Other 'points' of view

The United Jousters group is currently voting on a new point system for the tabulation of their joust results. The SL JOUSTING LEAGUE group saw this notice from Forester Lowenhart, DDA Headmaster sharing his view and experience on point systems.

Since many in the SLTA also joust at UJ events, a new point system now being proposed by the UJ requires a closer look. If you have a vote, you might want to consider the following. See attached notecard

This notice has an attachment.

POINTS SYSTEM PROPOSED BY UJ

Since many of you joust at both the SLTA and UJ events, here are some things to consider if voting on UJ's proposed points system.

Capt. Blinker proposed the idea of a sliding scale of points based on the number of entrants idea to me last June when I first told him of the Jousting League, and well before he left the SLTA to start his own league. I thought then as I do now, that the idea was a bad one for the following reasons:

Not everyone has the same schedule or free time to make every joust. Using a system that is not equitable to the same joust at the same location on the same day because of the variant of entrants, creates a wide degree of disparity.

A wide variance in point tally reward jousters who are in SL 24/7 and penalizes those who can’t due to their RL schedule. SL is a pastime for most of us, and encouraging a points class system discourages new and old jousters from joining in.

It is a complex system to navigate and far from intuitive. Jousters should have a system they can easily add up, so any discrepancies can be flagged between the joust and the jousters records.

It only takes one point to win and the concept of KISS should be applied here. Keeping it as simple as 1,2,3. (1st=3pts, 2nd=2pts, 3rd=1pt.) Or modified for a 4th place. A point system with a tighter spread, provides a better chance to catch up when the schedule doesn’t allow attendance at every event.

‘UNITED’ by definition means coming together as one. The group should be giving more consideration to all jousters in SL who participate at all venues. Otherwise, the group is just an exclusive club serving their own, and should change the group name.

It would be more advisable to adopt a point system that has long been established so a jousters accumulate points that can be applied easily joust to joust, year to year.

Point systems should be ubiquitous, so they can easily be calculated consistently event to event. Regardless of the rational why each joust should be scored differently, in RL football a field goal is always 3pts, in Baseball 3 strikes and you’re out, the same in joust. Extraneous elements such as injuries or weather may factor in to the score, but alter the value of points used for scoring.

With the proposed system one jouster may gain 5pts while another 3, even though the first faced a large but inexperienced field, and the second faced 3 of the best. There are too many variants of this scenario to be fairly addressed, and I propose jousts be judged as a relative, not absolute reference.

In other words judged against the skills in the same match, not the matches you missed.

#united #joust