Looking at the bracket from round 3 onwards ... I don't imagine that much variation between guru contestants. I think there will be so much overlap many folks will be eliminated because they guessed wrong on too many DK - Ezio, Ramza - Nightmare matches.
Usually by the 1/8-finals not many brackets remain, but you'll still have the people that took risky late round picks and plus we'll have the Link/Ganondorf and Cloud/Sephiroth split.
I think the main problem with the old betting contest (that existed before spread betting) was that it was too easy to predict straight up winners, and that if I remember right, every match had 1:1 odds. Then when we had a surprise match, almost everyone busted at the same time, because people tended to bet all their money on every match.
I think that by having different odds on each match, people likely will not go all in every match. If betting on Magus against Knuckles only gives you 1:10 odds, I think a lot of people would resist going all in on Magus, even if everyone would pick him in the Oracle.
I really like the idea of betting during the match. Would let people win through their knowledge of trends, which no other board contest does. It would be a lot of work for me or any host though, to be updating the odds several times a day, especially when there will probably be days that I am not on Gamefaqs when it is time to update odds. Maybe if we update the odds only 4 times a day: at the freeze, 1 AM, noon, and 8 PM, it could work.
When I did it for the villians contest I had a base of $1000 to start off (just in case everyone bet on the same character) and people added money to the pot with the character they thought would win and if they won they would get their bet back plus a portion of the 1000 + loser's bets based on the amount they bet with.
Like you said by the end of the contest a lot of people had $0 and that was even with the rule that people could start over again up until the end of round 1.
People sure love their EV over variance on this board.....I guess that happens when you're not actually risking anything. It looks like you already tried differing odds (maybe it was in 2003 that every match paid 1:1?), and that wasn't enough to get people to stop betting everything on a lot of matches. But hopefully the trend betting option will keep people away from making max bets, because then they won't be able to bet if more favorable odds come up during the match. Or maybe it's better to just institute a rule that you can only bet 90% of your stake.
I thought Ramza > Nightmare was blatantly obvious.
FFT is lightyears ahead of anything Soulcaibur in strength so...oh wait, Ramza lost to a WoW boss a few years ago and is projected to be held under 60% by Wander (although after what SOTC did in GOTD, perhaps that isn't so bad!).
Ramza is fodder tier but so is Nightmare. 38% on Riku isn't terrible all things considered, and the 4-way where he lost to Hogger he was grouped with another tactics RPG main character in Laharl. I don't think it's a stretch to say many of the folks that played either have probably played both.
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"Getting lucky 100% of the time... it's called PRO SKILL." -BlAcK TuRtLe
So where is everyone pegging Pokemon Red & Blue at? I see there power level being picture dependent myself. If they get Charizard and co in their pics they would be stronger yeah? I mean classic pokemon tend to do decent in the contest.
Nightmare did not look like fodder in his first round matches in 2007 or 2008. He was definitely above Ramza in 2008 at least.
I agree that Nightmare probably has the edge but I wouldn't say it's clear-cut and they are both still fodder. Nightmare looks very much like fodder in both 4-ways. He just lucked out because each group of four contained two people that were even more completely fodder than he is. Raz, Ray-man? Those guys are Ellis-level of bad.
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"Getting lucky 100% of the time... it's called PRO SKILL." -BlAcK TuRtLe
I don't know if anyone commented on it, but Jim/Kerrigan and Raziel/Kain did way better there than they had any right to. Raynor and Kerrigan are coming off of Starcraft 2, which should be very good for them, but they're still essentially starting from 0. Kerrigan is stronger than Raynor and her pre-SC2 feats include getting quadrupled by Vincent. Raziel/Kain are just completely nonexistent these day. Yet, both parings did pretty good, all things considered. The proportions between Crono/Leon/Gordon look about right, because none of those rivalries are particularly good and it's essentially 1 v 1, but then you've got Kerrigan almost beating Gordon and Raziel almost beating Kerrigan.
There's other examples in the vote-in polls (Laharl was 2% from Yuna), but I think this is a pretty good example using data that's been pretty solid in the past. Also makes me feel better about Phoenix>Gordon, but that's a different argument!
I'm taking Cecil/Golbez over Luigi/Waluigi after some thought. I think Waluigi is really going to drag that team down. It's going to completely kill Luigi's votes from rivalry voters, and will take away a good portion of his tag team voters too.
I have two major problems with taking Cecil/Golbez>Luigi/Waluigi.
1. Whatever effect Dissidia had on the lower-tier FF characters has probably worn off some by now. 2. Golbez. Waluigi is going to be very weak, but Golbez isn't much better. I also don't think people consider the Cecil/Golbez rivalry to be that great - it's always been about Cecil and Kain. If Kain was there I probably take the pick myself, but Golbez just doesn't bring enough to the table.
