# 3x3x3 Blind, changing to 3/5?



## AvGalen (Sep 13, 2010)

For almost all events (if time allows it) the preferred format is now 3/5 (remove best and worst, average of the remaining 3 solves)

In 2009 the rules for multi-blind were changed to allow for DNF's (although the basic idea is still to stimulate perfection over speed)

Regular blindfolded solving is currently best 1 out of 3. This has resulted in competitors specialising in methods that can give great results, but also allows for many DNF's. The basic idea for most competitors seems to be "go faster then you are really capable of and accept the DNF's if they occur. A "safety" solve after 2 DNF's can always be tried to get a ranking.

I am in no way a good blindfolder, but I think it is not in the interest of the audience (and very annoying for judges) to see so many DNF's happen. Especially after you see (other) competitors do successful multi-blinds of > 5 cubes.

All of this leads me to the question: Should blind become a "3/5" event as well or is the goal for blind really "do 1 succesful and fast, plork the rest"?

Advantages of 3/5:
- Many more successful solves
- More attempts (for the more successful solvers)
- Mostly compatible with the current system because of "single" solves
- Removing lucky solves from the average to better represent skill while still allowing for a DNF

Disadvantage of 3/5:
- Might force competitors to practice and compete differently
- Not entirely compatible with current system
- Might require more time in competitions if competitors are allowed to do solves after DNF-ing twice
- More safety solves, leading to more time used and less spectacular results

Just throwing it out here to hear your opinions about this


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## Mike Hughey (Sep 13, 2010)

Most people probably already know I agree with Arnaud on this one.

But I suspect it really doesn't matter how we go in the near future - I suspect we'll get to the point someday where this just makes sense to do, although it may take quite a few years yet.

The fact is that cubing is in its infancy, and BLD cubing even more so. When the best BLD solvers have practiced regularly for many years, there really will be no reason to expect them to miss very many of their BLD solves. Practice will make perfect. I know that I can squeeze out 5 or 10 extra seconds by really rushing, with my accuracy going down correspondingly, but that time will decrease as I get better, and should be even lower for the really fast people. No one will want to waste a good attempt anyway, so all the good people will eventually really want to get every solve correct.

So I believe that our accuracy will eventually go up to where this is not a particularly big change.

And I agree with Arnaud's opinions about spectators. It's very disappointing for spectators to see so many DNFs. If we imagine this on TV someday, we would want a format where at least most of the solves are successful, and this format would encourage that. I think it would be better for spectators.

And while I really admire Haiyan (well, his blindfold solving, at least) and Ville (period), I must admit my BLD hero is Clément Gallet, which is why I keep bringing him up every time this issue comes up. 31 successful solves in a row - simply amazing!


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## Kidstardust (Sep 13, 2010)

That are your thoughts while traveling through Asia????? :confused:


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## Slash (Sep 13, 2010)

All my reasons against it are because I suck at bld accuracy. I think wit hthis format, we'll be able to see who _really_ is a good blindsolver. For example, maybe Mike could win a competition (which is on the one hand because of the format)

And yes, the blind event would get harder. But that would "filter out" those competitors who just go and try a blindfolded solve "just coz I solved it once at home"


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## Mike Hughey (Sep 13, 2010)

Slash said:


> All my reasons against it are because I suck at bld accuracy. I think wit hthis format, we'll be able to see who _really_ is a good blindsolver. For example, maybe Mike could win a competition (which is on the one hand because of the format)
> 
> And yes, the blind event would get harder. But that would "filter out" those competitors who just go and try a blindfolded solve "just coz I solved it once at home"



Please note that competitors could still do this - results of a 3/5 average are ranked such that the top people are those who get a full average, and then ranked according to single solves. So if you just want a single success, you can still go for one, and still have a ranking in the results. In fact, for a while, I suspect you wouldn't need a successful average at most competitions to make the top 3, and we'd probably often have a winner who didn't get a successful average. And there's nothing wrong with that. But if we made this change, the good people would start working harder to improve their accuracy, so eventually we'd probably almost always have a full podium of averages.

I'm in no hurry to make this change, by the way; I'd like to see it happen in 5 years or so. Give the event some more time to mature first. But if we did it earlier, it would give me an advantage.


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## FatBoyXPC (Sep 13, 2010)

Well then I vote we do it earlier! I think BLD is one of the more fun events to watch. I think stiffening up the event a bit would be a good thing, and it would especially make for more another set of WR for BLD. I think the mere fact that if HaiYan could use the 15s inspection time we got do it sighted, he'd set a much lower WR, which is so crazy to think about.

My question is: how long until we end up doing this for 4bld, 5bld, etc?


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## AvGalen (Sep 13, 2010)

Kidstardust said:


> That are your thoughts while traveling through Asia????? :confused:


For the first time in a long time I did the weekly competition and got all my solves for 222_blind and 333_blind correct. I also saw Haiyan compete and get 3 DNF's. Then http://www.speedsolving.com/forum/showthread.php?p=453479#post453479 happened and I thought it was time to post this. Anything wrong with my thoughts?



Mike Hughey said:


> Slash said:
> 
> 
> > All my reasons against it are because I suck at bld accuracy. I think wit hthis format, we'll be able to see who _really_ is a good blindsolver. For example, maybe Mike could win a competition (which is on the one hand because of the format)
> ...


In the past it has happened that I was DNF-fing my 2nd blindfolded attempt (quite slowly, as always) and everyone else had already gotten 3 DNF's. When I went up for my last attempt I knew I only had to do a succesful solve to win, time wasn't important.
And yes, Clément Gallet is my blindfolded hero as well, proving that "slow" but steady can be a perfectly fine tactic for blind.

I must say that I am surprised that fast blindfolders aren't shooting this idea down en masse :tu




fatboyxpc said:


> Well then I vote we do it earlier! I think BLD is one of the more fun events to watch. I think stiffening up the event a bit would be a good thing, and it would especially make for more another set of WR for BLD. I think the mere fact that if HaiYan could use the 15s inspection time we got do it sighted, he'd set a much lower WR, which is so crazy to think about.


Just to be clear: I am not suggesting to use 15 seconds inspection time for blind!
So far, only 60 people have ever succeeded at 444bld (15 below 10 minutes) and for 555 there are only 22 (nobody below 10 minutes). Never say never, but there just won't be enough time at a competition to do it, or people capable of doing it


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## cubedude7 (Sep 13, 2010)

Awesome idea! You have my vote!!


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## amostay2004 (Sep 13, 2010)

I don't see why fast blindfolders (or any blindfolders) would disagree with this. After all, they can just not go for accuracy and they still get 2 more attempts than before. It's a win-win situation for people who aim for speed, and those who go for accuracy.

Of course, the introduction of a format like this would definitely encourage fast BLD-ers to get a good average in comp as well  So I definitely agree with this.


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## Mike Hughey (Sep 13, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> So far, only 60 people have ever succeeded at 444bld (15 below 10 minutes) and for 555 there are only 22 (nobody below 10 minutes). Never say never, but there just won't be enough time at a competition to do it, or people capable of doing it



Yes, never say never. It might be a while, but we really might get there someday.

As for an example of someone who already can, look at Gabriel Alejandro Orozco Casillas. Get him to a couple more competitions, and he'll be my new hero.

4x4 Cube: Blindfolded
Guadalajara Open 2010	Final	1	5:54.56	NR 5:54.56 6:33.44 6:00.16


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## AvGalen (Sep 13, 2010)

Mike Hughey said:


> AvGalen said:
> 
> 
> > So far, only 60 people have ever succeeded at 444bld (15 below 10 minutes) and for 555 there are only 22 (nobody below 10 minutes). Never say never, but there just won't be enough time at a competition to do it, or people capable of doing it
> ...



Good example Mike. I must admit that I hadn't heard his name before.
But I think you proved that doing several continuous bigcubes blind without DNF'ing "years ago" in the weekly. Credit where credit is due


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## jms_gears1 (Sep 13, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> Mike Hughey said:
> 
> 
> > AvGalen said:
> ...


