Re^9: Perl Golf Ethics

[eyepopslikeamosquito]

to find that I started out at a distinct disadvantage from the start is the pisser

Luckily, this disadvantage is unlikely to have affected your final position at all since none of the players in your section of the leaderboard used the magic formula.

I've gone through every solution in the top 30, noting who used the magic formula and who didn't. Those who used it had scores of: 99, 102, 107, 111, 114, 118, 119, 122, 129, 135, 143.

For the sake of analysis, let's assume the tournament was played with a rule that forbade the use of any magic formulas. As Ton has already pointed out, not knowing the magic formula costs an expert golfer no more than about five strokes. So you might add a five stroke penalty to all those scores above. However, not all those golfers are experts (though most are), so let's be brutal and penalize them all by forty strokes. Doing that pushes the worst of the scores above up to 183, still three strokes ahead of your score. So it seems unlikely your position in the tournament would have changed at all had the playing field been more level.

Oh, one more minor nit, since you are so hot on level playing fields. I noticed towards the end that you joined forces with another competitor. Do you think it fair, or a "level playing field", for an individual to compete against a team of two, who are able to pool the best of each other's ideas?

[petdance]

Luckily, this disadvantage is unlikely to have affected your final position at all since none of the players in your section of the leaderboard used the magic formula.

It's not an issue of where I ended up. I'm sorry you spent the time investigating the what-ifs.

Do you think it fair, or a "level playing field", for an individual to compete against a team of two, who are able to pool the best of each other's ideas?

Clearly, yes.

[eyepopslikeamosquito]

Clearly, yes

It's not clear to me. ;-) Why do you think it fair? Clearly, if you took any two individuals from the 150-200 stroke range and put them together, they could not possibly do any worse and almost certainly could shave quite a few strokes (as you and Pete did) by combining their ideas.

Notice that TPR did not think it fair in TPR(0,6) (and others) where their rules stated:

There is also a special leaderboard for teams. There will be no prizes awarded to the best team, other than the admiration of your fellow golfers. If you are in a team, you can't also play individually.

Admittedly, it probably makes less difference at the sharp end of the leaderboard. For example, though I would be honoured to pair with Ton, I'm sure it would not improve our score one iota. :-)

Update: There is some luck involved on who you pair with. For example, pairing with pijll wouldn't have helped much because we both found the formula and both missed the symbolic reference trick. However, pijll or me pairing with Jasper or ambrus would be in the running for third place because one found the formula, the other the symref trick.

[petdance]

It's not clear to me. ;-)

That's fine. I meant that it was clear from my actions that I thought it was OK.