Board 8 > ....Q-R-S, T-U-V, Double U

(+) Yeah! (+)

It's over nin*gets shot*
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LeonhartFour posted...

I mean we haven't had a "traditional" Final Four in eight years

That might be, but it was basically all the same anyways aside from the big rallies for Draven and stuff. Theres nothing interesting about a traditional setup without outside rallies because we would probably have like 50k vote totals and the same results year after year

there was nothing interesting about rallies either

2012 and 2015 were both over as soon as the rallies kicked in
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ZenOfThunder posted...

@SBAllen do you plan on putting the poll in places other than the front page? like on the board list or on the side of the boards or anything like that. will it be on GameSpot in any way? I remember way back in the day a CB banner was on GameSpot's front page but that was about it.

I've asked him about the possibility of putting the poll on other parts of the site besides the front page, but he said it would be too spammy to have the poll displayed on every page of the site.

I think it's very important to make the contest voting more accessible to site visitors, because many visitors to the site have absolutely no clue that a contest is currently in progress. They can land on an FAQ from Google (or another search engine), get the information they need, and leave the site without knowing there's a contest running on the site.

When I talk about making the contest voting more accessible to site visitors, I'm not trying to suggest the poll should be shoved in your face on every page of the site. A more reasonable solution is to place a small banner image in the site header, and clicking on this banner would take you to the voting page. This form of accessibility allows site visitors to reach the voting page easier, but without shoving the poll in their face.

I would also suggest running a yellow site alert for just the final match of the contest, but doing a site alert for the entire contest was ruled out completely when I asked about this a few years ago.
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LeonhartFour posted...

there was nothing interesting about rallies either

2012 and 2015 were both over as soon as the rallies kicked in

It was interesting to not see the same characters/stuff constantly make the finals. Sure it was predictable the big rallies would be unstoppable, but thats way more preferable to me because otherwise its geriatricFAQs where almost nothing beyond the 80s-90s has any real strength.

OMG
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Exciting!!!

swordz9 posted...

It was interesting to not see the same characters/stuff constantly make the finals. Sure it was predictable the big rallies would be unstoppable, but thats way more preferable to me because otherwise its geriatricFAQs where almost nothing beyond the 80s-90s has any real strength.

so "even more predictable than usual" was preferable just because it was different
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LeonhartFour posted...

swordz9 posted...

It was interesting to not see the same characters/stuff constantly make the finals. Sure it was predictable the big rallies would be unstoppable, but thats way more preferable to me because otherwise its geriatricFAQs where almost nothing beyond the 80s-90s has any real strength.

so "even more predictable than usual" was preferable just because it was different

I dont think a rallied character winning is quite as predictable as Link winning yet another contest uncontested. There are basically two types of contests on this site to me now. One where there are lots of rallied votes which shake things up even if one rallied entry is strong enough to predictably win the whole thing and one thats the equivalent of eating bran flakes for breakfast your entire life. Ill take the one that isnt bran flakes every single time because it wont always be the same rallied games/characters

All members of the Noble Nine need to be banned from this. I'll be damned if they all make it in.

X you say



This is the year!
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No matter how you look at it, the reaction to rallies is all subjective.

Like, plenty of the same people who lost their shit daily about Draven were cheering for Vivi > Mario.
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swordz9 posted...

I dont think a rallied character winning is quite as predictable as Link winning yet another contest uncontested. There are basically two types of contests on this site to me now. One where there are lots of rallied votes which shake things up even if one rallied entry is strong enough to predictably win the whole thing and one thats the equivalent of eating bran flakes for breakfast your entire life. Ill take the one that isnt bran flakes every single time because it wont always be the same rallied games/characters

Undertale ended the contest as soon as the rally started.

Chrono Trigger at least had a shot at OoT.
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Vivi > Mario is still lowkey one of the worst results ever

should've been Squall man
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It wasn't predictable until it started. Whereas, in an extreme example, the guy who won in summer 2004 was virtually perfect with pre-contest predictions.

I'm not a big fan of the heavy rallies and I think enjoying the "unpredictability" they bring is tantamount to settling. Like you'll take any "unpredictability" no matter the cost, no matter the artificiality of it, no matter how shitty it makes the board. All that is worth it because Link didn't win and the noble nine didn't dominate? To me it's better if that unpredictability comes through demographic shifts, a natural change in voting patterns based on votals, age, etc, not an artifical outside boost.

So rallies do make the bracket more unpredictable, swordz is right. It becomes predictable once they start, (though I do think a heavy rally can be beaten under the right circumstances - that fucking downtime - and I don't think we've ever seen two huge rallying forces go head to head before) but that's still less predictable than the pre-Draven era, L-Block excepted.

But at the same time I think swordz is settling and putting too high a price on that "unpredictability". 4-ways were unpredictable too and everyone got sick of them eventually. Unpredictability does not trump everything else.
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LeonhartFour posted...