The Famous Blindfold rubiks


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## FatBoyXPC (Sep 13, 2010)

AvG: I wasn't saying you were proposing inspection, I was saying that HaiYan can memo in almost the 15 seconds we get for inspection, just imagine what that would do to WRs (especially if he was still able to compete in the WCA right now). I do agree though with the 3/5 format


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## qqwref (Sep 13, 2010)

I don't like this idea, and here's why.

I've been to a lot of small competitions in my time. I'm sure for all your BLD masters there are people at every competition (that is, YOU) who are not only fast but also can get at least 4 out of every 5 solves correct. But from my point of view this is not the case. I've gone to a lot of more local competitions where the only people who are likely to do that well are the very slow people who take their time. You'll get 7 minute people winning small competitions, I guarantee it. You will also get fast people getting very angry when they realize they've made a mistake on another solve. The reason is that the fast people often go quickly to get a good time, whereas the slow people tend to care mainly about consistency because of how long it already takes to do an attempt.

The thing about BLD is that getting a DNF is very easy. It's like Clock, but even worse. Make a small mistake and don't notice it, and your solve is forfeit. To me, asking for a maximum of one DNF in 3BLD is just as strict as asking for 3 of 3 non-DNFs in clock: even for the best people you cannot go fast without some chance of a DNF, and that means there is always some probability that you automatically lose. Unlike speed events, DNFs are final: you can rarely just fix it before the timer stops. This proposal just adds more stress to every BLD round. You have to remember, also, that competitions are not optimal environments to do something which requires great and constant concentration. You might have people running around, other cubers solving stuff in the background, people talking, and so on. This never happens in the big/multi BLD room, but 3BLD is usually on the main stage. So making BLD a 3/5 event takes control completely out of the hands of all but the most skilled or slow-and-steady competitors. Instead of being a contest of speed, it becomes a game of luck, where a bad roll will completely disqualify you no matter how much practice you have done or how skilled you are.

tl;dr: DNFs are luck, and asking for so few of them means that even very fast people will get randomly DQ'd. The event will be more stressful and the winners will occasionally be extremely slow.


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## Escher (Sep 13, 2010)

qqwref said:


> Instead of being a contest of speed, it becomes a game of luck, where a bad roll will completely disqualify you no matter how much practice you have done or how skilled you are.



Agreed ~ in my mind speedcubing has enough problems with variance in and of itself, let alone introducing new formats that are punishing for it in an event that is one of the worst for it.


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## Slash (Sep 13, 2010)

qqwref said:


> I don't like this idea, and here's why.
> 
> I've been to a lot of small competitions in my time. I'm sure for all your BLD masters there are people at every competition (that is, YOU) who are not only fast but also can get at least 4 out of every 5 solves correct. But from my point of view this is not the case. I've gone to a lot of more local competitions where the only people who are likely to do that well are the very slow people who take their time. You'll get 7 minute people winning small competitions, I guarantee it. You will also get fast people getting very angry when they realize they've made a mistake on another solve. The reason is that the fast people often go quickly to get a good time, whereas the slow people tend to care mainly about consistency because of how long it already takes to do an attempt.
> ...



You're right in some way, but those slower people at smaller competitions would also win with their singles. so, the ranks would look like this:
first: best average with best single
second: worse average with (maybe) worse single
third: DNF average with good enough single
...

so, at a small competition where there are no that good blindsolvers, the DNF average with good single can easily win. (It's like at Czech Open 2010 Charlie was the third in clock with DNF avg.)


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## Mike Hughey (Sep 13, 2010)

qqwref said:


> You'll get 7 minute people winning small competitions, I guarantee it.



Are there really many 7 minute people who are also that accurate? And besides, you would most likely run something like this as a combined final - one of your first two solves in under 2 or 3 minutes, for instance. So a 7 minute solver would never have the chance to get an average.


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## AvGalen (Sep 13, 2010)

Escher said:


> qqwref said:
> 
> 
> > Instead of being a contest of speed, it becomes a game of luck, where a bad roll will completely disqualify you no matter how much practice you have done or how skilled you are.
> ...



...and I have no problem with disqualifying people that don't solve their cubes blindfolded during a blindfolded event. It doesn't matter how much you have trained or how skilled you are, if you don't solve the puzzle you don't deserve to win.

I also think that you are wrong in assuming that fast people would DNF more often than slow people. I have judged many fast people that solved cubes blindfolded in 55, 60 and 65 seconds while a slow persons just DNF'ed 3 times after 9 minutes.

Mostly, I have listed all your points already in my startpost under advantages/disadvantages. The only point you added was that circumstances for 3x3x3 blind can be bad during competitions. For that I have to say: The organisers and delegates should take care of those problems, "earplugs" are allowed and Tim did 24/24 inside the main hall (not in a special quiet blind room)


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## Tim Reynolds (Sep 13, 2010)

qqwref said:


> tl;dr: *DNFs are luck*, and asking for so few of them means that even very fast people will get randomly DQ'd.



I disagree.



qqwref said:


> The event will be more stressful and the winners will occasionally be extremely slow.



I agree.

My main objection is that it would take considerably longer to do a blindfold round at a normal competition. Not only would two more solves need to be done, each solve would take longer as people would be more careful. 3-4 minute solvers, who usually aren't holding up the competition too much, might take 5-6 minutes to make sure they get each solve. Sure, for competitions like worlds at a time when people have gotten used to this format, people would still be able to go quickly, but at small competitions it makes BLD a much harder event to run.

Also I don't think we need to worry about the media getting upset about too many DNFs--if they see people in the finals at worlds DNFing, they'll think it's very difficult, not that the competitors suck at it.

As for combined finals, if you cut people off after 2 solves who are over (say) 5 minutes, then people with 2 DNFs have to be cut off as well. I still don't know how to effectively run a combined round for BLD that follows the regulations.


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## FatBoyXPC (Sep 13, 2010)

Not to mention, cubers can train themselves in loud areas. In the "Frustrated while cubing" thread, I mentioned training while under different types of pressure. Chris Hardwick says he likes to train where he can get distracted and tells his family to try to distract him while he cubes. He does that to get better. My point is that if you train yourself to only work in a quiet environment, that is your fault as a cuber.

A good comparison can be made to the sports teams that aren't used to playing in cold conditions, real grass vs astroturf, etc. It's much harder to train in snow in Florida (american football) than it is to train in a very loud distracting area (no matter where you live).


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## Olivér Perge (Sep 13, 2010)

I like the idea in general, but it would make the competitions longer which is bad from an organisation point of view. 

I don't like the "slow people will win" kind of argument. If enough people would vote for this and that would become an official rule, we should respect it and follow it. 

It's like saying, he broke the world record, yeah, but he got a PLL skip... Who cares, it's still a WR. 

Everyone would have the same conditions, so noone would have any advantage or disadvantage. And by the way, why the fast competitors can't do an average?


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## tim (Sep 13, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> For that I have to say: The organisers and delegates should take care of those problems, "earplugs" are allowed.



Practicing in noisy environments is even more important.

Anyway: Count me in for 3/5, cause i would benefit a lot from this format.


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## Ville Seppänen (Sep 13, 2010)

I guess all I have to say is I'd rather keep it the way it is.


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## AvGalen (Sep 13, 2010)

I personally don't actually believe that "safety" solves work. If you go fast you only have to keep the memo in your head for a shorter time and have less time of forgetting anything.

Most slow people wouldn't even be able to do 5 solves right now. My first solve is easier (empty head) than my third solve (mixing up previous memo) and doing a fifth solve would be even harder.

I do think that cutoffs would solve the time problem. And yes, I think that IF there are cutoffs, they could be on both time and nr. of DNF's.

I don't think people would get slower because of this system. In order to win you have to go fast, you would practise more on getting solves right, and if you have 5 solves instead of 3 you have more chances of a good single.

