WXV Rule Discussion 2024

[Purple 77]

Hey all :D

The majority has revealed itself with a 'yes' for rule discussion, so lets get stuck into it

ANYONE can nominate a rule change, and it will be voted on. However, be sure there is adequate explanation to validate your proposed change.

Every now and then throughout the year, someone has brought up something they'd like Worlds to do differently. Now is the time to bring that up, and it WILL be voted on. We only have 3 weeks of the year to discuss rules and change them, so use this time wisely. Once the rules have been voted on, THAT IS IT for the next 12 months!

We need all rule changes approved/rejected by Monday the 28th of August, which probably means I'll leave the final PM no later than August 26th.

As always...

THERE WILL BE A SALARY CAP! It is the only thing that I will enforce, even if against the majority. The only thing I'll entertain is what kind of cap system we implement.  It will not go away whilst I'm admin, so suggestions to get rid of it entirely are fruitless.

So with the above in mind, I'll leave the floor open for rule suggestions :)

[RaisyDaisy]

TRAIN-ON PLAYERS

At the moment we can nominate 2 players to "train-on" in a new position. I have no issue with the criteria (ruck % etc) however the change I would like to suggest is that when we reach the mid season byes we have the option to update our 2 players

We currently nominate our 2 players by end of year which is also fine, but as the season goes on your 2 players might get an LTI or even retire, so I think it's reasonable that at the byes we have the option to change/update our 2 train-on players

REP ROUND

In recent years we've transitioned to a 2 game rep round due to the AFL byes, but having 2 games where the actual games results don't matter, just total points do, is kinda lame. It also weakens the full strength of AAP v EurAsia as coaches can't use the same player twice which dilutes the overall scoring, so I'd like to suggest the following:

Week 1: AAP v EurAsia (Seniors)
1 game, winner takes all, both teams no longer have to worry about sharing a larger player pool over 2 games, just name the absolute best and the winning team is crowned the champion for the year

Week 2: AAP v EurAsia (Rising Stars)
This game showcases the best young talent of the comp, and gives the rebuilding/lower ranked teams more interest in rep round as they should have players included. You can only name players 22 years old and under (Let's say 22 on Jan 1 that year, so you could technically have some 23 years old playing)

There are no limitations on naming a player twice - Eg a 21 year old could be named both weeks

As per normal, the 2 coaches at the top of the ladder will continue to be the coaches of Rep Round for Seniors, but for the Rising Star round I think we can go a few ways - either the senior coaches coach them too, or maybe the next top 2 coaches do, or even maybe the top 2 teams outside of the 8 coaches do? More inclusion the better

[PowerBug]

1: Change WXV sub rule back to what it was
We made a change to the WXV sub rule on the expectation that the AFL sub was picked from outside the starting 22. With the AFL changing their rules on us, this sub rule has no value anymore. So I propose we go back to:

AFL Starting Sub = WXV DNP
Any AFL player who doesn't participate in the second half = WXV DNP

-- -- -- -- -- -- -- -- --

The following fall under the same opening statement...
"WXV is starting to gather a problem with teams (so far smartly) tanking."

2: Mandatory list preference update during the AFL byes
One method I propose is that it becomes mandatory for all teams to update their list preferences during the AFL byes for when they don't submit their team. Failure to do so should be considered tanking and punished accordingly.

3: Draft Lottery amongst the bottom x teams
Simple (once we work on finer details). Work on some %s for each spot, and then draw the top x draft picks each year. This would obviously come into effect from the 2025 Draft onwards.

4: Actual punishment (not just warnings) for other obvious offences
These need to be fleshed out before they hit a vote, but they include things like:
- not naming a team on a given week, and
- not naming train-on players in December.

[Ringo]

PBs 3.

Like the idea but think we need to protect picks for lower teams. Maybe something like this and will not be offended if you treat as rubbish.
Teams with 3 or less wins for the season retain their picks. To avoid controversy using rule 2 to monitor tanking,
This may be the controversial but the next 4 lowest teams also play off during finals series to decide piuck order with winner getting the next pick etc.

My idea but concerned with the proposal above Team finishing 13th could get pick 1 at the expense of team finishing last. 

[PowerBug]

PBs 3.

Like the idea but think we need to protect picks for lower teams. Maybe something like this and will not be offended if you treat as rubbish.
Teams with 3 or less wins for the season retain their picks. To avoid controversy using rule 2 to monitor tanking,
This may be the controversial but the next 4 lowest teams also play off during finals series to decide piuck order with winner getting the next pick etc.

My idea but concerned with the proposal above Team finishing 13th could get pick 1 at the expense of team finishing last.

The idea is that it would be a sliding % scale so that yeah whilst a team in 13th could get pick 1, it wouldn't be as likely as the team in 18th getting pick 1.

There's a few ways we can have the %s worked out:
- it can just be a fixed % based off ladder position. This is the simplest method
- It can be a % based off wins/losses/total points. This is the method which would help with even and uneven seasons. E.g. 13th and 16th are 1 win apart does 16th really deserve a significantly greater chance at Pick 3 than 13th? Probably not
- Something else which involves W/L records over multiple seasons to assist with teams who are near the bottom in consecutive seasons.

