Tiebreaker in Swiss tournament

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euklid314
Posts: 309
Joined: 06 April 2020, 22:56

Tiebreaker in Swiss tournament

Post by euklid314 »

I am sure that this has been discussed before:

In a seven round Swiss Carcassonne-tournament (https://boardgamearena.com/tournament?id=43043) I had a bye (free win) in the first round (bc. of an odd number of participants) then I played against six very strong opponents in the preceding rounds.

The first tiebreaker (points of opponents) is heavily punished. My first "opponent" is calculated to have won -6 games out of 6 games (not 0 out of 6, as I did expect). This will increase to -7 wins after the last round is over.
The second tiebreaker (ELO of opponents) is heavily punished too. My first "opponent" is calculated to have an ELO of -1000 (not 0, as I had expected).

Please note, that there can never exist a fair ruling if any byes occur in a tournament. Why should I have an advantage because I got a free win? But on the other hand, why should I have such a heavy disadvantage if I get a bye? I never had the chance to play the first round and thus win the tournament (which I probably would have, even if my first round player were a novice with 0 Elo points and made 0 wins in the whole tournament). Now I can take at best something like the 5th to 7th place in the tournament (which is still in progress - and I am happy with this result too :-).

Has this topic been discussed before? Is there a broad agreement that a player with a bye should have as little as possible chance to win a tournament?

Please note that I am fine with any rules. In all my previous tournaments that I played online or offline (chess,...) the tiebreaker penalty for getting a bye was less severe. Thus I am eager to learn if there is a broad consensus on the BGA rules presented above.

Have fun, euklid
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ThreeMiler
Posts: 14
Joined: 28 December 2019, 06:34

Re: Tiebreaker in Swiss tournament

Post by ThreeMiler »

If the bye always went to the lowest ranked player, or the lowest ranked player out of the group with the fewest points (with the stipulation that any player may only receive one bye), then the byes would be very unlikely to play a role in determining the champion. Playing against a bye should be like playing against a player that has not won any games, so 0 points and should not even be included in the average ELO of opponents, seeing as a bye has no ELO.
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