But my main reason for this is simply: Get your cubes solved when you do blindfolded. I hate it when people start memoing for 20 seconds, realise it is a "bad scramble" and then not even attempt to solve it because it wouldn't improve their previous 40 second solve anyway. I have never seen anyone look at a cross, realise it was a horrible one, and then decide not to solve that cube because "it wouldn't be a good solve anyway"


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## Sakarie (Sep 13, 2010)

There is no other puzzle where it is bigger chance of getting a DNF when it is faster than the blind events, accept for the last turn in a solve, or not checking every clock on clocks. But there is no other puzzle where you can't be sure of getting a solve. 

And there ARE a lot of events for the "slow but safe"/"very accurate and fast" cubers! Multi, 5x5blind, and maybe 4x4, is three events where probably 90% prefer accuracy before speed. If anythings unfair, it's not that the accurate blinders is dispreviliged.



Mike Hughey said:


> And I agree with Arnaud's opinions about spectators. It's very disappointing for spectators to see so many DNFs. If we imagine this on TV someday, we would want a format where at least most of the solves are successful, and this format would encourage that. I think it would be better for spectators.


I don't agree. Would you really prefer seeing 20 mediocre successes before 5 good ones? Maybe the audience do, maybe not.

But is that so important? Do we cube to satisfy the spectators? I think that we should be careful to change rules to satisfy non-cubers.


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## qqwref (Sep 13, 2010)

Slash said:


> You're right in some way, but those slower people at smaller competitions would also win with their singles.



No, I don't mean slow like 2:30, I mean slow like 6:00 or worse.



AvGalen said:


> ...and I have no problem with disqualifying people that don't solve their cubes blindfolded during a blindfolded event. It doesn't matter how much you have trained or how skilled you are, if you don't solve the puzzle you don't deserve to win.


If you solve the puzzle correctly 3 times, in 40 sec each, and make two mistakes on the two other solves, you don't deserve to win? This isn't a case of "lol I can't really solve it", this is a case of making two or three mistakes in the entire round and being kicked out because of it. We're all human.



AvGalen said:


> I also think that you are wrong in assuming that fast people would DNF more often than slow people. I have judged many fast people that solved cubes blindfolded in 55, 60 and 65 seconds while a slow persons just DNF'ed 3 times after 9 minutes.


Well, yeah, not all slow people are going to get successes. Some slow people are slow just because that's the 5th BLD solve they've ever done. I just mean that doing best of 1 means that the winner is almost certainly one of the fastest few people there, whereas doing an average of 5 means that the winner may be one of the slower people, who cannot go fast but makes an effort to have good recall. And even if a fast person is capable of getting no more than one DNF in 5 solves, that doesn't mean they will.



Olivér Perge said:


> Everyone would have the same conditions, so noone would have any advantage or disadvantage. And by the way, why the fast competitors can't do an average?


I don't mean that there's an objective advantage, but that the format itself favors certain people. The old format (which we are used to) favors fast people regardless of consistency; the new format favors people who have very high consistency, and time second, so if there is only one person at the competition who has very high consistency they are guaranteed to win regardless of speed. And why can't fast competitors do an average? Ville and Haiyan are two of the best BLD solvers ever, in practice; and yet Ville has never had 3 of 3 solves in a BLD round, and Haiyan only rarely does (and he's never done an average on his practice solves during the speed round). Maybe getting an average at a good speed is harder than you think.


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## Pedro (Sep 13, 2010)

I don't really like this idea...



AvGalen said:


> I don't think people would get slower because of this system. In order to win you have to go fast, you would practise more on getting solves right, and if you have 5 solves instead of 3 you have more chances of a good single.
> 
> *But my main reason for this is simply: Get your cubes solved when you do blindfolded.*



I'm pretty certain that nobody is going to do a 3x.xx average in the next...few years. I got a sub-60 single the other day, but no way I can average anything close to that (at home, let alone at a competition).

I'm not sure if it's just me, but I don't practice blindfolded to get a good average. I practice to improve my time. It's not like sighted events where you can spot a mistake or a shortcut and avoid a DNF average. I've done safety solves to "win" a competition, because I had 2 DNFs already. And, well, it's not that fun...My times were like 40% worse. Doing 4 safety solves doesn't sound good for me.

Also, about the bolded part, I don't see why we should do that with single bld, since we already "gave up" on that idea for multi, which is a lot harder. Yes, if you solve all your cubes, you have a better chance of winning. Same for single bld. But it shouldn't be a requirement.

And, seriously, I don't like the idea of a [(8:03), 9:04, 9:30, 9:50, (DNF)] beating [(48), 49, 50, DNF, DNF]...


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## CharlesOBlack (Sep 13, 2010)

consistency > speed.

thus, I think a5 should be done, not ra5.


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## Kirjava (Sep 13, 2010)

Best of 5!

The event is the same, only more attempts! Has none of the problems caused by introducing the average format! Only advantages!


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## aronpm (Sep 13, 2010)

I don't think 3/5 is a good idea. It's too difficult for a lot of blindfolded solvers to get averages of 5. The point of rankings in competition is to get the best times you can. If you're forced to go slow in your blindfolded solves so that you get at most 1 DNF, you can't get your best times. I think the 'best of' format is the best for blindfolded, although I'd support best of 5 to give people more attempts.


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## maggot (Sep 13, 2010)

I have never seen anyone look at a cross, realise it was a horrible one, and then decide not to solve that cube because "it wouldn't be a good solve anyway"

there was a kid who post video online of sub 15? and then he went to comp and he was actually not even sub 30 and he DNF through his solve on purpose so they wouldnt record anything that was sup 30. i think he got 1 or 2 solve on his avg of 5.


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## Quadrescence (Sep 13, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> Best of 5!
> 
> The event is the same, only more attempts! Has none of the problems caused by introducing the average format! Only advantages!



As a long member of the cube community, I believe this is an especially good solution and will provide accurate means (no pun intended!) for obtaining an accurate representation of one's capabilities.


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## qqwref (Sep 13, 2010)

aronpm said:


> I don't think 3/5 is a good idea. It's too difficult for a lot of blindfolded solvers to get averages of 5. The point of rankings in competition is to get the best times you can. If you're forced to go slow in your blindfolded solves so that you get at most 1 DNF, you can't get your best times.


Another good point. Blindfolded solving is not speed solving: unless you are a god of consistency, you actually have to slow down to be sure to get an average. Again, look at Haiyan's 3x3 "speed" results. It's not like people are getting DNFs because they don't feel like solving, and someone who doesn't get a success every time doesn't deserve to do well at a competition. A single solve is impressive; four out of five is even more so but it shouldn't be a requirement.

Personally I would like best of 5 (with cutoffs, for organizational reasons) more than both best of 3 and average of 5. But it may be too many solves to be feasable. I know some competitions now only do two solves in a round for time reasons, when they could be doing 3.


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## tim (Sep 13, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> Best of 5!
> 
> The event is the same, only more attempts! Has none of the problems caused by introducing the average format! Only advantages!



No, best of 5 doesn't eliminate lucky cases (which can be pretty crucial if the fastest people are in different groups).


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## Pedro (Sep 13, 2010)

tim said:


> Kirjava said:
> 
> 
> > Best of 5!
> ...



If you're a smart organizer, you should put the fastest people in the same group


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## tim (Sep 13, 2010)

Pedro said:


> tim said:
> 
> 
> > Kirjava said:
> ...



What about new people who've never competed and kept silent about their times? Or people who've just practiced their ass off since their last competition?


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## Sakarie (Sep 14, 2010)

And about judging; you claiming that judges are having more fun if you do ao5. I'd rather judge fast dnf's than slower successes


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## Kirjava (Sep 14, 2010)

tim said:


> No, best of 5 doesn't eliminate lucky cases




Best of 3 doesn't either.


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## Mike Hughey (Sep 14, 2010)

I guess all this discussion supports my suspicion that we're just not ready for average of 5. I think if we have this discussion 5 years from now, it will likely be very different. I suspect that if Haiyan or Ville continue working at it for those 5 years, by then they'll be getting times just as good as or better than they get now, but with 80% or better accuracy. At that point, we can have this discussion again, and it will be more likely to be considered.

I really do think that with people who practice a lot, 80% accuracy will eventually be common. It just hasn't happened yet.