Vivi > Mario is still lowkey one of the worst results ever

should've been Squall man

But then we wouldn't have gotten that epic Squall comeback over Missingno. One of my favorite comebacks ever. I stayed up through the night to watch it despite having to be at work at the asscrack of dawn.
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That result had literally nothing to do with Squall/Missingno.

All it meant was that Pokemon got to further dominate the non-Draven portion of the contest.
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Without all those rallied voters I dont believe CT would even have a snowballs chance in hell of putting any pressure on OoT on this site.

Literally every result up to that point indicated it did. Just compare their matches against FFX and FFIX
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Oh.

Fuck you, Nanis.
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XIII_rocks posted...

I don't think we've ever seen two huge rallying forces go head to head before

Undertale/Melee?
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Undertale/Melee and Undertale/Pokemon
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LapisLazuli posted...

Oh.

Fuck you, Nanis.

Don't you fucking dare give Nanis any credit for this

I really doubt Allen announced it because Nanis @ed him a few times, but the idea that Nanis probably thinks that's what happened is really bad news. I'm happy the contest was announced but it's shitty that Nanis' brattish behaviour has been (inadvertently) enabled
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Leonhart4 posted...

Literally every result up to that point indicated it did. Just compare their matches against FFX and FFIX

Wasnt CT being rallied too? I mean I dont analyze any of these contests like you and other contest stats guys. CT doing well against those two doesnt really mean anything to me because FF has gradually gotten weaker every contest for the last several contests. Our vote totals are also so bad a fraction of a subreddit can completely bulldoze us. I would never even give CT a 0.00001% chance of beating OoT on this site unless it had a Draven sized rally even if stats made it look strong. CT would never beat OoT here without a big rally much like how Cloud will literally never beat Link again even when 7R releases in 2025

CT literally has nowhere to rally from

it's a 23 year old niche RPG
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but it's weird that you'd rather have guaranteed artificial change instead of take any sort of chance on something actually potentially unpredictable like CT winning the contest
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Yeah, like I said

Settling
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At this point it is becoming predictable that a rally will decide who wins the contest, so rallying is now as predictable as the 2004 bracket. What's so exciting about that?
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Thats because I dont believe there IS any chance or hope for change on this site. The outside voters are the only thing keeping us from a repeating cycle

There was this Chrono Trigger Facebook group that was supposed to rally for Chrono Trigger. When the rally call went out it didn't even show up as a blip in the poll updater. For comparison, the undertale_bot Twitter account has an immediate and massive effect on results whenever it retweeted a poll.
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spoilers we're in a repeating cycle right now

you'd just rather have this one that has zero chance of ending as opposed to one that could
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swirIdude posted...

At this point it is becoming predictable that a rally will decide who wins the contest, so rallying is now as predictable as the 2004 bracket. What's so exciting about that?

Can you say with absolute confidence, pre-contest, which character will be rallied? That there won't be more than one? If there was more than one, could you be absolutely sure which one would win? Did you predict Undertale?

You can predict that there will be rallies but not specifically which character will catch a rally and, in some cases, if that rally will be enough
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An entity needs a lot of support from a large group of people in order to make a rally matter. Unfortunately for Chrono Trigger, the only group that qualifies is already on gamefaqs.
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no but predicting which rally will happen isn't fun and if you didn't pick it you can't even console yourself with prize money
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Suprak the Stud posted...

What happened to our old sticky?

RIOT

RIOOOOOOOT

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Picking which rally is going to win the contest is more like trying to pick the right number on the roulette wheel, while choosing who would win in the past could be helped by investing yourself in the stats and understanding the potential strength changes from year to year as a result of game releases. The latter rewards effort, the former rewards blind luck.
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Team Rocket Elite posted...

There was this Chrono Trigger Facebook group that was supposed to rally for Chrono Trigger. When the rally call went out it didn't even show up as a blip in the poll updater. For comparison, the undertale_bot Twitter account has an immediate and massive effect on results whenever it retweeted a poll.

The undertale_bot Twitter account having a massive effect on the results was a bit surprising since the account had under 10000 followers when it tweeted the polls during the 2015 contest. There were competitive Smash players with more than 100000 followers that tweeted during the CT/Melee match that produced a spike in the poll updater that lasted for maybe 30 minutes at the most before fizzling out, but undertale_bot with less than 10000 followers created a spike for Undertale that lasted for several hours. The tweets from undertale_bot didn't have a huge number of retweets from other people who saw them (and those who retweeted mostly had less than 100 followers).
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Also, and this is my opinion so you may not agree, I feel like a 10,000,000:1 underdog showing up in the finals and giving the invincible and undisputed #1 a match is pretty exciting. Although, I guess Chrono Trigger would probably lose because OoT can rally and CT can't. Aren't rallies great?
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There is literally no way you can convince me now that Allen is not specifically targeting me with this harassment.
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I hope he is
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Four ways plz
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Rallies have given a new winner every time so far at least. Link is never losing a character contest on this site without a rally. Mario wont ever top him and nobody else in the N9 will ever get strong enough to beat him. I can get being unhappy with rallies if they cost you prize money, but I cant really get being happy with having the same boring results (other than it meaning you get your prize money). Without a flood of outside voters the only interesting thing is if any new recent character will even make it into the contest only to lose in R1 or if #3 can stay strong enough to compete with #2, but still be defeated by Link.

swordz9 posted...

