Backgammon Online

21-Feb-2023
10:22 PST

New thread for any BBL-related forum posts.

22-Feb-2023
08:43 PST

YAY! The old one had had enough of us.

23-Feb-2023
11:12 PST

Friends,

I was thinking about how else we could speed up our BBL tournaments and would like to bring up the following for your review:

Currently, we have two groups of 16-18 people, depending on the total number of registration requests, followed by 3 rounds of playoffs. Each player is guaranteed from 15 to 17 games on the group stage. It does make it challenging to get to the playoff (which is a good thing!) but, unfortunately, we can all see that it is prone to occasional delays.

Proposed Format Change: Knowing that we usually have 32-36 people playing each tournament, we would start with 4 groups of 8-9 people. The two best players from each group would form quarterfinal matches and we continue with the regular playoff routine from there with no additional changes.

While each player will only be guaranteed 7-8 games on the group stage in the proposed format, the reduced number of games will immediately impact the tournament's overall timing, bringing it much closer to the actual Blitz nature of the league.

Please let me know your thoughts - if I get enough positive feedback here, I can implement this by the time of our next tournament in March. The Rules/Code of Conduct will also be updated by then to accommodate this change.

Looking forward to hearing from you all,
Leoton (Host)

23-Feb-2023
17:17 PST

I totally agree with the proposed change.
We should try it next time, if it doesn’t help we can always revert to the existing format.

23-Feb-2023
17:28 PST

i like the idea. lets try it

23-Feb-2023
17:43 PST

I like the idea and would also like to see some method of excluding slow players, maybe from the next blitz?

23-Feb-2023
21:56 PST

Good plan..

24-Feb-2023
03:48 PST

Good idea. The biggest advantage I can see is that those with a 25 game limit have more chance of getting 7 blitz games started, than they do 17.

24-Feb-2023
04:49 PST

It is supposed to be BLITZ tournament but is too slow so I agree change would be a positive.....

24-Feb-2023
09:39 PST

Well, just my two bits. My first thought is I don't like losing the opportunity for all those games. That's one thing that makes the tourney so much fun.

At the same time, I've never been a fan of one game matches. That's why in tourneys in BG, they are always "first to ___ pts".

My recommendation is to make the matches in these smaller round robins First to 2, or, if that's not fast enough, have two game matches, and if the players split the two games, greater pip victory wins.

I think that would be more exciting, more true to the game, and I think players who take too long to play should be given a one tourney detention, for sure. One could even make a rule where the last match in, the slower player of the two is punished every tourney. We would all fight then not to be last.

I know the main criticism of this would be "it would take too long", but I'm sure with the quality and quick players we have here, we'd still be fine, and the tourney would be complete with plenty of time to start the next one. The competition will increase. I also like this idea because it would reward gammons more - first to 2. A gammon wins the match outright.