And by the way, Gabriel Alejandro Orozco Casillas (who I mentioned earlier in this thread) has a success rate of 8/9 for 3x3x3 BLD, and 3/3 for 4x4x4 BLD. And he's 3rd in the world at both. So certainly it is possible to be very fast and accurate simultaneously.


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## tim (Sep 14, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> tim said:
> 
> 
> > No, best of 5 doesn't eliminate lucky cases
> ...



I disagreed with the part in bold:



Kirjava said:


> Best of 5!
> 
> The event is the same, only more attempts! Has none of the problems caused by introducing the average format! *Only advantages*!


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## Kirjava (Sep 14, 2010)

So what disadvantage does best of 5 have that best of 3 doesn't?


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## tim (Sep 14, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> So what disadvantage does best of 5 have that best of 3 doesn't?



Oh, come on. Your "only advantages" is so close to "by introducing the average format", that (at least) i read it as: "best of 5 has only advantages over 3/5". And i'm sure you knew that for the last two posts...


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## Kirjava (Sep 14, 2010)

It's more fun to let people discover their own mistakes!


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## tim (Sep 14, 2010)

Kirjava said:


> It's more fun to let people discover their own mistakes!



So you've discovered the ambiguity in your post?


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## Kirjava (Sep 14, 2010)

Not at all, it was quite clear.


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## EVH (Sep 14, 2010)

I am a noob, so what occurs if you get more than one DNF does the entire average become a DNF?


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## Ville Seppänen (Sep 14, 2010)

ya


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## qqwref (Sep 14, 2010)

Mike Hughey said:


> I guess all this discussion supports my suspicion that we're just not ready for average of 5. I think if we have this discussion 5 years from now, it will likely be very different. I suspect that if Haiyan or Ville continue working at it for those 5 years, by then they'll be getting times just as good as or better than they get now, but with 80% or better accuracy. At that point, we can have this discussion again, and it will be more likely to be considered.
> 
> I really do think that with people who practice a lot, 80% accuracy will eventually be common. It just hasn't happened yet.
> 
> And by the way, Gabriel Alejandro Orozco Casillas (who I mentioned earlier in this thread) has a success rate of 8/9 for 3x3x3 BLD, and 3/3 for 4x4x4 BLD. And he's 3rd in the world at both. So certainly it is possible to be very fast and accurate simultaneously.



I don't think the issue is that the community isn't ready; I think it's that 4 of 5 in 3BLD is difficult and is a lot to ask. I'm sure people can practice enough at 3x3 to get under 10 seconds every time but that doesn't mean we should DNF people who are over that mark. Cubing isn't supposed to be for only the most elite, but for everyone. You will never reach the point where for a small local competition everyone who wants to do BLD is capable of doing 4 out of 5 solves at full speed every time. We shouldn't make it artificially hard to just get a success, in any round. 4BLD and 5BLD are very difficult (not because of the format but because it's a hard event to do at all) and look at how popular they are - and look at how many competitions have no winners. It's a lot more exciting to see people get one good solve and two mistakes than to see someone get a few very fast solves and then lose to someone who did four 7 minute (or even 3 minute) solves.


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## Daniel Wu (Sep 14, 2010)

EVH said:


> I am a noob, so what occurs if you get more than one DNF does the entire average become a DNF?


Right now the format is best of three. So as long as you get one non DNF solve, the average won't be a DNF because the format is *best* of three.

Supporting what qq said, I'm one of those people who would find it hard to get 4/5 solves. Officially, I'm 1/6 for my BLD success rate. I saw no real point in going slowly and making sure I made no mistakes in execution or memorization. I probably could have done 3/3s in both of those BLD rounds but I went as fast as I could in order to take 2-3 minutes instead of 4-5 minutes. Anyhow, I think that average of 5 format for competitions is impractical because of the limited time of competitions as well as the high DNF rate. I'd rather watch a person do a 40 second BLD solve and a few DNFs than 5 perfect solves that are slower than what said person is capable of. Pretty much speed and accuracy of a balance and I think average of 5 tips it too much toward accuracy.


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## AvGalen (Sep 14, 2010)

Wow, a lot of new posts and lots of interesting content in them to address. Since I opened this can of worms I will try to comment on everything. In order to keep my post from becoming a meter long I will not quote most things, but instead use the @Person#Number format (my opening post being @AvGalen#1)

@Tim Reynolds#19: As I mentioned earlier, I do not believe that going slower gives a higher chance of success. I personally DNF fast and DNF slow and solve "fast" and slow as well. If media sees many DNF's they will think it is too difficult and they will not report on it (media doesn't report on the people dropping out of a marathon). If DNF's are too common media and the audience loose interest.

@Olivér Perge#21: The increade amount of time needed is absolutely a drawback, as I mentioned already in the opening post

@tim#22: Too bad you seem to like it just because it would benefit you personally
@Ville Seppänen#23: Too bad you seem to dislike it just because it would harm you personally (I am guessing since you didn't list any reason)

@Sakarie#25: Most competitions only have regular blindfolded, but not multi or bigcube. And just like so many others you assume that this format would lead to much slower times without providing any rational behind that assumption. And yes, the WCA cares most for the competitors, but they also like to entertain the audience, media and sponsors.

@qqwref#26: Why do you assume that people that need 6 minutes CAN solve at least 4/5 cubes while people that need 1 minute CAN'T? And if you make 2 or 3 mistakes in a round of 5 I see no reason not to kick someone out. You get disqualified from most other sports at least that fast (although I do see parallels with weightlifting and highjumping-like sports that allow for more errors, which annoys me as well to see so many failures). Currently, fast people that rarely have success will either take 1st place or last which seems too extreme for me. I am claiming that getting an average at a *good* speed isn't extremely hard. I am claiming that some people are getting crazy fast times because they are taking extreme risks and don't care for the DNF's. If Ville or Haiyan does a 40s solve on the first solve they already know that they have won and will take every risk in their other solves to break the WR. And Haiyan doesn't use his practice solves to try to do an average, he uses it for practice (and a chance to break the WR for blind "unofficially")

@Pedro#27: You are basically saying that you are doing solves about 30% faster than you can actually do them "normally" (meaning not taking risks). We gave up on the idea of perfection for multi-blind indeed, but if you look at the current top 100 there are almost no solves in there that have > 1 unsolved cube. Multi-blind was black-and-white and became grey. I am not proposing to turn blind from grey into black-and-white. I am proposing to make it like everything else 1 good and 1 bad removed. I also don't like the idea of your (extreme) example but find that very unlikely to occur and will propose a (radical) solution for that at the end of this post. I am also wondering if your "go 40% slower to get a guaranteed solve"-strategy worked out every time. If you could provide me with some statistics of fast vs safety solves (success-rate and time) that would be very useful

@Kirjava#29: Best of 5 doesn't have only advantages over the current format (it requires extra time) and it doesn't have only advantages over 3/5 (it promotes extreme risk-taking even more and wouldn't allow for the cut-off procedure I mentioned)

@aronpm#30: Why is it too difficult? Because they don't practice for accuracy but for optimal single speed, which makes perfect sense under the current rules. The point of rankings in competitions is not to get the best times you can. It is to compare your skill to others. Again, the link between slower and more succesful isn't proven.

@bobbyfearfactor: My reasoning is that people will practice more with focus on accuracy. All the other issues you mention are solvable with cut-offs as I mentioned in the start post. Your "I personally prefer speed and taking chance" basically sums it up. You go faster than you can actually go while hoping to solve it anyway

@maggot#32: That happens with blind as well and people like that should get a warning, a ban and ridicule from the community. They make a joke out of the competition and waste the competitions resources.

@Quadrescence#33: Best of 5 would provide a good way to represent someone's OPTIMAL, not average capabilities. Nothing wrong with that, but not what I think we should focus on and that is the crux of this topic. Do we want to measure single, or average performance?

