. If you apply the former principle, then the matches can perhaps be longer as, on average, fewer will be needed.

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