It's crazy that they are this organized, precise, and serious about it. I had no idea they had this kind of extensive video review, but that's kind of epic!
imo, i like the back up trick, because knowing if I was going to compete i'd be super optimistic like "Oh yeah, imma do these lvl 5-6 tricks for the prelims!" but in reality, i'd probably get really nervous and mess up so it'd be great to at least make up a few points if I can't get a lvl 5 trick. also, i'd eliminate the past champion seeds... like if you're the best one year, that doesnt mean you're gonna be finals material next year (for example in major golf tournaments, if you dont make a certain score, you dont play the next round even if you won that cup last year or another tournament. no fast pass! lol) the gender seed is a good start... but hopefully we wouldnt need it in the future because the lady dama players would slay much more! lol maybe only enable it when there's a small percentage (like less than 20% of finalist or something like that)
I honestly don't understand the gender seed. Just because there are less overall females that play doesn't mean that the ones who do play are any better or worse than the male players. To me it is kinda like an underhanded insult, as if females aren't good enough so they have to get a pass somewhere...givinga gender seed is kinda a form of reverse sexism in a way. So many good females came out and competed this year, I say let their skills speak for themselves. How do you fellow slayers feel about the country of origin seeds? Do these fall in the same boat?
I think the seeds are more about showing a wider representation of global kendama. We will probably see this disappear as the diversity in kendama is rising naturally. This probably boils down to sponsorships of the event wanting a broader audience.
I see it as having a one additional girl slayer being able to showcase her skills to a wider audience and compete at a high level. I don't see it as reverse sexism by any means. if it helps encourage more females to get at it and level up to get that gender seed i'm all for it. Like i said, hopefully one day we wouldn't need it and the guys will haha (I'm definitely a bit biased lolol) Besides, the gender seed this year scored higher in the prelims than 3 of the 5 regional seeds (like the european champ and previous KWC winners). Imo, i don't like wildcard-ing into the finals rules as a whole. like if there was a semi-finals or round 2 in-between prelims and finals and then a smaller pool in the final round, it would seem more logical to me to have wildcards from prelims into a semi-finals if there was such a thing. lol
I think the biggest issue was the cutoff for finals qualifying score jumping from 67 pts last year, to 83 this year (I think it was like 64 two years ago? Would have to double check that though). With a score this high, there are effectively like... 30 tricks that competitors can choose from if they actually want to make finals. With a score like 67, it's more like 50 tricks. So the diversity of play goes down a lot, or at least is limited to the style of tricks in only the highest levels. Two reasons for this: - level 11-12 not being used in qualifying, and level 10 being easier than years prior - back up tricks I would say either ditch the level 11-12, and just keep making the list tougher within levels 1-10, or allow all levels in qualifying... I'm not sure which would be preferred. For back ups, if they're gonna keep them, I think just ONE backup trick between your two rounds would be a good compromise. So if you use it first round, you don't have a backup trick second round. I think having every previous winner sees in is weird, but it's the first time they've done it so I guess maybe that's why. In the future, I hope they knock it down to just 1-2. I think having some people seed in from other contests is okay, MKO, a big Asia contest, and a big euro contest make sense at the three spots there. I'm fine with Girls wildcard too. The whole idea for the wildcard is to bring more diversity to finals, and this year all of the wildcard finalists scored really well, so it worked out I think. If a wildcard scores zero (that has happened before!) then obviously that's no good, that finals spot could have been better used. I disagree about the EKO being a seed event, as an event it doesn't have a very good rep amongst players. This year they used a Romanian event that had like 400+ competitors as the seed, whereas the EKO has had like 20-50 players over the last few years if I recall correctly, so that alone is good reason. I certainly don't think a seed spot should be given in hope of having another contest grow because of it. Also, I like country seeds more than continents. What about Japan or Mongolia? Africa? Why give S America a seed? Agreed on the penalties, it's good to see dama culture push back heavily against any sort of cheating.
Top seeds are likely considered more of an economic "draw" for the event (though they could also be partly a courtesy to past winners for their support). Big names in an event attracts viewers and more viewers means more eyes on a company's product/service/whatever. Events aren't cheap to host so without support from sponsors they'd be pretty much impossible to produce. Trying to convince a potential sponsor to support an event is easier if one can show big numbers of viewers/attendees at past events. It makes the proposal more attractive business-wise; it's an easier sell. However there will be a point at which it simply doesn't make sense to keep adding seeds or the event probably should be changed to an "invitational" where all players are effectively "seeds."