October's Daily Duel

Jon Corby · Post by **Jon Corby** » Wed Oct 01, 2008 8:44 pm

After two months as "Daily Duel" champ I feel I would like to now step aside and let some of these new young pretenders have their day.

I am therefore announcing my retirement, undefeated, from "competitive" Daily Duelling. I'll still do it every day, but it won't sort of "count", or whatever.

Unless Paul and (especially) Conor can assure me that they will only be completing approximately 15% of next month's Duels

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Wed Oct 01, 2008 11:19 pm

Numbers games seem underrepresented in duels.

Paul Howe · Post by **Paul Howe** » Thu Oct 02, 2008 5:07 pm

Jon Corby wrote:After two months as "Daily Duel" champ I feel I would like to now step aside and let some of these new young pretenders have their day.

I am therefore announcing my retirement, undefeated, from "competitive" Daily Duelling. I'll still do it every day, but it won't sort of "count", or whatever.

Unless Paul and (especially) Conor can assure me that they will only be completing approximately 15% of next month's Duels

I reckon I'd have won this month if the scoring system hadn't changed half way through

A fresh start in October, and then Conor turns up

Also I won't be here this weekend so will miss 2 then

And I had a perfectly good 6 disallowed today which I'll be complaining about on the Countmax errors thread later

In short, I'm feeling very aggrieved

Dinos Sfyris · Post by **Dinos Sfyris** » Thu Oct 02, 2008 8:31 pm

Maybe since some quality players cant play the duel every single day, you could also do an average score table or something. Although it might not be a very good average, with the numb of attempters being different each day and all. Just an idea.

Paul Howe · Post by **Paul Howe** » Thu Oct 02, 2008 8:36 pm

Dinos Sfyris wrote:Maybe since some quality players cant play the duel every single day, you could also do an average score table or something. Although it might not be a very good average, with the numb of attempters being different each day and all. Just an idea.

Something like dropping your 5 worst scores might be better as then you always have an incentive to play (with an average someone could play once and win the monthly league). However, despite the avalanche of disgruntled dudes in my previous post, I'm not that bothered.

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Thu Oct 02, 2008 9:58 pm

Paul Howe wrote:Something like dropping your 5 worst scores might be better as then you always have an incentive to play (with an average someone could play once and win the monthly league). However, despite the avalanche of disgruntled dudes in my previous post, I'm not that bothered.

This is a pretty good idea.

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Thu Oct 02, 2008 10:47 pm

Charlie Reams wrote:
Paul Howe wrote:Something like dropping your 5 worst scores might be better as then you always have an incentive to play (with an average someone could play once and win the monthly league). However, despite the avalanche of disgruntled dudes in my previous post, I'm not that bothered.
This is a pretty good idea.

Or you could have different sized gaps between the positions, rather than one point all the way. With one-point gaps all the way, out of a month, I'd say you'd need to knock out your worst 10 or so.

Damian E · Post by **Damian E** » Fri Oct 03, 2008 10:17 pm

Weird thing happened to me in the Daily Duel on Thursday this week.

TYPED in Judgement for conundrum, was not allowed, then answer was revealed as Judgement.

The game said JUGDMENT is not the right answer, and carried on, but in the text box where i typed the answer, it was clearly written down as JUDGEMENT. The mystery of the vanishing E is something i can't figure out.

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Tue Oct 07, 2008 6:47 pm

Just looked at the results of yesterday's duel - I was pretty sure I was going to finish last so I wasn't surprised. Had some terrible rounds - a lot of 0s. The very first duel I did I came third (I think was a bit lucky getting SUBLIMATE) and could even have won without the zero round on he last letters game and I've not reached those heights since.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Wed Oct 08, 2008 7:24 pm

If there is ever a situation where Apterous is down all day (from midnight to midnight), meaning noone can partake in the duel, does that mean then that the day after, there will be 2 duels?

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:27 pm

Congrats to Jim on what I believe is his first win!

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:32 pm

Well done Jim. Who else saw SEAMINESS but laughed internally at the idea of submitting it as a real answer?

JimBentley · Post by **JimBentley** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:43 pm

Cheers! First win, and first time I've been anywhere near a win, too

I knew I'd done pretty well but am slightly amazed at the margin of victory, as I also knew I'd missed a couple of gettable ones. I thought I'd be about 3rd or 4th, maybe 2nd, but not for a minute 1st. I didn't think SEAMINESS was that risky, but fortunately for me, a lot of you must have done

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Thu Oct 09, 2008 5:46 pm

Gavin Chipper wrote:
Charlie Reams wrote:
Paul Howe wrote:Something like dropping your 5 worst scores might be better as then you always have an incentive to play (with an average someone could play once and win the monthly league). However, despite the avalanche of disgruntled dudes in my previous post, I'm not that bothered.
This is a pretty good idea.
Or you could have different sized gaps between the positions, rather than one point all the way. With one-point gaps all the way, out of a month, I'd say you'd need to knock out your worst 10 or so.

