[FF]: 2017 Season Long Fantasy FIRST

[Adisai1]

The whole trade was really messed up. I was the only member of F3 online and a member of The Regal Falcons proposed the trade. Before they finished the proposal I agreed. They didn't think this was out of the ordinary as they assumed it was a gift for us helping them out in a tough situation yesterday.

[JosephC]

Originally Posted by Adisai1

The whole trade was really messed up. I was the only member of F3 online and a member of The Regal Falcons proposed the trade. Before they finished the proposal I agreed. They didn't think this was out of the ordinary as they assumed it was a gift for us helping them out in a tough situation yesterday.

Here's the thing, teams are not supposed to help other teams, at least not to the extent you guys have. Sure, I've pinged people before on facebook when their pick is coming up when they've forgotten, but that's just good sportsmanship(I do it as a draft runner too if I have you added). What's not okay is teams making picks for teams in exchange for superior advantages, trading picks for advantages, etc.

This is a competition. Its one team vs the rest. It's not two teams helping each other other constantly vs the rest. It's not fair for any other team in the competition that you guys are doing this.

[EricH]

After seeing the discussions, and pending any responses to my most recent suggestion, there are some things that I know for sure. (I know I'm a bit late here... sorry about that.) This is going to be a long post.

1) Rules change (proposed):
Conflict of Interest Drafting
It may happen that players, either individually or as a team, determine that they may have a conflict of interest when playing FF and also volunteering at a particular event, depending on their particular volunteer role, and that having knowledge of their FF teams previous to the event has the possibility of creating uncomfortable situations. If the players determine that they cannot handle this by having another team member handle the draft, they have two options:
A) Randomize their picks. This is the preferred option, and will cover the vast majority of cases.
B) Request a Conflict of Interest draft (COI) by contacting the league commissioner, the draft runner for that draft, and one other draft runner (not either of the above), with the event and volunteer position. The draft runner for that draft and either one of the other two must both approve.
Approval guidelines: The player needs to be in a position that has the capability to directly affect either FF points or event outcome, or both, a list that includes but is not limited to refs and judges. Also, there needs to be a reasonable expectation that existing countermeasures may not be enough to deflect questions should they be asked. Existing countermeasures may include non-FF-playing volunteers in higher positions, or enough non-FF-playing volunteers, or even other FF-playing volunteers from other FF teams at the event.
COI Draft Implementation: Upon approval, the draft runner will place "COI" in the player's draft slots, and the draft will skip over those slots. The player is not allowed to fill those slots by any means--no trading, no waiver picks, and no selections. During scoring of the event, those slots will be filled by random teams after all other open slots are filled, and scores will be tabulated as normal.
COI Denied: If a complete COI draft is denied, the player will be assigned random teams during the draft, unless they make a pick.

2) Draft Slot Trading
I believe that we can agree on the following:
--A Google Spreadsheet, or similar, will keep track of proposed trades. There's one set up on the schedule sheet that works.
--A group comprised of the commissioner and the 3 most prolific draft runners, no two of whom are on the same FF team, will be the approval committee for trades. Currently, that would be myself, JosephC, Mars_James, and TDav540--BrennanB would be eligible but is on JosephC's team. [Fine print: commissioner's approval is automatic approval, otherwise 2 draft runners that are not involved with the trade must agree. That's why there's 4 persons.]
--Trades must be approved 1 hour prior to the draft start time, but must be submitted no later than 3 hours prior to the draft start time.
--Any player may raise a question about a trade between submission and approval.

I think that this would be a reasonable interim solution, to become more permanent if it works.

[TDav540]

Originally Posted by EricH

....

Sounds all reasonable and good to me. Do we want to develop a Google Form to submit trades through that will end up in the proposed trades sheet? Or just let players post them in the sheet without going through a form?

[EricH]

Originally Posted by TDav540

Sounds all reasonable and good to me. Do we want to develop a Google Form to submit trades through that will end up in the proposed trades sheet? Or just let players post them in the sheet without going through a form?

I would start with--as an interim solution--just posting in the sheet. We can always re-evaluate in about a week.

[BrennanB]

Originally Posted by EricH

I would start with--as an interim solution--just posting in the sheet. We can always re-evaluate in about a week.

Am fine with rolling with this. Lets do it!

[EricH]

I haven't read any screaming, so we're going to roll with it. Sheet will be updated shortly with the current trades I'm aware of, and that will be followed by Shenzhen.

[EricH]

Well, THAT won't work...

Untitled, TBC, you guys have some rework to do.

For everybody else, Untitled has the #1 slot at Shenzhen, and has reached trade agreements with both QD(#6) & TBC (#2) for that slot. QD is in first, by about 8 hours.

Because QD is in first, that trade will go through unless somebody puts a panicked PM in before I post Shenzhen, and the TBC trade will be vetoed on grounds of incorrect slots.

[EricH]

And Shenzhen is now up. Welcome back from the "off-day"!

[MARS_James]

So I have been thinking about something that has been bugging me for a while about the COI drafts. I think that if you are in need of a COI draft it is unfair if you are first pick, both to you and the league as a whole as whoever is second pick effectively gets to be first pick twice in a row. So I propose if a COI draft is called that event becomes a specific draft order for that round, basically we skip the normal rotation for that draft and switch it with the draft where the person in need of COI is at a specific location in the draft. I believe this position should be the middle spot (rounded down) so since we have 9 this year it would be position 5, if we have 8 it would also be position 5 since it is rounded down.

The reason for this specific position as I feel that the middle spot has the least impact on the draft, since putting them last basically gives the person who is second to last a 2 pick swing.

