[gblake]

Originally Posted by EricH

See the 1vs3 thread for what else I have to say.

Remember, the #2 alliance wants you, BUT they can get you if you are in the top 8! The only way they can't get you is if #1 picks you, or they pick someone else as their first pick.

In the scenario I carefully described, I said that the #1 team intends to use their position to go down the line giving pseudo invitations to the other captains. This is not all that far-fetched. I think that this sort of thing happens reasonably often when highly seeded captains are worried about alliances between other captains. I postulated that the #1 captain would do exactly what you said (and if I didn't make it clear earlier, the presumption is that you and the #1 seed do not make a good alliance because of different approaches to playing the game or because of overlapping capabilities, or because your team colors clash, or...).

For Blake: The situation as originally described is that it's your last match and you want to throw it to get out of the top 8 (or rather not enter it). The question as given is whether or not this is GP. You are on a completely different topic.

I didn't say it is the team's last qual match. I said that it is the last Qual match of the tournament.

I don't think that I am far from a discussion of GP. If a strategy is sound and is supported by allies, then I have a hunch that the strategy is neither ungracious nor unprofessional. I also think that it satisfies the oft stated goal of competing like crazy.

With the described situation, 1) it doesn't matter unless you can't pick within the top 8 (which is not currently the case),

See above, the #1 captain plans to be a spoiler if this team is in the top 8.

and 2) throwing the match does nothing except make enemies. You don't advance in rank, true. However, because it is your last match (and therefore, presumably, most of the teams are either done or mostly done),

In my scenario I said the match is the last match of the Quals. There are no more qual matches for any team afterwards.

you can't fall very far. Probably not even out of the top 15, ALL of whom can move up. So you might not be around.

#2 gets to pick an ally (the team in question) before moving up would have an effect on the strategy.

The situation described is a case where it won't help you, period.

See above, I think we disagree about the statements preceding this one

It will probably hurt you.

One more point: numbers are NOT definitive. There were once two teams that a particular picking team rated approximately equally. When representatives from the team went around to one of the teams, they got nothing. Nobody talked to them. They went to the other pit and got the opposite response. That alliance went out and beat the other team in two matches.

The team I described is the sort of team that consults with its allies before a match and doesn't try an unusual strategy without support from those allies. I think that they are more like the second team you describe above.

The point? You are dealing with PEOPLE, not computers. People have long memories...feelings...attitudes...that sort of thing. By presenting the attitude that you don't care about your partners and how they feel (even if you talk to them, they may feel hurt), you probably will incite some feelings of annoyance.

I described ONLY using the strategy if the team received active support from their allies.

Those people who have those feelings will remember what happened, and may hold a grudge for some time. This hurts your team in the future.

I presume that the allies would only actively support the strategy if they agreed with it and that if they agreed with it they would have positive memories of the team that they supported.

Numbers are all well and good, but they only tell part of the story.

OK

Even though I disagree with Eric about some things above, - He is the most recent person to come the closest to giving the one actual reason I would agree with for not doing this. That reason is this:

"Other teams will not understand the logic behind the actions of the three allied teams and will (irrationally in my opinion - but that doesn't matter much - Logic has a hard time removing an idea that didn't spring from logic in the first place) look down upon the team(s) that purposefully score low in a match."

Even though my green dots have perversely gotten more numerous rather than shrinking because of this thread (go figure - I expected to see them disappear in a twinkling of the eye). I do see that many people would not give a team AND their allies the benefit of the doubt if that trio scored low on purpose. Apparently, without seeking out the reason for the team's actions, some folks (not necessarily anyone who posted in this thread, but some folks) might brand them with a scarlet "S" for being scalawags and scoundrels.

That might cause trouble in the future that might outweigh any improvement in the expected outcome of the tournament in which the incident occurred.

Blake
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PS: Kudos to Alan Anderson for hitting this paricular nail (that even if what the hypothetical team did was the 100% right thing to do, that might not equate to the team having post-tournament, long-term success because of how other people judge their actions) on the head in a PM he sent to me while I was typing the pre-edit version of this post. At least he and I agree about something
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