The World Cup Discussion Thread (OOC, version II)

[Errinundera]

If you would excuse a new World Cup participant's ignorance, what is generally considered the amount of in-character time that passes between World Cups? I am currently forming a roster for World Cup 56, and need to adjust my players' ages accordingly.

This page from NSwiki is worth read. Errinundera assumes four years; I've seen other nation treat it as yearly. And yes, all our national calendars are way out of sync.

[Saugeais]

If you would excuse a new World Cup participant's ignorance, what is generally considered the amount of in-character time that passes between World Cups? I am currently forming a roster for World Cup 56, and need to adjust my players' ages accordingly.

I've rotated between 3-4 years, but then again other nations follow their own various timelines. So make up your own if you want.

[Sarzonia]

Most of us use something called fluid time here on NS.

Some people use one year. Some use two years. Some use four years.

I RP in real time.

[The Babbage Islands]

My calendar is one RL month = one NS year, so I average sometimes two, sometimes three years between Cups. I scorinate my domestic league once each month, nominally as of the 1st but in practice whenever I find the time. My season 41 was "played" in the year corresponding to RL May 2011, and I should finish scorination in the next couple of days and post results.

One year, two years, four years, real time, in-sync, out-of-sync, or just outside of time entirely, you'll find all manner of scales happily co-existing.

[Pretty Awesome Persons]

Bergnovinaia 0-5 Pretty Awesome Persons

Yes!

[Civil Citizenry]

I'd like to introduce an idea that was discussed on IRC last night. During this World Cup cycle, I introduced the Next Generation Trophy, a friendly tournament with four newish, up-and-coming nations. It ran pretty well and it was rather interesting as a whole. I'm interested in expanding that event past a friendly WC competition.

The idea that was shuffled around was to field an invite-only 16-team tournament. Only nations created relatively recently (2010-2011) that have RP'd actively and have participated in a Baptism of Fire can be invited. Four groups of four would be made, playing a double round-robin in four randomly-selected competing nations. The top two go to the quarterfinals in my nation, and the semis and finals are held in the defending champions' stadium.

This would be a high-RP tournament with large RP bonuses and penalties for not RPing. The goal is to give new nations the opportunity to win a prestigious tournament before they're ready to challenge in the larger WC cycle tourneys. This would most likely be played alongside the BoF.

What do y'all think?

[Saugeais]

I'd like to introduce an idea that was discussed on IRC last night. During this World Cup cycle, I introduced the Next Generation Trophy, a friendly tournament with four newish, up-and-coming nations. It ran pretty well and it was rather interesting as a whole. I'm interested in expanding that event past a friendly WC competition.

The idea that was shuffled around was to field an invite-only 16-team tournament. Only nations created relatively recently (2010-2011) that have RP'd actively and have participated in a Baptism of Fire can be invited. Four groups of four would be made, playing a double round-robin in four randomly-selected competing nations. The top two go to the quarterfinals in my nation, and the semis and finals are held in the defending champions' stadium.

This would be a high-RP tournament with large RP bonuses and penalties for not RPing. The goal is to give new nations the opportunity to win a prestigious tournament before they're ready to challenge in the larger WC cycle tourneys. This would most likely be played alongside the BoF.

What do y'all think?

It also forces those you play to RP or face dire consequences. It seems like a good idea and I'd be all for it.

[Kagdazka and Pazhujebu]

<snip>

One very small comment.

I would be very careful what scorinator you use under your suggested RP bonus format. What you've just described (large potential bonuses plus penalties for non-RP) is a recipe for disaster if you use NSFS 3. You'd be forced to set max-points very high for your six-matchday group stage, and because nations could potentially be docked bonus points, you'd end up with a massive clump of nations at or near zero points, resulting in insanely wacky results.

I would test the living crap out of your RP bonus format before you go forward with anything.

EDIT: I'm also not a fan of double round robins on a neutral site... just ICly makes no sense to me. Why not just have teams play each other home and away? Or, if you want it to be neutral-venue but want the group stage to last longer than three matchdays, why not just have two groups of eight playing single round robin?

That's just my opinion, though.

[The Archregimancy]

One year, two years, four years, real time, in-sync, out-of-sync, or just outside of time entirely, you'll find all manner of scales happily co-existing.

Raises hand.

Though for practical purposes of working out the Archregimancy's Orthodox liturgical calendar, I use RL real time (Gregorian calendar for saints and Christmas; Julian calendar for Easter - the combination used by the Orthodox Church in America, who have the best English-language website for this sort of thing).

But otherwise the Dreamed Realm nations exist outside of both ordinary time and ordinary space.

I think the cumulative advice Stachland is getting here is 'suit yourself'.

[Krytenia]

Hell, I mix and match. Krytenia uses a four-year cycle, whilst both Logria and Keyne Island (yes, that Keyne Island) used two. So, go nuts.

[Bears Armed]

If you have many players who play for teams abroad then looking at what time rates apply for the nations in which they play might also be a good idea.


