methods for determining the winner

[sixty]

hello, I'm a newbie here .. I found you all in search of a quick answer for a little article I'm writing for a backgammon community,
FIBSboard .. what a delight to see others as curious as I have become about the subtlties and vargarities of round robin tournaments .. I'm delighted to have found you

I suppose there are not as many ways of detrmining the winner in a round robin tournament as there are ways to schedule pairings, but I suspect there may be many more than the few of which I am aware .. additionally, on-line tournaments seldom have fixed scheduling problems as most matches are just arranged ad hoc by the players, but there are numerous other issues justas interesting, but that'll be another topic

my first question is whether the method of giving the winner of a match 3 points and the loser 1 point has a formal name?

further, I am wondering what the benefits, if any, such a scoring system may be versus a straightforward comparison of won-loss records for all entrants?

I've always found round robin tournaments fun, but now that I've become involved in both playing, supporting, and organizing such tournaments, I'm curious about not only background of this style, but in learing about others

thanks in advance, I look forward to seeing a response, learning more about the site, and  sharing other goodies, too

sixty_something at FIBS

[wbport]

In chess it is 1 point for a win and 0 for a loss.  I don't see that giving the loser of a match anything does much since everyone will be getting a minimum score "just for showing up".  Perhaps a penalty of - 1/3 point for unplayed matches if you can determine who didn't want to play, couldn't be found, etc.  Then if you had two busy players who wanted to play but couldn't find free time at the same time, how could you apply the penalty?

[Ian Wakeling]

I agree with wbport.  If the only outcomes are a win or a loss, the 3-1 scoring system is going to give an identical ranking of the players to a 1-0 system.  It gets more interesting when a draw is a third possible outcome of the match.  In sports like soccer, a draw will often be given less than half the points awarded for a win, while a loss gets no points.  This system discourages teams settling for a draw in the final stages of match, hopefully making it more exciting for spectators to watch.  There are many possible variants of this system, some which may take into account the home-team advantage.  
This Wikipedia article decribes many of the systems in use.

[sixty]

i've discovered that the 3 point win may be derived from soccer league scoring where 3 points are awarded to the winner and 1 point each for a draw .. some have 1 point awards for a win on a penalty kick and 1 point awards for other special situations .. that makes sense in games where a draw or technical win is possible, but that is never the case in backgammon other than in a forfeit

perhaps the 1 point awarded for a loss is an incentive point for playing the match .. in most on-line tourneys, not all players finish all their matches in the time alotted .. this can be a real problem in close finishes leading to disputes and directly effecting outcome .. that very situation arose for me in the last session of a league .. i'd been unable to find 1 last opponent and was tied in points with another player who had finished all their matches as I recall .. had I finished and lost the 1 point award would have given me the tourney win .. without it the tie-breaker decided it and I had lost that heads up match

for another example, consider an 11 player tourney where each player would play 10 matches .. if Player A, has won 6 and lost 4, the 3/1 point system advances him over Player B with a 6-2 record .. if ranked by W/L Pct Player B (not completing 2 matches) would finish ahead of Player A .. awarding 3/1 points for W/L, Player A has 22 points (6*3+4*1) .. Player B would have only 20 points (6*3 + 2*1)

this seems to also work with a 2/1 point rating for W/L .. but in a situation where Player C has a 7-1 record, Player A (6-4) would have 16 points to Player C's 15 points .. with a 3/1 rating for W/L, Player C with 22 points would finish tied with Player A, also with 22 points  .. their heads up match would decide the tie

thus, the 3/1 rating places an appropriate premium on that extra W and still adds the incentive for finishing with 1 point for a L

ok, that finally makes sense to me

now, anyone know what the formal name for it is? or know where else it may be used?