Anime Saimoe Tournament 2013 (Japan)

[Demi.]

Originally Posted by ion475

Not to mention, I do found ISML taste to be crap...as if they only watched the same few series and that's it...

JSaimoe used to have diverse taste, but if the last few years is anything to go by, Jsaimoe isn't any different from ISML, really...It's actually more of a series popularity contest then even ISML; at least ISML only has a couple girls dominating from a respective series while the rest from their series do only relatively well. I mean, you can't even tell who is the most popular Madomagi until they face each other, because they all rape everyone else equally hard.

[wontaek]

Originally Posted by ion475

I found the problem to be the underlying structure of the whole tournament anyway, aka it being a league. It doesn't help that the same few girls just keep dominating no matter how they change the format (Shana, Taiga, Tenshi, Biribiri, Eu...)

(Not to mention, I do found ISML taste to be crap...as if they only watched the same few series and that's it...)

That same few girls problem has to do more with almost everything people think is bad in ISML compared to anything else. Even the SDO problem is more likely due to this same few girl problem instead of something fundamental or structural. The problem is, there isn't a fair unbiased way to remove these few girls, especially since the voters flock to ISML as the last place to find their old favorites.

ISML is a rare exception among Saimoe events in letting older girls participate. This attracted the fans of the "same old girls", and since these "same old girls" win much, its fans have more reason to stay around while fans of other girls tend to get discouraged and leave. Over years, this has accumulated to the state we have now. This is why ISML have so many devices built in to keep the MINORITY fans of WEAKER girls around as much as possible. We just hope that it is enough to buy us sufficient time for these "same old girls" to weaken and be replaced by new girls.

Best Moe Tournament, at one point in the time, was the international alternative for those who wanted things to resemble J AST more. It sadly degraded and is no longer a viable alternative. If people wanted something like AST ( now it would really help if people define what quality they find really desirable from AST ) without the problems of ISML ( and again, it would help if people define what qualities they want to avoid ) , the only way to have one that also supports multiple languages and promotes international participation is to make one yourself, here. ISML got started from AnimeSuki from these discussions. There is no reason why another International Saimoe Event can't be started here. What is important is for the makers to be sure what they want, what they want to avoid, and then take the pain to think through what are the possible consequences of any choice they make, and how best to keep things fair. Any little choice may have far reaching consequences, so think carefully. It is doable, so why not try?

[BloodyKitty]

Things I like best about AST (pre-2011 at least), which I also want them in a new Saimoe tournament if possible:

- Diverse taste
- The direct elimination format that gives more feelings of a competition.
- Promoting newcomers and new series each year (with each champions except this year being newcomers from notable series of the respective year). This is helped by the restriction of allowing only series aired in a specific year-time, but to prevent overdomination, we could add one more rule: do not allow previous champions to participate in the next years.

[RegalStar]

You can't force diverse taste from voters. They're going to know what they know and don't know what they don't.

[BloodyKitty]

Originally Posted by RegalStar

You can't force diverse taste from voters. They're going to know what they know and don't know what they don't.

I know that well, so I won't put it as one of the top priorities in a new competition, it's just something that I like in the older days of AST. Though wontaek did mention some way to encourage it so I sometimes do consider.

[BaKaBaKaOtaKu]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

However, such strategic concerns are gone now, with only two PMMM girl left. So if Sayaka defeats Madoka then I think it simply means that the movie boosted Sayaka more than it did Madoka (and having discussed the movie and its moe competition effects with some other people, I do think this is possible at least). If Madoka wins, then it means that Madoka was boosted more by the movie, or her and Sayaka were boosted equally by the movie.
.

Strategic voting could still be there and that would come from the bitter anti-PMMM faction, anti-voting who the faction really supports just for the sake of spite.

The maximum of the faction should be considered here, assuming that the PMMM faction only has not more than 300 voters left(which I think has been the case here):

-If Sayaka beats Madoka gaining like 240 or even lesser like 210 while Madoka only gets like 190 or 200, she had help from the anti-Madoka faction, which quite reflects what had happened to Mami against Sayaka. Mami got herself loads of haters for defeating Saki top tiers, especially Toki.

-If Sayaka wins around 190 or 200 WHILE Madoka ONLY gets like 120 or 110, the PMMM faction had definitely chosen Sayaka to win it all, this reflects what happened in Madoka- Kyoko match which, IMO, was a non-tactical voting match. It was a bit if we count the few non-PMMMs who voted for Kyouko.

I believe no boosting happened, the faction has always voted for the girl they've always liked imo and I haven't seen any change in that.

[wontaek]

Originally Posted by BloodyKitty

Things I like best about AST (pre-2011 at least), which I also want them in a new Saimoe tournament if possible:

- Diverse taste
- The direct elimination format that gives more feelings of a competition.
- Promoting newcomers and new series each year (with each champions except this year being newcomers from notable series of the respective year). This is helped by the restriction of allowing only series aired in a specific year-time, but to prevent overdomination, we could add one more rule: do not allow previous champions to participate in the next years.