@qqwref#34: Are "gods of consistencies" necessarily slower? Mike's example of Gabriel Alejandro Orozco Casillas seems to disprove that. You seem to be convinced that fast people could only get consistent enough by going slower. I am of the opinion that speed and accuracy aren't linked very much, except for going beyond one's true capabilities to reach WR. I hope to get some clearance about this in this topic

@tim-Pedro#35-37: So we agree that best of 5 would enhance the results of lucky cases and that results would be different depending on group. That seems like proof to me that best of 5 is BAD

@Mike Hughey#40: I was thinking it would be to early to have this discussion, but I am actually surprised that I got so much support. I was expecting to get my head bitten of. Thanks for providing the example of Gabriel Alejandro Orozco Casillas. I have another example, just from FaceBook: Kai Jiptner "now I can tell: I did sub-1 avg of 12 with 57.xx". He didn't provide more details (yet) unfortunately

@qqwref#49: I still don't understand why you think that slow people CAN do 4/5 but fast people can't. If I look at your results your times decreased while your accuracy increased. This seems perfectly normal to me as a result of more practice and experience.

@rickcube#50: So you are saying that you have a 1/6 accuracy while taking 2-3 minutes and at least 6/6 (3/3, multiple rounds) when you take 4-5 minutes? You might be right, but I would like to see evidence. You might even surprise yourself. So I am asking you the same as I asked Pedro (others, feel free to do the same): Please provide some statistics of fast vs safety solves (success-rate and time)

That is it for now, made it all the way to 50, refreshed, and saw no new posts. I am going to post a radical proposal soon after this


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## Faz (Sep 14, 2010)

Interesting. Although I could never get an average of 5 in comp, unless I memorise really carefully (Still, I would probably DNF 2) I think it would add a whole extra level to BLD rankings, and would favour accuracy, rather than recklessness. I think the average world record would be very interesting to follow. People could still go all out for the single WR, and then in a different competition, they could go for the average of 5 WR.


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## AvGalen (Sep 14, 2010)

This topic is doing so well that I don't want to complicate it with a second proposal, but I think it would be best to discuss it here for now. If it is interesting enough, we can always open another topic and continue there.

So let me propose an idea that is very rough and that I really would like to see discussed as well:
*What about making blind a "how many successes can you get in xx amount of time" format?*
Time planning for blind has always been a major problem. This idea would solve that while not favoring speed over accuracy. Let me list the basic idea I have:

- You get a total time for the event of xx minutes (let's assume 10 for now)
- You solve 1 cube at a time with a different scramble every time (just like we do know, not like multi-blind)
- You get a point for every cube you solve
- You loose a point for every cube you don't solve OR you loose time (let's assume 30 seconds for now) for every cube you attempt. (This is to avoid cherry-picking of easier scrambles. We don't want people to inspect a cube for 10 seconds, put it down and say "give me the next scramble"). I am not sure which of these 2 systems (deduct point or deduct time) would be he best. Let's discuss
- Scoring is done on most points first, time second (so 10 points in 9:50 beats 9 points in 8:45, making the 9-pointer make a strategical decision if he could solve a 10th cube and do it fast enough)

A fast person with low accuracy would be able to score 4 points after doing 12 attempts
A slow person with high accuracy would be able to score 4 points after doing 5 attempts
slow people with low accuracy would be able to score 1 point after doing 2 attempts
fast people with good accuracy would be able to score 8 points after doing 10 attempts

This scoring system
-doesn't seem to favor speed over accuracy
-would allow fast people to do more solves (more fun) than they do now
-allows for > 1 DNF
-could still be used to list individual (fastest single) times as well
-and would make blind events more predictable for the organisors

They challenges and disadvantages I can see are that
-the total time would have to be fixed among competitions to allow results to be comparable
-the "deduct point or deduct time for an attempt" would have to be chosen wisely
-if "deduct time" is chosen, it's value should be carefully chosen
-total used time for all attempts has to be kept track of by the judge
-more scrambling is involved in some cases

A radical idea? I would say so. Please read the proposal a few times, think about it and then let me know
- what you think about the basic idea
- what you hate about it
- what you like about it
- if you would actually like to see it in WCA competitions
- and if you have ideas about the challenges and disadvantages I mentioned


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## tim (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> @tim#22: Too bad you seem to like it just because it would benefit you personally
> @Ville Seppänen#23: Too bad you seem to dislike it just because it would harm you personally (I am guessing since you didn't list any reason)



Nah, i do have more reasons why i like it, but you've already posted all of them in your first post (like removing lucky solves and more successful solves). I guess the same is true for Ville.



AvGalen said:


> So let me propose an idea that is very rough and that I really would like to see discussed as well:
> *What about making blind a "how many successes can you get in xx amount of time" format?*
> 
> ...
> ...



First: Yes, it's radical and seems to solve the drawbacks of 3/5. Second: It's way too complicated. Especially for spectators. You have to keep track of the total time + solved cubes to have an idea who's leading and who's not. That's impossible without a screen containing live results.

For example: Person A has 4P in 8:10 and averages about 1:20 for a solve. Person B also has 4P in 8:10 and also averages about 1:20. Depending on Person A's next solve Person B's strategy is completely different.
Basically what i'm trying to say is: All competitors need either all information or none. None informaion is impractical as long as there are spectators who applaud or happy/unhappy competitors.


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## Sakarie (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> A radical idea? I would say so. Please read the proposal a few times, think about it and then let me know
> - what you think about the basic idea
> - what you hate about it
> - what you like about it
> ...



Sure, have it as an event, but I really hope you don't mean that this is also to exchange todays 3x3 blind for?

BUT, you (or whoever it was) say that most competition doesn't have big cube or multi. But this? Should this be prioritated over multi, or 4x4?

Also, VERY hard for administration I think. I wouldn't want to be the one responsible for that everyone gets the correct cube. It's an event for a very small selection of people, and my first naive opinion of it is that it is way too complicated.


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## Pedro (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> @Pedro#27: You are basically saying that you are doing solves about 30% faster than you can actually do them "normally" (meaning not taking risks). We gave up on the idea of perfection for multi-blind indeed, but if you look at the current top 100 there are almost no solves in there that have > 1 unsolved cube. Multi-blind was black-and-white and became grey. I am not proposing to turn blind from grey into black-and-white. I am proposing to make it like everything else 1 good and 1 bad removed. I also don't like the idea of your (extreme) example but find that very unlikely to occur and will propose a (radical) solution for that at the end of this post. I am also wondering if your "go 40% slower to get a guaranteed solve"-strategy worked out every time. If you could provide me with some statistics of fast vs safety solves (success-rate and time) that would be very useful



Ok, from my official results:

Worlds 07: 2:08 success in the first round, after a DNF, so I wanted to at least get one. Final was 3 DNFs, some really close.

Brazil Open 07: 1:53 success on first attempt, then 2 DNFs, because I tried to go faster (and I could).

Minas Open 08: 1:23 success on first attempt, 2 DNFs. Same story.

São Paulo Open 09: Two over-2-min times (both on second attempt). Was trying a different strategy, which was getting a success (a slower but secure attempt) and then trying to go fast. Didn't work really well...

Santiago Open 09: 1:29 sucess on first attempt, 2 DNFs...I think I've seen that before.

Brasília Open 09: 2 DNFs, so I had to go slower to make sure I'd get one and qualify. Then failed the final (as everybody else) (Didn't want to go slow just to win).

Worlds 09: 1:47 sucess (bleh) then a faster DNF, qualified in 16th place. Final was: DNF (1:14, trying fast), 2:08 (to make sure I'd have a success and don't fail like last time) and DNF again (don't remember the time). Good enough for 9th place. *I think this is a good example. Everyone but Rafal, Yumu and Guillain did worse (or a lot worse (Norbert 1:30 - 3:30)) than first round, which was only 2 attempts...Why is that? *

UNESP Open 09: 1:20 and 1:19, first (of 3 so far) time that I got 2 successes in a single round. Third was 1:18, but fail. Final was 2 DNFs and a slow solve to make sure I'd win.

ABC Open 10: DNF, 1:46 to make sure I'd qualify, DNF. Both DNFs were faster than 1:46. Final: 1:27, 1:18, DNF. Second time ever doing 2 solves.

