2008: Changes to weekly competition

[CraigBouchard]

Or you could just do one, and then SAY the other one is a DNF even you you never tried it...

 

[Mike Hughey]

Or you could just do one, and then SAY the other one is a DNF even you you never tried it...

No, technically that would be cheating, but what Lucas is proposing technically would NOT be cheating. Of course, you could still do what you're saying, but you'd have to live with the fact that you cheated. And I really don't think we have many cheaters on the online competition - that would be even more idiotic than memorizing prepared speedsolves and making a video claiming that they're ordinary solves.

I think I could see someone doing what Lucas is suggesting, but I still think we ought to at least somewhat discourage it. Arnaud has already done something similar with fewest moves - when he first set it up he made it clear that people shouldn't submit a 3-minute ordinary solution without at least trying to do something to minimize their solution.

I will continue to post my memorization and DNF times for my big cubes BLD, so people can see I'm not doing Lucas's thing.

 

[CraigBouchard]

Yeah, I know it would technically be cheating, but I mean, with the discussion going on about the new blindfolds, I guess anything is possible, and people are apparently willing to do anything to win something as silly as an online competition, with no prize. (Not offending this competition at all, I love it, but I am just saying that people have hit a new low, according to Stefan)

 

[masterofthebass]

With Mike's 3c option, I think that it is the best. Another way for keeping track of times could be using excel. I know that I just copy and paste the scrambles into excel and keep track of my times that way. I also know that there are programming languages (Python being one of them) that can access .xls files. This could provide a relatively easy way to do the scores. Just another option...

 

[ExoCorsair]

I also know that there are programming languages (Python being one of them) that can access .xls files.

Any programming language with file I/O can access Excel files.

 

[masterofthebass]

Well I meant without having to parse through all the extra Office crap. I know that there are libraries that are made specifically used for excel in Python, allowing you to reference cells, worksheets, etc. There should be something similar for other languages, probably in .NET ones.

 

[AvGalen]

Also, what about applying this to real competitions, so that they can give out an award, "Best Cuber" or something...that way it awards people who do ALL events...As opposed to someone who does JUST 3x3, and is really good at it *cough* Harris *cough*.

At Canadian Competitions, Harris may come first, and win say...50 points, plus the participation, and then I may go and compete in EVERY event, and come say...3rd in each one (hypothetically) So that would be all the participation points...Maybe 30 in total based on what you said...And then the award points, but not all events have a lot of people...so I may only end up with 49 points for coming in 3rd in every event except the 3x3...And so I wouldn't be the best all around cuber, Harris would be, even though I do a lot more than him, and am fairly successful at it. It just *seems* faulty in a way.

Craig

Craig: If 50 people participate in 3x3x3 and you end up as nr. 10 and Harris as nr. 1 you will only be 9 points behind him. Just by competing in 5x5x5_bf you will beat him. If you look at the results from last year you will see that people that participate in lots of events are high in the overall rankings, not people that just do 1 event.

And I am not worried about cheating. Everyone could post whatever results they want for every event, take over an hour for fewest moves and use a computer or alg-sheet, not really attempt blindfolded at all, do one-handed with 2 hands or whatever.

I have one important question: Can anyone explain the clock-scrambler to me?

(and for people that want to access data in Excel without all the Office-crap, just save the sheet as a Comma-Seperated-Values file.)

 

[Erik]

Personally I don't care about clock at all and I wonder who does. For me the only reason I do it is because it's an official event...
The scrambler basically shows the position of the pins and which clock to turn how far.

 

[AvGalen]

Well, 10 people voted for clock and it is an official event, so including clock was a no-brainer.

I understand that
UU u=2
dd d=5

means UUdd means that the UL and UR pins are up and DL and DR pins are down. But which of the four corners is u and which is d?

 

[Henrik]

As far as i remember and understood when i looked into this the u and d means a wheel.
u=2 means that you turn a wheel where a pin i up, 2 hours clockwise
d=5 means that you turn a wheel where a pin i down 5 hours clockwise

So you have two choices of what wheels to turn in this case. Later you have three (3) for an up pin and one for a down pin and the other way around.

If I got it wrong please correct me. (Stefan?)

 

[AvGalen]

That is what I tried, before, but even after checking 3 times I never got the correct result. I must have made mistakes, because I got it correct now the first time.

 

[CraigBouchard]

So what did we decide on? The participation points as laid out in the original post, with the bonus of having last place get 1 point, and every place above that get 1 more, and is there a minimum?

 

[hdskull]

Sikan Li

2x2x2: 6.75, (7.08), 7.03, 6.28, (6.06) => 6.69

3x3x3:

4x4x4: 1:58.08 OP, 1:55.88 OP, (2:01.41 OP), (1:45.83), 1:51.61 OP => 1:55.19
Bad luck with the Parities, hahaha.

2x2x2 BLD: 38.92, 65.89, 76.34 => 38.92

3x3x3 BLD:

3x3x3 Multi BLD:

3x3x3 OH: 27.86, 27.22, (24.52), (29.74), 28.88 => 27.97

3x3x3 FMC:

 

[masterofthebass]

Sikan, wrong thread... I'll move it for you.

 

[hdskull]

Oh lol, thanks.

 

[AvGalen]

So what did we decide on? The participation points as laid out in the original post, with the bonus of having last place get 1 point, and every place above that get 1 more, and is there a minimum?

We haven't decided on anything yet, but it looks like 3c is going to be the winner.

I am thinking about giving "partial participation points" though:
For 4x4x4_bf and 5x5x5_bf I might give participation points even if you just do 1 cube (if 3 cubes give you 10 points 1 cube would give you 3 points)

 

[Mike Hughey]

I am thinking about giving "partial participation points" though:
For 4x4x4_bf and 5x5x5_bf I might give participation points even if you just do 1 cube (if 3 cubes give you 10 points 1 cube would give you 3 points)

That will decrease my advantage significantly (since I'll always do them all, and probably no one else will), so I should vote against it for selfish reasons, but honestly I'll admit that makes sense.

 

[tim]

I don't like participation points at all. If i dnf 3 4x4x4 in a row, i want to get exactly 0 points, because i don't deserve more.

 

[AvGalen]

Participation points can also be named encouragement points. They are meant to encourage people to take part in the competition and also in many events. The fact that I would get points for "with feet" almost made me try it. I think 3 attempts for 5x5x5_bf (or else no encouragement points) would not encourage people to try it as much

 

[MistArts]

3b idea for points..............but then what are they for?