Group Pairings

I've noticed that the way players are matched up in tournaments is inherently unfair to the lower ranked players. in a nutshell, the highest ranked players are matched up with the lowest ranked players, so you can pretty much tell who's going to win at the outset (at least for round 1). This is especially noticeable in head to head tournaments: 

Let's say there's a hundred people joining a head-to-head tournament, and we've ranked them from the best (player 1) to the worst (player 100). Now here's the crazy part:

player one is matched up with player 100, player 2 is matched up with player 99, player 3 is matched up with player 98, etc.

This results in the top third of players basically having a bye to the next round, and the bottom third players having no chance whatsoever. The middle third of the players are the only ones that are matched up in a somewhat fair manner, where both have a decent chance of winning. luckily for me I'm usually in that group, but I just think it's crazy to have a player ranked 2100 playing against a player ranked 800. What's even the point?

That isn't the way pairings work here.  In the Live Swiss events, top half plays bottom half. Say there are 100 players. Player 1 plays player 51, 2 plays 52, and so on. After round 1, the process is completed by pairing in score group, but the logic remains the same, though there are some considerations due to odd score groups.

https://www.chess.com/tournament/1200-1500-knockout-kamikaze-chess-16-special-edition

Look at the groups in this tournament. Starting with group one, you have a very high player against a very low player. Group 2 is the same but slightly closer, etc etc. By the time you get to the last couple groups they have basically the same ranking. So it is definitely set up the way that I said, in this tournament at least.

That tournament is on round 3 and started with a lot of players and has a group size of two.

So you work your way down the ratings. Highest rated in group 1, second highest in group 2, and on down until you fill the number of groups that is equal to half the players, then put in the second player in each group, from the bottom half of the pairings.

The only really surprising thing is that there are still so many lower rated players still in the event, that far into into it. But it is pairing exactly as I said, it just looks exaggerated based on group size. 

All the Daily tourneys work the same, currently, with that kind of pairing logic, which is the same way Swiss events work, just you have smaller Swiss groups each round. The end goal is to have the strongest performing players meet in the final round.

If you were a tennis fan, would you want to see Federer, Nadal, and Djokovic knock each other out in the early rounds of a tournament?

Or would you like to see them play in the semi-finals or final?

The Tournament you are showing is a knock out which has 1-8 2-7 3-6 4-5 keep playing until 1 person is standing

a Swiss has 1-5 2-6 3-7 4-8 everybody plays a set number of rounds you are not eliminated because of a loss 

GMPatzer thanks for the information, I didn't know that. Do you know  if the tournaments specify which type they are?

All Daily tournaments are round-robin knockouts. Live are either Swiss events or Arenas.

There used to be a good support article on how the Daily tourneys are paired, but I'm not finding it.

Ah, found it: https://support.chess.com/article/501-how-is-seeding-and-group-placement-determined-in-multi-group-tournaments

@GMPatzer was right.

Ok

 :fist

damn, this thread is pre-Covid