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FITD 2017 Suggestions Thread!

2K views 34 replies 9 participants last post by  AvidTennisFan 
#1 ·
Fill-in-the-Draw 2017 Suggestion Thread!

Now is your chance to suggest changes for next year!
 
#2 ·
You know what to do :)

I know last year(s) we talked about changing the points system. I feel this year we should try to focus rather on keeping the game alive. It seems to me that we have less people playing than last year. I know managing this year was tough too and I have to thank everyone who had to do even 2-3 tournaments a week. :worship:

So, what everyone thinks?
 
#3 ·
I'm not sure what we can do to put some life back into the game. It seems we have a core of about 35 players right now, with 250s and 500s getting 30-40 players. Slams and masters tend to get more, at least.

Maybe we could talk to the managers of some other games to do some cross-promotion? Especially since some of our guys also manage Suicide or TT.
 
#4 ·
It also seems that other games suffer. Especially for TT I feel it, as it was the most popular before. DTT we even had to basically cancel it.
 
#6 ·
Is TT suffering? Haven't played it since the FO I think, but I thought it would be least affected. I think it's just a case of the forum population decreasing. Might be time to wrap things up soon :/
 
#5 ·
Also, this isn't any in depth analysis or anything, but on weeks with >1 tournament, the one that has ST tends to have a couple players more. Could be just that ST people vote for the most prestigious/stacked tournament.
 
#7 ·
You can see it for challenger, or at least it's my impression.
 
#8 ·
I think problem #1 is that we don't have a lot of managers... we really only have 3 rotating around and occasionally we have another step up. However, if we get more managers, we get more updates, so people will keep playing. But if manager's are managing 2-3 tournaments a week, it becomes more work to post updates.

Problem #2 is that we have no rankings. :help:
The game would be more competitive if we had a ranking system. Now, it feels like we're playing for nothing. Next year, we need to have the rankings and race updated every week.
 
#9 ·
I can do a race next year, but doing the ranking is too much work, sorry. Unless I don't know something and the rankings are done in an automated way.
 
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#10 ·
1) In my opinion when there are three tournaments in one week, its also ok just to play 1-2 tournaments,
therefore the few managers can focus on managing the bigger tournaments.

2) If there is a Saturday or Sunday Start, this should be written in the Thread title bold, maybe we have more players then.

3) Ranking points should a comrpomise between the old and new system, between the system now and that try in 2015.
A compromise between those two would be good.

4) People like statistics, rankings etc.
A nice hall of fame, former winners, rankings which are updated from tiem to time easily will bring more players I guess :)
 
#11 · (Edited)
I don't think the issue is FITD specific. This forum has had a significant drop in activity this year which co-incided with the VS password fiasco. I spoke a member of the TT board (Litotes), and he believes that a similar drop has also happened with TT. He said that they used to have five tournaments a week or four when one of them had a 64 draw. Now three 32 draws are enough.

While I agree with the FITD-specific points raised here, I think they play a smaller role than the forums activity drop.

As for the manager issue, I haven't been able to do much this year, but will be try to be more active as a manger next year.
 
#12 ·
Definitely one of the things that we need to emphasize for next year is that managers update frequently (as in once per 1-2 days) - it creates more interest as players can see where they stand at all times. I know this can't be done all the time, but the more often we can do this, the better.

As @BMT360 mentioned earlier, ranking updates are very important. It would motivate people to keep playing I feel. I'd definitely be up for running the rankings for next year if needed.

On another note - this is being discussed in Suicide tennis right now, but how do people feel about more than 1 result counting per week for the rankings? If someone wins two titles in a week, shouldn't they be rewarded for that? With how the race is calculated currently, it would still be best result of the week, but for your ranking, it could include multiple results from a week. (Maybe we need to adjust how the race is calculated too?)
 
#13 · (Edited)
If someone has the ranking spreadsheet, I can update it now, and have it finished by sunday at the latest. I offered bryan assistance, in any way small or big, last week and have not received any response. EDIT: Bryan got back to me and is updating asap after having microsoft program issues. :hug:

I am also able to manage tournaments. I put more focus into PAW (@Ponas Donny, ;) how dare you not mention PAW as another game! :lol: ) and PAW has a core group of around 40 players.

I quit playing FITD for a while because I thought giving bonus points for each of the 'swings' was just too unfair and complicated the rankings. (This is not a dig at anyone, I needed a break from playing TT, FITD, ST and PAW each week, so it was a time thing as much as anything.)

As RNW mentioned, ranking history etc is really nice to have for the longevity of the game. I have noticed in PAW that this has not been kept up to date and perhaps all of the games need to make a list of things that need to be maintained by the board for the year. I think what happens is someone drops off and then no one else wants to step in, just in case it upsets someone else, or can't be bothered. And then over time, the job gets TOO big for someone to do in a short period of time.

