At all GP's, the Friday last chance Trials (grinders) are run using single elimination, not using the Swiss pairing system. It is true that if we want to keep the same time, the player who gets the byes would remain the same (he'd still have to win all the matches) but the other prizes on trials would be awarded more fairly and players would get to play more.

Why are grinders run with single-elimination and not Swiss? As a side question, does anyone remember when and for what reason the grinders were run for the first time?

From a tournament operations point of view, single elimination makes much more sense - with swiss:

• Grinders are using more table space, for longer.
  
• Players are slower to enroll into another event, so less revenue.
  
• Fewer grinders overall will run because of the above two issues.
  
• Scorekeeping can require more work.
  

Edited James Winward-Stuart (March 11, 2015 10:23:39 AM)

Many (many!) years ago, we did a thing called a Last Chance Trial; it started Friday evening, and often ran until about 7am. TOs and Judges got tired of the long hours, and players who lost in the Top 8 - esp. the finalist! - hated it. The winner at least got 3 byes for a nap…

It didn't take long to migrate to 32-player, single-elimination grinders, and more of them; I want to say it's been at least 10 years, possibly a bit longer, that we've done that.

d:^D

I may be wrong but the main reason players play last chance gpt are byes. So if you lose the first round why do you want to continue playing? It's not worth some boosters. You want byes! Then it's better you enroll in another gpt and try to get your byes instead of playing 4 more hours to get only half box of boosters at most but no byes.

> On Mar 11, 2015, at 11:18 AM, Petr Hudeček <forum-16799-ad9e@apps.magicjudges.org> wrote:
>
> but the other prizes on trials would be awarded more fairly

I'm curious as to why you think the current prize distribution is unfair. It's static, published, and applied to everyone equally.

Originally posted by Bryan Prillaman:

> On Mar 11, 2015, at 11:18 AM, Petr Hudeček <forum-16799-ad9e@apps.magicjudges.org> wrote:
>
> but the other prizes on trials would be awarded more fairly

I'm curious as to why you think the current prize distribution is unfair. It's static, published, and applied to everyone equally.

Because except for the absolute winner, Swiss is fairer than single elimination. Suppose you are the second-best player in the tournament (based on skill) and are paired against the best player in the tournament. If we run Swiss, you can still turn out to be second in the standings, whereas in single-elimination, you would get no prizes at all even if you are more skilled than 30 other players.

That isn't more fair, though. Fair is applying to everyone equally.
Everyone has the same chance of getting paired vs the best player round
one. That's fair. What you're talking about is better representing skill in
the final standings. But that's not really the goal of grinders. The goal
is to get a singular winner to receive byes. Swiss rounds have some
problems actually doing that.

Even with a 16-player tournament, it's possible to not have a singular
winner after 4 Swiss rounds. Take the following example:
Entering the final round, most X-1 or worse players have dropped (since
they cannot get the bye). 4 players remain, 2 undefeateds and 2 X-1. The
two X-1 have already played each other. In this case, both undefeated
players get paired down. If they both win, we still have 2 undefeateds
left. If neither wins, we have NO undefeateds. Neither of these outcomes
are the intended result. Single-elimination guarantees we get our sole
winner in the minimum amount of rounds.

Nick Short
L2 Chicago, IL, USA