Our first tournament - questions.

News and discussion on tournaments been and gone.

Moderator: Shirluban

Krabman
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 121
Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2014 9:34 pm

Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Krabman » Mon Apr 06, 2015 9:57 am

Hey guys!

It's me again, from the Riichi Mahjong Club in Bielawa (Poland): https://www.facebook.com/groups/mahjongbielawa/

We're organizing a Riichi contest in May. It has not been officially announced yet. It's gonna be our first tournament ever so we'd like to use the best possible ruleset. My idea is to make it a KO tournamet since I'd like to record the final table Hanchans. So it'd go like this: 2 Hanchans for each round, 2 first places proceed to the next round until there are only 4 players left. Does that seem like a good idea?

What would be the best Oka/Uma settings for this type of tournament? Or should we maybe use Uma only?
My general standpoint is in favor of final placements not the amount of points players have.

We'll be using the standard European rules. I'm still wondering about Kuitan. We always play Ari but I know that allowing Kuitan would be controversial. It's not an EMA tournament anyway so... ;p Should the Kuitan setting influence our choice of Uma/Oka?

I'd appreciate any help :)

Iapetus
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 195
Joined: Sat Jul 16, 2011 1:00 am

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Iapetus » Mon Apr 06, 2015 10:33 am

Full knockout is too brutal for the half who lose in the first round. Either play round robin and take the top 4 for the final match, or do like the WRC did and allow losers to continue playing losers' tournaments.

Oka is dumb. Uma should be 10/30 if you use red fives and 5/15 if you don't. This means placements are important. Tanyao shouldn't effect uma.

Kuitan ari is fine. The EMA is already moving towards allowing it, and I think Poland is one of the more pro-kuitan countries in the association.

Krabman
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 121
Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2014 9:34 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Krabman » Mon Apr 06, 2015 11:23 am

Thank you for the quick reply!!!

True, all players should be allowed to fight for highest places possible. I actually thought about it right after posting. Round robin wouldn't be bad either. We'll think about that. My main concern was Uma since I don't have any experience with that.

Yeah, I'm also all for Kuitan. I was also thinking about Kuitan Ari-Aka Dora Nashi, Kuitan Nashi-Aka Dora Ari variants. My logic: lack of Red Fives would make plain open Tanyao less tempting. If that even makes sense.

Referee
Expert Reacher
Expert Reacher
Posts: 382
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2010 6:24 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Referee » Mon Apr 06, 2015 11:38 am

Well, if it is full knockout then what is the point of messing with uma? Top two advance, bottom two are left out...

It would help a bit knowing how many players you expect, and how many rounds you want to play.

Iapetus
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 195
Joined: Sat Jul 16, 2011 1:00 am

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Iapetus » Mon Apr 06, 2015 11:44 am

Referee wrote:Well, if it is full knockout then what is the point of messing with uma? Top two advance, bottom two are left out...
If it's two hanchan per round, then the uma matters to decide the top 2 of the two hanchans.

Referee
Expert Reacher
Expert Reacher
Posts: 382
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2010 6:24 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Referee » Mon Apr 06, 2015 11:51 am

True. My bad.

Krabman
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 121
Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2014 9:34 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Krabman » Mon Apr 06, 2015 11:58 am

It's hard to say how many players there will be. I'm hoping for 16-20. Official tournaments in Poland rarely gather over 20 people. Since ours is smaller and it's the first edition, I wouldn't expect to get more than 20 players. I wouldn't mind a pleasant surprise here, though!

The tournament system can still be adjusted as the number of players changes.

Gnom
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 122
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2013 9:15 am
Location: 名古屋市

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Gnom » Mon Apr 06, 2015 4:05 pm

In our club we use also have a final table, we feel it's more suited to a tournament. Agreed it reduces the amount of skill needed but for us that's the role of a long-term league, a tournament should also have an element of show and excitement (if at the final table one player has a big lead the outcome is pretty much decided). So far we've only done one day 4 hanchan tournaments, so the first three hanchans where randomly seated, and the last one was seated according to score, with the final table fighting for the title (so the winner is not necessarily the one with the highest overall score). When we do bigger tournaments there will probably be more final rounds (semi final and finals).