Link is never losing a character contest on this site without a rally.

Never again, you mean.
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HOW THE HELL DOES CRONO GET IN OVER SEPHIROTH

oh my god this is awful.
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LusterSoldier posted...

Team Rocket Elite posted...

There was this Chrono Trigger Facebook group that was supposed to rally for Chrono Trigger. When the rally call went out it didn't even show up as a blip in the poll updater. For comparison, the undertale_bot Twitter account has an immediate and massive effect on results whenever it retweeted a poll.

The undertale_bot Twitter account having a massive effect on the results was a bit surprising since the account had under 10000 followers when it tweeted the polls during the 2015 contest. There were competitive Smash players with more than 100000 followers that tweeted during the CT/Melee match that produced a spike in the poll updater that lasted for maybe 30 minutes at the most before fizzling out, but undertale_bot with less than 10000 followers created a spike for Undertale that lasted for several hours. The tweets from undertale_bot didn't have a huge number of retweets from other people who saw them (and those who retweeted mostly had less than 100 followers).

It's hard to accurately gauge, of course, but Undertale was near its peak of popularity, wasn't it? And Undertale is one those games where its fans were exceedingly likely to want to promote it to other people for its charm and memes rather than Melee, whose fanbase probably didn't feel a need to promote/share/support it actively.
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Underleveled posted...

swordz9 posted...

Link is never losing a character contest on this site without a rally.

Never again, you mean.

By that you mean the one time he lost to Cloud? Thats the last time he lost without a rally isnt it? If so that was such a long time ago and clearly wont ever be happening again if we keep the same old voter base

I wouldn't call it blind luck

Like nobody really predicted Undertale but there were rumblings about its huge and very, very dedicated fanbase before the contest. I think if you put all your eggs in that basket and know the fanbase, it isn't blind luck. It's certainly a gamble, but one based on prior knowledge and a hell of a lot of guts. I mean, nobody would really say that like Mass Effect 3, or MGS4, or in a character contest like Ness or Marle are going to get these huge, contest-winning rallies. You know that. You know what almost certainly won't be getting these rallies because of your knowledge of those games, those fanbases, and how easily mobilized that fanbase is. When the bracket for this contest comes out, you'll be able to say with some confidence that a huge amount of the field won't be getting rallies of that size. Why? Because of your knowledge. Predicting the winning rally can therefore also happen through an acquisition of greater knowledge, and then analyzing what you know.

LoL and Undertale had very clearly established large/highly dedicated fanbases before the contest. Predicting a huge rally there (especially in Undertale's case since Draven already happened) isn't "blind luck" to me. That said, I won't deny that it's possibly more luck-based than in the mid-late 00s where X-stats were actually somewhat reliable and strength was way more static year-to-year. I just think you're overstating the extent to which luck is involved. I think a rally can be predicted, with the right knowledge. I mean, going all the way back to 04, Ulti predicted with sound reasoning Starcraft beating Halo thanks to a rally (idk if he predicted it going all the way to the semis). That was due to his knowledge of various factors. Not just luck. Judgement too.

I really would rather not be the "pro-rally" guy here because I'm not, and I think I've shown that quite clearly over the last few years <_< but you're going too far.
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Yusss
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swirIdude posted...

Picking which rally is going to win the contest is more like trying to pick the right number on the roulette wheel, while choosing who would win in the past could be helped by investing yourself in the stats and understanding the potential strength changes from year to year as a result of game releases. The latter rewards effort, the former rewards blind luck.

Also, to continue with this - it depends what stats you're investing yourself in

I mean the size and activity of subreddits are a stat too, are they not? The sales of a game? The mentions of a character on said subreddit, or on twitter or tumblr? The number of forums a game/character has dedicated to it (allowing you to try and judge how centralized and thus how easily mobilized said fanbase is)? All these are factors that can help to predict a potential rally, and it's all just interpretation of stats - just different stats to what you're used to. X-Stats may not have the utility they used to have but that doesn't mean rallies have made stats worthless. It just might be that the way we statistically analyze and predict contests needs to adapt.
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Underleveled posted...

LeonhartFour posted...

Vivi > Mario is still lowkey one of the worst results ever

should've been Squall man

But then we wouldn't have gotten that epic Squall comeback over Missingno. One of my favorite comebacks ever. I stayed up through the night to watch it despite having to be at work at the asscrack of dawn.

Priorities
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