There's a few ways to do it, for now, just gathering info on people's immediate likes and dislikes on the idea before I bring forward a concrete proposal

[Ringo]

Thanks PB Something to work on as best way to implement. The main thing though with your proposal is to make what we do attractive for tanking which is why 2 needs to implemented.  And then really work out punishment like maybe forfeit the pick and go to pick 18.

[upthemaidens]

Has Tanking been an issue? A lotto system only hurts weaker teams.

With the Rep. round (rising stars), maybe Rucks can be any age. Wouldn't be many young Rucks to choose from.

[PowerBug]

Delay voting on Round 0 shenanigans
Until we see what the fixture is. I guess we could vote on "what happens if it's the same as 2024" now, but delaying it probably isn't going to hurt

[RaisyDaisy]

Has Tanking been an issue? A lotto system only hurts weaker teams.

With the Rep. round (rising stars), maybe Rucks can be any age. Wouldn't be many young Rucks to choose from.

Good call UTM, I didn't actually consider that but you're likely right. Maybe we increase the age limit to 25 for ruck, or use the 2nd best ruck who didn't play in the seniors?

[Koop]

Active Discord Presence

Given that banter and activity has always been the cornerstone of this competition, and a key reason why it is still alive, I'd like to propose a rule that makes a FF Discord presence mandatory.

This allows for

1) Greater communication from the administrator to the coaches
2) Frequent discussion and activity between coaches
3) The ability to still run the competition in the event of another FF downtime episode

[RaisyDaisy]

TAGGING

At the moment we only allow a mid to tag a mid, and for the most part from what I saw it didn't really make a big difference overall most of the time it was used. I think the formula needs to be refined but I'll leave that for someone else

I'd like to suggest that tagging is expanded to def and fwd. The formula remains the same as is for mids now (If that changes then that change would also apply to this so that it is the same across all lines) but I propose that a fwd can tag a def, and a def can tag a fwd

The forward line in SC is getting worse by the year in terms of genuine good scorers, whilst defenders are scooping up SC points and more are becoming relevant, so instead of a mid tagging a mid now (where for the most part it isn't doing too much) I can see a F4 fwd tagging a D1 defender or a D4 defender tagging a F1 fwd and it actually having an impact (both in succeeding and failing)

This also makes the use of tagging much more tactical, because right now if you had an ordinary M4 you just tagged the 5 best mids you faced for the year, but now you need to really think about how to best use your 5 allocated tags for the year, as you now have the ability to tag defs, mids and fwds. Additionally if you didn't have a weak M4 you likely didn't tag much or at all, but now you can use the tag feature with one of your forwards or defs, meaning it should in theory be a more used and tactical feature

[Ringo]

Like this one as it matches what happens in the AFL.  Could we even extend it further where a forward can tag a defender. We see forward tagging defenders now a bit in AFL.

[JBs-Hawks]

This is fantasy football , not real football. We need to lose this shower ideology that we need to simulate what happens in the real stuff.

Fwds should tag fwds
Defenders should tag defenders.

They are completely different scoring lines and should be treated as such.

[Holz]

If going for a Lottery should only be the bottom 6 teams.

1. there is normally a clear bottom 4-7 teams each year and 18 team comp, so bottom 3rd.
2. you do not want a team who just misses the 8 jagging pick 1 even if its a low chance.

My suggestion is bottom 6 teams get a "ping pong" ball with the amount depending on ladder position.

18th - gets 6 (28% chance of pick 1)
17th - gets 5 (24% chance of pick 1)
16th - gets 4 (19% chance of pick 1)
15th - gets 3 (14% chance of pick 1)
14th - gets 2 (10% chance of pick 1)
13th - gets 1 (5% chance of pick 1)

Now the last placed team isnt locked in to get pick 1 but given they have so many ping pong balls the chance they get a top 3 pick is very high

The odds that 18th place has a top 3 pick is about 80%+

The weaker teams still will end up with the good picks as the worst case is the bottom team gets pick 6 even though this is about a 1-2% chance.

Should stop any tanking talk (even though i dont think this is an issue) and the reality is the bottom few teams are probably equally deserving of the top pick.

For example Berlin this year is the lowest scoring team but dont have pick 1, Church is sitting in pick 6 despite being the 4th lowest scoring team.

[RaisyDaisy]

World Idol

This one might turn a few noses but I'll just throw it out there anyway and see what everyone thinks

So much of what we vote on/do is often to help the bottom teams, but I think this is one area where we can actually reward a team for being consistently the best. Idol is a great in-season game, but ultimately ends up with nothing for the winner

I'd like to propose that the winner of Idol gets some sort of prize

We're pretty limited in what we can do - naturally my first thought was something to do with draft picks but that really isn't going to work, so I've come up with something different

The winner of Idol gets to "call their shot" the following year, meaning they can choose 1 game during the season where they are scheduled to be the away team, and make it a home game.

Now I know it might be "unfair" for the side they pick (a likely higher threat/contender) to go from having HGA to losing it, but whatever, it's not too big a issue imo and I think the spiciness of it all will be great, and could create a new rivalry moving forward whilst actually making Idol much more worthwhile following