GameFAQs Contests
Contest Stats and Discussion - Part 906
Not_Wylvane | Posted 9/18/2010 9:20:11 PM | message detail |
From: LeonhartFour | #296 If you want to get literal with the definition of the word "contest," then sure. He still scored more points than everyone else despite not being smart enough to sign up for a prize. --- Wylvane Maniac64 is a horrible user. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/18/2010 9:25:38 PM | message detail |
Since
winning the contest is purely luck based you might as well take a risky
pick which is worth a lot of points that few people are going for and
hope you get lucky. Best example I can think of is Ulti's bracket in 2k4 he basically went cookie mode with Melee winning the 128-bit division. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/18/2010 9:26:22 PM | message detail |
From: charmander6000 | #302 FFX was the cookie pick, not Melee. --- http://img.imgcake.com/ultigardenpngba.png |
WarThaNemesis2 | Posted 9/18/2010 9:28:10 PM | message detail |
I assume he means cookie as-in by seeding sans Halo. --- http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh293/zukiraphaera/war-sig-1.png Nominate Ogre Battle 64 for the Game of the Decade contest! |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/18/2010 9:28:20 PM | message detail |
But
I guess what I was saying earlier is that just picking what you expect
to win, consistently, is a surprisingly good strategy. For one thing,
lots of people try upset specials, and the result of most of them is
that they lose points, so your conventional bracket will actually be
more unique than it looks. The L-Block example argues against this, but that was also a new format- which makes the probability of chaos a lot higher. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/18/2010 9:29:23 PM | message detail |
Banking on outside forces to influence the outcome is never a good strategy though. --- "Stay with me until the end. Please." "Not until the end. Always." |
Not_Wylvane | Posted 9/18/2010 9:31:09 PM | message detail |
From: charmander6000 | #302 That's what I do pretty much every contest. You'd be amazed at some of the winners I've picked. Luigi in 2003, Melee for the first Games Contest, Samus in 2005, L-Block in 2008, Brawl in 2009. But while we're talking about crazy picks, why not go into the craziest pick you actually got right? For me, it's probably predicting Crono making the semi-finals in 2002. For all the crazy stuff I had that contest (lmao Fox > Cloud), I'm still proud of that one, even if that was more favoritism talking then. --- Wylvane Colonel Alloy is a horrible user. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/18/2010 9:32:28 PM | message detail |
From: Not_Wylvane | #307 How is the cookie winner (on Board 8 anyway) a crazy upset? My biggest upset was Sonic > Crono 2006. Would've been Squall winning the Devil Division if he had managed to pull it off. --- "I couldn't stand a day without a past or future. I need to live each moment to keep fighting here and now." |
WarThaNemesis2 | Posted 9/18/2010 9:34:36 PM | message detail |
My biggest upset was Cecil to the Final Eight in 2008. ...It should've happened. Go burn, GameZACKs. --- http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh293/zukiraphaera/war-sig-1.png Nominate Ogre Battle 64 for the Game of the Decade contest! |
UltimaterializerX | Posted 9/18/2010 9:35:36 PM | message detail |
From: NoDicePwn | #300 That's my biggest issue. The entire interface is just crap over there. And the way you're acting now is pretty cool, keep doing that. --- ·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.~*ST*~.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.· http://img.imgcake.com/foolmoron/00x1.jpg |
UltimaterializerX | Posted 9/18/2010 9:36:31 PM | message detail |
He meant I had a cookie bracket except for Melee winning 128, which is true. --- ·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.~*ST*~.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.· This is good... isn't it? |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/18/2010 9:38:34 PM | message detail |
My biggest correct upset was Cloud > Link. I think it also depends on how much confidence you have in your own predictions. If you are someone with an excellent track record like cn or Yoblazer, it would seem that taking upset specials will hurt your chances most of the time. If your picks are usually pretty bad, it makes sense to gamble everything on something really unlikely, because you think your chances of winning a normal contest are even lower. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/18/2010 9:41:20 PM | message detail |
And the one time I won prize money (The 10th year anniversary contest), my prediction was very cookie cutter: 1. Final Fantasy VII 2. Ocarina of Time 3. Chrono Trigger 4. Link to the Past 5. Mario 3 6. FFVI 7. Melee 8. MGS 9. FFX 10. Halo The top 7 was the top 7 in the Games Contest x-stats straight up. Had no confidence in StarCraft or Wind Waker to actually make this list, so MGS and FFX were obvious replacements, at least to me. --- "But you have been given freedom. Freedom to be...outside." "I am lightning...the rain transformed." |
LOLContests | Posted 9/18/2010 9:56:56 PM | message detail |
In terms of Gamespot, I've got to agree with Blazer here. What self respecting nerd rallies against Darth ****ing Vader? Rallying can be pretty relevant here as well, potentiall 4chan potentially rallied 10,000+ votes in that NES Virtual Console poll a while back. --- "Ahem! There is *sand* on my *boot*!"--Kefka Dr. Football beat me, Yesmar in the 2010 Guru Contest! |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/18/2010 10:01:28 PM | message detail |
