This is a very interesting post, and unfortunately I don't have too much time to think or comment about it. I'm sad to see the reappearance of the large posterboards - the needs of the solvers should come before the audience here, but quite excited about the format. Certainly with the WPC, the strategies involved in choosing the puzzles could make things very interesting. I think equally good cases can be made for cumulative time vs. a points system in determining the champion though. I guess I'll comment more after I've seen how everything works out. Certainly, we've had good fun with the UKPA croco ladder, which was effectively a points system operating within a long term cumulative performance model.
This post saves me the trouble of writing my own fears about the playoffs this year. Last year still had a substantial luck element, given how I ended up winning by virtue of Ulrich's one brainfart, but this year is a huge lottery. It rewards insanely fast individual solves as opposed to consistency, there's too much riding on what selection of types are left in the pool for the finals, it's incredibly punishing for breaking even one puzzle...
It's something that I would consider a fun spectator-friendly side activity to participate in, but the added stress of the results mattering would make it miserable. Moreso than last year, I'm going to attempt to put myself in the mindset of considering the best solver decided after the prelims, in day 2. This will be true even if I win the prelims and lose the playoffs, or lose the prelims and win the playoffs.
From my standpoint, the major goal I have left in competitive puzzle-solving is to win a WPC prelim, so it shouldn't be too hard to think that way.
This general elimination structure was used in Turkey for two side tournaments (Paint By Numbers and Sudoku). And it was quite stressful as every match rested on 1 puzzle. Since both tournaments used puzzle types where guessing versus logic are at play against each other, the strategy of taking larger risks against particular opponents came into play. I sort of remember my competition in the final going on a big bifurcation route, it failing, and then resigning himself to second as he saw I was on logic and close to done. If he bifurcated right, he would have won
( ... )
The other sporting analogy you could bring up here would be tennis. Perhaps a motivating factor for this play-off format could be likened to having a bad set in tennis, going down 2-6 or something. Sure it's a disadvantage, and normally indicative that you are the weaker player, but every now and again everyone has a dip in form and the points system allows a stronger player the opportunity to bring it back. Borrowing Palmer's example, this means that Ulrich having one stinker wouldn't have been punished so much, even though (as you pointed out in your post) Palmer would still have just about won
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Re: WPC PuzzlesmotrisSeptember 26 2012, 02:28:59 UTC
WPC puzzles are not made freely available; instead member nations of the WPF have publication rights in their countries for them. Some countries include them in their own magazines in mostly intact form, others as anthologies after a couple years. In the US, our first WPC puzzle book in awhile just came out although the title might not suggest that is what it is. It collects puzzles from about the last 5-6 years, as well as some training puzzles put together by my teammate and sometime co-author Wei-Hwa Huang.
If you want WPC-like puzzles and don't know of this source, I recommend checking out the tests at the Logic Masters India site. These are all freely available and have many creative designs. I've contributed two contests so far, the 20/10 Decathlon and 2011 Double Decathlon.
Re: WPC PuzzlesmotrisSeptember 29 2012, 02:25:48 UTC
I've not seen a copy of the book yet, but the Amazon image is definitely problematic. My first book Battleship Sudoku had my name misspelled on the back cover, which I never saw until they had printed them all.
I actually prefer the large rounds at WPCs to be unfinishable, like in Eger. I think it's better that large differences are made by solving more puzzles and not by time bonus. Short themed rounds(20-45 mins) should be finishable. I would rather just be able to solve as many puzzles as possible for 2 hours than be done at 90 minutes and have to wait to see how that works out.
To be clear I think the perfect target is near 100% for one solver with zero seconds extra but organizers can err. Having a solver finish early, in 70% of the time, is quite bad. But having only 70% of a round finished by the best solver is bad too. It means they did not have to show depth on all the puzzle types. So Eger's model at 66% is much worse than hitting precise timing where the podium finishers likely attempt all puzzles but may not finish one or two (but not six or ten)
A belated followup to this, but it seems what was going to be a weakest link round for part 13 is now a massive instructionless round. That should be more entertaining than weakest link from a teamwork standpoint. Although, with 21 puzzles, a lot of it is probably going to be done divide-and-conquer style without much teamwork anyway...
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It's something that I would consider a fun spectator-friendly side activity to participate in, but the added stress of the results mattering would make it miserable. Moreso than last year, I'm going to attempt to put myself in the mindset of considering the best solver decided after the prelims, in day 2. This will be true even if I win the prelims and lose the playoffs, or lose the prelims and win the playoffs.
From my standpoint, the major goal I have left in competitive puzzle-solving is to win a WPC prelim, so it shouldn't be too hard to think that way.
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If you want WPC-like puzzles and don't know of this source, I recommend checking out the tests at the Logic Masters India site. These are all freely available and have many creative designs. I've contributed two contests so far, the 20/10 Decathlon and 2011 Double Decathlon.
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