Falatulu-Electrum 75: #TimeForCasaran (WC75 Bid)

[Falatulu]

Thanks to Red Blackiland for the logo

Falatulu-Electrum 75: #TimeForCasaran

About Falatulu

IC: Following Falatulu's secession from the Free Republics, the former Republican National Soccer Team became the Falatulu National Soccer Team. Although the Falatulu National Team failed to qualify for WC74, their first representing Falatulu, they nonetheless went on to win the 66th Cup of Harmony as part of Esportiva's sweep of the top 2 spots in both the World Cup and Cup of Harmony last cycle. Under pressure from Rule Theriault, the Falatuluan government agreed to authorize bids to bring Campionato Esportiva XVI and World Cup 75 to the island nation, though Rule Theriault's National Team corporation will be footing the cost of renovating stadiums out of pocket. Theriault secretly entered talks with officials from several nations before deciding to bid with the Electrumites and eventually working out the details, including a new format for Qualifying that would make qualifying more exciting and give every nation an equal opportunity to prove that they deserve one of the 30 spots in the World Cup Finals.

OOC: The user behind Falatulu has been around NS Sports for over 3 years and has hosted or co-hosted almost every major competition, including World Cup 68 (with Legalese), Cup of Harmony 58 (with Falcus), Baptism of Fire 59 (with Star United States), the X Winter Olympics, World Bowl XXII, CR XXII, WBC 27 (with Maklohi Vai), WCoH 23, IBC 17 (with Royal Kingdom of Quebec), the King Paulus XV Memorial Games, IBS 6 and many other tournaments. Falatulu is currently hosting CE XVI. Additionally, he is a former President of the International Basketball Organization, a former President of the World Bowl Assembly, a former Vice President of the Olympic Council and finished 3rd in the last vote for World Cup Committee President.

About Electrum

IC: Electrum Football had secretly entered talks with their counterparts from Falatulu during the qualifications of the last World Cup, after it was identified that both teams had managers with the organisational expertise to host a World Cup. After two successive qualifications, Electrum Football’s popularity has been at an all-time high, and they decided it would be best to take advantage of that and to host the multiverse’s premier sporting tournament. It was decided that for such a momentous occasion, the 75th World Cup, that there should be a change in the qualification format in order to bring excitement and reinvigorate qualification.

OOC: Electrum is a seasoned veteran and has hosted many tournaments including two editions of the International Basketball Championships and the World Hoops Showcase with Mizuyuki, the 22nd Rugby World Cup, World Bowl XXVI, 6 tennis tournaments and multisport events: Multiverse Games, co-hosting the Games of the X Olympiad and the XI Winter Olympics. Additionally, Electrum is the President of the International Basketball Organisation and the Vice President of the Olympic Council.

Format

The World Cup Finals will be contested under the conventional 32 team format used by all 74 previous editions of the World Cup.

Qualifying will be contested under a Casaran format, to last 10 matchdays. In the interest of giving everybody the maximum possible amount of time to roleplay and in avoiding burnout, we will be scorinating matchdays during Qualifying on the every 48 hours basis rather than the every 24 hours basis that has been used in previous World Cups. Due to one of the unique advantages of the Casaran format, any even number of teams is workable. Every team will play a total of 5 home matches and 5 away matches. An explanation of how the Casaran System works follows below:

