Anime Saimoe Tournament 2012 (Japan)

[ion475]

Three clear examples isn't exactly a bad supporting argument, you know.

You also have to note that all 3 didn't exactly face a LOT of competition...

Saki: Nearly lose to Maho. 2nd Round is a joke, wasn't exactly dominating against Kobato (Although Kobato still deserves the win...but oh well).
Koromo: Strike Witches (not even the top 2) split 1st round, face an assassin (Sorry, Miki is just not THAT strong) 2nd round, and well, Tacos 3rd round.
Bucchou: Average Amagami girl 1st round, 2 mediocre at best girls 2nd round, another assassin (against, well, Shizuno) 3rd round...

Compare to how much Kuro won against Nyaruko then Shirakiin, all 3 record are not exactly dominating...

Anyway, Louise won this time around. Not exactly exciting, but at least we all know Louise can troll and barring Nodocchi, has a pretty good record against Saki

For next round. We'll see whether Sanya is able to pull a Erica Hartmann or not. Saki will get hate, but is it close to enough to knock off Yuu? I doubt it...

Sanya did knock Hina out, but then, looking at the latest Hayate episode, that's for good reason (Okay, I need to stop trolling...)

Pick & Predicting a Yuu win. None of the girl has even gotten close to her so far.

[AP24]

And so Louise wins, which was kind of expected. So far Louise is the only one that has ever reached the top 8 in 3 different years. It's possible for Nodoka and Shana as well.


We now have 3 Saki + 1 Rie Kugimiya characters in the top 8. There will be 2 more Saki charcters that will definitely reach the top 8. Yuu and Shana have the advantage against their opponent so I think they will win. I think it's safe to say that the top 8 will definitely be 6 Saki + 2 Rie.

[RJ TAYLER]

MACKERRAS PENDULUM

SAIMOE 2012

SAKI 5 SEATS
NON-SAKI 2 SEATS
IN DOUBT 1 SEAT

Fairly Safe 5% PLUS
Group B 8.30%

Safe 2.5% TO 5%

Marginal Under 2.5%
Group A 1.36%
Group C 0.96%

Group F TBA
Group G TBA

NON-SAKI

Marginal

Safe
Group D (KPJ) 3.37%

Group H TBA

IN DOUBT
Group E TODAY

KPJ Kugimiya Party of Japan

Whereby 1% represents 1 in 100 voters needed to have changed their minds and voted for the other candidate.

The Mackerras pendulum was devised by the Australian psephologist Malcolm Mackerras.

[Ichuki]

1st 293 Louise De La Valliere @ Zero's Familiar
2nd 256 Hinata Hakamada @ Ro-Kyu-Bu!

Prediction- Yuu

For SAO there's a possibility it'll end up like the YuruYuri faction where only 1 girl dominates, I feel like Saki and Madoka may get the "Lucky Star backlash" because its more like even though they are most likely decently strong next year but a faction that's stronger than Madoka and Saki sounds plausible (who knows there's a chance Suite Prism Nana will be stronger than those 2 if it's elidgible next year.)

[Aya Reiko]

Images

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Guessing...
Yuu, easily.

[Coldlight]

Hmm, so it's a case of going with the veteran over the newcomer. Louise was twice a former Quarterfinalist, so I admit that I had some expectations on her to win the match. This makes it the third time she steps into the QF stage. Will she make it further for her final appearance this time? The third time could be the charm... then again that didn't turn out so well for a lot of other familiar faces. I wonder if her win also affects Shana's chances in some way.

Leaning towards Yuu to win in this match. Now that ahelo reminded me of it, Erica's unsightly fate last year in the Semifinals is giving me a case against Sanya. Needless to say, I'd call Sanya prevailing over Yuu an upset.

Also, I like that match poster title - very appropriate. If Yuu was even just a tiny bit related to the Finns, the title would be perfect.

Still no pick for this match. I don't like or dislike either girl enough to side with one.

[JW1]

I did think Hinata might cause a slight upset, but in the end she couldn't quite manage it.

Sanya's chances in today's match I would guess as being roughly equal to those of a snowball in hell.

[ahelo]

Originally Posted by Triple_R

Thanks a lot for that.