Going back to this, I think going up from one point in ones doesn't work that well. Finishing 1st out of 20 is obviously better than 8th out of 27. Using the logic from the "Heights" thread in the off-topic forum, 1st out of 20 makes you a "1 in 21" player, whereas 8th out of 27 makes you a "8 in 28" player. The scores could reflect this.

My pseudo-logical rambling method would be to add one to the number of players and your score would be that number over your finishing position. 9th out of 26 would mean 27/9=3 points. There would be weird fractions but a computer can keep track of them easily enough.

As for draws, instead of simply giving everyone the higher score, I would split the points between them. 1st and 2nd out of 19 would normally (under my system) get 20 and 10 points so we could give them 15 each. Or we could say they finished 1.5th and give them 13.333.

Also could only count 20 or so scores in a month as people are likely to miss some, and it would reward good play rather than consistency.

Kirk Bevins · Post by **Kirk Bevins** » Sat Oct 11, 2008 10:51 pm

How come today's daily duel only had 2 vowels per round? Was that a bug?

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Sun Oct 12, 2008 12:52 am

Kirk Bevins wrote:How come today's daily duel only had 2 vowels per round? Was that a bug?

No, I think this was meant to happen.

Don't forget Kirk, if you go back to the Duel on the 29th September, all the letter selections had 6 vowels in them

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Sun Oct 12, 2008 10:32 am

Yep. I figure if you can have variants with 12 letters or rounds of 10 seconds then the 6C/3V rule didn't seem too sacred.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Sun Oct 12, 2008 3:05 pm

Charlie Reams wrote:Yep. I figure if you can have variants with 12 letters or rounds of 10 seconds then the 6C/3V rule didn't seem too sacred.

It's a good idea Charlie. It makes the rounds more challenging and also you may learn some good vowel-heavy words from the selections

Dinos Sfyris · Post by **Dinos Sfyris** » Thu Oct 16, 2008 11:33 pm

Think there might be an error with todays (that is Friday's) Daily Duel. Although you cant view it yet its max scoring only, and in 1 round (round 4 I think) I got a 7 where 8s were available but it still gave me a point. Not that I'm complaining cause due to that I got all 9 maxes

Ben Wilson · Post by **Ben Wilson** » Thu Oct 16, 2008 11:41 pm

Actually it's not max scoring only, it's 'only winners score', which means all you have to do to score the point is beat your opponent's declaration.

Paul Howe · Post by **Paul Howe** » Thu Oct 16, 2008 11:44 pm

Ben Wilson wrote:Actually it's not max scoring only, it's 'only winners score', which means all you have to do to score the point is beat your opponent's declaration.

Lol, it's going to be tight at the top, the Duellist isn't exactly a stern opponent. I got 9/9 but am now wondering if I actually got all the maxes.

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 9:37 am

Oops. Oh well, can't do much about it now.

Jon Corby · Post by **Jon Corby** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 9:42 am

Paul Howe wrote:Lol, it's going to be tight at the top, the Duellist isn't exactly a stern opponent. I got 9/9 but am now wondering if I actually got all the maxes.

Heh, thanks for the heads-up guys, I'd have hated to have taken a risk on a word when I do this later and lost a point

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 12:32 pm

Looking at yesterday's results, I don't think I'll be playing another blind duel. I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway. Also there is the Bolas loophole which sort of makes a mockery of the blind variant anyway.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 2:30 pm

Gavin Chipper wrote:Looking at yesterday's results, I don't think I'll be playing another blind duel. I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway. Also there is the Bolas loophole which sort of makes a mockery of the blind variant anyway.

You don't have to call it the Bolas Loophole, I was only pointing out a way that the letters could be unhidden.

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 3:34 pm

Joseph Bolas wrote:
Gavin Chipper wrote:Looking at yesterday's results, I don't think I'll be playing another blind duel. I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway. Also there is the Bolas loophole which sort of makes a mockery of the blind variant anyway.
You don't have to call it the Bolas Loophole, I was only pointing out a way that the letters could be unhidden.

I thought it would make you proud.

JimBentley · Post by **JimBentley** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 5:12 pm

Gavin Chipper wrote:Looking at yesterday's results, I don't think I'll be playing another blind duel. I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway. Also there is the Bolas loophole which sort of makes a mockery of the blind variant anyway.

