Judging change thought

[bluecoats88]

So I was thinking, Whey should the GE portion of the scoring be weighted more than the visual or music portions of the performance. Each caption is worth 20 points (keeping the percussion as an average of the 2 judges) and if you take the totals and multiply these by .625 to normalize the 160 total points down to 100 points then each of the captions would have the same weight in the final score of 1/8th of the final score.

I ran this scenario on the past three finals scores and for 2005 & 2006 the 12 placements would have stayed the same, but in 2007 SCV would have dropped to 7th and Crown and Bluecoats would each have moved up a slot.

I think this would make the scoring more even and fair instead of giving one aspect of the show more importance than other aspects.

What does everyone else think?

[RegimentContra94]

Sounds like "more fair" to you means "Bluecoats placing higher". I think GE should be more than the "technique" categories.

[bluecoats88]

Sounds like "more fair" to you means "Bluecoats placing higher". I think GE should be more than the "technique" categories.

This has nothing to do with the Bluecoats placement but I figured someone would say that. I was just thinking you have 8 captions all worth 20 points when they are judged, but then 6 of those 8 get divided so they are of less value than the other 2. how come GE is more important than visual or music? why shouldn't all of the aspects of what the corps are doing on the field be weighted evenly? in the current judging system a corps can be stronger in GE and weaker in music and beat someone who is more evenly distributed across the captions. Why aren't all captions of equal value? That way a corps needs to be consistent across all captions instead of a corps being strong in GE and a little weaker somewhere else but still winning because the GE caption carries so much weight.

[RegimentContra94]

GE takes into account all aspects of the show. It is the overall effect of the show. It encompasses show design, emotional impact, visual impact and also takes into account the skill of the performers. A hornline that can't play will obviously have lower GE music scores.

It has never made sense to me to try to put a number score on art anyway. it's just as pointless are arguing if art is good or bad.

[MikeD]

So I was thinking, Whey should the GE portion of the scoring be weighted more than the visual or music portions of the performance.

It's not...music performance totals 30 points, visual performance also 30 points, music effect is 20 and visual effect is 20.

So...Effect is 40% of the score and Performance 60%.

[Liam]

Also, you can't just change the weighting now and say this is where the corps would have placed. They designed and practiced and cleaned their shows based on the scoring scale that they knew in advance. If the scale were different (emphasizing different things), then the shows would likely have been adjusted accordingly and the standings might have come out exactly the same (or not, who knows?).

Another thing -- the weighting of the scores only matters to the extent of what the spread is between the corps. If you made in 90-10 Performance over GE and all the corps maxed out their performance and were pretty close to each other score-wise, the corps with the dominant GE (even though only weighted 10%) could still win. Heck, look even today, one caption can either sink or rise a corps even though it isn't weighted particularly much. You can be even with your direct competitors across the board but finish above or below that group simply because your guard work (for example) was exemplary or below average. Does that mean that color guard get too much weight? No, it means that the corps are pretty even in all the other categories, so this one was the "tie breaker" so to speak. Could be percussion in some instances, GE in others, brass performance in others.

Don't get me wrong -- I have nothing against tweaking with the score sheets if we want for whatever reason -- just don't be surprised if the effect of changes is less (or at least different) than you might think. :)

[bluecoats88]

Also, you can't just change the weighting now and say this is where the corps would have placed. They designed and practiced and cleaned their shows based on the scoring scale that they knew in advance. If the scale were different (emphasizing different things), then the shows would likely have been adjusted accordingly and the standings might have come out exactly the same (or not, who knows?).

Another thing -- the weighting of the scores only matters to the extent of what the spread is between the corps. If you made in 90-10 Performance over GE and all the corps maxed out their performance and were pretty close to each other score-wise, the corps with the dominant GE (even though only weighted 10%) could still win. Heck, look even today, one caption can either sink or rise a corps even though it isn't weighted particularly much. You can be even with your direct competitors across the board but finish above or below that group simply because your guard work (for example) was exemplary or below average. Does that mean that color guard get too much weight? No, it means that the corps are pretty even in all the other categories, so this one was the "tie breaker" so to speak. Could be percussion in some instances, GE in others, brass performance in others.

