Begging by me. :) Actually I'm not sure why but we have long had discussion on the value of additional votes. I am of the opinion that more votes are better as it allows for a better spread of votes. What happens with fewer votes per round is the clear winners get lots of votes, but the number of votes separating the entries that sit at the make/miss line have a much smaller gap between then. I have suggested we would get a better feel of the true popularity of the submissions at the bottom end of the spectrum if we permitted more votes per round.
It helps do a better job discriminating between the lower ranking submissions. Or so I propose. Because really the only thing that matters to us is determining whether a submission is above or below the cut off. Giving people an extra vote or two to throw at an entry they liked, but didnt think was clearly a top entry might help give more validity to the cutoff determination.
What Clark said.
RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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Charles, it does a couple of other things as well. For example, with fewer votes, I know many people were voting strategically, figuring that very popular entries -as determined by the exit poll- didn't need any other votes. This way, very strong entries can get the support they deserve.
And really, anything that reduces the granularity among entries is a good thing. With more total votes being cast, people can better express their true feelings about the entries, and a freakish handful of votes one way or the other will have less impact.
It's Chicago rules: vote early and vote often! And dead people get 8 votes.
You say that like it's a Bad Thing [tm]. ;-)
Chief Technical Officer
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Question for the judges/Paizo:
So how did the experiment go then? Does it look like you have a clearer result?
Well, there's really no way of knowing how it would compare to people only voting for 4...
Personally, I don't think 4 was too low last time, and I think it would have been just fine this time, too.
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Chief Technical Officer
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Question for the judges/Paizo:
So how did the experiment go then? Does it look like you have a clearer result?
Well, there's really no way of knowing how it would compare to people only voting for 4...
Personally, I don't think 4 was too low last time, and I think it would have been just fine this time, too.
Clark said in his post upthread that he hoped 6 votes would discriminate better between the low-ranking submissions. Does this mean that despite the extra votes the low ranking submissions still look relatively close to one another?
I don't want to reveal too much about voting patterns, but I don't see much different in the way of the breakpoint between this round and last round. (Note that I'm not confirming that last round's low-ranking subs were all that close or not.)
Perosnally, I voted for two astrumals and two curjiirs.
But in general, yea, when you're trying to eliminate 9 of 15 entrants, saying "who did the best curjiir?" is a very easy first step.
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Chief Technical Officer
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in general, yea, when you're trying to eliminate 9 of 15 entrants, saying "who did the best curjiir?" is a very easy first step.
Agreed. I don't think there's any unfairness in there, though, as they all had their pick of 15 to do, and they didn't know beforehand which ones the other competitors were doing...
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Chief Technical Officer
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Okay. Well thanks for giving what feedback you can there.
As a note and something which I feel you should perhaps be looking at, is that there seems to me to be a pattern emerging that where multiple contestants decide to pick the same subject to treat, no more than one of those contestants goes through.
It happened last year with the Rustin Harp & Hecateus lairs (where contestants each doubled up), and this year with the Chaitrakhan, Astrumal, and Churjiir concepts. I would have thought that with all the votes around in this round that maybe we might see two treatments of the same concept go through for the first time, but apparently not.
I'm a bit too busy to do the math, but has one person in such a case *always* advanced? That is, has there been a case where two or more people did the same thing, and neither of them advanced?
I'm a bit too busy to do the math, but has one person in such a case *always* advanced? That is, has there been a case where two or more people did the same thing, and neither of them advanced?
I believe so. The only time opportunities have come up in the contest to duplicate things was Round 4 of last year when we were asked to take someone else's villain. Hecataeus and Rustin Harp both got used twice, and Eric Bailey and Matthew Stinson advanced while Trevor Gulliver and James Graham did not.
Then, this year, Round 3 asked the contestants to put together a stat block using someone else's monster. Four guys chose the Churjirr, two went for the Astrumal, and two went for the Chaitrakhan. One of each got through to the next round. The others didn't.
