I personally think every league is run by a volunteer. It's a lot of work with little reward. There are many people that make the job almost untenable. I really appreciate the work put in, and I think it's brilliant my team have the opportunity to play in 3 leagues, and a big cup.

I agree that we could argue all day and not resolve which scoring system is the best. I do however feel whoever is putting the work in to run the league(s) should decide 100% how their league is run, and us lucky enough to play in them should respect that.

I also agree there are enough leagues that there is room for everyones opinion, but there is pretty much one current league runner - and we should respect his opinions. If someone felt so strongly that they set their own league up, with their own rules and scoring system - I would also join that league, and give that league runner 100% respect. I'm sure chris would be more than happy for someone else to step up and run one of the leagues under their own interpretation.

I agree with many of your points, but we need stability rather than chopping and changing every season, and currently with all the pre-season negativity and debating, we're losing league runners every single season. And we've all seen how disastrous it can be for the clans when a runner leaves, especially when there's no-one willing, or competent enough to step up.

Change is good when implemented properly. I think these ideas are pretty good and would be easy to modify.

I was hoping this kind of discussion would hold off for another four weeks or so, so that teams could focus on the remaining competition. Then tackle it full on!!

In my opinion, the leagues being run by the same core of individuals works pretty well. Everything is kept together in one place, rules and decisions have (I think) been pretty consistent. It could even move in to one common website ultimately.

I will put out a couple of ideas that are floating around - hopefully these will be taken just as that and will provoke a positive discussion. Nothing at all has been decided.

Starting with the FCL. There seems to be three main options...

1) Completely unchanged from this season.

2) Score it as the FBL has been scored this season ie each individual game scores 2 pts for a win. Feeding in to the overall winning clan scoring 2 pts going towards the League table. The beauty with this kind of scoring is that it virtually removes at a stroke the negative effect of defaults. On the negative side of course it is completely alien to the the FCL concept.

3) As per beenjammin's view, score is purely on a frames won basis. I absolutely refute any claims that this is the most accurate way of producing a winner. I would almost go the opposite and say it is the least accurate. However the reason that it is now even a potential option is that the introduction of the League split at a certain point in the season means that outcomes are more likely to be decided between teams of more or less equal abilities rather than what clans do against the weaker clans or how defaults have been decided.

The FBL has worked pretty well this season and been so easy to manage due to the scoring system and how easy it makes default decisions. There are two overall scoring options I think...

1) Keep it unchanged completely

2) Change it so that the points won per each individual game carry throughout the season. This would mean that the team that wins the most individual matches during the season will win the league.

Individual game formats can be best of whatever. Currently 6 but could be 8 or 10. It also means that no dead frames need playing although players have not grasped that concept this season!!

Finally Super League. Much as this is my baby I think the time has come to change it....

....

1) Remove SL completely and incorporate the event bonuses in to the FBL scoring.

2) Change it back to very short games of 2 racks of each game type - either as a 5-a-side like before or an 8-a-side competition with one team per clan. The Play-Off knock-out system certainly makes for a more competitive end of season and is different from the normal Leagues which makes it potentially worth keeping for that alone.

I am not keen on separate Cup competitions. I think one Cup competition suffices. I think the Grand Slam Cup format from this season works well although it would be a straight knock-out cup competition rather than messing around with Groups.

The Players Championship to remain unchanged. This seems fairly popular and the 12 rack format is a lot fairer this season.

Introduce a separate Killer competition. This would run throughout the season and I have a plan on how to organise this competition and these games that will remove a lot of the hassle and arguing seen now on threads and produce as fair an outcome as possible for all.

This leads onto the general problem of tedious arguments that persist on forums regarding clans. Its very easy for people to talk about taking action against offenders, league bans etc but none of those will have any positive outcome and I am keen that site rules continue to outweigh all in these matters.

One idea of removing the arguments is to remove the source!!

Once fixtures are released then no subs can be made - only swaps to resolve time zone issues. This would mean that Captains would be under pressure to submit a team list of players that they believe to be available. Opponents would then only have one player to try and arrange a game against. If either player is inactive then the default decision making is simple.

