Ladle 30 31 and 32 Rules and timing discussion

[kyle]

I know that we are not even close to having ladle 29 but I think it's important to start these a bit earlier, that was a week or so after ladle 29 we can start a vote.
so first off a list on dates that they are on:
Ladle 30 - 07 February 2010
Ladle 31 - 07 March 2010
Ladle 32 - 04 April 2010

One think that I believe will need to be discussed is time, ladle 32 is after Daylight savings time begins. I think we should vote on something more general.

Ladles From April - October (which will cover daylight savings time) start at 17:00 GMT for a 32 team bracket, of course for 16 team it starts at 17:45 GMT
and from November - March it is at 18:00 GMT for a 32 team bracket, of course for 16 team it starts at 18:45 GMT

Now also there is really no clear rule as to when teams should be signed up by, In fact the old rule that the could sigh up up until the last day is still in the wiki. But with randomizing teams in the brackets i think something should be set. I would say by the Thursday prior to the ladle. Then brackets can be set that evening or the following day, allowing blogger time to write their "unbiased" predictions.

Since seconds Sunday for January seams to have a lot of support Lets go ahead and vote for that to be the correct date for future January ladles or maybe something like First Sunday after the first Tuesday of the month, It's not a for while(2013) that that would make it the first Sunday of the month but why wait an extra week when the first Sunday is far from new years?


I'm sure that i have forgotten some things that were on my list that I've been accumulating in my head, but i believe those of the main things. anything else?


Sample questions:
Ladle brackets should be set on...
Thursday, Friday, Saturday
...before ladle, which will stop the ability to sign up a team.

should ladles from April - October start at 17:00 GMT and November - March start at 18:00 GMT (no matter the amount of teams) or (based on a 32 team or more bracket making a 16 team bracket start 45 minutes after the time mentioned)

Should the January ladle be held on...
...The second sunday of the month.
...The first Sunday after the first Tuesday of the month.

[Concord]

Sounds good.

I never claimed to be unbiased, for the record. Who keeps the record these days?

[kyle]

I never claimed to be unbiased, for the record. Who keeps the record these days?

i was more or less referring to durka and his last one , I know i won one time and durka won the last one. I forget the rest.

Oh and the other big thing is we voted for global moderators, how do we determine them and whatnot?

[Goodygumdrops]

Let's just do 17 gmt for april to october and 18 gmt for november to march, no matter how many teams are signed up

[Flex]

most of the issues and problems that occur can be prevented, by simply up-holding some of the basic rules we have in place. such as;

1. Ladle brackets once locked, should be really locked. I've noticed quite a few times, someone decides to edit the bracket and change a roster, add or remove a player after the servers and team positions have been set. this simply shouldn't be done, it opens up a world of loop holes.
2. Ladle teams should have a minimum and a maximum amount of players. this simply prevents the abuse of "faking" a team onto the team list in order to vote in the settings and rules discussion on these forums. maximum amount of players per team simply prevents the abuse of having an influx of players, just so you can make sure that you can by-pass the #1 rule. (not having to edit the locked wiki) or any other form of abuse from having too many on one team. I think a minimum of 4 and a maximum of 12 should be enough.

as far as i can see, we have a very open tournament with a lot of areas that can be abused for a simple advantage, but luckily nobody really abuses it. though it should still be ruled out, for the future.

[Concord]

I still don't understand the arguments for a minimum, and I can't think of one team sport that has a minimum either.

[epsy]

1. Ladle brackets once locked, should be really locked. I've noticed quite a few times, someone decides to edit the bracket and change a roster, add or remove a player after the servers and team positions have been set. this simply shouldn't be done, it opens up a world of loop holes.

Teams can, as far as I know, already pick up players on the spot. It's actually better if they edit the Challenge Board page(!= brackets)

[kyle]

I added some of the questions to the first post, see if they should be written a bit better or whatnot.

also we still have not discussed about who or how we should determine global moderators.

@goody, the reason why I say based on a 32 team bracket is because when we first brought up moving the starting time back it was based on a 32 team bracket, the first time it was implemented it was for a 16 team bracket, so it was only moved 15 minutes back and that time seams to be working well, but I added both options to the question.

[kyle]

This really should get finalized soon, so voting can start only 3 weeks and 2 days till next ladle

[sinewav]

Important Stuff

Our annual voting has only a couple of issues to address for Ladle 30-32. However, I think this is a good time to clear up important issues regarding the very out-of-date wiki page "Guidelines". After voting ends, we should shape it up a little.

For complete and up-to-date information about what to do, click the Guidelines link at the top or the bottom of the page.

My first suggestion is to combine the "stages" with the bullet points below them into a cohesive description. I think this is a matter of simply writing the bullet points into the appropriate stage. Maybe we can use Stage 4 to talk about this very important and successful process of annual voting?

I will now attempt to reiterate the above suggestions in a simpler format for voting. Then I will transition into highlighting the parts of the wiki that needs a rewrite.

