Most consistent Type 1 players?

[CrazyCarl]

I've been noticing a trend of certain players constantly making top 8's at large events which is pretty cool.

Stephen Menendian(obv)
Andy Probasco (The Brass Man!)
Ben Kowal
Dave Allen(thorme)

Who else?

[Hyperion]

Jacob Orlove
Rich Shay
Carsten Kotter
Kim Kluck
Serge Metz
Benjamin Ribbeck

I don't follow the Italian tournament results that closely but I'm sure there are T8 regulars there too.

[Kowal]

Luca de something if I recall.  And MaxxMatt always seems to have a 4th place slot with his name on it.

Corey Canfield has been on a winning streak recently too.

By the way, thanks for the recognition Cr4l.  

[Bram]

I've only ever been in two tournaments in my life that had playoffs (a rather new concept in the Dutch Vintange scene as neither Castricum nor Eindhoven used to have them, but Eindhoven now seems to have switched ever since they started giving away power) and I T8'ed on both occasions. That's a 100% boys and girls. Now let's see if I can keep that up

[thorme]

My opinions on additions to the list:

- Kevin Cron
- ShockWave (Rich right?  I can't recall the last name)

Also Carl, you do pretty well for yourself - so I'd chalk you up as well.

[Dr. Sylvan]

I can't believe it took four posts for this thread to include Rich Mattiuzzo aka Shock Wave. (Canada: getting ignored across the longest unguarded border in the world since the Founding!)

Some Italian names I've noticed over and over:

Lorenzo Fedeli
Filippo Grigatti
Marco Marotta
David Beduzzi
Pietro Cavalleti

Giuseppe de Luca is the one Kowal was thinking of earlier. I don't exactly have numbers on this, but those are names that at least ring a bell when I scroll through T8s.

[Kowal]

I don't exactly have numbers on this

You're fired.

[rvs]

I'm 2 for 2 in Antwerp power tourneys

Also, I haven't missed a T8 except for one time for 2 years in either a dutch or belgian T1 tournament (and I also made T8 in Berlin). However, in Duelmen, I have been 9th 3 times, and like 11th, 13th and 15th, out of 7 or 8 times attended O_o

[Ric_Flair]

My Pro Team of Vintage:

Steve Menendian
Jacob Orlove
Rich Shay
Grand Inquistor
Diaionc (Corey)
Carl

[JACO]

Welcome to the Global Leaderboard, in no particular order (handles in parentheses; PM me if you'd like your name updated with your handle, and I'll gladly edit this list). This is the who's who of Type 1 Top 8ers:

Lorenzo Fedeli (Aj3j3)
Filippo Grigatti (Twister)
Marco Marotta
David Beduzzi (InJ)
Pietro Cavalleti
Morten Oberg (IronMorten)
Richard Mattuzio (ShockWave)
Peter ? (dicemanx)
Oliver Daems
Rasmus Roar
Rasmus Nielsen
Mennoe Rieff (mrieff)
Peter Matyssek
Serge Metz
Fabian Moyschewitz
Danilo Benvenuti (Benga)
Alberto Bertinetti (Albertbob)
Marco Marotta
Alexander Witt
Max Mally
Gaby van Dinteren (Gabethebabe)
Andreas Klaes
Johannes Goeth
Carsten Kotter
Benjamin Ribbeck
Kim Kluck (Shades?)
Bo Fingerhut (LOLinger; one of the best real names I've ever seen)
Phillip Mayer
Daniel Paarde
Hero 't Mannetje
Roy Thisjen
Koen van der Hulst (Thug)
Bram Voorhees (Bram)
David Third
Arthur Tindemans
Stefam Gussenhoven
Torben Blatz
Steven Menendian (Smmenen)
David Allen (thorme)
Marc Perez (PTW)
John Blake (Ultima)
Ray Robillard (Iamfishman)
Corey Canfield (Diaonic)
Giuseppe De Luca (Siral or Luca?)
Massimo Mattioli (MaxxMatt)
Aaron LeKarz
Rich Shay (TheAtogLord)
Carl Winter (CrazyCarl)
Ben Kowal (Kowal)
Christian Wollblad (Wollblad)

Congratulations gentleman. You have performed at a consistently high level, gathering Top 8 after Top 8. I have recognized your success for quite some time, and it about time the rest of the world starts to notice too.

PS. Part of the reason Canada gets ignored is because we never see any results, deck lists, etc.

