Listening to the Playerbase that Make a Tournament Exist

[16bit]

What is the core appeal of SPL? For many competitors and spectators, it's that it contains the most proficient players of the metagames the tournament has to offer. The decision for a good number of people involved in SPL on whether they supported RBY being bo3 or bo1 depended on who was going to play as a result - people want to play against or be able to watch Serpi and Felix. The umpteenth threads that have been made and discussions that have been had tell us that there's a number of top DPP players that prefer bo3, and some of which have explicitly said their participation in this upcoming SPL depends on whether bo3 happens or not.

That leads me to think about that if we do care about the level of competition in SPL, how much better or worse would the playerbase be if DPP was bo3 instead of bo1? We don't know if we don't actually try and do any kind of surveying of the playerbase. Shutting down calls that are dissenting to the status quo without actually gathering data on how many people are in support of said proposal, and would sign up for the tournament if a change was made, is a failure on the governing body of SPL. If a goal of the TDs is to create the 'best possible SPL' and one of the factors is the best possible player pools, then you have sat on your hands and not done your job in trying to determine if changing DPP to be bo3 could make a better prospective pool. I implore the TDs to do a survey of some kind, because any kind of attempt to get a pulse on what the DPP community feels is better than what just happened, ignoring and shutting down any kind of dissent to the established ruling.

 

[Maia]

I don't have strong opinions on whether or not bo3 in SPL is a good or bad thing, but speaking purely as someone who has always been a hosting main, not a player main, I always viewed people asking to bo-whatever in my tournaments as like, whatever. If players want to spend the extra time to prep and play three games, that's their problem, not mine.

I said I'd let RoAPL be bo3 this past edition as a test drive for SPL bo3 arguments and then I retired before RoAPL so oops sorry about that but it might be worth exploring that sort of avenue before making threads in the future.

 

[16bit]

I don't have strong opinions on whether or not bo3 in SPL is a good or bad thing, but speaking purely as someone who has always been a hosting main, not a player main, I always viewed people asking to bo-whatever in my tournaments as like, whatever. If players want to spend the extra time to prep and play three games, that's their problem, not mine.

I said I'd let RoAPL be bo3 this past edition as a test drive for SPL bo3 arguments and then I retired before RoAPL so oops sorry about that but it might be worth exploring that sort of avenue before making threads in the future.

I think the people clamoring for DPP to be BO3 in SPL would definitely appreciate a year experimenting with RoAPL’s DPP slot being bo3. I advocated to change what was previously the suspect slot in DPPPL to a bo3 slot, as a result of bo3 becoming a big talking point with DPP OU players in the generation’s Discord. A good amount of the bo3 slot players were people that had previous played DPP in SPL, and from what I’ve seen of community feedback, people appreciated the slot being in the tour now and we’ll bring it back for this upcoming edition. I will do what I can to work with solutions more in this vein in the future, but given BKC’s thread about the issue was immediately shut down without any time for DPP players to voice their opinion, I felt I had to make this thread (especially considering this post started out as a reply to BKC’s thread).

 

[Finchinator]

Making more slots Bo3 in SPL is not being entertained right now. The first thread was locked for a reason, not to simply convert discussion into a new thread. I will use this post to expand on the reasoning as the public is owed transparency at the very least.

For starters: surveying players either in general or in the confines of player-pools is a non-starter. Suggesting that should not be taken as a serious proposal. This sends the entirely wrong message for the future about what can be changed regarding any format in any tournament — I recognize the word “precedent” has become a dirty word in policy circles to some of you, but it is important. We surveyed players in the last about 2 vs 4 SV slots, but this was probably not the best solution either as people on the fringe of being a starter or getting bought are incentivized to respond accordingly — we do not plan on taking this route again in any capacity and I regret advocating for that line-of-action in the past on a personal level.

Now you may be saying “but Finch, are you not disrespecting the wishes of your playerbase if you are not letting them decide the terms they are playing?” — maybe, but, to put it bluntly, not every single aspect of the game is up for active debate within the playerbase. Some things should take more momentum and external trial to be implemented, some fundamentals exist for a reason and need substantial support to be changed, some status quos have worked for a very long time, and so on. As it stands, there are hardly any Bo3 team tournaments on Smogon — Ubers PL used it many years back, but it burnt a lot of people out and had, to put it mildly, a mixed bag of responses. VGC tours adopt this across the board, but that’s a different playing field with teams carrying across games. RBY is the only outlier and I can promise you RBY will remain Bo3 (do not worry, we are not having a repeat of last year).

Adopting such a big change, especially if it were to be applied unevenly across generations, to the biggest tournament without any real trial period beyond vibes — and it’s hard to argue we have much more than that given discourse on both sides, lack of clear consensus, etc. — is irresponsible at best and a huge insult to a longstanding institution within Smogon, in SPL, at worst.

If there truly is enough dedicated support, then start with the grassroots in smaller capacities and actually see how people feel about it. You will get feedback that, if you truly want what is best for the community rather than just what you want, will prove valuable. However, it was quite literally proposed to do this over this year to numerous smaller scale tournaments and some of the same people advocating for it here refused to expand Bo3 in unofficial capacities. So at this point, that has to change before anything at this stage does. I think that is about as fair as it can get.

If you want my personal opinion as a Policy TD, I do not love the idea of Bo3, especially if it’s applied unevenly. I don’t think it will limit modern preparation so much as become a larger time sink. I also think it is arbitrary and could eventually lead to discussions about why 3 is the right number as opposed to something else (I know certain RBY players prefer Bo5, for example). It would be incredibly unappealing to me as a player who already dedicates more time than I should. However, if the community feels very strongly as a whole and the evidence is there over actual trials, then I am not going to stand in the way of it. The fact of the matter is that this evidence is not there at all.

Spamming threads right now is not going to move the needle. We are not going to change course at this time for the reasons outlined above.