From: MarioSuperstar | #223 Where would everyone put Cecil today after giving Knuckles a scare?
It's hard to say. There's so much SFF involved in Cecil's part of the bracket that we don't know how much of that match was Cecil being a good deal stronger or just Knuckles being bad. Kefka and Terra doing well makes him look better though.
My adjusted stats have Luigi beating Cecil with 61.40%, for what it's worth. That's fairly close to what Bowser got on Kefka and Frog, so...
The more I look at it the more I realize the Alucard/Shep/Freeman/Glados/Frog division is absolutely fubar because any one of those 5 teams has at least some potential to win it.
-- ~Acting on Impulse~ Black Turtle still didn't MAJORA'S MASK
Cecil/Golbez is s good rivalry, better than most in this contest. Might even be the best FF rivalry next to Cloud/Sephiroth. Kain would have been a more popular choice, though.
The more I look at it the more I realize the Alucard/Shep/Freeman/Glados/Frog division is absolutely fubar because any one of those 5 teams has at least some potential to win it.
1. Gordon isn't even that much stronger than Phoenix to begin with. It was 58-42 6 years ago. Since then, Phoenix has had more games in his main series, has become more recognized, has two upcoming games and an upcoming reveal trailer for UMVC3. Gordon has had nothing. Half-Life 3 is vaporware. 2. Brackets. People don't pick against the one seed. 3. Breen brings ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to the table. Edgeworth is weak, but Breen is weak. Remember that Alyx Vance got tripled by Lara Croft, and people like her way more than Breen. Breen's rivalry with Gordon is also pretty lame, and not going to boost him much, if at all. 4. Pic factor. Phoenix/Edgeworth is going to be photogenic as hell, and will scream "This is a rivalry". If you don't know either pairing that much, do you vote for or 5. 12-hour night match. Gordon is night-oriented. Phoenix is night-based. It's where he gets pretty much all his strength before he bleeds for the rest of the day.
In short, I think Phoenix has a fairly large advantage. Gordon wins if you think that people only thing of it as 1 v 1, and even then, I think Phoenix surprises. It wouldn't be worse than 53-47, I think
I don't know if anyone's really brought this up yet, but the lower vote totals this contest is sure to have could potentially help Phoenix/Edgey out as well.
Gordon isn't even that much stronger than Phoenix to begin with. It was 58-42 5 years ago. Since then, Phoenix has had more games in his main series, has become more recognized, has two upcoming games and an upcoming reveal trailer for UMVC3. Gordon has had nothing. Half-Life 3 is vaporware.
2006 was when the whole OBJECTION meme was at its highest (also the website linked to GameFAQs though I doubt it made a huge difference) and before The Orange Box which Freeman got a decent boost from as well.
charmander6000 posted... Gordon isn't even that much stronger than Phoenix to begin with. It was 58-42 5 years ago. Since then, Phoenix has had more games in his main series, has become more recognized, has two upcoming games and an upcoming reveal trailer for UMVC3. Gordon has had nothing. Half-Life 3 is vaporware.
2006 was when the whole OBJECTION meme was at its highest (also the website linked to GameFAQs though I doubt it made a huge difference) and before The Orange Box which Freeman got a decent boost from as well.
But it was also immediately after Episode 1, and before the Ace Attorney series really got popular, all memes aside. Also, Court Records rallying. I don't know if they still do, but they were pretty big from 2007 on, wouldn't have beaten Bomberman without them, and none of that for 2006.
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From: charmander6000 | #242 2006 was when the whole OBJECTION meme was at its highest (also the website linked to GameFAQs though I doubt it made a huge difference) and before The Orange Box which Freeman got a decent boost from as well.
And that's pretty much worn off since then.
Keep in mind that Gordon struggled against Peach and did worse against Tifa than Big Daddy. He's not going to 60/40 Phoenix.
I'd argue that the series hasn't expanded to newer audiences and that as a whole of the internet it was most popular/known back when it was a popular meme.
I mean Phoenix Wright hasn't exactly looked any stronger than his 2006 despite the new games.
I don't think it's even all that close, honestly. In a 24-hour match, I probably wouldn't be taking Phoenix here, but in a 12-hour night match? He's got a real shot.
You guys aren't giving Gordon enough credit. After Phoenix, he'd be going against a fading Alucard and then the ultimate choker, Magus (with his animal friend). A real possibility exists for Gordon to go far.
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"You know what, forget it. Nothing I can think of posting will really be of much use to anyone in any way, shape, or form." ~LinkMarioSamus