Yeah,
but most of the stuff 4chan and sites like that rally for are pretty
weak here, so rallying ends up being rather ineffective, so a lot of
times they'll give up pretty quickly (like with Battletoads in the
Games Contest or Bidoof a few years ago). Gamespot's contest is a lot
easier to influence because they don't really care, for one thing. --- "The great GF...Bahamut." "...GF? I...? Using my powers...It is you humans...I fear..." |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/18/2010 10:11:49 PM | message detail |
I
don't know if GameSpot smarten up and put matches on the front page I
feel that they'll still be hit with a lot more rallying than what
GameFAQs has been use to. Also yeah I meant that Ulti's bracket was pretty cookie with the exception of taking Melee to win the 128-bit division (his other non-cookie picks were SFII>SMRPG and Starcraft>Halo though they cancel each other out). Heck I bet taking Charizard to win the Heart Division would have given most people major points, even I who did pretty badly would have been pretty close to the Top 50. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/18/2010 10:14:37 PM | message detail |
Yeah,
but I'd consider Charizard to be a "calculated risk" because he had
reason to be the strongest Pokemon, in addition to the wild success the
series has enjoyed the last three years. It wasn't a bad pick, even
before the contest started. --- Please sign up to support the 2010 Nomination Rally Tournament winners! http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/55967577 |
UltimaterializerX | Posted 9/19/2010 12:35:11 AM | message detail |
Watch
HGSS boost GSC to astronomical heights and make it win the next
contest. If it were RBY, I'd pick it as an afterthought a la Sephiroth
in the villains contest. --- `·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.~*ST*~.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´¯`·.,¸¸,.·´ http://img175.imageshack.us/img175/7315/ocelotpartycd1.gif |
Masato_Tanaka | Posted 9/19/2010 12:41:22 AM | message detail |
WE WANT THE DAMN BRACKET! --- Elephant Talk: A New Kind Of Music Blog! http://elephantmusictalk.blogspot.com/ |
-LusterSoldier- | Posted 9/19/2010 12:45:42 AM | message detail |
Makes you wonder why this hasn't happened more often on GameFAQs. Prior the last contest, there were no rallying links for Twitter/Facebook. It wasn't until the last contest that we finally got Twitter/Facebook links and those links certainly had somewhat of a role in helping out Missingno against Crono (the Twitter rallies). Those links now make it easier to rally on Twitter/Facebook. You've got a point on Daily votes, but... If Gamespot had the vote somewhere that was much easier to see like Gamefaqs does, I'm pretty sure their votes would kill ours. But you gotta go through several links to reach all the matches and its not very user friendly at all. Agreed, a better voting interface and placing the voting interface on the homepage could boost the vote totals quite a bit. --- Luster Soldier --- ~Shield Bearer~ | ~Data Analyst~ Popular at school, but not as cool as Dr_Football, Guru Champ! |
Not_Wylvane | Posted 9/19/2010 5:51:41 AM | message detail |
From: LeonhartFour | #317 Charizard over Kratos, yeah. Charizard over Sora/Bowser? Eh. Though I had Kratos winning the division, so I'm probably not one to talk about making calculated risks in the context of that division (or in general, really). And another risk I was happy to nail was WCC > Tidus. I mean, the poll had Tidus AND Donkey Kong. No way I wouldn't pass up taking an upset with freaking Donkey Kong there. --- Wylvane Pyrostormer is a horrible user. |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 9:07:35 AM | message detail |
Charizard
over Sora/Bowser I don't think even falls under calculated risk.....you
could legitimately think that was probable to happen, and it did. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 9:34:31 AM | message detail |
We can say that now, but back then almost no one was saying that. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 9:37:07 AM | message detail |
Some people were! (Though I was not). It was no different really from the Vincent > Magus people in 2005. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 9:56:00 AM | message detail |
They both fell under calculated risk. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:00:53 AM | message detail |
You
really can't call picks bad (meaning not likely to happen) just because
you or the majority disagreed with them. Something like taking L-Block
to win is a calculated risk......you could, and people did, make legit
arguments for why Charizard and Vincent would win those divisions, and
they were right. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
TheKoolAidShoto | Posted 9/19/2010 10:06:09 AM | message detail |
From: red sox 777 | #326 No. Some picks are just BAD, no matter how you may try to reason it. Just look at Lopen's upset picks on a yearly basis. --- And I certainly do not agree with my words being taken out of context. - Vlado |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:08:04 AM | message detail |
No. Some picks are just BAD, no matter how you may try to reason it. Just look at Lopen's upset picks on a yearly basis. Some picks are just bad, yes, but not Charizard or Vincent winning their divisions. Those were upset picks that some people took because they actually believed they would happen, reasonably, not just because they were searching for upsets. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:10:02 AM | message detail |
Just
because a couple of people thought Charizard could doesn't mean he can.