As for the rules, I feel that:
-kuitan nashi calls for atozuke nashi (if you're into the whole nashi thing, personally I like ari/ari)
-uma should be a bonus but not the major part of the score (so 30 would too big, with score varying between maybe -15 and +15... We decided for 10/5 which reduces the gap between 1st and 2nd and between 3rd and 4th, so the overall goal should be to stay in the first half but not necessarily the best)
-chonbo should amount to a penalty on the overall score of the tournament and not of the game, so that players at the table don't benefit from it more than the others. I'm almost sure this was done at the WRC but I don't remember the amount. In our tournament we choose -20 because there was a jansō where I played that did that it makes sense since the median of a chonbo is 10 points (8 for ko and 12 for oya) and the other players gain them (so overall you're 20 points behind).

Krabman
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 121
Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2014 9:34 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Krabman » Mon Apr 06, 2015 7:31 pm

Thanks, Gnom! EMA currently uses 30/10 Uma and I've heard it's spurred much controversy.

So far my friend and I have decided on a round robin tournament with e.g. 16 players playing 4 Hanchans. After that phase top 4 players play 2 games at the final table. I still don't know whether the summed up Uma from the 1st phase should be carried over to the final table. I think the final should be counted separately.

Gnom
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 122
Joined: Fri Feb 15, 2013 9:15 am
Location: 名古屋市

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Gnom » Mon Apr 06, 2015 8:04 pm

Resetting the score makes it more spectacular and thrilling. You can't count on your +200 lead, you have to earn your points again!

Krabman
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 121
Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2014 9:34 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Krabman » Mon Apr 06, 2015 9:53 pm

That's what we thought too!

Referee
Expert Reacher
Expert Reacher
Posts: 382
Joined: Sat Apr 24, 2010 6:24 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Referee » Mon Apr 06, 2015 10:22 pm

16 players is ideal for 5 rounds, I don't know if you would have the time necessary to do that. Three opponents times five equals 15 (that's all of them!) After that, you can have a final table if you wish. If you want something grander and have the time, two final tables and top two of each into the grand final.

Krabman
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 121
Joined: Sun Jun 15, 2014 9:34 pm

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Krabman » Sat Apr 11, 2015 7:17 pm

Hey! We're all set with the tournament system and rules. If anyone's interested:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B7PMGK ... sp=sharing

User avatar
Scott Miller
Junior Reacher
Junior Reacher
Posts: 53
Joined: Fri Dec 14, 2012 4:16 am
Contact:

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Scott Miller » Sun Apr 12, 2015 2:22 am

I've added your tournament to the Mahjong News calendar.

I took a stab at the name of your tournament, best I can tell it's the Big Owl Taikai Tournament. If that's wrong, I can fix it.

Best of luck!

:D
Editor, Mahjong News
Author, "Mahjong from A to Zhú"
Columnist, "Tiles of the Unexpected" in "Mahjong Collector Magazine"
World Riichi Championship Committee
Vice President of the Mahjong Int'l League
Chow Eater

Senechal
Senior Reacher
Senior Reacher
Posts: 175
Joined: Wed Mar 04, 2009 5:42 am
Location: The frozen part of HELL!

Re: Our first tournament - questions.

Post by Senechal » Sun Apr 12, 2015 6:25 am

The 10-7-4-1 TP plus one-ten-thousandth of score is a virtual 15-45 uma.
EDIT: Scoring on paper during the game serves no benefit to any of the players present. If you do not have tenbou, please resort to poker chips (5x5k red, 3x1k blue, 3x500 black, 5x100 white for 30000) or something... all scoring on paper does is burn out the guy who does the counting for the table and the clock for the hanchan.


Best of luck to your event.

Post Reply