Proposal for One Day Tournament format.

I have a proposal for a tournament format that is inspired by the “January Weekend Tourney” idea. It is designed to be a short and concise tournament that takes place on a single day. I have included a graphic to accompany this post and I believe it sums up the format very handily. Below are some notes on the format including the theory crafting around its duration; its pros and cons; and the suggestion of point/stats system that allows future tournaments to be organized more easily.

Format Overview
TL;DR: Four teams duke it out in a best-of-three single elimination tournament. A third place match is also included.

Four teams are seeded into a single elimination bracket. Each series played is a best of three with the winners advancing forward and the losers being eliminated. However, a third place match will also be held in order to determine ultimate placing. The opening series are played simultaneously, and so are the finals and third place decider. This kind of schedule amounts for an approximate time of 6 hours and 30 minutes of game time and lobby time. Please note that breaks, for instance lunch, are not included in this estimation. Also note that teams will be made through some form of balancing just like the current January Tourney or following a method I will discuss further down in this post.

Duration Theory Crafting
TL;DR: (10+16+35)x3x2 = 366 minutes or 6 hours and 6 minutes.

When coming up with this tournament I was fully aware of how long a series of DotA tends to be. My aim was to make this tournament take place over a day or 10 hours to be exact. Through some average calculations I was pleasantly surprised to find that the total game time could be much less. Four teams in a single elimination tournament give us two rounds of matches; essentially the semi-finals and the finals. We can split total time in half if we play all games simultaneously in each round.

I started with drafting phase of Captain’s Mode. If both teams use all the time given to them then the full duration of the drafting phase is 15 minutes and 20 seconds. I rounded this up to 16 minutes. Following this I looked up the average match length online and factored in the expected skill level of the participants of the tournament in order to settle on 35 minutes per game. I then multiplied the sum of drafting and game length by three to get the max duration of a Bo3. I also decided to add 10 minutes of lobbying time. This amounts to a total time of 6 hours and 6 minutes across the whole tournament. I also redid the calculation with each game being 70 minutes long and came up with the max of 9 hours and 36 minutes.

Pros and Cons
TL;DR: More frequency in tournaments means more playing, but single elimination is still a downer.

Pros:

• Tournament can take place in a single day (6.5 hours).
• All teams play a similar amount of games.
• Requires a minimum of two admins per round.
• Short duration means tournaments can be played more frequently.

Cons:

• No round robin.
• Single elimination.
• Only four teams get to play. 
• Players can’t watch each other’s games. 
• I’m not sure if you can even do that with private lobbies anyway.

Notes:

• The small amount of teams and games played is definitely a detriment, but this is covered by the short duration of the tournament. This allows for more tournaments to be held more frequently, and thus allows for more games over a longer period of time. In the same way, more players get to play.
• The single elimination format can discourage a lot of players when it comes to gunning for the prize money, but it can also invigorate them to try their hardest since they only have one shot. If a prize is the only motivator then I have no solution to this downer, but I have thought up of a system that I will elaborate on below.  

Possible Point System
TL;DR: Players get points based on the team performance in tourney. Makes balancing and seeding easier long term.

This is a little idea that is geared towards player and tournament balancing, but can also serve as motivation for player to win every match possible. It is a simple point system. We want any noob or pro to be able to come into this tournament and have a fun, but also fair, fight. We can use mmr and total game time to decide teams, but there are other ways.

For each placing that a team gets in the tournament, a corresponding amount of points will be given to each player. For instance, the first place players will each receive 4 points; the second place players receive 3 points; and the rest is simple. Now we’ve got a bunch of players with arbitrary number attached to them, perfect. Players will bring their points to the next tournament, should they choose to join, and are balanced into teams accordingly. It’s a simple process of averaging really, but instead of using two variables you just use points.

Now players can strive to get more points by placing higher, but the only way to do that is by having your team win. Therefore, it encourages teamwork which is the nature of DotA. This system can also be good for guild interaction, as you can be sorted into teams with players you’ve never played with before. Since role preference isn’t taken into account in the sorting system, it also promotes players to try new roles. It also makes balancing stand-ins easier as you just have to find one with similar points.

Summary
TL;DR: One day tournament over 7 hours is good as more tournaments can be held. By sacrificing double eliminations we get long term benefit.

Discussion is hugely appreciated!