My analysis:

2005 and 2006 were basically all about Nanoha faction vs. Rozen Maiden faction. Nanoha didn't weaken after winning it all in 2005 - In fact, it produced the losing finalist of 2006 (Fate Testarossa) who herself slightly edged out the defending champion. Nanoha and Rozen Madien each had one representative in the Final 16 of 2007, while Shinku made the final 8 of 2007. Nanoha herself also won a couple rounds in 2008, while Hayate won three rounds that year. That's a pretty good 3/4 year run for these two shows, imo. This is just the sort of slow, gradual weakening that I'd expect to see in moe competitions.

Lucky Star did indeed face a serious backlash for its 2008 domination.

K-On! produced finalists in both 2009 and 2010, winning in 2010. K-On! then faced backlash last year.


It's fair to say that J-SaiMoe generally doesn't like sticking with the same anime franchise for more than two years. But at the same time there have been cases where a show produced finalists in back-to-back years.

So, do I think that a Saki or a Madoka Magica character will win it all in 2013? Probably not.

But do I think that they'll face a Lucky Star-esque backlash? That's much more guesswork, in my opinion. Nanoha and Rozen Maiden didn't really face such an immediate backlash, while K-On! at least had two years of riding high.

2005 was much more complicated than a Nanoha-Rozen Maiden thing since it was a very dirty year (a lot of people even say that Shinku was the real winner of 2005). 2006 was when people started doubting the randomization of the brackets and the Haruhi faction who was supposed to win it all ended up being compiled in a single block with only Yuki as a representative and she ends up losing to Suiseiseki in the QFs.

2007 was the reason why IP bans started. As I explained, things weren't really going the way it's supposed to be with Nagi losing to Rika. The Rozen Maiden faction made a really nice hurrah (with Shinku's Semifinal repeat) while the Nanoha faction had Nanoha herself as the representative again. But 2007 (and 2006), imo, are the 2 most colorful eras in Saimoe history. The variety that 2007 represented (in the top 8) is the thing I've always wanted to see repeated (and it kind of was in 2010).

For looking at trends on factions, Saki has been a scary mainstay since 2009 though Hayate used to be what Saki was. In fact for 4 straight years, the Hayate faction managed to sent a representative in the top 8.

For the winning factions though: Higurashi never produced a top 8 representative after 2007. Lucky Star stopped also after 2008. K-ON! got crushed in 2011. That's what, 3 factions with very identical dilemmas. The only ones that always stayed strong were Rozen Maiden and Nanoha and those two factions are "legends".

In terms of challenging Rozen Maiden and Nanoha for the legendary status though, I'd say the Madoka faction and the Saki faction (if they win this year) have the biggest chance to do this feat.

Still though, Nanoha only had 2 characters that are sent to the top 8. Rozen Maiden has Shinku and Suiseiseki (Souseiseki doesn't really count if you know Saimoe's history) though they also have untapped potential like Suigintou (who never really got her Saimoe justice). Lucky Star only has Konata (in 2007) and the Hiiragi sisters. K-ON! had Yui in 2009 and Azunyan in 2010. Madoka sent 4 (would've been 5 for Homuhomu) which, personally, made the competition stale. What about Saki? They're already assured 5 slots (gonna be 6 today) in the quarterfinals.

tl;dr Saki (as I see it) will probably not face a backlash next year (Saimoe 2010 already proved that the forgotten summer shows aren't things applocable to the Saki faction) but Madoka might. Also, I think I lost the point of my post. I just got way into the whole Saimoe history digging (which is the reason why it's so fun in the first place).

[TnAdct1]

Originally Posted by ahelo

This is just within my perspective but looking at how ISML is, the international anime community aren't big Saki fans. It's already shown since Saimoe 2007 that foreigners really affect the results of matches. Nagi would've won Saimoe 2007 if the foreigners didn't vote. Mikoto would've reached quarterfinals in 2010 if no foreigners voted in her match with Azunyan. This is exactly the reason why ip bans are strict. The 2ch peeps think that we, the gaijins, ruin their moe tournaments (though they're really ruining themselves atm or at least the way I see it).

I mean exactly, how many of are actually able to even vote in this tournament? I mean some people in Japan can't vote in Saimoe. I'm exactly in the same position as Coldlight who tried to find ways around the system or just vote "once" in a year and that completely stopped last year. While I'll always be excited in every Saimoe tournament, there will always be frustration in my part that I can't vote.

tl;dr Us gaijins would provide votes that would give the non-Saki characters an actual chance.