As I'm an impulsive idiot, I rarely read the rules before playing and just charge on, so when the letters started disappearing yesterday I didn't know what the fuck was going on. Once I'd realised, though, I found it really good fun. I'd never tried it before and I probably won't play much more of it by choice, but having it as a possible variant in the Daily Duel is perfect.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 6:19 pm

Gavin Chipper wrote:
Joseph Bolas wrote:
Gavin Chipper wrote:Looking at yesterday's results, I don't think I'll be playing another blind duel. I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway. Also there is the Bolas loophole which sort of makes a mockery of the blind variant anyway.
You don't have to call it the Bolas Loophole, I was only pointing out a way that the letters could be unhidden.
I thought it would make you proud.

I am probably a pedant for point that out, but I don't feel proud.

Martin Gardner · Post by **Martin Gardner** » Fri Oct 17, 2008 9:14 pm

I got 9 maxes out of 9 today, I assume this means loads of people will have 9/9 because you don't need a max to score the one point.

Kirk Bevins · Post by **Kirk Bevins** » Sat Oct 18, 2008 10:38 am

Gavin Chipper wrote:I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway.

I certainly didn't. What is the point of a blind variant if you're not going to play it "blind"?

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Sat Oct 18, 2008 2:41 pm

Martin Gardner wrote:I got 9 maxes out of 9 today, I assume this means loads of people will have 9/9 because you don't need a max to score the one point.

I loved yesterday's duel. More of that duel again please

I myself only got 7 maxes (missing OUTSIDES and IMPAIRED), but got the 9 points

I know I am joint first with 16 other people, but thats probably the only time I will come first in a duel

Matt Coates · Post by **Matt Coates** » Sat Oct 18, 2008 5:27 pm

the 9/9 duel seems a bit stupid to me.

i got all 9 maxes, but i get the same amount of points as people who got 7/8?

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Sat Oct 18, 2008 5:54 pm

Matt Coates wrote:the 9/9 duel seems a bit stupid to me.

i got all 9 maxes, but i get the same amount of points as people who got 7/8?

Well, I suppose I can see where you are coming from because people should get more points for getting all 9 maxes, compared to say myself who only got 7.

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Sat Oct 18, 2008 9:04 pm

Kirk Bevins wrote:
Gavin Chipper wrote:I suspect some people missed the point and wrote stuff down anyway.
I certainly didn't. What is the point of a blind variant if you're not going to play it "blind"?

I was just being bitter for being last by a long way.

Matt Coates · Post by **Matt Coates** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 1:39 am

ive just noticed i only got 8 maxes that round, so i dont feel too bitter.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 8:46 pm

Matt Coates wrote:I've just noticed that I only got 8 maxes that round, so I don't feel too bitter.

Oh yeah

, you missed IMPERIAL

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 9:22 pm

I was annoyed I fucked up today's duel. All those numbers games and I didn't get it together.

Also in the winner onlt scores duel where a million people tied for top, how come they got 28 points when there were 25 entrants? Normally they would get 25 wouldn't they? I still think you should use my scoring system.

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Sun Oct 19, 2008 11:12 pm

Gavin Chipper wrote:I was annoyed I fucked up today's duel. All those numbers games and I didn't get it together.

And that was specifically in response to your request for more numbers game!

Also in the winner onlt scores duel where a million people tied for top, how come they got 28 points when there were 25 entrants? Normally they would get 25 wouldn't they? I still think you should use my scoring system.

Good question. I guess the scoring system needs some work.

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Mon Oct 20, 2008 5:49 pm

Charlie Reams wrote:
Gavin Chipper wrote:I was annoyed I fucked up today's duel. All those numbers games and I didn't get it together.
And that was specifically in response to your request for more numbers game!

Thanks for that by the way.

Dan Vanniasingham · Post by **Dan Vanniasingham** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 10:22 pm

Could someone enlighten me as to what "Gevin rules" are before I screw up today's duel? Thanks.

Jon O'Neill · Post by **Jon O'Neill** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 10:31 pm

Nines count as 9 points as opposed to 18, and you only score at all in any round if you've voted for GevCountdown here.

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 10:40 pm

9 points for a 9.

Dan Vanniasingham · Post by **Dan Vanniasingham** » Tue Oct 21, 2008 10:54 pm

Cheers guys. Decided to screw it up anyway.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Wed Oct 22, 2008 12:17 am

Dan Vanniasingham wrote:Could someone enlighten me as to what "Gevin rules" are before I screw up today's duel? Thanks.

Charlie Reams wrote:9 points for a 9.

And yet there was no 9's

, so if the rule was normal scoring, the outcome would've been the same

Gavin Chipper · Post by **Gavin Chipper** » Wed Oct 22, 2008 7:34 pm

Dan Vanniasingham wrote:Could someone enlighten me as to what "Gevin rules" are before I screw up today's duel? Thanks.

I'm famous!

