I've noticed looking through the bracket as it currently stands that most of the team currently in the tourney have made it to the current round via all forfeit wins.

For example the remaining 32 teams competing, 6 teams had to win a game to get to the current round. Out of those 6, 3 of them are in the same bracket.

I understand that brackets are randomly generated (mostly) but at some point, isnt the standard of the tournament compromised when this happens? Looking at our bracket (2nd from the top) We have possibly 3 of the 8 best teams in the tourney playing for one spot in the dbl elimination section.

Is it possible to re-distribute some matches or teams to different brackets so that a team isnt put into the round of 8 DBL elim. bracket due to all forfeit wins? This seems like the best approach if you wish to maintain any kind of quality to the DBL elim. part of the tourney.

#1

Thanks for your feedback, it's always good to hear from a player's perspective. I wanted to quickly take a moment to address your concerns and the points you've made above.

First, it's common in any online event where a large number of teams enter for teams to forfeit their matches in the first and / or second rounds due to scheduling issues, players not being present, etc. Looking at any other major open online event will yield the same observation, as it's impossible for a tournament organizer to control who shows up to play their matches.

However, as the event progresses into the later rounds of single elimination, teams will ultimately meet who are serious about competing. Again, this is simply the nature of an open tournament.

Second, since the brackets are seeded randomly (the only truly fair way to seed a bracket of this size) due to lack of pre-qualifying or match information to draw from, it is possible that some portions of the bracket are tougher than others. However, this is a necessary by-product of a randomly seeded open event, and done to ensure the "fair-ness" of the event. Ultimately when it comes down to it, the winners of the event will have had to play each-other at least once. A tournament's goal is to determine who are the best players or teams, and even with tougher areas in a single elimination bracket, the end result will still be the same. Whether a team had to play a "tougher" team earlier or later in a bracket is irrelevant... if both teams make it far enough in the event, they'd have to play anyway in order to win.

In short, your concerns are definitely valid, although I'd also like for you to consider the position of the tournament organizer.

In the end, the best team will be the team that out-lasted each and every other team. Regardless of how "stacked" a randomly generated single elimination bracket may seem, all teams perform the same task to take home the grand prize, and that is win.