Posted by redcped on 10/5/2019 9:37:00 PM (view original):
This is an observation, not a complaint, but it does appear at least possible that a good deal of roster formation in the $255M draft will come down to luck and some owners could find themselves at a massive disadvantage within the first couple rounds. An owner could easily wind up losing on on multiple players in each round and be far shorter on cash than others, and it wouldn't really have anything to do with how good they are at playing WIS.

I've done a couple silent auctions just with players and without the money factor, and it becomes a bit more of a psychology game than a draft.

I hate this theme idea. Way too many unforseen problems could arise. If I really want Silver King and bid $50M and somebody else bids $55M, I am f'kd. What if seven other people also bid $40-$45? Now they are also f'kd. This theme idea has disaster potential written all over it. And like redcped commented above, this isn't really a theme as much as a game theory exercise with too much luck involved.

Posted by rbow923 on 10/5/2019 10:25:00 PM (view original):
Suggestion, replace the 2nd draft with the abandoned $100m theme. smells too much like last years fiasco.

Exactly.

Here's something to consider - when there are 6 pages of questions, it might be time to consider that the theme rules are too complicated to understand.

Here's another thought. Building rosters are supposed to be fun. Challenging is fine, but it's still got to be fun. The variable cap theme in round 1 was fun. A few of these round 2 themes not only do not seem like fun, but seem like a chore.

Posted by schwarze on 10/7/2019 11:01:00 PM (view original):

Posted by redcped on 10/5/2019 9:37:00 PM (view original):
This is an observation, not a complaint, but it does appear at least possible that a good deal of roster formation in the $255M draft will come down to luck and some owners could find themselves at a massive disadvantage within the first couple rounds. An owner could easily wind up losing on on multiple players in each round and be far shorter on cash than others, and it wouldn't really have anything to do with how good they are at playing WIS.

I've done a couple silent auctions just with players and without the money factor, and it becomes a bit more of a psychology game than a draft.

I hate this theme idea. Way too many unforseen problems could arise. If I really want Silver King and bid $50M and somebody else bids $55M, I am f'kd. What if seven other people also bid $40-$45? Now they are also f'kd. This theme idea has disaster potential written all over it. And like redcped commented above, this isn't really a theme as much as a game theory exercise with too much luck involved.

Why not run it just like the "Silent Auction" draft I ran a while back? No bidding, but simply request players and you only get them if you are the ONLY owner to do so. Yes there is still a slight "luck" element here but much reduced from the current theme proposal.

I actually like the 255 Draft theme, although there will be quite a bit of luck involved. The key is NOT to get carried away with expensive bids. The potential problem is that if a couple owners get screwed with bidding too much on players they don't get, and then decide to quit, it messes up the whole tournament. NebHusker's idea above is pretty solid.

Having thought a little bit more about the themes:

It's pretty clear that this WISC $110M is a descendant of your WISC $70M The Chain from a couple of years ago, with the no player can be a teammate of anyone except the players that they are "chained" to. However, this theme is 50 times harder than The Chain ever was, for two reasons:

1. Instead of dealing with cross-checking for 25 players, we are doing cross-checking for 50 players.

2. The fact that everything is restricted to a ten year period around the base team significantly complicates this Chain-based theme. If The Chain had stipulated that all 25 players must come within a 10 year period, it would have been transformed from difficult to near impossible... like this one is.

Conclusion: One of these two problem elements has to go. If not, this theme will be impossible and the biggest chore in the history of WISC.

WISC $140M (Teammate draft) is fine, although I'd like to know whether the nominating owner gets to pick the teammate he'll use before the draft begins.

For the Silent Auction draft, I just don't see how the money is going to make much of a difference, unless it is late in the draft and you have so much more money than everyone else. The cost of bidding big and losing is just prohibitive, and unless the auction is Vickrey-style it will likely cause the Winners' Curse as well. Also, it makes no sense for this to be such a high salary cap league as we know almost no one is going to get there (due to the fact that there are only so many high-WIS salary players).

Personally, I'd rework the draft leagues to the following:

WISC $140M - Silent Auction Draft. This one is run like Nebhusker suggested, where an owner only gets a player in a round if they are the only one to request the player.