Julie T · Post by **Julie T** » Thu Oct 23, 2008 12:13 am

I think that Charlie's gone to off to the finals, but, if not, or if anyone else knows if it can be fixed:
I was declining a challenge, and accidentally declined the duel instead. Can it be retrieved?
TIA hopefully,
Julie

Ben Wilson · Post by **Ben Wilson** » Thu Oct 23, 2008 1:35 pm

Julie T wrote:I think that Charlie's gone to off to the finals, but, if not, or if anyone else knows if it can be fixed:
I was declining a challenge, and accidentally declined the duel instead. Can it be retrieved?
TIA hopefully,
Julie

Try logging out and in again, it might work.

Julie T · Post by **Julie T** » Thu Oct 23, 2008 9:56 pm

Ben Wilson wrote:
Julie T wrote:I think that Charlie's gone to off to the finals, but, if not, or if anyone else knows if it can be fixed:
I was declining a challenge, and accidentally declined the duel instead. Can it be retrieved?
TIA hopefully,
Julie
Try logging out and in again, it might work.

Thanks,Ben, it worked!

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Sun Oct 26, 2008 12:03 am

I think the record for the most players in the duel was set yesterday, were 36 players partook in it

Damian E · Post by **Damian E** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 8:44 am

Am just curious re latest Daily Duel (all conundrums).

How does someone manage to answer in 0.2 seconds?

GIven that you have to hit the first letter on the word on the keyboard correctly, its an amazingly quick reaction time. The key depression alone must take 0.1 second. Don't get me wrong, i'm not suggesting anything other untoward here, i just wondered if there is a method involved in answering so quickly. It seems almost superhuman.

All credit to them, but that IS bloody amazingly fast.

Kirk Bevins · Post by **Kirk Bevins** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 12:14 pm

Damian E wrote:Am just curious re latest Daily Duel (all conundrums).

How does someone manage to answer in 0.2 seconds?

GIven that you have to hit the first letter on the word on the keyboard correctly, its an amazingly quick reaction time. The key depression alone must take 0.1 second. Don't get me wrong, i'm not suggesting anything other untoward here, i just wondered if there is a method involved in answering so quickly. It seems almost superhuman.

All credit to them, but that IS bloody amazingly fast.

I posted to another thread regarding this. Yesterdays daily duel kept running slowly and crashing so some of us had to restart. Amazingly, they allowed you to start the duel from the start so you knew what the conundrum answers were going to be before they even came up, hence the 0.2 seconds. Bit of a farce really yesterday's duel.

Damian E · Post by **Damian E** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 12:28 pm

Ah thanks for that Kirk.

I tried practising earlier at answering as fast as possible. I simply pressed the letter D every time a conundrum started, whether there was one in the selection or not, and i managed to get a 0.2 second answer eventually, withouth of course getting the answer correct.

Makes sense now.

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 12:34 pm

Makes me quite happy that I managed to finish fifth without cheating. Not sure what went wrong yesterday but, as always, the result stands. Generally if you quit during the Duel then it won't let you replay so something must've gone wrong with that mechanism too.

Damian E · Post by **Damian E** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 12:43 pm

You're a disgrace Reams.

Do you want to know who you've drawn?

Julie T · Post by **Julie T** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 5:20 pm

I'm quite pleased that I got 5 out of the 20, even though that meant I was joint bottom.
BTW, is there any logic as to why I was ahead of Gevin? Was I faster overall, or is it random?

Conundrums are my weakest part of Countdown, and with only 10 seconds to answer on the duel, I considered not attempting it, but gave it a bash anyway.

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 5:49 pm

Julie T wrote:BTW, is there any logic as to why I was ahead of Gevin? Was I faster overall, or is it random?

You weren't ahead of Gevin, you both came 24th and got 2 points.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 11:30 pm

Charlie Reams wrote:
Julie T wrote:BTW, is there any logic as to why I was ahead of Gevin? Was I faster overall, or is it random?
You weren't ahead of Gevin, you both came 24th and got 2 points.

I think what Julie means, is why does her name appear above Gevin's in the list?

If two people or more are tied, is there any logic to the order the names appear in the list?

Charlie Reams · Post by **Charlie Reams** » Wed Oct 29, 2008 11:48 pm

Joseph Bolas wrote:If two people or more are tied, is there any logic to the order the names appear in the list?

Nope.

Joseph Bolas · Post by **Joseph Bolas** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 12:29 am

Going by yesterday's duel, very well done to Dan Vanniasingham and James Hurrell for getting the conundrum ENCHILADA.

Kirk Bevins · Post by **Kirk Bevins** » Thu Oct 30, 2008 4:12 am

Joseph Bolas wrote:Going by yesterday's duel, very well done to Dan Vanniasingham and James Hurrell for getting the conundrum ENCHILADA.

Yes well done - a hard one. I had HACIENDA for a nice 8 but didn't know the nine. Turns out only S and L can be added to HACIENDA to make nines so easy to learn!