Lots of people back then would have called you crazy, heck some people
even called Charizard > Kratos crazy especially with God of War 3
coming so soon. For example while you may have thought Red defeating
MMX was possible it was still a calculated risk. Now we can look back and say Charizard had a chance, but back then it was only a handful of people and they were laughed at. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:18:52 AM | message detail |
Red
> MMX was a calculated risk (or perhaps not so well calculated)
because none of the people taking it (just KP and myself as far as I
know among regulars here) actually believed it was likely to happen. If
people were calling Charizard > Kratos crazy, then they were just
wrong, as the contest proved- I don't see how you can claim that was a
bad pick. We're not that good at predicting contests here that we can
claim we just got unlucky when we get matches wrong. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:19:38 AM | message detail |
Though
going back to Vincent he had a decent chance at winning his division
because it was possible that he would be closely ranked to Aerith
(though not everyone thought that back then, he is after all optional).
That would put his chance at roughly around Squall's chance, but again
you had to hope for a lot of things to go your way. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
Team Rocket Elite (Moderator) | Posted 9/19/2010 10:20:37 AM | message detail |
Charizard over Sora/Bowser? Eh. The match was on the release date of HeartGold/SoulSilver. Even if you thought Bowser/Sora was normally stronger, it's not completely unreasonable to believe Charizard could overperform on that day and win. --- "Let me believe what you've always believed! That living is wonderful!" "Thank you so much... Thank you for loving me." |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:21:41 AM | message detail |
In retrospect, there was a very simple line of reasoning for why Vincent would beat Magus: Vincent : FFVII :: Magus : CT Of course, I would never have seen that before the contest thanks to CT fanboyism. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:22:51 AM | message detail |
If
people were calling Charizard > Kratos crazy, then they were just
wrong, as the contest proved- I don't see how you can claim that was a
bad pick. We're not that good at predicting contests here that we can
claim we just got unlucky when we get matches wrong. They were more of the anti-Charizard people, though Kratos was the favourite for good reason (until round 1). The point stands that you had to hope a lot of things go your way for Charizard to defeat Sora (Bowser). --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
PartOfYourWorld | Posted 9/19/2010 10:23:23 AM | message detail |
[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster] |
PartOfYourWorld | Posted 9/19/2010 10:23:51 AM | message detail |
Worst
bracket I ever made was the 2008 CB. I must have had a severe joke
character phobia, because I had L-Block and Sandbag reach the finals. I
completely distorted my bracket and brain just to give Sandbag a finals
spot, including taking Sandbag/Sonic out of Round 2 and leaving Auron
in the dust. What the hell was I thinking. Calculated risks - more like
terrified bracket maker! --- Yoblazer: http://i43.tinypic.com/25z1non.jpg Watch and you'll see... some day I'll be... part of your world! |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:25:00 AM | message detail |
In retrospect, there was a very simple line of reasoning for why Vincent would beat Magus: Vincent : FFVII :: Magus : CT Of course, I would never have seen that before the contest thanks to CT fanboyism. As previous contests showed us things don't always work that way. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:26:43 AM | message detail |
They
were more of the anti-Charizard people, though Kratos was the favourite
for good reason (until round 1). The point stands that you had to hope
a lot of things go your way for Charizard to defeat Sora (Bowser). And Charizard did win (and easily!), showing that the people who backed him were right. Come on now- this is like claiming that your opponent played badly in Go after he made a move that you didn't know how to counter, because you would have played differently and you must be right. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:27:53 AM | message detail |
Worst
bracket I ever made was the 2008 CB. I must have had a severe joke
character phobia, because I had L-Block and Sandbag reach the finals. I
completely distorted my bracket and brain just to give Sandbag a finals
spot, including taking Sandbag/Sonic out of Round 2 and leaving Auron
in the dust. What the hell was I thinking. Calculated risks - more like
terrified bracket maker! I know sometimes I feel like I'll take Pokemon GSC as my winner in the upcoming contest. It probably has the best chance outside of SSBB/SSBM/FFX. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:29:53 AM | message detail |
I
mean, Charmander, there doesn't have to be only one "reasonable" or
"correct" pick per match. If we were as good at predicting contests as
it were possible to be, then yes, that's how it would be, and any
variations would be from randomness. But we're not close to that, so
it's perfectly viable for people to hold different opinions on matches
without either side taking it only as a calculated risk. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:34:08 AM | message detail |
And
Charizard did win (and easily!), showing that the people who backed him