SESC/Santos 10: 1:18, DNF, magical-wtf-easy-scramble-let's-go-fast 1:03 . Then 2 DNFs and a slow solve in the final...didn't want to screw up yet another time.

So, my official record is 18/49 = 36.73%, because I try to beat my best time. My "average" is 1:39.82. I could have a 2:00 average with maybe 70% or more accuracy, but I never saw the point. And I would probably never got that 1:03 (or any of the sub-1:20).

(I'll talk about your other proposal on the next post.)


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## Kirjava (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> @Kirjava#29: Best of 5 doesn't have only advantages over the current format (it requires extra time)




You can still hold best of 3 or less if time is an issue. Time requirement is not a disadvantage.



AvGalen said:


> and it doesn't have only advantages over 3/5 (it promotes extreme risk-taking even more and wouldn't allow for the cut-off procedure I mentioned)




Risk-taking is already what BLD is about, and this brings it closer to what it's like to do BLD at home.

As for cut-offs, it can always have it's own style of them - they have already been mentioned! (Did you listen to the latest podcast? )


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## Pedro (Sep 14, 2010)

So, about your new proposal, I don't really like it. We'd have to fix times for the bld event to be able to compare competitions around the world. Some people just squeeze in half an hour of bld because of demand, some have 2 hours and 50 people. Some do cut-offs for the first time, then for the second one, while some let people do 3 attempts in 10 minutes each (we do, most of the time). Also, as Tim pointed out, it's difficult to the audience to follow, more work for judges (people don't really enjoy holding a piece of paper for 5 minutes), more complication.

If I understood correctly, your main idea behind this is to make bld the same format as (almost) everything else. But it's not a speed event. You don't practice the same way. If you can sit down and do 50 solves, non-stop, and get your best time in the 46th solve, I can consider  (I can do that in speed events, even OH, which involves more tiredness...some people do 200 3x3 solves PER DAY).


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## AvGalen (Sep 14, 2010)

@tim#54: Keeping track won't be as hard as it seems. Most people don't keep exact track of all solves (not even in 3x3x3 final) but they have a good idea who is doing well and who isn't. If I see A do a few solves then I know he is doing well, just like when B would do a few sub 11's in a final. Also, it isn't my idea to introduce a huge tactical game, but the top blindfolders could try anticipating and analysing others results indeed which isn't a problem for me (can happen in multi-blind or bigcubes blind or even speedsolves as well). As long as a competitor solves at his best, he will put pressure on others and increase his chances of winning.

@Sakari#55: Yes, I did mean as a replacement of current 1/3 blind. And it isn't complicated at all for administration. All the judge needs to do is determine how many time is left and what the results for all attempts were (duh). It could look something like this (assuming deducting points for DNF):
Attempt, Result, Time spent on this solve, Total time left, Score
1, DNF, 59.16, 9:00.84, -1
2, Solved, 1:14.25, 7:46.59, 0
3, Solved, 1:36.37, 6:10.22, 1

and when the scramble table gets his cube they apply the 4th scramble just like they would determine that a speedsolver has done the first 3 scrambles but not the 4th one yet.


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## AvGalen (Sep 14, 2010)

@Pedro#56: Thank you for taking the time to write all of that. I can't really draw a conclusion from your competition results and analysis though. It seems that you got faster AND more accurate over time. It seems that safety solves only work sometimes but DNF's are more likely to happen when you push beyond your limits. But when you push beyond your limits you also did your best time ever, confirming to me that your best time was more a result of tactic and luck than of skill. I am assuming the results from Worlds 09 in the final were worse because of pressure that some people handles better than others?

@Kirjava#57: I think it would be very unfair to have competitions with 1/3 (or 1/2 sometimes) and other competitions with 1/5. Records wouldn't be comparable anymore. According to you we should make competitions more like home which is just silly. Make your home solves more like competitions instead! I am not going to a competition to scramble my own cubes, start/stop the timer by pressing spacebar while listening to my boombox! 
I haven't listened to the podcast and won't. Podcasts are easy for the producer (no need to type, just talk) and easy if you prefer listening over reading but they are too inconvenient for searching. Text rules!

@Pedro#58: I think there is too much variation in blind currently making the winner of a competition the rightful winner, but making records less comparable. I understand how difficult it is to estimate how much time you need, which is why my proposal aims to solve that as well. If you have 50 competitors for blind you would need 50*10*(1+overhead_factor) / nr_of_timers minutes (10 being the total time as I proposed, overhead_factor being the percentage of time that you loose with scrambling, getting to your timer, changing groups, etc). I do agree that we need to find a solution for "holding the piece of paper", but that is independant of my proposal here.
And I agree about the fatique factor, which is why I proposed the total time to be only 10 minutes. Surely practising 10 minutes (maybe even multiple times per day) isn't too hard for the top-blinders? Haiyan told me he did 200 blind solves per day, I have seen Dennis Strehlau do 5/5 (small multiblind) between ordering food and getting the soup, and I see more and more people doing warm-up blindsolves during competitions. Maybe you are so inaccurate because you focus on going fast, but undertrained your memo?


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## Kirjava (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> @Kirjava#57: I think it would be very unfair to have competitions with 1/3 (or 1/2 sometimes) and other competitions with 1/5. Records wouldn't be comparable anymore.




This already happens anyway? Some compitions have multiple rounds of events and other competitions only have one round. Why aren't you complaining about them, too?



AvGalen said:


> According to you we should make competitions more like home which is just silly. Make your home solves more like competitions instead! I am not going to a competition to scramble my own cubes, start/stop the timer by pressing spacebar while listening to my boombox!




The point I was making is that you're trying to treat BLD like speed, when the two are very different.


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## kinch2002 (Sep 14, 2010)

So here's my opinion

Speed is very very important. Especially in single 3bld, where it's not so difficult to get a success as in bigcubebld. I think the accuracy rate is about where it should be. I guess currently most of the fast blders get a success in most rounds on bld, which is good I think, because you don't want a podium of people who did 9 minute safety solves, and you also don't want people getting every solve success because that indicates that they're going too slow if the format is best of 3. So I don't have a problem with the system at the moment because I think it works well. But, I wouldn't be opposed to best of 5 at all as long as slow people have a cutoff of some sort (like sub-3 success in first 2 attempts or something).


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## Olivér Perge (Sep 14, 2010)

kinch2002 said:


> But, I wouldn't be opposed to best of 5 at all as long as slow people have a cutoff of some sort (like sub-3 success in first 2 attempts or something).



In my opinion if the format for blind would be average of 5, our style would suit for it, and all the competitors would go a bit slower. I don't see why everyone is saying that slow people would come first... Fast people cannot go slower? Or slow solving means definitely 80% accuracy?

On the other hand, Thom has a very good point: Blind is not like speed solving. At all.

Honestly I don't see this happening, ever, but maybe that's just me.


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## Stefan (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> *What about making blind a "how many successes can you get in xx amount of time" format?*



Blows up the database format, *you*'re gonna have to rewrite it then cause I don't want to


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## Edward (Sep 14, 2010)

fatboyxpc said:


> A good comparison can be made to the sports teams that aren't used to playing in cold conditions, real grass vs astroturf, etc. It's much harder to train in snow in Florida (american football) than it is to train in a very loud distracting area (no matter where you live).



Yeah we don't like the cold much.


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## Pedro (Sep 14, 2010)

Actually the fatigue argument was headed more towards the 3/5 average proposal. We practice for speed events (which are 3/5) by doing many many solves in a row and rolling solves and stuff. I don't think that is doable for blindfolded, but maybe that's just me.

What I'm saying is that we shouldn't try to make it the same as speed events because it is, in nature, not the same. It's not like a system with feedback where you can spot a mistake and fix it quickly (or even a misalignment, which can make you confuse about wheter you did or did not do a move, or POPs, which are a disaster in bld, but can be fixed in speed events)


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## qqwref (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> @qqwref#34: Are "gods of consistencies" necessarily slower?


When I say a "god of consistency" I mean a fast BLD solver who can go at maximum speed and still get a very very high consistency. I don't think everyone is capable of this.