Clan sizes could also be reduced accordingly, leading to more, and more competitive, clans. It would also take away the advantage currently held by the large 'super clans' who needn't worry if one of their players goes missing because they just bring a sub of equal ability in.

This would be a major change - almost back to the very first seasons of clans. No doubt there would be a few more unplayed games but the question would be whether the advantages overall in terms of better competition and fewer arguments outweighed the drawbacks.

This could also potentially be trialled in one League to see the effect if people wanted.

players champ is a bit er a waster er time i got into last 16 without playing a game, by time i were there i saw it as nowt short of a hinderence

Players champ is not something you have to play it's a choice.

arr i know pal, i were just saying it were 3 month in b4 i got a game

Why should clans that don't do tactical subbing suffer though, at pros we put any team out and only sub in second week to get games done, sometimes sub in first week if it is warranted due to time zones. I do think there are too many drawbacks getting rid of subbing mate.

Edited at 16:15 Thu 01/05/14 (BST)

i came up with a solotion to this last year and no one listened

wherever u are placed on the teamlist, you can only swap a player either 1 up or 1 down on the list, and a max of 2 subs

foolproof

Wouldn't work mate what if there is four games to played on the deadline day but you have already made all your subs.

Maybe we could do something like only swaps then deadline WEEKEND from the friday to Sunday unlimited subs?

well youve got 2 subs amnd 2 swaps surely thats manageable

no chance 2 subs would work if players go awol get muted or dactivate thats not captains fault and u get defaults cause uve made ur 2 subs subs should stay the same

thats half the idea, kick out er the mardy bums, and have players who atre reliable and cooperative

I am happy with whatever format is used tbh.

I do however, strongly oppose any huge reduction in clan size. I formed Uprising 4 or 5 seasons ago, maybe even 6. We was the worst team, and we worked very hard to become the force we are now. And we've still not managed to win anything - not even the division 2 title.

Forcing players out now, that have stuck by the team for seasons makes almost 2 years of effort pointless! The only reason we have attracted some top players is because of the hard work we put in season after season - and any other team could replicate that if they applied the same effort.

This season is more competitive than ever, with 4 teams all more than capable of beating each other. Premiership football only has a top four, and most people agree that's fairly successful. People talk about a limited player pool, but look how easily Wolf Pack have pulled together this week and recruited back up to 16 players. Some of those could quite easily become top players, like when I signed cgibson92, or sharky89 as players new to clans. I feel to the core that a reduction in numbers is a backwards step, and no successful clan would argue in favour of it - and I don't think we should reward failure.

Arguments would subside if players mind their own business, communicate with fellow Captains or Vices via offline messages instead of posting a grumble then the rest jump on the band wagon. This includes myself too.

If we can bring the threads back to their original purpose, eradicate the useless crap posted then that could be a step forward in the right direction. The rest of the team players shouldn't have to witness or view any such arguments and if cannot be resolve amicably offline then the opinion of the League Runner should be sought.

IF they don't want the responsibility then don't be a League Runner as the 2 - Role and Responsibility go hand in hand.

Ash do you realise people are giving up their time to run an event they are not being paid, crikey I hope you are not trying to.campaign.for league runner.


Reduction in size is a negative way forward, as stu says he at uprising has worked hard to get where they have I remember when they wasn't their best now they are fantastic and would be horrible if they had to force players out.

if clans are downsized u have lest subs meaning more defaults in case guys get muted deactivated etc

Yeah especially when you have a team of loyal players who don't want to play for any other clan. I think no swaps been aloud will also cause a lot more defaults when your up against a team that are a nightmare to get games played against.

I disagree with the notion that the fbl scoring system has "virtually removed at a stroke the negative effect of defaults".

Whether an indiv match can earn 2 points, or 15 points, if there's 8 indiv matches it is still 1/8th of the team match being affected either way.
I could even argue that the fbl style gives defaults more weight, because of its black and white style of scoring, not many options to choose from when deciding the default.

Does the fbl style make the default decision simpler? yes
Does it reduce the negative effect of a default? no

Edited at 21:45 Thu 01/05/14 (BST)