were right. Come on now- this is like claiming that your opponent
played badly in Go after he made a move that you didn't know how to
counter, because you would have played differently and you must be
right. At the time Charizard defeating Kratos was possible while at the same time Charizard getting enough of a bandwagon to defeat Bowser was a calculated risk. We can say this stuff now, but go read the stats topic back then to see what we thought. Today we have the advantage to take a step back and evaluate what went wrong (or right). Another example in the games contest many of us took Contra > Metroid despite knowing Metroid was stronger because we thought LoZ would SFF Metroid to death. Today we look at the match and say what's stopping one of the top NES games from SFF Contra? --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:36:43 AM | message detail |
I
mean, Charmander, there doesn't have to be only one "reasonable" or
"correct" pick per match. If we were as good at predicting contests as
it were possible to be, then yes, that's how it would be, and any
variations would be from randomness. But we're not close to that, so
it's perfectly viable for people to hold different opinions on matches
without either side taking it only as a calculated risk. I agree that more than one character could pull an upset, but at the same time Charizard's chance was considered to be so low that it was a lot more risky to take it than say Bowser. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 10:44:58 AM | message detail |
I
also feel that our defination of calculated risk may differ to me it
seems that almost anyone with a decent argument wouldn't be considered
a calculated risk while to me it requires something higher than say a
5% chance of winning. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
HaRRicH | Posted 9/19/2010 10:47:35 AM | message detail |
From: NoDicePwn | #283 For the record, I don't normally take upsets for the sake of taking upsets. If it wasn't GameSpot, I wouldn't have taken that pick...but I had mentioned before their bracket was released that I would probably take anybody Sephiroth faced in the first round over him there... From: red sox 777 | #287 ...I agree with this logic: use good logic available. I'm not always as logical as I hope to be, and I understand some things are longer shots than others...but I try to stick to the picks I honestly believe in after reviewing what we have available. --- http://img812.imageshack.us/img812/3492/eponaharr.jpg Nominate EPONA here: http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/55150177 |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/19/2010 11:11:08 AM | message detail |
From: red sox 777 | #333 The most simple line of reasoning (which I used): Magus was overrated. There was plenty of evidence supporting it. And a "calculated risk" isn't always a right pick. SF > RE was a calculated risk, but I got it wrong. --- Support Seifer Almasy (Final Fantasy VIII) for Character Battle IX! http://img18.imageshack.us/img18/9342/banner3seifer.jpg |
charmander6000 | Posted 9/19/2010 11:30:34 AM | message detail |
Yeah
had Ganondorf performed worse on Sephiroth than Bowser I may have been
tempted to take Squall to win the division. Every single match with the
exception of Tidus/Shadow and Sephiroth/Ganondorf suggested that the
four-pack was overrated. I know I mustn't have been the only one that
saw the trend back then. Still despite Magus maybe being overrated he still should have won over Knuckles. --- Calintares made a whole lot of geolocation x-stats Congrats to Dr. Football for winning the Guru. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/19/2010 11:32:56 AM | message detail |
Yeah, Ganondorf was the outlier, but mostly because 2004 Ganondorf was stronger than 2003 Ganondorf, due to TP hype. He still ended up performing a full 3% less than he was supposed to on Alucard in 2004. --- "But you have been given freedom. Freedom to be...outside." "I am lightning...the rain transformed." |
red sox 777 | Posted 9/19/2010 11:33:00 AM | message detail |
I
agree that more than one character could pull an upset, but at the same
time Charizard's chance was considered to be so low that it was a lot
more risky to take it than say Bowser. IIRC, ngirl was arguing for Charizard as more than an upset special. I took Sora > Charizard in the division final and thought Sora was the clear favorite to win the division- I do not think I would have agreed that Bowser was more likely to win than Charizard. I recall I didn't think very much of Charizard until after round 1, but I don't think I ever called that upset unreasonable. To me, a calculated risk is a pick that is not the most probable outcome (from the bracketmaker's point of view, not the board's). So for example, if I thought Sora had a 40% chance, Charizard had a 30% chance, Bowser had a 20% chance, and L-Block had a 10% chance, not taking Sora would be a risk. --- Crono > Sephiroth. 7 years of waiting, and perhaps many more to go. Remain steadfast. |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/19/2010 11:36:14 AM | message detail |
[This message was deleted at the request of the original poster] |
LeonhartFour | Posted 9/19/2010 11:36:40 AM | message detail |
I
would consider a calculated risk to be anything that actually has some
reasonable backing to it (i.e. not a fanboy pick or something you
picked just to have an upset pick), even if you don't end up being
right. --- "Hold on a minute! That testimony stinks!" "Witness! You can't just say 'Hello' and expect us to get anywhere! I want you to testify!" |
