Weird Qualifying Rules

[Bongle]

Originally Posted by Vikesrock

I'm just going to ignore the collusion thing for now and comment on the original post.

The largest possible difference in movement between a 0-6 loss and a 4-6 loss is 3 spots. Either way you are getting 6 Seeding points, in the 4-6 loss your opponents get many more seeding points so they may move past you.

You haven't explored all the options, though:

Let's say in this scenario that your alliance's scoring capability is 4 points, and your opponent's is 6.

We can derive some facts:
1) If you defend so that you win 4-3, you get 10 QPs, assuming your defending bot wasn't necessary for any of your points and you actually manage to win.
2) If you go for maximum scoring, you lose 6-4 and get 6 QPs.
3) If you go for maximum scoring for your opponent, you "lose" 10-0 and get 10 QPs
4) If you go for minimum scoring, you lose 6-0 and get 6 QPs.

So the two best options are:
A competitive 4-3 match where you hope very strongly the outcome is in your favour, but it might not be.
A "collusive" 10-0 match where you know the outcome is in your favour.

Given a scenario like this, your opponents might agree to the 10-0 option, assuming they aren't trying to overtake you in the standings since it is the "certain" option. If they choose to play a competitive match, then they risk either losing or not getting as many points as they would if they played cooperatively. If either alliance has a robot that is trying to overtake other robots for a better picking position, then other considerations may prevail.

This ranking system makes a team's motivations very complex, which will be hard to decode from the stands, but will make for some good pre-match deliberations.