And then of course there are the nations whose players are so long-lived that the passage of time doesn't really matter for them (Elves, for example, or the Invisible Wabbits...) and whose teams could therefore potentially remain unchanged in membership for as long as their owners want...

[Starblaydia]

If you have many players who play for teams abroad then looking at what time rates apply for the nations in which they play might also be a good idea.

When Simeone Di Bradini went to player-manage in Vilita, their two-year-per-cup system prolonged his career long into his late forties, by the Starblaydi timeline. I think I blamed something in the Vilitan water. After he was very old by any standards, he ended up coming out of time entirely and is back to a sprightly 40-something. Forever.

[Virabia]

I go by One RL month per one IC year.

One domestic season per year and the WC falls roughly every four-five years. However when in an event time slows down to one day per rl day.

[Polar Islandstates]

CH is in control of my calendar. I age my players by one year everytime I see the draw go up for the first qualifying rounds of the TQCC.

[Mytannion]

CH is in control of my calendar. I age my players by one year everytime I see the draw go up for the first qualifying rounds of the TQCC.

This is pretty much the same for me, except I age them after the TQCC final - Commerce Heights is in complete control

[Bears Armed]

Re limiting the number of entrants into the World Cup to 122, as the V/NS bid for WC56 does, but without either leaving it simply at "first come, first served" (which could lead to a rush of newbies pre-empting too many of the regulars...) or automatically eliminating the new applicants, here's my current suggestion:

Limit the qualifiers to 120 teams, but with an actual upper limit of 180 applicants.
Assign half of those 120 places to the highest-ranked applicants, maybe plus the BoF winner [& runner-up, too?] as a reward for their success in that tournament.
Hold a set of play-off games (which, like any play-offs during the qualifiers, wouldn't count for KPB purposes) to fill the remaining places: 61st-highest-ranked applicant against 121st, 62nd against 122nd, etc (selecting randomly from amongst any teams that are ranked equally to each other on KPB points), maybe one 'home' & one 'away' match per pair rather than just a single game per pair.
If there are fewer than 180 applicants then increase the number of higher-ranking teams that automatically get into the qualifiers by one for each two teams by which you are short of 180, and adjust the number of puppets involved (by adding or removing one) if that's necessary in order to get an even number of teams for the play-offs for the remaining places.

[Virabia]

Re limiting the number of entrants into the World Cup to 122, as the V/NS bid for WC56 does, but without either leaving it simply at "first come, first served" (which could lead to a rush of newbies pre-empting too many of the regulars...) or automatically eliminating the new applicants, here's my current suggestion:

Limit the qualifiers to 120 teams, but with an actual upper limit of 180 applicants.
Assign half of those 120 places to the highest-ranked applicants, maybe plus the BoF winner [& runner-up, too?] as a reward for their success in that tournament.
Hold a set of play-off games (which, like any play-offs during the qualifiers, wouldn't count for KPB purposes) to fill the remaining places: 61st-highest-ranked applicant against 121st, 62nd against 122nd, etc (selecting randomly from amongst any teams that are ranked equally to each other on KPB points), maybe one 'home' & one 'away' match per pair rather than just a single game per pair.
If there are fewer than 180 applicants then increase the number of higher-ranking teams that automatically get into the qualifiers by one for each two teams by which you are short of 180, and adjust the number of puppets involved (by adding or removing one) if that's necessary in order to get an even number of teams for the play-offs for the remaining places.

I disagree, teams that repeatedly fail the Qualifier-Qualifier Match would suffer a huge KPB loss. Having a 200 team 1093 day long WC is honestly better. I favour a system like Newmanistan's modified that teams around the limit are entered based on the criteria of:

- Nations who competed in the previous Cup (non puppets)
- New Nations (non puppets)
- Puppets (First come first serve)

[Saugeais]

FYI my groups in the Cup of Harmony will be scorinated much later than expected today. I'm expecting to be out all day and will get back to have the groups done by midnight EST. Sorry for the inconvenience.

[Jedi8246]

Will there be a score/RP thread once all applicants have been accepted?

[Eastfield Lodge]

Will there be a score/RP thread once all applicants have been accepted?

Once signups are completed, there will be a separate thread for each of Rosters, Scores, and RPs.

[Newmanistan]

I sync together all tournaments in my advancing of time. So the gap between World Cup 54 and 55 could be 2 years; 55 and 56 be 1 year; and 56 and 57 be 4 years.

Bears, I think you just described a KPB-calculating nightmare.

[Jedi8246]

Will there be a score/RP thread once all applicants have been accepted?

Once signups are completed, there will be a separate thread for each of Rosters, Scores, and RPs.

Thank you.

[Stachland]

Thanks to everyone for the advice on how to advance players' ages between World Cups! It seems that I have my choice of how to proceed, so I will be sure to take all the suggestions I've received into account.

[Pretty Awesome Persons]

I tested my Paint skills with today's RP.
I failed.

[Novikov]

I would just like to point out that this thread has reached a L337 337 pages! Woot!