We are running into difficulty pairing a small team tournament. We currently have four teams of three, and may expand to four teams of four. We would like to get 9-11 rounds in. In the past we have paired players in the same stratum twice during the event, but now we cannot figure it out.
Is there any simple algorithm for pairing such a tournament?
Thanks,
Angelo
If you kept 4 teams of 3, you could do a RR within a RR.
Each team will play a match with each other team.
During that match, each team member will play each member of the other team.
So each player would have 9 games by the end, 1 game against every player on the other teams.
If You have 4 teams of 4, that would yield 12 games each, slightly over your threshhold.
This is called Schiller System (after Eric Schiller). It’s a great system actually (and would be great for norm tournaments but is not allowed even though it was once used in England).
Skip the board 1 vs board 3 and board 2 vs board 4 pairings and you have your nine rounds. Adding the closest point-score matchups after that could get rounds 10 and 11.
Even easier from a pairing standpoint would be to just go to the 12 rounds.
Thanks for the suggestions.
One thing though: We prefer that boards play more games at their level, and fewer games above/below their level.
Any suggestion for skewing the pairings in this manner?
a. 6 games - Each board plays two games against the same board on the other teams.
b. 3 games - Board 1s against the board 2s, Board 3s against Board 4s.
Up to 3 additional rounds continuing b with colors reversed.
I like the 2 games against every other player at your board level and then 1 swapped. This gives more emphasis to the ‘equally matched’ games but adds the extra 3 games to get your 9 rounds in.