EckoShard Profile Joined January 2011 New Zealand 25 Posts #1 Hey everyone, this is my first real post, so may make formatting errors, forgive me.

I am many others no doubt greatly enjoy the GSL, the top players in the world duke it out for $50,000 is a spectacle unrivalled in the SC2 scene. It has, however, become a concern of mine that the format of group stages in not as fair as it could be. I feel that the format could be improved to give more deserving players access to the later rounds.

Currently the format stands as this, 4 players enter the group, 2 qualify to the next round. Initially, there is a best of 3 between two sets of two players with the winners proceeding to a winner’s match and the losers being relegated to a losers match. The winner of the winners match goes to the next round while the winner of the losers match faces the loser of the winner’s match, the victor proceeding in second place.

The idea behind it is that if you win two games, you are in the top half of the group and as such move on.

What I don’t understand is why in some situations, players must play each other twice, while not playing one opponent. In the occurrence that two players play each other twice, what is the justification for the player winning the second match going through? I may not have explained this well so I will use an example from GSL.

Last night Squirtle and MC proceeded to the winners match beating Symbol and Marineking respectively. MC won the Winners match and Symbol won the Losers match. Having already beaten Symbol, Squirtle this time lost 2-0. They had now both beaten each other once, but Symbol proceeded over him.

The systems justification is that Squirtle had lost two games, while Symbol had only lost one. But this makes no logical sense. If all players had played each other, Squirtle could have beaten Marineking as and Symbol would have lost to MC. Now they are both 2-2, yet Symbol advances.

It seems to me that choosing to use GOM’s method over a simple each player plays everyone leaves lots of possibilities undiscovered. Maybe last night MC was king of the world, completely unbeatable. Marineking was unable to prove himself in his best matchup (TvP) against an equal opponent (Squirtle) but instead lost in his worst (TvZ) and was then eliminated. If Marineking had beaten Squirtle and lost to Symbol, he would have been 1-1. There easily could have been a three way tie between Symbol, Marineking and Squirtle, but GOM’s system does not allow it.

I understand that one counter argument could be that Symbol could have lost 1-2 then won 2-0, putting him at 3-2 vs. Squirtle. Yet two seasons ago Marineking was 3-2 vs. Genius and Genius proceeded.

In conclusion, I feel that GOM’s system leads to outcomes that would not occur if every possible match was played. To have each player play each other only requires one more match, but the upside being a fair result for all. The only downside is the possibilities of ties, yet these can be played quickly on a day that could be planned for. To my understanding this is how the OSL ro16 works, and I wonder why Sc2 has moved away from this proven fair system.