So, yeah, in a way I think the voters do assess who did the best job with a particular creature, villain, etc....and they pretty much always advance one of them based on that, whether subconsciously or consciously.
I'm pretty sure the liesinger channeled votes to the rictus; both Sean's thread and mine had a lot of "I like the rictus better than the liesinger" posts. I don't think that was a big contributor to my elimination, though (people liked the rictus better because, as written, it WAS a better monster. I'm just still surprised that Sean got eliminated too).
And when compared to the two chaitrakhans, or the four curjiirs, the 'mouth monsters' were still very distinct. Ditto for the villain lairs from last year, which left the contestants a LOT of room to flex their creative muscle regardless of villain chosen.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 8
aka Tarren Dei
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I'm a bit too busy to do the math, but has one person in such a case *always* advanced? That is, has there been a case where two or more people did the same thing, and neither of them advanced?I believe so. The only time opportunities have come up in the contest to duplicate things was Round 4 of last year when we were asked to take someone else's villain. Hecataeus and Rustin Harp both got used twice, and Eric Bailey and Matthew Stinson advanced while Trevor Gulliver and James Graham did not.
As far as last year's contest goes, I won't say anything about James' lair vs. Matthew's lair for Rustin but Eric's lair for Hecataeus was definitely more interesting than mine was.
As far as last year's contest goes, I won't say anything about James' lair vs. Matthew's lair for Rustin but Eric's lair for Hecataeus was definitely more interesting than mine was.I'm a bit too busy to do the math, but has one person in such a case *always* advanced? That is, has there been a case where two or more people did the same thing, and neither of them advanced?I believe so. The only time opportunities have come up in the contest to duplicate things was Round 4 of last year when we were asked to take someone else's villain. Hecataeus and Rustin Harp both got used twice, and Eric Bailey and Matthew Stinson advanced while Trevor Gulliver and James Graham did not.
and he didn't fall into the Irises/Irides trap either. I thought that whole debacle... er... subject deflected far to much attention away from some of the strengths of your lair last year Trevor.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 8
aka Tarren Dei
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and he didn't fall into the Irises/Irides trap either. I thought that whole debacle... er... subject deflected far to much attention away from some of the strengths of your lair last year Trevor.As far as last year's contest goes, I won't say anything about James' lair vs. Matthew's lair for Rustin but Eric's lair for Hecataeus was definitely more interesting than mine was.I'm a bit too busy to do the math, but has one person in such a case *always* advanced? That is, has there been a case where two or more people did the same thing, and neither of them advanced?I believe so. The only time opportunities have come up in the contest to duplicate things was Round 4 of last year when we were asked to take someone else's villain. Hecataeus and Rustin Harp both got used twice, and Eric Bailey and Matthew Stinson advanced while Trevor Gulliver and James Graham did not.
Thanks. My point is that four lairs better than mine advanced last year so I don't see a problem with the side-by-side comparisons when two people draw on the same monster/villain or what have you.
Thanks. My point is that four lairs better than mine advanced last year so I don't see a problem with the side-by-side comparisons when two people draw on the same monster/villain or what have you.
I don't see a problem with it either...and didn't mean to imply there was one. I just noted that...
I think sometimes the psychology of the voter tends to subconsciously compare two duplicate entries, select the better of the two, and then move on to examine the singular-submitted entries for their remaining votes. Of course, if some duplicate entries absolutely rocked, they'd both garner votes regardless. At this level, though, the remaining contestants are usually doing quality work anyway. And I think there's a subset of voter who spreads their votes out when there are duplicate entries and only selects one of them to advance. Notably, this is the first year we've seen four people do the same thing. And yet, still only one of them advanced. That was kind of surprising to me.
Lastly, I've always believed it's better to not duplicate someone else's choice in such rounds of RPG Superstar. I personally feel that way, because I'd rather not be responsible for knocking someone out in a head-to-head comparison on who did the better job with something. I'd rather be competing against myself on how good of a job I can do on a unique entry that will be compared to everyone else's unique entries. Does that make for great drama over the course of the competition, though? No. Not really. This way, it's definitely more entertaining to those following along with the contest as observers and voters. But, if I can continue to draw a comparison to American Idol, you don't see the contestants in that kind of competition singing the same song in any given round. And I think that takes some of the pressure off.