I've seen this in managing issues too. When someone drops the ball while managing (whether it is their fault or not), very few people will pick the ball up and get it rolling again. Some people are very happy to whine about it, but not lift a finger to help sort it out.

I don't follow the managers thread, so if you need me to do anything, please send me a PM and I will jump in and help out if I can. (I have plenty of time lately, so use me). :wavey:
 
#14 ·
Well, since the next year I almost won't manage in TT because of deadline in Europe and I will have more time for FITD. I will try to updated rankings weekly.

But I really think we should make a change, the race and the ranking should have the same system.
 
#15 ·
Doesn't the Race become the normal rankings at the end of the year? Plus there is no reason to keep both. We should just keep the normal rankings, without race.
 
#17 ·
How did I miss this until now. It doesn't make sense :lol: What is the point of Normal Rankings then? It's not like we need seeds or something for FITD. We should change this rule in the off-season and keep on type of rankings.
 
#19 ·
Can doubles be reintroduced to FITD in 2017?
 
#22 · (Edited)
Race should just really show how well you are doing through the year and mimic the Rankings. (So Mandatory's + best 10 other)

Rankings should be 52 week cycle. So YEC/WTF stays there until it is played again the following year (then it drops off and replaced by the new YEC points). EDIT: retracted :D

Qualifying for the current YEC should not include the previous years YEC points which is why the Race is important because it doesn't show those points at all. In this case, the rankings and race will always be slightly different, even for end of year as Rankings will still include YEC from year before.

I think in this case, Synesthetic should still be #1 ranked until after YEC 2016 has been played. EDIT: I just noticed the ATP drops the YEC points after Paris. So I retract my last comment. :D
 
#26 · (Edited)
So I guess the specific problems were as follows:

1. Having both Rankings and Race which are calculated in a different manner. There is no need for seeds in FITD so there is no point in having two.

Options:
A. keep both of them
B. keep just the Rankings format (where 24 tournaments are counted: 4 GS + WTF + 9 ATP 1000 + best 10 ATP250/500 tournaments)
C. keep just the Race format (where all tournaments played by a player are counted towards the ranking)

2. Reduce the number of tournaments in order to have less workload on managers and better managing overall.

Options:
A. Keep playing all tournaments.
B. Have a reduced number of tournaments. Tentative schedule:

Code:
Week 1: (250)Doha and (250)Brisbane or Chennai
Week 2: (250)Sydney
Week 3: (GS)Australian Open
Week 4: (250)Montpellier and (250)Sofia or Quito
Week 5: (500)Rotterdam and (250)Memphis or Buenos Aires
Week 6: (500)Rio and (250)Marseille or Delray Beach
Week 7: (500) Dubai and Acapulco
Week 8: (1000) Indian Wells
Week 9: (1000) Miami
Week 10: (250) Houston or Marrakech
Week 11: (1000) Monte Carlo
Week 12: (500) Barcelona
Week 13: (250) Estoril and Munich or Istanbul
Week 14: (1000) Madrid
Week 15: (1000) Rome
Week 16: (250) Nice
Week 17: (GS) Roland Garros
Week 18: (250) Stuttgart
Week 19: (500) Queens or Halle
Week 20: (250) Eastbourne
Week 21: (GS) Wimbledon
Week 22: (250) Bastad and Umag or Newport
Week 23: (500) Hamburg and (250) Gstaad or Atlanta
Week 24: (500) Washington and (250) Los Cabos or Kitzbuhel
Week 25: (1000) Montreal
Week 26: (1000) Cincinati
Week 27: (250) Winston-Salem
Week 28: (GS) USO
Week 29: (250) St Petersburg or Taiwan
Week 30: (250) Chengdu or Shenzhen
Week 31: (500) Beijing or Tokyo
Week 32: (1000) Shanghai
Week 32: (250) Stockholm and Antwerp or Moscow
Week 33: (500) Basel or Vienna
Week 34: (1000) Paris
Week 35: (WTF) London

ATP 250: play 21 out of 39 tournaments.
ATP 500: play 10 out of 13 tournaments
21 tournaments less to manage and we never have 3 tournaments in the same week.

3. Tournaments in the same week can all count for ranking (based on the specific ranking rules. I'm not sure what is the rule used right now.

Options: A. Only one tournament per week (the best result) can count for rankings, even if the player are allowed to play more).
B. All results can be counted for ranking regardless.



I think these are the main problems we can open some polls for. Does anyone agree? :)
 
#29 ·
So I guess the specific problems were as follows:

1. Having both Rankings and Race which are calculated in a different manner. There is no need for seeds in FITD so there is no point in having two.
At least for me the Race should be done in the same way as the ranking, maybe you can add that option too.

And by the way the current rule is that we just count one tournament per week
 
#33 ·
I'm going to write here what I wrote to jervisjames: can we please just make the rankings in a google doc so that anyone (from the board, I mean, not anyone anyone) can update them if the need arises?
 
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