Don't get me wrong -- I have nothing against tweaking with the score sheets if we want for whatever reason -- just don't be surprised if the effect of changes is less (or at least different) than you might think. :)

this is exactly what I'm saying. If all captions were of equal value then being even with your competitors in all but one caption and being better or worse in the other caption would make sense to me for that corps to be up or down in relation to the others. But say they were even in 6 of the 8 captions with their competitor, but were better in CG by .5 and worse in GE Music by .5. In my scenario those wo corps would still be even since all captions were of equal value, but currently the corps that was up in GE music would be up overall because the other corps CG win would only be worth half of the first corps GE music win. Just doesn't seem right. Make all the subcaptions even and then .5 is .5 across the board not .25 in these 6 captions and .5 in these 2.

[bluecoats88]

GE takes into account all aspects of the show. It is the overall effect of the show. It encompasses show design, emotional impact, visual impact and also takes into account the skill of the performers. A hornline that can't play will obviously have lower GE music scores.

It has never made sense to me to try to put a number score on art anyway. it's just as pointless are arguing if art is good or bad.

Yes I understand how the captions relate to each other, but in your example if a hornline is poor then their GE music score also suffers and this makes sense. but why should GE music be more important than the Actual Brass score? It's all related to the music. Brass is how well the horn line handles and performs the music, Ensemble is how well the horns and percussion blend, perc is how well the drum line handles the music and works front to back (pit/battery), and GE music is how effective the overall music is. so why is that one aspect, GE, of the music more important than the other aspects of the music?

[Liam]

this is exactly what I'm saying. If all captions were of equal value then being even with your competitors in all but one caption and being better or worse in the other caption would make sense to me for that corps to be up or down in relation to the others. But say they were even in 6 of the 8 captions with their competitor, but were better in CG by .5 and worse in GE Music by .5. In my scenario those wo corps would still be even since all captions were of equal value, but currently the corps that was up in GE music would be up overall because the other corps CG win would only be worth half of the first corps GE music win. Just doesn't seem right. Make all the subcaptions even and then .5 is .5 across the board not .25 in these 6 captions and .5 in these 2.

I get what you're saying, but look at it this way -- if the judging were laid out 99% percussion score and 1% everything else, the corps would bust their butts to max out everything they could do in percussion and probably not be AS concerned about the rest of the show. So, in this scenario, a .5 change in percussion would mean EVERYTHING, but a .5 change in CG (for example) they might not care about as much. So this would affect the way they design shows and they way they practice and clean. Does this make sense -- as ludicrous an example as it is???

So relate this back to your example above. Differences are slighter than in my ludicrous example, but because the scoring is set up the way it is, .5 in CG is not viewed the same as .5 in GE, so therefore efforts in design and practicing and cleaning are adjusted accordingly. Of course, everything is maxed out as best as can be, but with limited resources and time, priorities will naturally fall based on the scoring format. So change the scoring format and you change the priorities just that little bit. So your .5 difference in CG in today's rules might have been only .4 under the change you propose because the efforts on the practice field and design might have re-prioritized enough to pull those corps closer together. So the standings might have ended up exactly the same. See what I mean?

This all complete conjecture, of course -- my point is that it's not as simple as changing the weighting and then saying this would have been the result. Change the weighting and the design efforts will change, the practice efforts, the recruiting maybe even, etc, etc. So I think in the end, there's a good chance you'd end up with the same (or reasonably similar) results despite the change. What you are proposing makes the math easier to understand for us -- but I'm not sure it will really change the results all that much placement-wise.

Again, I'm not saying that the judging can't (or even shouldn't) be tweaked. What I'm saying is that the results are not as cut and dried as "change this and this will be the result", that's all. :)

Edited August 16, 2007 by Liam

[kevingamin]

It has never made sense to me to try to put a number score on art anyway. it's just as pointless are arguing if art is good or bad.

Don't tell that to the figure skating community or, worse, the ice dancing community...