Originally Posted by BloodyKitty

I know that well, so I won't put it as one of the top priorities in a new competition, it's just something that I like in the older days of AST. Though wontaek did mention some way to encourage it so I sometimes do consider.

1. Some part of structure can be designed to slightly increase diversity in taste. There are much limits to such a system, however. Any thing in place at ISML will help only a little bit. The reason they are there is because it is better than nothing.

2. Would need more details as to the direct elimination. For example, do you mean accepting only 1vs1 matches? Can match with 7 contestants, with 3 surviving to the next round be allowed? Please keep in mind that 1vs1 matches have much problems. Also consider that one of good ways to encourage diversity is to have a format which lets voters choose more than 1 characters in each group. Having voters think about their 2nd choice among anime series which isn't their favorite is one of the good ways to make them try out new series and also allows smaller factions a chance to attract new voters.

3. This is easy part as most events follow "appearance within 1 year rule". Only twist is the past champion thing. I recommend not letting the champion appear in the immediate year following their win, but allow them to return if there is more than 1 year gap. For example, 2013 winner can't appear in 2014 event, but may return in 2015. The reason is, (1) I doubt any champion can maintain their strength for so long (2) Having a champion a token chance to repeat is not too bad.

[BaKaBaKaOtaKu]

Sigh, I could have enjoyed this tournament if it weren't for the multiple bans. We might have had different characters in the Finals...

[Hachiko]

Originally Posted by BaKaBaKaOtaKu

Strategic voting could still be there and that would come from the bitter anti-PMMM faction, anti-voting who the faction really supports just for the sake of spite.

The maximum of the faction should be considered here, assuming that the PMMM faction only has not more than 300 voters left(which I think has been the case here):

-If Sayaka beats Madoka gaining like 240 or even lesser like 210 while Madoka only gets like 190 or 200, she had help from the anti-Madoka faction, which quite reflects what had happened to Mami against Sayaka. Mami got herself loads of haters for defeating Saki top tiers, especially Toki.

-If Sayaka wins around 190 or 200 WHILE Madoka ONLY gets like 120 or 110, the PMMM faction had definitely chosen Sayaka to win it all, this reflects what happened in Madoka- Kyoko match which, IMO, was a non-tactical voting match. It was a bit if we count the few non-PMMMs who voted for Kyouko.

I believe no boosting happened, the faction has always voted for the girl they've always liked imo and I haven't seen any change in that.

Such possibilities will have to wait for now. Madoka leads Sayaka 91-79.

[BloodyKitty]

Originally Posted by wontaek

1. Some part of structure can be designed to slightly increase diversity in taste. There are much limits to such a system, however. Any thing in place at ISML will help only a little bit. The reason they are there is because it is better than nothing.

2. Would need more details as to the direct elimination. For example, do you mean accepting only 1vs1 matches? Can match with 7 contestants, with 3 surviving to the next round be allowed? Please keep in mind that 1vs1 matches have much problems. Also consider that one of good ways to encourage diversity is to have a format which lets voters choose more than 1 characters in each group. Having voters think about their 2nd choice among anime series which isn't their favorite is one of the good ways to make them try out new series and also allows smaller factions a chance to attract new voters.

3. This is easy part as most events follow "appearance within 1 year rule". Only twist is the past champion thing. I recommend not letting the champion appear in the immediate year following their win, but allow them to return if there is more than 1 year gap. For example, 2013 winner can't appear in 2014 event, but may return in 2015. The reason is, (1) I doubt any champion can maintain their strength for so long (2) Having a champion a token chance to repeat is not too bad.

1. I haven't quite come up with a better method to encourage diversity than ISML's, so I push this problem aside for now. Of course the priority is keeping the weaker factions in the tournament as long as possible.

2. One of the things that bothered me in round 1-2 of AST is that there are a lot of boring matches consisting only girls from weaker factions or predictable one-sided matches with the stronger factions come out on top. I agree with your point about the format of choosing more than 1 character to advance in one round, since it allow more diversity, also more competitiveness in later rounds. It also allows characters with more realistic chances to win the tournament to go deeper. I want this format to be done in preliminaries and 2-3 rounds in the main tournament (and we can reshuffle the characters into new different groups every time a new round begins), then started with the 1 vs 1 matches when the number of contestants have been cut down to like, top 32.

3. Yes, that would be reasonable enough.

[BaKaBaKaOtaKu]

Originally Posted by Hachiko

Such possibilities will have to wait for now. Madoka leads Sayaka 91-79.

I agree though. But there's still a lot of time, the anti-voters might come in late. In any case, Madoka winning this match is the natural way to go.

