In lieu of a survey, I wanted to open up a public discussion about the LC Circuit format, particularly for the upcoming 2022 year as the 2021 circuit enters its final stages. While final say will still be between me and the TLs, we do want to hear what you want to see in the circuit and why.
Note that this isn't just for things you want changed, if there's something you strongly want to see remain as a part of circuit then let us know that too!
A few points as a jumping off place:
LC Swiss - Swiss is a pretty painful tour to host due to the sheer number of games remaining constant until people drop out (and of course absolutely huge numbers of players drop out of the tour by the end). It's also either a fairly long tour (12 weeks for a 7 week swiss+5 weeks for a 32 person playoff) or requires that we hack together a point distribution that doesn't require playoffs, as done this year. Personally, I believe the main selling point of Swiss, that you get to play more games even after losing or being 'out' in general, is accomplished by the much more successful and less stressful to host Majors. I'm strongly in favor of cutting Swiss for the 2022 circuit and replacing it with a different 'last chance' single elimination tour like we had previously.
Championships - Last year we shifted to a 12 player championships with the first 4 seeds receiving byes, from the previous 16 person championship after receiving feedback that once you guaranteed yourself a spot in playoffs there was little reason to continue pushing for a higher seed. In addition, there were concerns that reducing point gain by using the type A/B/C tour system would make the cutoff for seed 16 low enough that a single good (but not tour winning) performance in a Type A tour with otherwise little participation would be sufficient to quality. To summarize, the goal was to incentivize players who put up strong performances early in circuit to continue participating even after guaranteeing qualification. Should we continue to have a 12 player championships or should be shift back to 16? In addition, a few people have asked about making championships double elimination in the interest of competitiveness, though keep in mind this will significantly increase the length of championships and result in 'down weeks' for those in winners bracket.
Additional Tours - Currently we have 6 tours as part of the LC Circuit, with a full half of them being Type A tours. I'm not against adding additional tours to the circuit, so if there's a style of tour you'd like to see added, please, make a case for it. To go alongside that, additional people interested in hosting tours should feel free to reach out, it's difficult to feel comfortable adding tours to the circuit without knowing for sure that we won't be overloading the fairly small current hosting pool. Be aware that tours that include OMs aren't eligible for being added to circuit and anything that covers oldgens, if added, would guaranteed as a Type C tour since championships will always be current generation LC. Alternatively, if you feel that we should drop a tour then please let us know that too!
Don't take these as the only things up for discussion, just somewhere to start. Thanks for your feedback and for participating in the LC Circuit.
Note that this isn't just for things you want changed, if there's something you strongly want to see remain as a part of circuit then let us know that too!
A few points as a jumping off place:
LC Swiss - Swiss is a pretty painful tour to host due to the sheer number of games remaining constant until people drop out (and of course absolutely huge numbers of players drop out of the tour by the end). It's also either a fairly long tour (12 weeks for a 7 week swiss+5 weeks for a 32 person playoff) or requires that we hack together a point distribution that doesn't require playoffs, as done this year. Personally, I believe the main selling point of Swiss, that you get to play more games even after losing or being 'out' in general, is accomplished by the much more successful and less stressful to host Majors. I'm strongly in favor of cutting Swiss for the 2022 circuit and replacing it with a different 'last chance' single elimination tour like we had previously.
Championships - Last year we shifted to a 12 player championships with the first 4 seeds receiving byes, from the previous 16 person championship after receiving feedback that once you guaranteed yourself a spot in playoffs there was little reason to continue pushing for a higher seed. In addition, there were concerns that reducing point gain by using the type A/B/C tour system would make the cutoff for seed 16 low enough that a single good (but not tour winning) performance in a Type A tour with otherwise little participation would be sufficient to quality. To summarize, the goal was to incentivize players who put up strong performances early in circuit to continue participating even after guaranteeing qualification. Should we continue to have a 12 player championships or should be shift back to 16? In addition, a few people have asked about making championships double elimination in the interest of competitiveness, though keep in mind this will significantly increase the length of championships and result in 'down weeks' for those in winners bracket.
Additional Tours - Currently we have 6 tours as part of the LC Circuit, with a full half of them being Type A tours. I'm not against adding additional tours to the circuit, so if there's a style of tour you'd like to see added, please, make a case for it. To go alongside that, additional people interested in hosting tours should feel free to reach out, it's difficult to feel comfortable adding tours to the circuit without knowing for sure that we won't be overloading the fairly small current hosting pool. Be aware that tours that include OMs aren't eligible for being added to circuit and anything that covers oldgens, if added, would guaranteed as a Type C tour since championships will always be current generation LC. Alternatively, if you feel that we should drop a tour then please let us know that too!
Don't take these as the only things up for discussion, just somewhere to start. Thanks for your feedback and for participating in the LC Circuit.