[TDav540]

Originally Posted by MARS_James

So I have been thinking about something that has been bugging me for a while about the COI drafts. I think that if you are in need of a COI draft it is unfair if you are first pick, both to you and the league as a whole as whoever is second pick effectively gets to be first pick twice in a row. So I propose if a COI draft is called that event becomes a specific draft order for that round, basically we skip the normal rotation for that draft and switch it with the draft where the person in need of COI is at a specific location in the draft. I believe this position should be the middle spot (rounded down) so since we have 9 this year it would be position 5, if we have 8 it would also be position 5 since it is rounded down.

The reason for this specific position as I feel that the middle spot has the least impact on the draft, since putting them last basically gives the person who is second to last a 2 pick swing.

So what you're proposing is that this draft be moved in the rotation so that the person calling the COI is sitting position 5? That sounds reasonable to me.

[jlmcmchl]

Originally Posted by MARS_James

So I have been thinking about something that has been bugging me for a while about the COI drafts. I think that if you are in need of a COI draft it is unfair if you are first pick, both to you and the league as a whole as whoever is second pick effectively gets to be first pick twice in a row. So I propose if a COI draft is called that event becomes a specific draft order for that round, basically we skip the normal rotation for that draft and switch it with the draft where the person in need of COI is at a specific location in the draft. I believe this position should be the middle spot (rounded down) so since we have 9 this year it would be position 5, if we have 8 it would also be position 5 since it is rounded down.

The reason for this specific position as I feel that the middle spot has the least impact on the draft, since putting them last basically gives the person who is second to last a 2 pick swing.

A problem still arises in this situation if two teams have approved COIs for a draft. If we have the first and last picks, which are the strongest positions to draft from (At least, for deeper events) declare and approve COI, what rotation do we choose? Say, for two teams that declare COI, they're at positions 1 and 6 in that draft. If we choose the rotation that moves 1 to the 5th draft spot, then the 6th place w/ an approved COI would be in the 1st position for the draft, leaving us with the same conundrum.


Instead, I propose this as a solution:

Remove all teams which have submitted a COI from the draft list, and mention them elsewhere as having a COI draft for that event. This should probably be in the SLFF Draft Spreadsheet.

For the remaining participating teams, randomize the draft order independent of the current rotation, and proceed to draft normally with the participating teams.

For the COI teams, leave their picks as COI until the corresponding FRC event has completed and assign them teams at random off the top of the random list. (I believe this is the same as COI Draft Implementation in the new rules)

While this does undermine our goal of rotating everyone through 1st pick, it's just one draft very infrequently and doesn't mean much in the full scale of SLFF. With as many drafts as we run, it won't cause us to deviate significantly from this intention.

[MARS_James]

Originally Posted by jlmcmchl

A problem still arises in this situation if two teams have approved COIs for a draft. If we have the first and last picks, which are the strongest positions to draft from (At least, for deeper events) declare and approve COI, what rotation do we choose? Say, for two teams that declare COI, they're at positions 1 and 6 in that draft. If we choose the rotation that moves 1 to the 5th draft spot, then the 6th place w/ an approved COI would be in the 1st position for the draft, leaving us with the same conundrum.


Instead, I propose this as a solution:



While this does undermine our goal of rotating everyone through 1st pick, it's just one draft very infrequently and doesn't mean much in the full scale of SLFF. With as many drafts as we run, it won't cause us to deviate significantly from this intention.

This solution could prevent someone from achieving a first pick in that round which would be a big impact potentially, although i see your point with 2 teams potentially needing COI in which case i feel we combine our two ideas so:

If one team needs a COI we make the draft in which the COI is needed to be the draft that they are in the median pick position, rounded down

If >1 teams need it for a particular draft the draft is rescheduled to be the first in the rotation, the runner for that position randomizes all teams except those in need of COI. After randomizing those teams are put in median position rounded down (With 9 of us that means 5 and 6 with 8 it means 4 and 5) If three or more need it it still proceeds the same (9 people it is 4 5 and 6 with 8 it is also 4 5 and 6)

[EricH]

Originally Posted by MARS_James

This solution could prevent someone from achieving a first pick in that round which would be a big impact potentially, although i see your point with 2 teams potentially needing COI in which case i feel we combine our two ideas so:

If one team needs a COI we make the draft in which the COI is needed to be the draft that they are in the median pick position, rounded down

If >1 teams need it for a particular draft the draft is rescheduled to be the first in the rotation, the runner for that position randomizes all teams except those in need of COI. After randomizing those teams are put in median position rounded down (With 9 of us that means 5 and 6 with 8 it means 4 and 5) If three or more need it it still proceeds the same (9 people it is 4 5 and 6 with 8 it is also 4 5 and 6)

I highly doubt that there will be two COI requests in the same draft. That being said, I have no problems at all with putting COI drafts in the middle (slots 4, 5, or 6) by swapping with another draft. Note that this means that COI requests will need to be in early, so that they can be announced.


Modified proposal: Standard COI procedure is to use the next draft order that places the requester(s) in the middle of the order, and replace that draft with the COI draft's normal order. (If a COI is known in advance, and a previous draft order works better, that may also be used if that draft has not run yet.) Should that not be possible due to multiple requests, a special draft will be added into the normal rotation as follows: Randomize all non-COI players, then insert all COI players into the middle slots in random order. Rotation resumes after said draft.

Middle of the draft order is determined by number of players in the league.




Speaking of which: Falcon is requesting a COI in Orange County. I sent the reason to Joseph and James last week. (Just our luck, it's a randomization draft.)

[EricH]

BTW: Random draft order for Greater Kansas City is:

Questionable Decisionmakers
Untitled Team
F3
The Breakfast Company
FIRST Pick
NE Way You Want It
Swamp Life
Falcon
The Regal Falcons