After each matchday, teams will be sorted by the following order: Points, Total Wins, and by placement from the World Cup Seeding Committee (IC designation and RP opportunity; OOCly, it will be in order of RP-adjusted Rank - that is, the Rank and RP bonus combined, as used for the most recent scorination).
Brackets will be created by splitting teams by point level – for example, after the first matchday, all the winners will go into one bracket, all the teams that drew into another, and all the losing sides into a third bracket – checking for even numbers, and then pairing within the brackets. These pairings will be top – to – bottom, where the highest-placed side in a bracket faces the lowest-placed side, and so on. This will start with the top bracket, and work our way down the table, until everyone is paired up.
There are a few restrictions that come into play that may modify the pairings. The first is a no-rematch rule, which prohibits two teams from playing each other more than once during this phase, since the idea is to spread the matches out from around the entire field. If this occurs, the nearest swap that can be made, in terms of points and rank, will be made with another opponent.
The other restriction will apply partially on MDs 3 and 7, and completely on 4, 8, and 10. As all matches are hosted by one nation or the other, it is the aim of the hosts to provide each team with a schedule that balances the timing of these matches. As such, each team will have a home game twice in their first four matchdays, twice more in their next four, and again on either MD 9 or 10. To do this, pairings will be tweaked to ensure this occurs where necessary. Otherwise, the home team will be determined either by who needs a home game, or by a completely random method.

After all ten matchdays have been completed, the teams will be ranked by the sort order once again and the top 30 will qualify for the World Cup. Should any teams be tied on points with the team in 30th place, then all teams tied on points with the 30th team will be guaranteed, at minimum, a spot in a two-leg home-and-away playoff.

Scorination/RP Bonus/Tiebreakers

We will use Xkoranate, with the version of SQIS previously used for World Cup 68, the Sporting World Cup (U-18WC1) and currently being used for CE XVI. It is a slightly less random version of SQIS originally designed by Legalese. The RP bonus will be cumulative, non-degrading and emphasize quality over quantity. There will be a carryover for the WC finals equivalent to one matchday's worth of RP bonus. The full range of style modifiers from -5 to +5 will be used. For tiebreakers during the Finals, we will utilize (in order): HTH points, HTH goal differential, overall goal differential, goals for, neutral site tiebreaker match.

Feel free to ask any questions you may have.

[Frenline Delpha]

That logo is... something.

[Ethane]

Interesting format...

[Flardania]

Why is it #TimeForCasaran? What about Casaran in you opinion makes it better than the usual format and what does it actually do different in terms of final result. Is it more low rank friendly, more high rank friendly, and if so why is that so important. So many questions

[Falatulu]

Why is it #TimeForCasaran? What about Casaran in you opinion makes it better than the usual format and what does it actually do different in terms of final result. Is it more low rank friendly, more high rank friendly, and if so why is that so important. So many questions

Well, I have wanted to try again with Casaran ever since I was the junior partner on the last Casaran WC bid, which lost the closest host vote in the history of the World Cup and I've finally found a co-host in Electrum who is able and willing to go down this road.

If you're trying to make World Cup Qualifying more friendly to high ranked nations or low ranked nations, the way to do that is not really through the format so much as your choice of scorinator and your RP bonus scale. The final 32 teams that qualify for the World Cup Finals will likely be roughly the same under either a Casaran or a more conventional x groups of y format. The difference is mainly in the journey to that destination.

The primary advantages of Casaran, from the point of view of those participating in a Casaran tournament, would likely be the shorter length of Qualifying and a more exciting schedule. With Casaran, we can offer the same 10 matchday length of a 30 group format but without any winner take all groups or putting group winners into playoffs. Instead, Casaran simply places everybody into a group and constructs the equivalent of a ladder over the course of the matchdays. As you win matches, you climb up the ladder and as you lose matches, you fall down the ladder. To visualize what a Casaran tournament looks like in practice, you could take a look at the World Bowl XXII Results Thread. In the end, the teams at the top of the ladder were almost entirely the ones that were either highly ranked coming in or actively RPing in the tournament (and that World Bowl had [url=http://forum.nationstates.net/search.php?keywords=world+bowl&terms=all&author=&fid[]=7&sc=1&sf=titleonly&sr=topics&sk=t&sd=d&st=0&ch=300&t=0&submit=Search]roughly twice the level of activity[/url] of other World Bowls from that era).