1. Ladles will be adjusted one hour for Daylight Savings Time [ yes | no ]
   Ladles in January will happen on Sunday following the first Tuesday. [ yes | no ]
   The cutoff for teams to sign up on the Challenge Board is 18:00 GMT on: [ Thursday | Friday ] ......(teams will be .randomized and placed in the bracket soon after. This is a restriction on teams signing up, not on players, which can, and have been, replaced on the Ladle day.)

I see most of the above as part of Stage 1. I suggest striking most of the current copy in Stage 1 and replacing it with something along the lines of "Ladles will happen at this time (depending on the size of the bracket) and this week of the month. Sign-ups are done by team captains and end at this time/day."

Stage 2 looks pretty solid and up to date with current practice.

There are a few bits of Stage 3 that need help. Since captains don't organize in the IRC channel and brackets aren't rearranged, we can strike all of that. It looks like this stage deals mostly with the playing of the Ladle, not preparation. I suggest that most of the bulleted items below Stage 4 be written into Stage 3, since they seem appropriate there.

And finally...

as far as i can see, we have a very open tournament with a lot of areas that can be abused for a simple advantage, but luckily nobody really abuses it. though it should still be ruled out, for the future.

I agree we are lucky there hasn't been more abuse. And ideally, yes, we have an airtight system for the future. I think your post, and the issue of global moderators we keep dodging, both point to the fact sometimes people cause trouble. But we have an accountability problem here, as in, there isn't a whole lot we can do. Maybe the t2o crew will come up with a better tournament system we can adopt? And then there was that crazy talk of writing the tournament MCP...

[Olive]

@Flex; though I love your idea of the locked brackets (I remember when I started crying degree had to face TUS the first round, which switched to DS after 5 minutes. In the end it didn't matter anyway.), I despise the maximum and minimum player rule. Many teams are unsure on who will show and won't and simply sign a whole bunch to be in the safe zone.

Last ladle degree relied on 2 substitudes, which I signed as 'mystery guest' because I wasn't even sure who'd show. Dear psyko called upon the rules that they weren't allowed to play, as they weren't signed. However this can be bypassed by a simple name change.

I understand your view however:
1. the rule is easily bypassed
2. why add another rule which won't make the ladle run smoother

About the timing issue (answers to sine.wav's questions):
[yes] (the majority of tronners lives in countries where the time is adjusted (if im correct))
[yes] (but why discuss something that is 1 year ahead?)
[thursday] (see kyle's arguments)

[Jip]

Ladles will be adjusted one hour for Daylight Savings Time [ yes ]
Ladles in January will happen on Sunday following the first Tuesday. [ yes ]
The cutoff for teams to sign up on the Challenge Board is 18:00 GMT on: [ Friday ]

[sinewav]

Ok look, this isn't the voting thread. This is the discussion preceding the voting thread. The actual vote will be done in a new thread by team captains who have signed up a team for the next Ladle. I'll start that thread in a few days after we've exhausted the discussion.

Thank you.

[Flex]

I've not read every single post regarding global moderators, but I'm all for it, with of course it being firmly regulated. I think it should work like this;

1. Global moderators should be voted on an individual bases and each team signing up should have one vote for each candidate.
2. Global moderators should be active participators in the Ladle, either active players or active spectators, (like Z-Man who has been administrating it for a long time now).
3. Global moderators should know what they're doing. (There's a lot of nice players, but sometimes they won't get involved and that's useless to us.)
4. Global moderators should only have specific powers and not more. (A simple quick set of rules should be added and modified as we go.)
5. There should be a maximum number of global moderators, say 4-5? (Need to agree to how many.) (Why would we need a lot of mods? We've handled most of everything fine for now, but we just need a tiny bit of extra help in those moments where things got a bit heavy.)
6. Every quarterly voting, the global moderators should be re-voted and added or removed. (Votes regarding global mods should look like;
   A) Everyone is happy with the current list. No changes done.
   B) Someone needs to be added/removed. Name included under the voting with a Yes/No.)
7. Voting should be stricked and if a team votes "no" to an individual global moderator. Then they shouldn't be a mod, for at least till the next quarterly voting or 2 quarterly voting's.

This obviously requires maturity on the voters to only use their "no" vote to ensure that they really don't want that specific person with global mod powers. Also with the regulation it gives the global moderators a bit of a warning that one "no" vote can take them off the list and that they should treat everybody with respect.

Finally this is a bit general to the voting, but to ensure that the teams voting are legitimate teams, they should only be able to vote if they've been in the past 2 previous Ladles. To indicate to everybody that they are legitimate voters and that they have experience in the current history of the Ladle.

[Olive]

I agree on all points with flex. Yet I have difficulties with the last point.

Good and objective moderators are hard to find. The votes will probably be based on personal issues with the candidate. When the team had some (minor) difficulties with the candidate in the past, it means he/she automatically can't mod. I think it would be better to assign candidates with a 75% majority of yes votes. Or you could simply not place them in the server where the team with 'issues' is playing.

Globad administrator votings could be done at the same time as the ladle votings?