The player in 5th place got 2.5 points out of 4…which consisted of 2 half point byes, a inexplicable full point bye (not sure what rule situation happened there), and a draw. I ended up with 2 points, in part due to bad pairing luck (stuck playing Zhaozhi Li in the last round despite a higher rated 2.0 existing due to colors).
Is there some rule that a player who doesn’t play at least half the games in a tournament can’t get a prize out of it? And if not, I kind of think there should be. There’s something a little sketchy about a player getting part of the prize “fund” while playing only one game out of 4.
Added: Yes, part of this arises because there were 5 places in a 13 player section, which is unusual. But I can see this reasonably arising in larger tournaments with class prizes as well–an open section with an U2000 prize where the tournament has an U1800 section could easily have that prize’s winner having a 50% or below score, and if the TD doesn’t put sensible limits on half point byes, you can get the same result quite plausibly.
No, but I would think it would be very unusual to allow a player half point byes in half of the rounds. There are certainly circumstances that would encourage it. For example, in my tournament a week ago, I offered prizes for first and second under 1250 in the U1500 section. There were three registered players in the section under 1250, but one of them tied for first in the whole section, which means that the other two players won the two prizes. The second place winner scored one point, based on a full point bye in the first round. He was not expecting a prize, and I hope that he doesn’t throw away his check when it arrives in the mail, unopened. Still, if he had requested zero point byes for the last two rounds, as opposed to withdrawing, he would have absolutely deserved the prize. After all, I certainly didn’t.
To answer your question, no. However, there is a rule that if a player withdraws from a tournament he is not entitled for prizes unless the director decides otherwise.
It is peculiar for a player to have two half points byes in a four round event. Usually only one half point is available. Another problem is that this player has a full-point bye in the third round when already received a half-point bye in round 1.
Further clarification: I now realize that the full point bye is explained in this thread: viewtopic.php?f=2&t=17986. The player who ended up with 2.5 points is that author’s sister’s opponent.
Of course, the explanation in that thread makes the situation worse, not better.
So, why did this player get the two half-point byes? Was that an advertised tournament condition?
What do the rules say about that? Is there a rule against such a player winning prizes? Should there be? What would the unintended consequences be for such a rule? What would be the upside?
Then you run accross the interesting situation that I had on 11/17 in an 8-fixed-board team event with 24 teams. Six of the teams were missing board eight. Over the four rounds one team played four of those six teams and its board eight went 4-0 without having an opponent play a move. He did tie for first (granted, with lousy tie-breaks) and received a trophy. He was ready and willing to play every round, and you could say he went through the entire event without making a single error over the board.
We also had a simultaneous individual event for the extra boards and allowed the team events boards that were receiving forfeit wins to play for that round in that event. In two of the rounds his coach remembered to let me know that he would be playing that round in the individual event (he won both games but that was not enough to win a trophy in that one). It was entirely possible that he could have played all four rounds in the individual event and gone home with two individual trophies.