CAPPL is our biggest tour of the year, and the only one (aside from circuit poffs) with an actual prize; it should have an identity that is as prestigious as competitive as possible, and that means slotting in our most developed, most enjoyed, and most played tiers: our oldgens.
BDSP should be out of the question imo. It’s a fun tier, but we should NOT be putting the competitive legitimacy of this format to its first real test during our biggest tour of the year.
Same with DPP, unfortunately. We only need to look at BW during CAPCL to see why. Speaking as a manager for CL, BW was incredibly hard to draft for. The signup pool for BW was really dire, which is even crazier considering CL had the most signups of a CAP team tour ever. But perhaps even more importantly - we had a lot of games that were just not good quality. There were teams drafting absolutely no BW player AT ALL and just slotting literally whoever with HO teams ripped from OU. There were some fantastic and competitive showings, but there was also a lot of the opposite. To the best of our ability,
we want to be showcasing high-level, competitive games. Now let’s look at DPP. This format is EVEN LESS accessible than BW and I have no doubt in my mind it would be near-impossible to draft for, support, and get competitive games out of (at this point in time - who knows what the future holds). Sorry, but let’s save this format’s first real test-run for CL.
As for BW - while the above paragraph makes it sound like I probably hate it, I would actually be okay with it here. But it’s on thin ice, and I would prefer alternatives. It got its early-tier rough start out of the way already, and I think now that we know more about the tier and its playerbase, we can consider it a contender for our premier summer oldgens tour. That said, we should look to other formats first.
6 slots: SS/SS/SS/SM/ORAS/Multigen Bo3 or SM2 or BW (in order of preference)
Clean and simple, others have already discussed this as a nice format for 6 slots. The last slot is ultimately pretty free, but Bo3s are cool imo.
Almost every PL has them, and for good reason. It’s an inherently more competitive format because you have more chances to win, is incredible from a spectator perspective, and is sick for players in a way because it’s the best shot you have at showing you
are the best; if you’ve got something to prove, the bo3 is the best place to do it. This format also mirrors our last PL which helps establish a stronger identity for the tour. However, SM is our most popular + developed pastgen, so in the case of no bo3 it should be chosen over BW.
8 slots: SS/SS/SS/SM/SM/ORAS/Bo3/ORAS2 or BW
I think if we’re 8 slots, we REALLY can’t justify no bo3. Yes, they require a lot of work, but they’re great. Last slot is subjective, idrc which way it goes. PLEASE no 4x SS though.
Manager prices:
I would like to preface this by saying
there is no fair AND accurate way to price managers, period. During CL I was a fan of subjective prices, aka manager prices are determined by all the managers voting. I thought this would lead to the most accurate prices, but they were still completely all over the place. There is also almost no incentive not to overprice everyone else and underprice yourself. It’s a flawed approach. Now, let’s look at objective ways to determine prices, such as by taking into account a player’s previous TT wins. These ways might seem more accurate in practice, but they just aren’t. Our best player can be haxxed to hell and back one season, and end up WAY underpriced the next season as a result. A terrible player can still have a good season somehow and end up super overpriced relative to their skill. An unknown player can be priced low and overperform, or vice versa. Any way we do this is bad. BUT: Objective data-based approaches are at least fair, while subjective approaches are much less so. So,
we should use a formula to determine manager prices based on their performance in last years premier league.
Here are a couple possibilities, taken from
THIS post in the ZUPL policy thread:
- Base price (10k) + difference based on differential: let's say, Tuthur went 4-1 in the last ZUPL; if he wants to selfbuy as manager, he needs to pay 10k+(3*3)=19k
- Base price (10k) + 2k for win, - 1k for loss; as for the example above, he needs to pay 10k+(4*2-1*1)=17k
The difference between these formulas, or any other, is pretty arbitrary; like I said, they won’t be accurate no matter what so let’s just choose the one we think is more fair.