Don't play many tournaments at all, mainly because of the ranking system, which I think is pretty unfair from what I can gather?

example: Just played the Arcade Speed Tournament and reached the Final, yet after 4 rounds (could of been 5, can't remember), I finish off worse than before I even started rank wise? Surely this is why some players are put off? All the effort to get to a Quarter's, Semi's or the Final just to be worse off at the end of it all?

Would it not be better to lessen the impact on players ranking once they reach these stages, instead of punishing them for a 1 frame loss?

Opinions?

I'd say that's the whole point of a tourny, you must pay the price for not winning it. Hard to explain but you can't win both ways. Either win the tourny or expect to have your ranking drop.

I understand that it's frustrating to lose rank in the tourney despite winning it. That's happened to me many times.
But to artificially change the ranking because it's the later stage of a tournament would destroy the whole system.

Everything is done mathematically. If you lose a tourney game to a lower-ranked player, you'll lose more than you gain from beating them a few times. That's the nature of rankings.

It's the same in normal ranked games. If you lose to the guy, you'll need several games to make up the loss.

I just don't think that works as a principle.. the further you progress, the more you should lose? Its just not the correct way..

Professional players earn rewards (i.e money) for being runners-up to award their progress, same principle applies here? (barring the money haha)

That's not how it works. You don't lose more the further you get into a tournament. If you lose to a lower-ranked player, whether it's in a tourney or other ranked game, you lose lots of points. The only difference is that in the tourney, the points you lose AND GAIN are increased. The proportions are the same.

The only comparison I can make is chess. Their ranking system is similar to funky. If a top player wins a tournament, but loses or draws a few games against crap players, he may end up losing rank overall despite winning the tournament.

You're supposed to beat lower-ranked players more often than not, which is why you lose more points than you gain. In a tourney or any other ranked game.

Well, I have just lost -7.5 in one game in the 3rd round to a mid Adept in the Arcade tournament, simply because I refused to play tip-tap snooker..

Maybe I shouldn't bother with tournaments at all in future, as it is just clogged with that style of play, so on the whole, tournaments seem to be completely negative and boring, with more to lose than gain, so whats the point?

There isn't..

Complete waste of 2 hours really!!

Ranked tourneys have taken the fun out of it for me. Before ranking points were introduced to tourneys most people entered for fun. Now when I join one you get people distracting you often and players who tap tap tap. I know you can't really complain about tapping as it's a perfectly fair playstyle but for a lot of people including myslelf it is so boring tip tapping the pack for what feels like an eternity. Tourneys have become all about the points for alot of people now and many take them far too seriously.

i much preferred it when the tournies were just an honour to win ,without double points or any points exchanging,the people who consistantly win tournies will always be way out of reach for the average player points wise,i dont think that was the case when the old system was in place,just my humble opinion,i dont think any points should be lost for the entrants,just a prize fund of points,winner 25 points,2nd 15 points etc etc, this would be fairer and avoid the situation of getting to the semi finals ,losing and be worse off points wise,how can that be right,or an incentive to join other tournies

Edited at 16:30 Sun 01/07/12 (BST)

Agree with both _nightmare_ and samj147

But then you're ruining the whole ranking system! What about the edge modification and a whole host of other problems that would create?

I'm not sure why you're tying this loss of points to the win of a tournament.
If you get the following results in a tournament:
win vs 700, 713, 716, 770
loss vs 680
you'll have (proportionally) the same effect on rankings as if you get the same results in non-ranked games.

In a tourney, you are
1) playing for the tourney win
2) playing ranked games
The two are not connected!!

thats already in place nightmare, its called tournament points

i do prefer the friendly tournaments as for example i would like to enter arcade tournaments sometimes but because i don't like tap breaking i never enter them.

rankings are suppose to be like that, if your a virt like Seb for instance he is expected to beat 70% of opposition, if he doesn't he is expected to lose tons of rank unless its a newbie of course

Depends on who I play. If I lose to a 700 in an orig tourney, I'd lose about 15 points. Would take about 10 games to get that back.

I don't understand what you mean by this? There are clearly two ranking systems, one for normal gameplay and one for tournament matches, because the points for wins and losses are higher? So there is not one complete ranking system, because changes have been made to tournaments rankings..

So how would it effect the whole system?

Because the tournament games are still tied into the rankings using the same formulas and the same overall system. There are no two ranking systems! Edge and newbie modification, the comparative rule, and everything else are exactly the same.
Just different scales for different game types and modes.

http://www.funkysnooker.com/help#rankings

Actually, I think I was hinting that the scales could do with being reduced to make arcade tournaments more fair?

Also, are you are saying this ranking system can never be altered for the better?

I'm sure it would take no longer to implement a suggestion similar to what _nightmare_ has suggested, creating a seperate ranking system (or, by the looks of things, making all tournaments friendly) than all the new changes we have had to tournaments schedules, tournapoints, medals, home page etc.

Oh right, yes, the scaling could of course be altered.
Or the tourneys could be made friendly.

Some time ago, nick decided that tournaments should be the main focus of the site- so they increased their importance by increasing the ranking scale in tourneys.

rankings has been done for the better, in ancient times i beat ste_efc in one game of original and had 100 rank difference and i won 20 points from him in a normal ranked game.

now it would be about 12-13 in a tournament and 6 or 7 in normal play.

over the years rankings has been made harder rather than easier, saying that its double points in tournaments so to get a high ranking you need to win tournaments frequently without losing too many frames

It's like killer if you come 2nd you still lose ranking despite all that effort It's not really the fact that you lose your ranking it's the fact you can lose more ranking points than a person who comes in last place in killer this still annoys me

I suppose its a double-edged sword,

Elements worked for certain members in ancient times (which I remember fondly) and now these harder rankings are making it a much more serious, tougher game.

But to be honest, it highlights a point I made earlier, which is I think tournaments are becoming less attractive now. You find a great number of Adepts playing tap snooker, who are obviously taking the game seriously and trying to become Professionals (I find anyway) and I just have a problem with the idea that you can progress 3,4,5 rounds and come out worse than when you started, what a waste of time.