This pretty much summarizes the big problem with last year's and this year's tournament: 2ch may think that they're "improving" the tournament by banning international votes (and certain Japanese votes). However, in reality, it's actually ruining the tournament, as it allows "factions" that can be kept in check via the international vote to over-dominate, thus taking away most of the fun from the tournament. If 2ch is going to keep this ban next year, and unless someone can do an "international" alternative that's more true to the Saimoe tournament than ISML (as in the contenders anime from a certain time period, among other things), there's only two ways the tournament can be saved IMO (although both are full of controversy):

1. Pretty much make winning franchises from previous Saimoe tournaments ineligible for later tournaments. Yeah, it may upset the Nanoha fans, but the idea is more to teach a lesson over over-domination, as it means that Madoka Magica and Saki (if they do win, with is pretty much going to happen) would not be in next year's tournament, and it would cause fans of "factions" to consider giving other titles a shot, as an over-dominant show will pretty much mean that it won't be another Saimoe tournament if there is another season/OVA/movie.

2. If a show is a threat of being "over-dominant", put the powerhouse characters from that show in the same block. In other words, repeat what happened in Saimoe 2006 when it came to Nanoha, Rozen Maiden, and Haruhi. It's controversial as it takes away the "luck of the draw" for certain shows. On the other hand, it would allow for other shows to have a representative in the quarter-finals, and personally, I'd prefer variety over a huge amount of characters from a show that I don't care about.

[seemmeriast]

Louise is the first ever character to reach Elite Eight 3 times. So far, only nine have done so more than once. (Nodoka and Shana can also match her record.)

- Louise (2007, 09, 12)
- Sora (2003, 04)
- Nanoha (2005, 07)
- Shinku (2005, 07)
- Tsukasa (2007, 08)
- Nagi (2007, 10)
- Shana (2006, 10)
- Nodoka (2009, 10)
- Koromo (2009, 10)

[Ithekro]

Another problem would be the serious reduction in votes. Either because of voting restrictions or them actually stopping faking from getting through. But the numbers have been on the decline since 2006 and 2007, with 2011 and now 2012 having a hard time getting more than a 1,000 votes outside the finals.

[Ichuki]

Originally Posted by TnAdct1

This pretty much summarizes the big problem with last year's and this year's tournament: 2ch may think that they're "improving" the tournament by banning international votes (and certain Japanese votes). However, in reality, it's actually ruining the tournament, as it allows "factions" that can be kept in check via the international vote to over-dominate, thus taking away most of the fun from the tournament. If 2ch is going to keep this ban next year, and unless someone can do an "international" alternative that's more true to the Saimoe tournament than ISML (as in the contenders anime from a certain time period, among other things), there's only two ways the tournament can be saved IMO (although both are full of controversy):

1. Pretty much make winning franchises from previous Saimoe tournaments ineligible for later tournaments. Yeah, it may upset the Nanoha fans, but the idea is more to teach a lesson over over-domination, as it means that Madoka Magica and Saki (if they do win, with is pretty much going to happen) would not be in next year's tournament, and it would cause fans of "factions" to consider giving other titles a shot, as an over-dominant show will pretty much mean that it won't be another Saimoe tournament if there is another season/OVA/movie.

2. If a show is a threat of being "over-dominant", put the powerhouse characters from that show in the same block. In other words, repeat what happened in Saimoe 2006 when it came to Nanoha, Rozen Maiden, and Haruhi. It's controversial as it takes away the "luck of the draw" for certain shows. On the other hand, it would allow for other shows to have a representative in the quarter-finals, and personally, I'd prefer variety over a huge amount of characters from a show that I don't care about.

I think this summarizes this issue as well and very good rules for future saimoe. I don't know if this will be effective but what about to be eligible a girl have to appear at least 15 minutes of screentime (about half of an episode). Also judging by the vote totals so far looks like everyone is bored of the Saki over dominance since it's like a round 1 filled with weak girls level low.

[broken270]

The Cold War begins...