So, as a contestant, I'd much prefer that my work stand alone...be evaluated alone...and not invite comparisons to how someone else handled the exact same subject. Aside from avoiding the possibility of knocking someone else out just because our entries were compared to each other, it also improves my own chances of not getting knocked out because someone else did a better job with it. I do still think, however, the most important thing is to make sure you select something that inspires you first. That way, you can produce your best work. And, if someone else just so happens to select the same thing as you, hopefully your best work stands up to any comparisons that do get drawn between them (whether by the judges or the voting public...consciously or subconsciously).
But, if you can find something that inspires you equally as much as everything else you could pick from...and it's something you feel pretty confident everyone else will avoid...and you think you can do something with it that will be really inventive and appeal to the voters, I'd take that risk in a heartbeat to try and separate myself from the pack and stand out.
And, in fact, that's pretty much exactly what I did last year by choosing Sharina during the villain's lair round. It paid off. But, I get the sense I squeaked by in the voting because of that choice. Nevertheless, it worked. And I like to think it worked because I did a pretty decent job with it in addition to making a very hard, risky choice that got people talking about it right from the very moment it got posted. I think I needed that extra element, because the competition got really, really tight in that round last year. All eight of the villains' lairs were really cool and vote-worthy. So standing out at that stage of the game was pretty paramount, in my opinion.
Anyway, that's just my two-cents,
--Neil
RPG Superstar 2009 Top 32, 2010 Top 8
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Star Voter Season 6
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Thanks. My point is that four lairs better than mine advanced last year so I don't see a problem with the side-by-side comparisons when two people draw on the same monster/villain or what have you.I don't see a problem with it either...and didn't mean to imply there was one. I just noted that...
** spoiler omitted **...
I'm prone to agree, that's why I didn't post my lahamu until the round was over I didn't want to bias anyone.
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RPG Superstar 2009 Top 8
aka Tarren Dei
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Thanks. My point is that four lairs better than mine advanced last year so I don't see a problem with the side-by-side comparisons when two people draw on the same monster/villain or what have you.I don't see a problem with it either...and didn't mean to imply there was one. I just noted that...
** spoiler omitted **...
TLDR.
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RPG Superstar 2010 Top 16
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I imagine that would be pretty dull.
Unless the monster concept had some serious problems with it, and the challenge was to see how the entrants would (a) recognize, and then (b) propose to fix those problems.
Which strikes me as a round in the RPG-Development-SuperStar contest.
Stuff about only one of each duplicate entry advancing.I wonder what would happen if there were a Superstar round that required everyone to stat up the same creature...
Only one would advance! ;-D
And then the whole contest would experience:
EXPLOSIVE RUNES!
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Chief Technical Officer
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But, I get the sense I squeaked by in the voting because of that choice.
I wouldn't use the phrase "squeaked by" there. I'm not going to tell you details of the actual voting, but I'll note that the exit poll for that round last year had you with nearly double the votes of the leading person who got eliminated...
I wouldn't use the phrase "squeaked by" there. I'm not going to tell you details of the actual voting, but I'll note that the exit poll for that round last year had you with nearly double the votes of the leading person who got eliminated...
Wow. Really? Cool. Then I guess that strategy paid off even better than I thought. That...or, perhaps success from the earlier rounds carried over a bit. At that point, we were on Round 4 and I think at least a few voters had decided ahead of time who they wanted to see in the Top 4...i.e., who they wanted to view an adventure pitch from...
I think there does come a point in the contest where that happens. People stop evaluating JUST the submission in a specific round and they look past that at the entire portfolio, what they've come to expect from that designer, and whether they think he or she would put forth a really cool adventure idea.
Anyway, enough about the strategies of RPG Superstar. As much as it's a contest, it's really just downright entertaining, both for those competing in it and those watching and voting.
--Neil