In a Casaran format tournament, the low-rank, no RP, no roster teams tend to fall toward the bottom of the ladder after a few days and stay there, allowing the teams that are actually active or highly ranked to battle it out for the 30 spots in the World Cup without having to worry about dropping points on the final day of qualifying to somebody who CTEd a week prior. Instead, you'll play 10 different opponents over the course of Qualifying (5 at home and 5 away) and if you're in serious contention for qualification in the final days, your opponents will be other teams that are also in serious competition. Likewise, teams that have already secured qualification will be playing other teams that have already secured qualification and teams that are out of contention will be playing other teams that are out of contention.

Another benefit of Casaran's shorter group stage is that we are able to double the amount of time between matchdays, giving everybody 48 hours to RP during Qualifying instead of just 24, without making the tournament excessively long in RL terms. Even with twice as much time between matchdays, World Cup Qualifying will still just last 19 RL days from start to finish under our proposed format, excluding any possible playoffs to sort out ties for 30th place after matchday 10.

While I certainly don't expect Casaran to ever become the norm for the World Cup (especially since it is significantly more difficult to host a Casaran tournament than it is to host a conventional tournament of comparable size and activity level) but I have hosted several tournaments with this format in the past and have seen firsthand its potential for making tournaments more exciting. While none of the past 74 World Cup used the Casaran format, Casaran has been tested in the World Bowl, the IBC, the CR, the CoH and the BoF and has shown itself to be a viable alternative to the conventional format for those tournaments. I'm convinced that a Casaran WCQ would make WC Qualifying, which is already the most exciting and most active event on our sub-forum, even more exciting and that's why I've wanted to give this another try for a long time. It was just a matter of finding a bidding partner who was both interested in bidding with a Casaran format and capable of pulling it off and I believe Electrum qualifies as such a bidding partner.

[Frenline Delpha]

I like this idea, so this bid has my full support. I do believe it is #TimeForCasaran

[Pasarga]

What Falatulu fails to mention is how the Casaran punishes successful and high ranking nations, as they have to face one another, providing easier paths to qualification for those who lose a few matches or low ranking sides. It does not crown the best squads, rather the most fortunate ones, far more arbitrarily than the conventional format.

[Eura]

What Falatulu fails to mention is how the Casaran punishes successful and high ranking nations, as they have to face one another, providing easier paths to qualification for those who lose a few matches or low ranking sides. It does not crown the best squads, rather the most fortunate ones, far more arbitrarily than the conventional format.

I personally concur with these sentiments, and I also have issues with the length of qualifying in this bid and how it cuts down opportunity to RP, the scorination formula which last time it was used went down pretty poorly, and with my own past witnessing of Casaran in practice. Its not been used that much but if the CR with it was anything to go by (and an AOCAF I think) then I don't personally want the Casaran format anywhere near the World Cup. I also take issue with your comment in the OP that Casaran is advantageous because it doesn't have groups where "winners take all" and doesn't have a play off lottery - the whole Casaran stage is near enough a lottery in relative terms and I am firmly in favour of World Cup qualifying groups always having one automatic qualifier, because its fair and it works, and rewards people who are persistent enough and make enough effort to qualify without them being stunted by playoff lotteries like certain World Cups previous. Wink wink nudge nudge.

Also, and I know this is an odd criticism, but the format just seems too far off the real life formula for me. I know the NSWC is not remotely realistic and I don't think that's a defining reason why someone should be against Casaran or something, but the whole system just strikes me as changing it up for the sake of changing it up/Americanisation of a more traditional format that we know works. Its pretty off putting in that regard, as is the crusade in favour of it without trying to be too critical of the hosts who I both appreciate have a great deal of hosting experience etc.

So my all in all summary of my view is that Casaran might work for some tournaments and sports, but it will not work for the World Cup and I'd be very unsurprised if we massively regret using it later. Trying it for the sake of doing so when it doesn't improve significantly on the existing usual qualifying formats is pointless. I got the same vibe from the whole "everyone has to go through playoffs" group stage which was crap, and I got the same vibe from that bid you abandoned a few cycles ago Saintland. So no, I'm afraid I'm strongly opposed to this bid as you might both have guessed based on my previous comments on IRC, though I don't hold much against either of you over it - my tone can just come across as a bit bitey sometimes. Sorry.