[RegalStar]

Originally Posted by BloodyKitty

2. One of the things that bothered me in round 1-2 of AST is that there are a lot of boring matches consisting only girls from weaker factions or predictable one-sided matches with the stronger factions come out on top. I agree with your point about the format of choosing more than 1 character to advance in one round, since it allow more diversity, also more competitiveness in later rounds. It also allows characters with more realistic chances to win the tournament to go deeper. I want this format to be done in preliminaries and 2-3 rounds in the main tournament (and we can reshuffle the characters into new different groups every time a new round begins), then started with the 1 vs 1 matches when the number of contestants have been cut down to like, top 32.

If something I saw as a passing mention on TVTropes is right, JAST's bracket seeding is totally random. Some effort put in to at least try and seed the characters' strength would probably result in significant improvement in bracketing.

[Ithekro]

For Saimoe itself, aside from the double elimination styling that is new to this year, the only thing they keep changing for sure is the restrictions. If one wants to see some diverse tastes and more interesting matchups, open up the restrictions on international IPs. Then they will start getting probably 5 times the number of voters again.

For ISML...the system seems fine now. The problem seems to be more that the incoming girls don't get enough of a following, and that's not the tournament's fault. That is the voters. Since everyone has to come in via the nominations period, that is when a newbie needs support to get in. After that its is up to the voters for the 72 girls involved.

The older girls will eventually fade. It has happened already. How many girls from 2008 are still even in the tournament in 2013? 13 by my count.

[broken270]

@BloodyKitty: You can buy KBM and call it IBM (International Best Moe). It had most of the things you want: a single-elimination style tournament with girls that were present in a specific time period, and it all comes with some form of preliminary and main tournament seeding (to an extent, diversity, although that is a bit of a stretch to call). Add in a few more tweaks that may suit your interest on how the tournament should be like, and you're done.

[Hachiko]

Originally Posted by broken270

You can buy KBM and call it IBM (International Best Moe).

Spoiler for ibm?:

[Triple_R]

Originally Posted by BaKaBaKaOtaKu

Strategic voting could still be there and that would come from the bitter anti-PMMM faction, anti-voting who the faction really supports just for the sake of spite.

This is just your theory though. And I'm saying it's a pretty flimsy theory since you have nothing concrete to go on here.

Character boosting based on the most recent anime installment featuring that character is not at all unusual, and there's several pretty obvious cases of it (ex. Ayase in ISML this year was clearly boosted by the final season of Ore no Imouto; ex 2. Tomoka was likely boosted by the final episode of her anime, helping her win a Block in J-SaiMoe 2013). So there's much more precedent and basis for that idea than your relatively wild and speculative "Anti-PMMM faction still cares even if its major PMMM girl vs. major PMMM girl" theory.

The maximum of the faction should be considered here, assuming that the PMMM faction only has not more than 300 voters left(which I think has been the case here):

We don't really know what the maximum of the faction is. The PMMM faction may have 500 voters left, but many sat out Madoka vs. Kyouko because they didn't have a significant preference between the two girls.

-If Sayaka beats Madoka gaining like 240 or even lesser like 210 while Madoka only gets like 190 or 200, she had help from the anti-Madoka faction, which quite reflects what had happened to Mami against Sayaka. Mami got herself loads of haters for defeating Saki top tiers, especially Toki.

I think that Madoka faction, and anti-Madoka faction, isn't necessarily the only way to view it. You could also think of it as Madoka faction, and "neutral voters". It's possible that neutral voters may have their own personal preference between the two finalists, and aren't voting out of spite at all.

For example, some people here dislike MadoMagi domination in this tournament, but still have a preference in this final match (and it doesn't seem to be based on spite).

I believe no boosting happened, the faction has always voted for the girl they've always liked imo and I haven't seen any change in that.

Madoka getting more votes than Homura in Round 2 should tell you that there may well have been changes in relative character strength within the Madoka faction (Ion may well be right about Madoka now being favored over Homura by SaiMoe voters). Sayaka defeating Mami hot off the heels of the third Madoka Magica movie should also make this a possibility to be seriously considered.

You act like character boosting is some strange thing, but it isn't. Not at all. And it sometimes benefits certain characters more than others. Going back to Ayase, Ore no Imouto's 2nd Season benefited her more than it did Kirino, even though Kirino is the more important character of the two.

[BloodyKitty]

Originally Posted by broken270

@BloodyKitty: You can buy KBM and call it IBM (International Best Moe).

Funnily, I have mostly nothing against KBM, I participated in it too. Sadly it ended just like that.

[Hachiko]

Madoka is the first to hit 100 votes. 103-93 Madoka now.

[Kogetsu Shirogane]

Well it's definitely good to see Sayaka putting up a good fight here. Only ten vote difference, it's gonna be close, regardless of who wins.

[Hachiko]

Sayaka has now hit 100 votes. 109-101 Madoka.