[CrazyCarl]

Forgotten is probably a better word.  Or overlooked, actually.  There's just so many who's-who type people in Type 1.  That's why I asked the question

I'll also have to add Eli Kassis to that list(He's t8ed a few NE tourneys and consistantly finishes high in the standings).

[SliverKing]

I cant believe the lack of respect for the Canadians!  Did none of you guys go to the same GENCON I've been to the past 2 years?   Did you not get to see them play?  These guys are really good.  They combine creative deckbuilding with solid play and classy attitudes.  
I guess we're just talking top8's here, but if we were talking perfect type 1 team, you better believe some high draft picks would come out of Canada.

[rvs]

Since he hasn't been mentioned, Peter (dicemanx) is one of the best t1 players I've met.

[BWM]

I pretty consistently crap out...

[CrazyCarl]

Seeing as I'm ridiculously lazy I wouldn't do this, but it would be sort of cool to have some sort of scoreboard for # of Top 8's or perhaps a list of people who have reached a certain number of Top 8's.  Maybe even power rosters .

Pip, you game?

[Dr. Sylvan]

I was planning on creating data for the players of all the tournaments included in my monthly articles for 2004, at the end of the year. That's when I'll have time to actually write articles, too, over the amazingly long American college winter vacation. Until then, this thread can remain in the territory of personal perception and non-quantitative speculation/estimation/penis envy. And for the concerned public, yes I will have separate scales for North America and Europe when I do this.

[Komatteru]

Seeing as I'm ridiculously lazy I wouldn't do this, but it would be sort of cool to have some sort of scoreboard for # of Top 8's or perhaps a list of people who have reached a certain number of Top 8's.  Maybe even power rosters .

Kinda like the 'money leaders' on the PGA Tour.  That would be pretty neat.

We could also vote on awards at the end of the year/season.  You know, stuff like "Newcomer of the year," "Most improved player," "Player who no one knew was totally awesome," etc.  We could expand on the TMD Awards from earlier this year (http://www.themanadrain.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=17522&highlight=awards).

[Eastman]

If I had to pick, from those I've seen:

Smmenen
Carl
(kevin cron sp?)
iamfishman
Shockwave
Diceman
Triple S
PTW
Thorme
Atoglord
Grand Inquisitor
Eastman
Orlove
Samite Healer

are the guys who I'd put in the 'elite', in no particular order.

Sorry to the foreign guys I haven't seen play. I'm not saying my list is conclusive, those are just the elite among the players I've seen.

it would be sort of cool to have some sort of scoreboard for # of Top 8's or perhaps a list of people who have reached a certain number of Top 8's.

What size tournies we talking? I've hit at least 20 top 8s in the last year at the 30-50 man events we see so often in NE, but haven't cracked it at the big events. Can I trade top 8's at 30 man events in for large event credit at a reduced rate? With my numbers, I'm happy to take 4:1 or even 5:1.

[CrazyCarl]

it would be sort of cool to have some sort of scoreboard for # of Top 8's or perhaps a list of people who have reached a certain number of Top 8's.

What size tournies we talking? I've hit at least 20 top 8s in the last year at the 30-50 man events we see so often in NE, but haven't cracked it at the big events. Can I trade top 8's at 30 man events in for large event credit at a reduced rate? With my numbers, I'm happy to take 4:1 or even 5:1.

Probably the 50+ person tournies as per Pip's usual range, though possible Zheromnibus would be willing to take over the <50 events.

[The Atog Lord]

I think that WotC does a great job of rating players with their K system. I think that all of you know how it works, but for those who do not:

Every player begins with a rating of 1600. Whenever a player plays a sanctioned match, the rating of that player is changed (up for a win, down for a loss). The change is a function of the difference between the two players' ratings and the K value of the event.

K value is a number, such that no match can cost a player more than K points. K is tied to the importance of the tournament. K is 8 for FNM, and around 48 for the Pro Tour, with many events being 16 K.

Now, while this system is great for most forms of Magic, the fact that most Type One events are not sanctioned means that most T1 events do not change a player's T1 rating.

What I'm wondering is, would it even be viable for The Mana Drain to implement a similar system? Of course, there would be problems with it. I suppose K value could be some function of the tournament size. But the system would still require some central entity to gather results and update what would no doubt be a large data base. This idea might be too hard to implement.

[kirdape3]

I'm sure that someone can actually do it, but they'd need a consistent way to report such things.  The rating system isn't terribly difficult to understand, but we'd have to basically use DCI guidelines to figure out what K-level to run them at.