[Super-Llamaland]

How much more room for randomness do you think there'd be in a Casaran that only lasts ten MDs?

[Eastfield Lodge]

Aside from the concerns that have already been aired, I have one that I'm pretty sure came in the Legalese bid - how quickly will you be able to announce the next MDs fixtures for RP purposes?

[Chiata]

Aside from the concerns that have already been aired, I have one that I'm pretty sure came in the Legalese bid - how quickly will you be able to announce the next MDs fixtures for RP purposes?

I was in in BoF 52, which was Casaran format. Assuming it would be the same, the next MD schedule is posted right after the results are given for the current

[Falatulu]

Aside from the concerns that have already been aired, I have one that I'm pretty sure came in the Legalese bid - how quickly will you be able to announce the next MDs fixtures for RP purposes?

I was in in BoF 52, which was Casaran format. Assuming it would be the same, the next MD schedule is posted right after the results are given for the current

Our plan is to post the scores first in the interest of making sure everybody knows how their team did as soon as possible. The actual table and schedule for the next matchday will be delayed slightly. We'll guarantee that the schedule for the next matchday will be posted at least 24 hours prior to every cutoff, though we'll aim to have them as soon as possible (ideally within 2 hours).

How much more room for randomness do you think there'd be in a Casaran that only lasts ten MDs?

While shortening the sample size inherently increases randomness, we are using the less random version of SQIS to balance things out.

Under Casaran, even if a weak team upsets a strong team, teams at the same point total and win total are still drawn best vs worst, 2nd best vs 2nd worst and so on. This provides the teams with higher rank+RP bonus with an easier schedule early on. When they end up playing each other, quite a few of them will have already qualified. For example, you're not going to see Nephara playing SJG on MD3 or Pasarga on MD4 (barring a major scheduling error). If you doubt me, look at the results of World Bowl XXII. The teams that were tied for 16 at the end were basically the same teams that would have likely advanced under a conventional format. As always in Qualifying, somebody will overperform and somebody will underperform but in the end the final 30 will be basically the same as it would be in an x groups of y format. Compared to a 10 MD conventional format, Casaran may actually be less random.

It is true that Casaran will alter the statistical distribution of the ranking points by slightly decreasing points for most of the teams at the top and slightly increasing them for most teams at the bottom. Another factor that can alter this is the choice of scorinator. For example, NSFS helps the teams toward the top while SQIS is more favorable to mid-rank teams. In addition, choosing one scorinator as opposed to another has much more impact on the qualifying chances of various nations than the choice of format.

Based on my past experience hosting and participating Casaran tournaments, I can state with confidence that it isn't going to be that different in terms of randomness from what we're used to.

[Vilita]

Would it be fair to say that a "major error" of the type suggested (IE: A scheduling error) with grave impacts to the integrity of results is both A) More likely to occur and B) More likely to go immediately unnoticed, thereby causing awkward decisions later on when it is uncovered after multiple matchdays have progressed - every once of which was impacted by the single mistake; when compared to a more traditional system where the entire schedule is posted and known in advance, there is no additional manual labor required on a matchday by matchday basis and, should any such errors occur, their impact would be isolated to a single group and not affect the integrity of the entire qualifying session?


How do you reduce/remove these risks?

[Audioslavia]

What Falatulu fails to mention is how the Casaran punishes successful and high ranking nations, as they have to face one another, providing easier paths to qualification for those who lose a few matches or low ranking sides. It does not crown the best squads, rather the most fortunate ones, far more arbitrarily than the conventional format.

As strange as it is for me to be in this thread defending a rival bid, this fallacy that the Casaran system 'punishes' stronger teams gets brought up too often for my liking. It just patently isn't true. Higher-seeded teams have a much, much easier time of it over the first half of qualifying. The big teams won't be playing each other until the latter stages, and even then a loss against a big team won't hurt, as every round is seeded. A top-seeded side on, say, 13 points after six matchdays may well be tied for twenty-somethingth place with a host of other teams, but the side they will play in the next round will be the lowest seeded side on 13 points (or possibly the highest seeded side on 12 points).