Spoiler:

[Kyuu]

Originally Posted by TnAdct1

This pretty much summarizes the big problem with last year's and this year's tournament: 2ch may think that they're "improving" the tournament by banning international votes (and certain Japanese votes). However, in reality, it's actually ruining the tournament, as it allows "factions" that can be kept in check via the international vote to over-dominate, thus taking away most of the fun from the tournament. If 2ch is going to keep this ban next year, and unless someone can do an "international" alternative that's more true to the Saimoe tournament than ISML (as in the contenders anime from a certain time period, among other things), there's only two ways the tournament can be saved IMO (although both are full of controversy):

1. Pretty much make winning franchises from previous Saimoe tournaments ineligible for later tournaments. Yeah, it may upset the Nanoha fans, but the idea is more to teach a lesson over over-domination, as it means that Madoka Magica and Saki (if they do win, with is pretty much going to happen) would not be in next year's tournament, and it would cause fans of "factions" to consider giving other titles a shot, as an over-dominant show will pretty much mean that it won't be another Saimoe tournament if there is another season/OVA/movie.

2. If a show is a threat of being "over-dominant", put the powerhouse characters from that show in the same block. In other words, repeat what happened in Saimoe 2006 when it came to Nanoha, Rozen Maiden, and Haruhi. It's controversial as it takes away the "luck of the draw" for certain shows. On the other hand, it would allow for other shows to have a representative in the quarter-finals, and personally, I'd prefer variety over a huge amount of characters from a show that I don't care about.

A much more simpler solution:

Re-create these same exact Saimoe rules available to everyone, under the same time frame OR offset scheduling to a later start (like in the fall) to not overshadow the "original Saimoe". Yes, there's ISML; but ISML is completely entirely different based on the ruleset being used.

OR

Pressure the Saimoe organizers to open things up a little bit, like allowing foreign voting on a limited basis.

[Micchi]

Picks: 0-1 (0-4, 79-69)
Predictions: 0-1 (1-3, 106-42)

Ohhhhhhhhh noooooooooooooooooo......

Pick: Sanya
Predictions: Yuu

None of my picks are going to go through.

[ion475]

Pressure the Saimoe organizers to open things up a little bit, like allowing foreign voting on a limited basis.

They already do allow foreign voting on a limited basis. You can argue that they can open it up more, but that's about it. Usually I can get a code if I click on the generator within the 1st 2 hours or so after voting starts (I got one every time if I click on the generator right when code generation starts, but since it's only from home and I'm usually working at 11am ET...)

[Kyuu]

Originally Posted by ion475

They already do allow foreign voting on a limited basis. You can argue that they can open it up more, but that's about it. Usually I can get a code if I click on the generator within the 1st 2 hours or so after voting starts (I got one every time if I click on the generator right when code generation starts, but since it's only from home and I'm usually working at 11am ET...)

Limited? Well, what's the limit - if you happen to know?

[ion475]

Limited? Well, what's the limit - if you happen to know?

No clue. I know it's really low but I personally can't just throw out the list of "Which code is foreign and which is not" from top of my head (Or else you can just look at the list of code at the end of every match and count...)

I've never ran into any problem getting a code at 10:35am ET (2335 Japan Time, the beginning of code reservation). Usually I can still reserves a code around 1pm ET (0200 Japan Time) and as late as 3pm ET (0400 Japan Time). After that? Usually no luck...

[TnAdct1]

Originally Posted by Kyuu

A much more simpler solution:

Re-create these same exact Saimoe rules available to everyone, under the same time frame OR offset scheduling to a later start (like in the fall) to not overshadow the "original Saimoe". Yes, there's ISML; but ISML is completely entirely different based on the ruleset being used.

That is exactly what I meant by an international alternative: one that has the same rules as Saimoe, but is open to people all over the world, not restricted to just Japan.

[ahelo]

Originally Posted by ion475

They already do allow foreign voting on a limited basis. You can argue that they can open it up more, but that's about it. Usually I can get a code if I click on the generator within the 1st 2 hours or so after voting starts (I got one every time if I click on the generator right when code generation starts, but since it's only from home and I'm usually working at 11am ET...)

You're so lucky because I haven't been able to vote since 2010. I think I share the sentiments of most of the people in this forum so I think (well even I have no statistics so my claim can be invalid) the margin of them allowing foreign voting is really really really LOW.

I swear though, if they allow foreign voters to vote, things would look really different in this year's Saimoe since the tastes of foreigners in general are slightly different than the Japanese and a small percentage (a bigger one than what we have now) of foreign voters can really make a difference in this tournament where a few votes can really matter.

Or just in essence, LET EVERYONE VOTE 2ch. They really need to stop being so gaijinphobic.