Should 4BLD and 5BLD means be recognized officially?

[CarterK]

This more than likely won't change anything, but I was mainly curious to what most people think about this.

 

[Mike Hughey]

I don't understand the reason why these are treated differently from 3BLD. I see no logical justification for the difference.

 

[JustinTimeCuber]

y e s, o f c o u r s e

 

[Underwatercuber]

I don't get why they aren't means in the first place

 

[Sue Doenim]

What about MBLD means?

 

[Underwatercuber]

What about MBLD means?

The problem with that is multibld takes an hour and usually there isn't 3 multibld attempts at a competition. 4Bld and 5Bld however usually are usually best of 3 format which means that by adding means for it almost nothing at competitions would change.

 

[Sue Doenim]

I think it'd have to work similarly to FMC means. Those don't have to be all from the same competition, do they?

 

[T1_M0]

I think it'd have to work similarly to FMC means. Those don't have to be all from the same competition, do they?

umm???

 

[Sue Doenim]

umm???

Sorry, yeah, I guess I should have maybe checked that. You really only get them at FMC specialized competitions though, so MBLD means would be similar, only gettable at BLD specific competitions.

 

[T1_M0]

Sorry, yeah, I guess I should have maybe checked that. You really only get them at FMC specialized competitions though, so MBLD means would be similar, only gettable at BLD specific competitions.

Lol I've been to 6 comps and 5 of them had fmc means.

 

[T1_M0]

No, that would ruin the all wca events completion club.

It doesn't work, too small success rate, the nature of the events would change completely.

 

[Keroma12]

No, that would ruin the all wca events completion club.

It doesn't work, too small success rate, the nature of the events would change completely.

• Making it harder to get into the all wca events completion club is not necessarily a bad thing; you could argue both ways.
  
• What do you mean by it doesn't work?
  
• You could argue that such a small success rate is all the more reason to officially recognize those who can get a mean.
• I'm not sure the nature of the event would change much. Competition ranking would still be by single, not mean. I suspect most people wouldn't even try to get a mean; it would just be a small number of people who might go a bit safer to try and get one.

 

[Cale S]

The problem with that is multibld takes an hour and usually there isn't 3 multibld attempts at a competition. 4Bld and 5Bld however usually are usually best of 3 format which means that by adding means for it almost nothing at competitions would change.

also MBLD scores are combinations of points and time, taking a mean isn't very accurate

 

[abunickabhi]

I think it is just too hard to get a good pool of competitors who have a mean, since the event is hard itself.

So it is meaningless to have a ranking for it, and it will be not worthwhile to do analysis on the data, as many good solvers might not have a mean.

 

[mark49152]

I guess I don't really understand why they are treated differently to 3BLD means, as aside from the rarity, the same arguments apply to both.

Personally I find it a little frustrating when starting the third 3BLD attempt after two successes, because there is a temptation to go safe and get a mean rather than go all-out to get the best single. That seems a conflict of interest and distracts from the spirit of the competition which of course should be to go for the best result.

 

[Ollie]

I don't understand the reason why these are treated differently from 3BLD. I see no logical justification for the difference.

I guess I don't really understand why they are treated differently to 3BLD means, as aside from the rarity, the same arguments apply to both.

Personally I find it a little frustrating when starting the third 3BLD attempt after two successes, because there is a temptation to go safe and get a mean rather than go all-out to get the best single. That seems a conflict of interest and distracts from the spirit of the competition which of course should be to go for the best result.

I'm biased since I stand to gain a world record if they were made official, but there honestly isn't any reasonable justification. In my cynical opinion, it's because the vast majority of delegates are all-rounders and would lose their platinum/gold club memberships and it would be too much effort to get it back.

 

[mark49152]

I'm biased since I stand to gain a world record if they were made official, but there honestly isn't any reasonable justification. In my cynical opinion, it's because the vast majority of delegates are all-rounders and would lose their platinum/gold club memberships and it would be too much effort to get it back.

I'm not sure which way you're arguing. But anyway, I don't really see the point in any ranking being "official" unless it meets some WCA competitive purpose. Unofficial rankings already exist for big BLD means and people can care about it as much as they want to (like Kinchranks). What would be the purpose of making that ranking WCA "official"? For most events, competitions are decided on average, so that is ranked, and single should be ranked because that's what many see as the primary record in an event. But although BLD means are notable achievements, competitively they are nothing more than by-products of the format. The fact that the OP included 2-means in the poll shows how contrived it is .

 

[Ollie]

I'm not sure which way you're arguing. But anyway, I don't really see the point in any ranking being "official" unless it meets some WCA competitive purpose. Unofficial rankings already exist for big BLD means and people can care about it as much as they want to (like Kinchranks). What would be the purpose of making that ranking WCA "official"? For most events, competitions are decided on average, so that is ranked, and single should be ranked because that's what many see as the primary record in an event. But although BLD means are notable achievements, competitively they are nothing more than by-products of the format. The fact that the OP included 2-means in the poll shows how contrived it is .

Ah, you're right, I was a bit ambiguous. I'm arguing for 4BLD and 5BLD means being official mainly because:

• The vast majority of arguments for making 3BLD means officially recognised apply directly to 4BLD and 5BLD as well.
• Making them official does not change the strategy of a competitor (as fastest single will win in competition)
• It does not take extra competition resources away since the format is already Bo3 (compared to multi where 3 attempts are really rare and FMC where Bo3s were more frequent, but still rare)
• No difficult changes would be required to update the database or the website.

 

[Ollie]

I should get all my ducks in a line one day and prepare a proper argument (GitHub style like Noah Arthurs did for 3BLD means) and challenge people to actually come up with legitimate reasons for not including official 4BLD and 5BLD means. I fear it will be mostly to do with it not being fair to 'all-events-club' members, although I don't remember that being an argument when FMC Mo3s were official.

 

[mark49152]

• Making them official does not change the strategy of a competitor (as fastest single will win in competition)

That's the only point I disagree with, for the reason I gave a couple of posts back. I can't think of any other event where a competitor sitting down to solve is faced with a decision whether to prioritise single over mean/average or vice versa. In most cases, the best strategy is to solve as fast as possible, but that's not the case for 3BLD means where competitors are incentivised to go safe if they already have a good enough single to make the next round, for example.

People can of course pursue whatever goals they want even if not aligned with winning strategy, for example success streaks or fastest 2/2 multi, but in most other cases that's unofficial and not incentivised by an official ranking.

Just to be clear, I'm not arguing against big blind means being official. I'm expressing the opinion that no BLD means should be official and 3BLD mean should never have been made official. But that's academic and since 3BLD is already official, I see no justification for 4&5BLD being treated differently.