AvGalen said:


> If media sees many DNF's they will think it is too difficult and they will not report on it (media doesn't report on the people dropping out of a marathon). If DNF's are too common media and the audience loose interest.


You keep mentioning the media. This proposal will mean fewer DNF singles, sure, but also fewer good solves as everyone who isn't a god of consistency slows down considerably. I think the media is more impressed by good solves than by consistency - they seem to be on 3x3 speed, too. The cubing community cares about averages and all the media wants to know is what your best single solve was.



AvGalen said:


> And if you make 2 or 3 mistakes in a round of 5 I see no reason not to kick someone out.


OK, so let's make a rule that on 3x3 speed you get DQ'd if you make at least 2 or 3 mistakes of the form: (a) locking up, or (b) misrecognizing a case, or (c) popping, or (d) starting the timer incorrectly, or (e) doing something like U U'. This should make competitions more exciting for the media because the slow people wouldn't bother to compete. And hey, who cares if someone gets a DNF average on what might be their one competition this year? They just don't have what it takes and should be kicked out of the event. 



AvGalen said:


> @aronpm#30: Why is it too difficult? Because they don't practice for accuracy but for optimal single speed, which makes perfect sense under the current rules. The point of rankings in competitions is not to get the best times you can. It is to compare your skill to others. Again, the link between slower and more succesful isn't proven.


It's too difficult because it's too difficult. If you misremember a sticker/piece, forget an object, make a turn and aren't sure what you did, undo a setup move wrong, perform any cycles in the wrong direction, or anything similar, and don't know exactly what you did wrong, you will get a DNF with certainty. I will admit that I go for high speed in competition, but in practice I tend to try for accuracy and yet my success rate is not much better. It's been terrible ever since I started and probably always will be. And actually, I think the point of rankings *is* to get the best times you can, so that the competition can rank that. It's easier to rank times than skill, especially since a BLD avg5 will only tell you whether someone managed to get an average or not.



AvGalen said:


> @tim-Pedro#35-37: So we agree that best of 5 would enhance the results of lucky cases and that results would be different depending on group. That seems like proof to me that best of 5 is BAD


Wouldn't it actually put LESS emphasis on lucky cases? If you get a very lucky solve, other people get 5 attempts in which to beat it, instead of 3. It's similar to how best of 3 involves less luck than best of 1.




AvGalen said:


> So let me propose an idea that is very rough and that I really would like to see discussed as well:
> *What about making blind a "how many successes can you get in xx amount of time" format?*
> [...]
> - You get a total time for the event of xx minutes (let's assume 10 for now)


I'll surprise you: objectively, I like this idea as an event. It combines speed and accuracy without making either unimportant, and because you don't DNF all results with less than 80% consistency it is much more yielding to slow people. However:
- It feels a lot like multi, considering the scoring system, and we have enough of that. Also the need to be able to do BLD solves in quick sequence means that probably the vast majority of people will get a best result of 1 or maybe 2 points, and only a few people will get beyond that (and just like multi some will go very far beyond). Rankings like that tell me that the event is too difficult for most competitors.
- As mentioned, it's really tough for spectators and for StefanDatabasemann. Do we even record single solves? If so, how? As a combined final type round with anywhere from 1 to 15+ solves in it?
- It would make it harder for a beginner to do solves. Since we need to limit the time globally - to 10 minutes, say - anyone over 5 minutes would likely only get one real attempt. This compares to competitions now where a nice organizer may let them try 3 times. And even if you are a bit slower, if you fail the first solve you must then get 2 more to get a positive result, which is annoying. By a "rolling average" type of argument I'm not sure someone who gets the first solve they try and then stops is any more skillful than someone who gets a DNF, then a solve, then stops. 
- It definitely goes against the current feel of the event. 3BLD is based on performance in single solves; we don't measure 3speed by having people do as many solves as they can in under 60 seconds.


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## MatsBergsten (Sep 14, 2010)

I don't think it has been explicitly mentioned that the difference in scrambles has a greater impact in bld than normal speedsolving. Compare a scramble with only one cycle each for corners and edges (and perhaps a few pieces correct) and no parity with one scramble with lots of cycles and twisted/flipped but correctly placed pieces and on top of that also parity.

I may underestimate (as I am a good bld-er but a very bad speedsolver) the bonus of an easy cross or already connected pairs in speedsolving, but one very lucky solve in speed does not affect a speed average at all. In bld it makes the whole result. 

So I think it would be more fair with an avg also in bld. But I also see the backsides of the need for 80% accuracy. Why not take the best of both Arnauds and Michaels arguments: an avg 3/5 does not necessarily have to be the same in bld as in speedsolving. How about an avg of *the three best of five*, that would allow for 2 DNF:s but still require 60% accuracy so no one but the "gods" mentioned can go for maximum speed.

If you find that 5 solves take to much time, an avg 2/3 (that is avg of the two best solves of three) would remove the fluke/chance solves but still not require too much accuracy.

You may say that I personally would benefit of this (as being the slowest turner of all). Perhaps I would, though I thought more like Arnaud in the beginning of my bld career. I don't really see the need for change today, most often the best blindcuber (however we define that ) wins no matter what.

As for averages for big bld there's really no need for it. The very much greater number of moves needed to solve a big bld both in itself constitute an average and also lessens the effect of good/bad scrambles.

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Edit: post 900 
Edit 2: perhaps this avg 3/5 does not suit the WCA DB/Stefan either, too bad


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## riffz (Sep 14, 2010)

MatsBergsten said:


> How about an avg of *the three best of five*, that would allow for 2 DNFs



You beat me to it. This is at least somewhat reasonable, although I still don't like the idea of taking BLD averages anyway.

Kirjava is basically summing up my viewpoint on this issue, so I won't bother repeating points that have already been mentioned.


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## Pedro (Sep 14, 2010)

Another thing I just thought...

Let's say Feliks uses 55 moves in average. So his 5 solves take 275 moves. How many mistakes can he make and still get a sub-10 average? I'd say quite a bit...like 2 or 3 per solve? Let's say 3, he may be out of shape...10 out of 275 = 5.45%.

Let's say a very good blder uses something like 30 moves for corners and 45 for edges. In 5 solves, that's 375 moves. (And this is a top blder, not the average competitor who uses maybe Pochmann or long cycles with setups and possibly piece orientation). How many mistakes can he make to get a *valid* average, no matter what speed? 1! one! ONE! How much is that? 0.27%. Which is 20 times less than what Feliks can do. I don't see why we should be so harsh with someone, specially since 3x3 bld is already much harder than regular speedsolving...

Is like I said, the events are very different in nature. Regular speedsolving is about knowing a lot of algs and constantly looking ahead and updating the cube status in your mind, with the crucial advantage that you can see when you make a mistake or can make a change in your plan which may give you an advantage. Bld is about planning everything ahead and making every turn, algorithm, object conversion, memory browsing, everything correct. There's no room for the tiniest mistake.

Different events shouldn't have the same measurement/treatment, in my opinion.


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## riffz (Sep 14, 2010)

AvGalen said:


> riffz said:
> 
> 
> > I have to agree with AVG for the most part.
> ...



That's entirely different. Divide the total time that attempt took by 24 and you'll notice that the indivudal times per cube are not comparable.

If I proposed that competitors not be allowed to finish an average unless the mean of their first 3 solves was sub-10, I could also point to people who could achieve that easily, but it doesn't make it reasonable or applicable to the community as a whole.


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## Jani (Sep 14, 2010)

In here, the BLD competitors are so many. As you noticed in Indonesian Open 2009 perhaps.

At our last competition, we were running more than 1 hour late just because 3x3 BLD events. I just can't imagine if it becomes Ao5. 

Maybe we should lower down the limit, to 3-5 mins?


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## Gunnar (Sep 14, 2010)

Jani said:


> In here, the BLD competitors are so many. As you noticed in Indonesian Open 2009 perhaps.
> 
> At our last competition, we were running more than 1 hour late just because 3x3 BLD events. I just can't imagine if it becomes Ao5.
> 
> Maybe we should lower down the limit, to 3-5 mins?