As for Eura's comments about the Casaran AOCAF Cup going badly: It didn't. It was great fun. I wouldn't call it an 'Americanization' either, as the system isn't an American one.

The Casaran system is fine. The only problem with this bid is that there is a much better bid elsewhere sneaky link

[Gregoryisgodistan]

Would it be fair to say that a "major error" of the type suggested (IE: A scheduling error) with grave impacts to the integrity of results is both A) More likely to occur and B) More likely to go immediately unnoticed, thereby causing awkward decisions later on when it is uncovered after multiple matchdays have progressed - every once of which was impacted by the single mistake; when compared to a more traditional system where the entire schedule is posted and known in advance, there is no additional manual labor required on a matchday by matchday basis and, should any such errors occur, their impact would be isolated to a single group and not affect the integrity of the entire qualifying session?


How do you reduce/remove these risks?

As I recall from the World Bowl, Saintland/Falatulu/FFR has a computer program that handles this. It may require adaptation to handle draws (which aren't possible in the World Bowl) but the program worked fine then. He can say more if he wants.

Edit: Given the massive timezone difference between the hosts, I'm assuming Electrum will be using the program too rather than Falatulu running it himself for all matchdays due to the delay that might cause if Electrum cuts off during the middle of the night in North America. Has Electrum practiced with the program before, or, barring that, is it intuitive enough that anyone can use it without much difficulty?

Edit 2: If the schedule will be posted at least 24 hours before the next cutoff but possibly up to two hours after scores are posted, won't this mean cutoff will get progressively later to the point where it will be unfeasible for the host to cut off so late? I suppose since you're each scorinating only five matchdays, if your first cutoff is at noon your time, the last would be no later than 10 PM, but are you able to handle such a wide range of cutoff times?

[Eastfield Lodge]

Would it be fair to say that a "major error" of the type suggested (IE: A scheduling error) with grave impacts to the integrity of results is both A) More likely to occur and B) More likely to go immediately unnoticed, thereby causing awkward decisions later on when it is uncovered after multiple matchdays have progressed - every once of which was impacted by the single mistake; when compared to a more traditional system where the entire schedule is posted and known in advance, there is no additional manual labor required on a matchday by matchday basis and, should any such errors occur, their impact would be isolated to a single group and not affect the integrity of the entire qualifying session?


How do you reduce/remove these risks?

As I recall from the World Bowl, Saintland/Falatulu/FFR has a computer program that handles this. It may require adaptation to handle draws (which aren't possible in the World Bowl) but the program worked fine then. He can say more if he wants.

Edit: Given the massive timezone difference between the hosts, I'm assuming Electrum will be using the program too rather than Falatulu running it himself for all matchdays due to the delay that might cause if Electrum cuts off during the middle of the night in North America. Has Electrum practiced with the program before, or, barring that, is it intuitive enough that anyone can use it without much difficulty?

Edit 2: If the schedule will be posted at least 24 hours before the next cutoff but possibly up to two hours after scores are posted, won't this mean cutoff will get progressively later to the point where it will be unfeasible for the host to cut off so late? I suppose since you're each scorinating only five matchdays, if your first cutoff is at noon your time, the last would be no later than 10 PM, but are you able to handle such a wide range of cutoff times?

On the second point, they have two days between matches (i.e. 48 hours), the next matches will be posted between 2 and 24 hours after the scores

[Eura]

What Falatulu fails to mention is how the Casaran punishes successful and high ranking nations, as they have to face one another, providing easier paths to qualification for those who lose a few matches or low ranking sides. It does not crown the best squads, rather the most fortunate ones, far more arbitrarily than the conventional format.