WISC Unlimited Cap - Teammate Draft. Every owner nominates a player, and gets first crack at picking the teammate of the player they nominate for their roster before the draft begins. Then, every owner receives $255 to bid on eligible (and undrafted) teammates of nominated players. A Vickrey-style auction then commences for the teammates of the nominated players one at a time. For example, if Ed Walsh is on the block, every owner has a choice of whether to submit a bid or pass. The winner will pay the losing bid + $1 and receive Ed Walsh, and all the losing bidders pay the amount they bid. As there will likely be a lot of teammates of any one player, it would be hard for someone to wreck their team to the point they could not field a roster.

Who is this Vickrey guy?

I should say - I'm excited about the 110m league and I think it sounds like a fun challenge. I just want to make sure I understand before I start building teams.

Posted by odalisgagne on 10/8/2019 7:05:00 AM (view original):
Who is this Vickrey guy?

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vickrey_auction

Essentially, if I bid $100mil for Silver King and the highest losing bid is $60mil, I would get him for $61mil ($1mil over the 2nd highest bid). It's a different way of running auctions. To be clear, I do NOT think we are doing it this way, nor do I care if we do or not.

Posted by schwarze on 10/7/2019 11:01:00 PM (view original):

Posted by redcped on 10/5/2019 9:37:00 PM (view original):
This is an observation, not a complaint, but it does appear at least possible that a good deal of roster formation in the $255M draft will come down to luck and some owners could find themselves at a massive disadvantage within the first couple rounds. An owner could easily wind up losing on on multiple players in each round and be far shorter on cash than others, and it wouldn't really have anything to do with how good they are at playing WIS.

I've done a couple silent auctions just with players and without the money factor, and it becomes a bit more of a psychology game than a draft.

I hate this theme idea. Way too many unforseen problems could arise. If I really want Silver King and bid $50M and somebody else bids $55M, I am f'kd. What if seven other people also bid $40-$45? Now they are also f'kd. This theme idea has disaster potential written all over it. And like redcped commented above, this isn't really a theme as much as a game theory exercise with too much luck involved.

You of all people should see that this really isn't that complicated. I didn't want to say too much, but since there is so much griping, here it is: you only need $1M to get a player if no one else bids on them. Sure, it may make sense to bid huge the first couple rounds to try and get a stud, but after that, there's really not much reason to bid more than $1M at a time. And if other owners use up a ton of their payroll early on, even better for everyone else down the road.

Posted by schwarze on 10/7/2019 11:06:00 PM (view original):
Here's something to consider - when there are 6 pages of questions, it might be time to consider that the theme rules are too complicated to understand.

Thank you. I thought I was the only one reaching for the Pepto. I really don't want to play this one...pretty hard to find a theme I don't want to do...

Let's play a theme, not a scavenger hunt.

Posted by Jtpsops on 10/8/2019 10:21:00 AM (view original):

Posted by schwarze on 10/7/2019 11:01:00 PM (view original):

Posted by redcped on 10/5/2019 9:37:00 PM (view original):
This is an observation, not a complaint, but it does appear at least possible that a good deal of roster formation in the $255M draft will come down to luck and some owners could find themselves at a massive disadvantage within the first couple rounds. An owner could easily wind up losing on on multiple players in each round and be far shorter on cash than others, and it wouldn't really have anything to do with how good they are at playing WIS.

I've done a couple silent auctions just with players and without the money factor, and it becomes a bit more of a psychology game than a draft.

I hate this theme idea. Way too many unforseen problems could arise. If I really want Silver King and bid $50M and somebody else bids $55M, I am f'kd. What if seven other people also bid $40-$45? Now they are also f'kd. This theme idea has disaster potential written all over it. And like redcped commented above, this isn't really a theme as much as a game theory exercise with too much luck involved.

You of all people should see that this really isn't that complicated. I didn't want to say too much, but since there is so much griping, here it is: you only need $1M to get a player if no one else bids on them. Sure, it may make sense to bid huge the first couple rounds to try and get a stud, but after that, there's really not much reason to bid more than $1M at a time. And if other owners use up a ton of their payroll early on, even better for everyone else down the road.

A couple of things: First off, there are a limited number of high salary players & pitchers (that are good and not just 500 innings of crap), particularly when only one instance of a player can be chosen. Thus, an owner who obtains more of those players will gain an advantage.

Secondly, the assumption is that people can stay out of each other's way, once the big fights are over. The reality is that people will continue to get in each other's way, and if they all bid $1 million to fill out their roster, the likely result is that a whole bunch more players will get blacklisted.

Gaming this out, the likely result is that those who don't lose the big fights early will get a snowballing, even bigger advantage over anyone who lost the battle for the top guys.