<br />If you didn&#039;t already sit at your computer and sadly calculate sesason strengths for four different teams with identical regular season records, and IF the draft order written in the rules is used for this season, which it may or may not be, then this will be the draft order for Summer 2011 (IRC me if you disagree):<br /><br />1. FLS Legion<br />2. DMR LordBritish<br />3. DMC Nautilus<br />4. SPE MassVC<br />5. SXP Humanbones<br />6. EBL Hatred<br />7. KGB Tai<br />8. TKV Rus<br />9. KNF Strangle<br />10. BBC Prime<br />11. SUC Ralphis<br />12. BSK Clim<br /><br />I do not want to discuss how this draft order will be selected, but how draft orders in general should be selected, and indeed which sort of draft should be used.<br /><br />&lt;WALL OF TEXT&gt;<br /><br />[b]Does the draft need to be revised?[/b]<br /><br />The fact that some people win, even that they win by a lot, and that some people lose, even by a lot, is not by itself a reason to revise the draft.&nbsp; It is the nature of competition that some people win and some people lose.<br /><br />However, at the outset of the last season, even before the draft, there were many who speculated that Goatface would not do so well, or that Ralphis and Jenova would do well, and they turned out to be correct.&nbsp; This is not a coincidence.&nbsp; It is because Ralphis and Jenova are very good players with respect to all the captains, and Goatface, with no offense to him personally, was less good than the rest of the captains. Captains, who usually play in their teams&#039; scheduled games, make up 1/3 of a given team&#039;s players.&nbsp; In ZDaemon CTF, whether this person is very good or less good makes a huge difference.&nbsp; (Even 5v5 priv games are easy to call for certain randcaps outcomes.)<br /><br />Supposing the draft is completely balanced, this means that Ralphis will have a higher chance of winning than Goatface in any season.&nbsp; Some people believe that this is how it should be--that better players should have a better chance at winning than worse players.&nbsp; But I think most people involved in the IDL believe that all players and teams should have a more or less equal chance of winning.&nbsp; Blowouts are not good competition; neck-and-neck struggles are good competition.&nbsp; So, if the draft favors some captains, the favor should be directed towards captains who are at a disadvantage so as to even things out.&nbsp; In an ideal league, the draft should be designed to perfectly compensate for the skill differences between the captains so that each captain predictively has a 50% chance of winning any game.<br /><br />Of course, an even better situation would be a league where all of the captains are of approximately the same skill level.&nbsp; This could either be all 3rds: Strangle, Prime, Xen, Dr_Noob, Goatface, Clim, Legion, OurHero, Beast, MadV, ReXn0r, and I (+10 others); or it could be all 1sts: Bones, Ralphis, Nostar, Hatred, Jenova, Whiteboy, Chaindude, Cha0tix (+net), Chewy, Stallion, Mikehail, and LordBritish (+10 others); but not a combination of the two.&nbsp; Since many of the former want to cap (and why shouldn&#039;t they), and many of the latter refuse to cap (and why shouldn&#039;t they), this can never happen.<br /><br />[b]If we keep the current draft system, how should pick orders be determined?[/b]<br /><br />Which draft pick is the best pick?&nbsp; There is a lot of debate and varying opinion on the matter, but it is certainly not clear that the first pick is the best pick.&nbsp; Which pick is the best pick depends on the captains--defenders would want to go early to pick runners, and runners would want to go late to pick two fraggers; in a league with very few first-teir players in free agency, everyone wants to go early so they can have at least one (source: Jenova and Hatred, #idl).&nbsp; If we took a poll (and we should), I think (based on over-hearing conversations) that the average most-desired spot would fall mid-to-late in the draft.<br /><br />So, it doesn&#039;t make sense that captains of the worst teams in previous seasons are given the first draft spot.&nbsp; I think a slightly better system would be to put the teams with the worst records last in the draft.<br /><br />[i]An even better system[/i] would be to let Legion choose his own draft spot, and then let the next in line pick, until Ralphis gets to choose between two spots, and the final captain&#039;s spot is the only one remaining.<br /><br />[b]How else could the draft go?[/b]<br /><br />One possible draft system would be to randomize pick order in every round.&nbsp; This even seems the most &quot;fair.&quot;&nbsp; The problem with this is that it is probable (79.86 % likely) that some teams will go early (in the first half) of every round, and this very well may be Hatred or Ralphis.<br /><br />For drafts that preserve order in a three-round system, there are four possible drafts:<br /><br />A &quot;snake draft,&quot; currently used by the IDL, changes draft order every round.&nbsp; This draft seems to favor A and disfavor C the least severely of the four drafts.&nbsp; But, as the discussion above points out (and because the third round is often a moot draft), it may in fact favor C over A.&nbsp; For three teams A, B, and C, the rounds would go like this:<br /><br />[i]1: ABC<br />2: CBA<br />3: ABC[/i]<br /><br />A &quot;straight draft&quot; has the same order in every round.&nbsp; This draft favors A and disfavors C the most severely.&nbsp; Notice that no reasonable argument could be made that this draft favors C over A.&nbsp; It goes like this:<br /><br />[i]1: ABC<br />2: ABC<br />3: ABC[/i]<br /><br />For the sake of middle ground and spanning possibility, Alternative Draft #1:<br /><br />[i]1: ABC<br />2: ABC<br />3: CBA[/i]<br /><br />^This draft still clearly favors A, although not as heavily as a straight draft.&nbsp; Alternative Draft #2:<br /><br />[i]1: ABC<br />2: CBA<br />3: CBA[/i]<br /><br />^This draft favors C at least more than the snake draft (and favors A at least less).<br /><br />These drafts compensate for captain skill level more or less.&nbsp; The order in which they compensate for skill level, from least compensation to most, goes:<br /><br />[i]Snake Draft<br />Alternative Draft #2<br />Alternative Draft #1<br />Straight Draft[/i]<br /><br />[b]Why should we consider different drafts?[/b]<br /><br />In my opinion, the current draft does not compensate strongly enough for captain skill level.&nbsp; I do not think any team drafted by Goatface can beat any team drafted by Ralphis under the current system.&nbsp; If both are allowed to be captains, then both should have an even shot at winning any given game, including the MB.<br /><br />I think a draft with stronger skill compensation should be used so that Goatface is favored and Ralphis is disfavored more severely.&nbsp; With the current spread in captain skill, I am personally in favor of a straight draft where teams with the lowest records go first and teams with the highest records go last.&nbsp; I think Goatface with 1 and 13 vs. Ralphis with 11 and 23 would be a fair match; Legion with 2 and 14 vs. Jenova&nbsp; with 12 and 24 would be a fair match.&nbsp; This is because Ralphis and Jenova are equivalent to 1-6 draft picks, while Legion and Goatface are equivalent to 18-24 draft picks.&nbsp; In this system, each team plays with approximately a 1st, 2nd, and 3rd (one of each).<br /><br />If not this, then I believe at least one of the Alternative Drafts should be used as a compromise.<br /><br />&lt;/WALL OF TEXT&gt;<br /><br /><br />I would like to know what people think about this because the decision is first of all up to the players and only second of all up to the board and the commissioner.<br /><br />...Hatred?