As for Eura's comments about the Casaran AOCAF Cup going badly: It didn't. It was great fun. I wouldn't call it an 'Americanization' either, as the system isn't an American one.

The Casaran system is fine. The only problem with this bid is that there is a much better bid elsewhere sneaky link

Maybe I'm wrong on the AOCAF point, I was speaking on the basis of what others have told me. The Rushmori one though was definitely not good. Americanisation is perhaps the wrong term to use too, but I stand by my point that its a pointless transformation.

[Falatulu]

Would it be fair to say that a "major error" of the type suggested (IE: A scheduling error) with grave impacts to the integrity of results is both A) More likely to occur and B) More likely to go immediately unnoticed, thereby causing awkward decisions later on when it is uncovered after multiple matchdays have progressed - every once of which was impacted by the single mistake; when compared to a more traditional system where the entire schedule is posted and known in advance, there is no additional manual labor required on a matchday by matchday basis and, should any such errors occur, their impact would be isolated to a single group and not affect the integrity of the entire qualifying session?


How do you reduce/remove these risks?

The #1 way we'll be keeping that risk to a minimum is by finding a cutoff time when both of us can be online to handle the scheduling process and ensure that the schedule is 100% accurate before it is posted.

The Casaran scheduling rules are:

A) Matches between teams with the same number of points.

B) No repeat matchups in Casaran stage. Adjustments will be made to prevent repeat matchups whenever they shall occur.

C) Each team must play exactly 2 home matches on MDs 1-4, exactly 2 home matches on MDs 5-8 and exactly 1 home match on MD 9 or 10. Adjustments shall be made to ensure that any team that has already received its home games shall be on the road.

To make it easier to catch matchups that violate scheduling rules B) and C), our bonus spreadsheet will contain a grid listing every single nation down both the first row and the first column. On this grid, there will be two cells where every individual pair of nations intersect. A positive 1 will be placed into one cell while a negative 1 will be placed into the other (to represent home and away). The SUM() function will be applied to each column and each row corresponding with each nation. On MD3 and MD7, any team with a +2 or -2 sum (2 more home matches than away matches or 2 more away matches than home matches) will be assigned the matchup they need to bring that down to +1 or -1. On MD4, MD8 and MD10, every team with a +1 or -1 will be assigned a home or away matchup in order to bring their total to 0. We're also going to let the spreadsheet tabulate the absolute value of each row and column, as a sanity check to ensure that everybody has the right number of matches entered into the spreadsheet.

---

The process for determining schedules for the following matchup can be summarized as:

1) Scorinate the previous matchday
2) Paste results into the xkoranate table generator to produce a table
3) Apply the sort order to the table
4) Determine raw matchups based on table
5) Check for duplicate matchups, swap as necessary
6) Check for matchups between 2 teams that both need a home game/both need an away game, swap as necessary (verify that new matchups aren't duplicates)
7) Determine home/away teams for all matchups, make sure all teams that need a home game or need an away game are playing where they need to be playing
8) Post matchups

[San Jose Guayabal]

Guys, seeing that we are getting near the crunch time, let me ask you a couple of questions.

1) In case your bid is elected, how will the group format be sorted out, considering that we have around 125 entries.
2) Apart from the format, what marks the difference of this bid compared to the rival ones?

[Falatulu]

Guys, seeing that we are getting near the crunch time, let me ask you a couple of questions.

1) In case your bid is elected, how will the group format be sorted out, considering that we have around 150 entries.
2) Apart from the format, what marks the difference of this bid compared to the rival ones?

1) If our bid is chosen, we'll reopen signups until the end of the BoF. If the final number is odd, we'll add or remove a puppet to make it even. If the final number is even, we'll go with it no matter what it is because any even number is workable with Casaran.

2) The other major difference besides the format is the choice of scorininator. We've gone with the modified SQIS used in WC68, which we feel provides a middle ground between unmodified SQIS and NSFS. While I'm posting, I probably should also mention that we're the only bid with 2 former Olympic hosts.