But this is a problem of how the competition was organised, not of the format itself. The format is "best of <3" e.g. you may give 1, 2 or 3 attempt per person, depending of how much time you are willing to use for the event. The same could go for a format "best of <5". The only difference is that the organiser MAY allow 4-5 attempts, if they find it appropriate.

Time limits are also already allowed to be set by the organiser.

On subject, I guess I agree with what Sakarie and others wrote. The event is very different from speed events. The times would most probably increase, if we start to use the average format, since you won't benefit (as much) by going fast. If you are very fast you know that by going safe you may still get an average faster than a slow solvers average, but the single times won't be as impressive. 

Of course, one may say that singles aren't important, but in sighted events you may go for full, or close to full, speed and still have a very high chance of getting a good average. To me, singles are much more important in BLD events.

I don't know if one person's stats tells much of the blind events, but I have maybe 25% accuracy in 3x3BLD and 80% accuracy in multiBLD just because I memo a little slower in the latter event.


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## macky (Sep 14, 2010)

I'm against average of 5. I won't repeat the argument that blind is inherently different from speed, but here's the objection from Pedro that I find most convincing, and which no one seems to have directly addressed:


Pedro said:


> And, seriously, I don't like the idea of a [(8:03), 9:04, 9:30, 9:50, (DNF)] beating [(48), 49, 50, DNF, DNF]...



But I'm not against average itself. Ignoring for now the question of format, how should the following results be ranked? Should C be ranked first? 

A: 8:03, 9:04, 9:30, 9:50, DNF
B: DNF, 1:31, DNF, DNF, 1:50
C: DNF, DNF, DNF, 50, DNF

How about here?

A: 8:03, 9:04, 9:30, 9:50, DNF, 8:50, DNF, 9:31, 8:38, 9:01
B: DNF, 1:31, DNF, DNF, 1:50, DNF, 1:49, 1:33, DNF, DNF
C: DNF, DNF, DNF, 50, DNF, DNF, DNF, DNF, DNF, DNF

I think there's a good argument to be made for a success rate requirement. It's also true that scrambles vary considerably in difficulty (especially for certain methods), and so there's a good reason to rank by average, which effectively sets a success rate requirement. I'm fine with this as long as it doesn't significantly change the top blindfold cubers' competition strategy/approach to single solves.

For example, with a 3-attempt round, mean of best 2 (requires 2/3 success) is already too much; DNFing the first solve forces two safety solves. Compare this to speed events, where DNFs are rare and can be avoided with little loss in speed. Even after a first-solve DNF, a top 3x3 solver can do 4 more solves at full speed with little worry. If any success rate requirement is to be in the rules, it shouldn't be much higher than 50%. An organizer who feels strongly about this can set a cut-off after 2 attempts, without any rule change. With a 5-attempt round, 2 out of 5 (mean of best 2) seems acceptable, but probably not 3 out of 5. 

So, a question for the top blindfold cubers: would requiring 2 successful solves out of 5 significantly change your competition approach to single solves? How about 3 out of 5?


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## Kynit (Sep 14, 2010)

Would median of 5 be a bad idea?

You'd need a 60% success rate to get a valid 'average', which seems very possible by most competing BLDers, and having a 4th/5th success can only help you. Is it too much different from 3/5 to be a good comparison?


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## syuhei222 (Sep 15, 2010)

macky said:


> For example, with a 3-attempt round, mean of best 2 (requires 2/3 success) is already too much; DNFing the first solve forces two safety solves. Compare this to speed events, where DNFs are rare and can be avoided with little loss in speed. Even after a first-solve DNF, a top 3x3 solver can do 4 more solves at full speed with little worry. If any success rate requirement is to be in the rules, it shouldn't be much higher than 50%. An organizer who feels strongly about this can set a cut-off after 2 attempts, without any rule change. With a 5-attempt round, 2 out of 5 (mean of best 2) seems acceptable, but probably not 3 out of 5.
> 
> So, a question for the top blindfold cubers: would requiring 2 successful solves out of 5 significantly change your competition approach to single solves? How about 3 out of 5?



I agree with Macky in principle.
I think [2 success out of 3 attempts] is better than [2or3 out of 5].

For most competitor, on BLD event, they need longer times than regular speedsolving events.To time 5 attemps for ALL competitor may cost too much times. It will trouble with Organazation-team.
3 attemps at most is suitable.


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## Pitzu (Oct 4, 2010)

In Euro 2010 final there was 15 successful solves among 45 tries. I invited 2 (non cuber) friends of mine and they saw 2/3 of the solves failed.


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## RCTACameron (Oct 4, 2010)

I agree with this idea. How about scoring in this order:

Fast average
Not as fast average
3 successes, fast single
3 successes, not as fast single
2 successes, fast single,
2 successes, not as fast single

etc...


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## yoruichi (Oct 4, 2010)

1. u get 3 solves
2. if one of the solves < 4 minutes then u get 2 more solves?


i didn't read the whole thread so this idea is probably in it somewhere


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## Tim Major (Oct 5, 2010)

Kynit said:


> Would median of 5 be a bad idea?
> 
> You'd need a 60% success rate to get a valid 'average', which seems very possible by most competing BLDers, and having a 4th/5th success can only help you. Is it too much different from 3/5 to be a good comparison?


 

I like this idea. But why not 1/3. Take out best and worst and keep that as the "average", and then a best time can be the "single". 2 DNFs = DNF average, but this way, you can do a safety solve, a faster solve, then a flat out attempt 

Edit: And then it would be presented in similar format, to other events.


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## yoruichi (Oct 5, 2010)

does mean of best 3 solves out of 5 work?


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## ssb150388 (Oct 9, 2010)

Can we have maximum 1 DNF allowed in 3 attempts and calculate average by discarding the worst solve?
I dont know if I am being naive.


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## MatsBergsten (Oct 9, 2010)

ssb150388 said:


> Can we have maximum 1 DNF allowed in 3 attempts and calculate average by discarding the worst solve?
> I dont know if I am being naive.


 
That is what the proposed average 2/3 means.


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## qqwref (Oct 10, 2010)

I really really don't like the idea of uneven trimming.


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## MatsBergsten (Oct 10, 2010)

qqwref said:


> I really really don't like the idea of uneven trimming.


 
And then what do you consider "best of three" is? Is that not uneven? You remove only the worst two?
Or do I misunderstand you?


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## Cubepark (Oct 17, 2010)

I would like as at the Olympics at pole vault:
It starts at 3 minutes, and all the competitors have 3 attempts, who make a time under 3 minutes goes to 2nd round.
2nd round time limit is 1:30, if there are 2 competitors or more under 90 seconds there'll be a 3rd round.
The time limit in the 3rd round would be 1 minutes.
In this mode, it will be possible to do more solve and more "rounds" with not much competitors, and not much time will be lose because for do 3 solves under 1:30 minutes it needs only 5 minutes


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## Kynit (Oct 17, 2010)

I think there's a rule against having a lot of rounds with a small number of competitors.


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## qqwref (Oct 17, 2010)

MatsBergsten said:


> And then what do you consider "best of three" is? Is that not uneven? You remove only the worst two?
> Or do I misunderstand you?


That's a single solve metric so it is supposed to be the best solve you have no matter what. But the 2 of 3 average is an average metric, and average metrics should not be trimmed unevenly, because then they aren't a good measure of your typical time.



Cubepark said:


> I would like as at the Olympics at pole vault:
> It starts at 3 minutes, and all the competitors have 3 attempts, who make a time under 3 minutes goes to 2nd round.
> 2nd round time limit is 1:30, if there are 2 competitors or more under 90 seconds there'll be a 3rd round.
> The time limit in the 3rd round would be 1 minutes.


I don't like this idea. 3BLD is not like pole vaulting - there is a lot of luck involved not only with the solve but with the distractions and mental readiness when each solve is attempted. The same person will occasionally get solves under 1:00 and occasionally get solves over 1:30. In pole vaulting the results are a lot more consistent; anyone who can easily make a jump will make it pretty much every time. So this format will include a lot of luck as even the best people in a competition may not be sure of passing the second round.


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