[JACO]

I think that WotC does a great job of rating players with their K system. I think that all of you know how it works, but for those who do not:

Every player begins with a rating of 1600. Whenever a player plays a sanctioned match, the rating of that player is changed (up for a win, down for a loss). The change is a function of the difference between the two players' ratings and the K value of the event.

K value is a number, such that no match can cost a player more than K points. K is tied to the importance of the tournament. K is 8 for FNM, and around 48 for the Pro Tour, with many events being 16 K.

Now, while this system is great for most forms of Magic, the fact that most Type One events are not sanctioned means that most T1 events do not change a player's T1 rating.

What I'm wondering is, would it even be viable for The Mana Drain to implement a similar system? Of course, there would be problems with it. I suppose K value could be some function of the tournament size. But the system would still require some central entity to gather results and update what would no doubt be a large data base. This idea might be too hard to implement.

I've actually been brainstorming an idea for creating a seperate sanctioning body, primarily for proxied Type 1 tournaments.

One idea I had was to assign the K value of a given tournament based on the turnout. For example, a tournament of 8-16 players would be a max of 8K (but could certainly have more participants), while 16K events would require at least 20 people. 32K events would require 48+ people, and something like 200+ players would be 48K.

I don't want to get into all the details of it, but I'm working on a pretty broad Type 1 Grand Prix style tournament scenario, and this would be part of it. 1, 2, and 3 round byes would be assigned to winners of certain size 'feeder' events, for much bigger regional, or Grand Prix style events. Theoretically, players could also receive 1 or 2 round byes based on their 'rating' by this new sanctioning body.

If anybody has good ideas regarding this, I would encourage you all to email me (PM's are no good, thanks).

[Zherbus]

We worked on a system a while back, I think Jeek even wrote software for it. There's a lot more to it than people realize, but I wouldn't be opposed to bringing it up again.

I've hit at least 20 top 8s in the last year at the 30-50 man events we see so often in NE, but haven't cracked it at the big events.

This made me think a little. Eastman plays in at least 2 per month, often times 3 or 4. Correct? If we conservatively call that 40/year then 20 out of 40 is 50%, which is pretty damn good (read: consistant). Being self-centered that I am, I'll talk about me. I've probably played in 18 tournaments in the last 3 years combined (6 a year), as I generally play in 1 every other month. I can say I have t8/won at least 10 of those since my cycle is:

Play for the first time in months, do really bad from lack of playing.

Play again in two months having playtested my scrotum off, driven by last times performance. I'll top8/win.

Rinse and repeat.

So after a win, I get lazy. I won't touch my cards for weeks on end and barely keep up with what other decks are doing. That's how I'll be for 2 months. After I lose, I'm practicing multiple times a week. I'm studying our gauntlet, I'm reading reports more closely. When I'm in this phase, I'm on top of my game.

My question, to those who DO play more regularly (and don't go through phases as I do) is how consistant are you at roughly 50% wins? Are we talking a top 8 every other tournament? A good streak of 5 top8's then a dry spell of 5 misses? If so, what do we define as consistant?

[Kowal]

I view not t8ing as having scrubbed out, especially in 30ish man tournaments.

I go to a new tournament every weekend, and sometimes a double header.  The only times I can recall not top eighting recently are Richmond 2, Chicago, and Somers CT.

[Zherbus]

What question was that answering?

[Kowal]

My question, to those who DO play more regularly (and don't go through phases as I do) is how consistant are you at roughly 50% wins? Are we talking a top 8 every other tournament? A good streak of 5 top8's then a dry spell of 5 misses? If so, what do we define as consistant?

That one.  Honestly, in a series of 25 man tournaments, not top eighting is usually the result of trying something new (experiment failed) or extraordinary conditions (shit poor luck, debilitating hangover, etc)

[Zherbus]

Oh I agree, I just don't see how that helps define consistant

[Grand Inquisitor]

These (Canadians) are really good. They combine creative deckbuilding with solid play and classy attitudes.

[The M.E.T.H.O.D]

I see that a lot of the full members I see at events (Whether or not they frequently play), usually make up the T8s of most NE tournies.

[mrieff]

I was planning on creating data for the players of all the tournaments included in my monthly articles for 2004, at the end of the year. That's when I'll have time to actually write articles, too, over the amazingly long American college winter vacation. Until then, this thread can remain in the territory of personal perception and non-quantitative speculation/estimation/penis envy. And for the concerned public, yes I will have separate scales for North America and Europe when I do this.

That would be a great idea, if you have the time please do!