Flipsider said:
I can't believe I'm actually starting to agree with Jon Schneider
Aw, cut it out, Eli, I'm getting all misty...
And don't start acting like I've turned you to the dark side. Actually I'm here to save you.
Unique Move
For the purpose of Composition Judging, a unique move is any move containing an add value whose add components are different from any other move done in that performance. Spin directions and leg direction in dexterity moves are considered different; moves coming from a different set are not unique unless that set forces another add component (i.e. body, in the case of "paradox" moves) to be added
By this definition, Scorpion's Tail and Bullwhip ARE UNIQUE FROM ONE ANOTHER. They've got different spin directions. To skip the Jobs for once, a Scorpion ending with right leg DOD to left clipper would have you spinning Counter Clockwise. A bullwhip with the righty DOD to lefty Clip has a Clockwise spin. Two different spin directions in this case makes two different moves. Don't get confused. Without any other elements involved, spinning clipper is the same as gyro clipper based on the spin direction (gyro clip is spinning clip set from another surface), but with, say, the dexes, a spin in one direction has dexes and stalls on one side, and spinning in the other direction has the dexes and stalls on the other side. You still with me? So Bullwhip and Scorpion are okay as uniques. The problem, if these are the kinds of things that are bothering you, is with Scorpion Tail and Inspinning DOD, or Inward Scorpion. Same spin direction to same DOD to same clipper. They're the same. But if we agree that Inspinning gets some other kind of ADD (X-Spin? I don't know, i wasn't following that conversation closely) then they are unique too. No problems.
You are also confused on another issue:
but perhaps Ripwalk vs. Sidewalk, Pixie Opp Legover vs. Pixie Same Legover, etc. are not unique after all, since following the set, they are in fact the same move.
I don't think thats what the rule says at all. Ripwalk IS unique from Sidewalk. Sidewalk is a double dex with one leg. Ripwalk is a double dex with two legs. Same with the pixies. Ripwalk isn't the same as Sidewalk, its the same as Dimwalk. (In Dex - Op Out Dex - Op Clip). I think the directions of the dex are making moves unique, just as in the rule I quoted above, and Ripwalk and Dimwalk have the same two dexes going in the same directions ending on the same clipper. Sidewalk does not have the same dexes in the same directions as Ripwalk. No, rather Sidewalk has the same dexes in the same directions as Parkwalk. I do think the Pixie and the Stepping can be equivalent exactly for that reason. Even when you want to bring UP-TIME and DOWN-TIME into it, what you've got (in Parkwalk and Sidewalk) is an (up-time) In Dex followed by a (down-time) Out dex with the same leg, to the op clipper, and thats the same for both those moves. The only difference is the setting surface, which we've agreed is irrelevant in counting uniques in competition (by we, I mean the players who wrote that rule).
Okay, its the wrong thread, but I just wanted to reply to Flipsider's posts, and I'm almost done. Here is my closing:
This past summer in Athens, the US Men's Gymnastics team got burned really bad by some crappy rules manipulations. The thing is, they'd been training for YEARS for their preformances in those games, skooling the same performance over and over. The performance they'd been skooling was based on their understanding of the rules (what rules they needed to follow in order to score well). After the years of preparation, they finally get to Athens well prepared, only to be told JUST TWO STINKIN' DAYS before their performances that THE RULES HAD RECENTLY BEEN CHANGED, resulting in lower values for some elements in their performances, thus they either had to accept that what they'd been practicing all of a sudden was worth less points, or they'd have to change what they'd been practicing. Big deal. I didn't really care in particular who won the event. I just wanted to see a good show. However, I wouldn't want that scenario to happen to US, HERE IN FOOTBAG. The point is I think we've got three options for counting Uniques:
1. Every little difference makes a move unique with no exceptions, or
2. Every little difference makes a move unique with some exceptions (like the various setting surfaces making double-dex butterflies unique, but not single-dex butterflies) , or
3. The above rule, which is makes it clear which difference count to make a move unique and which don't.
I'm okay with choices 1 and 3, but I think that most players don't really want to see butterfly be worth more than one unique per side.
I don't like #2, because their isn't really a clear standard for which moves are the exceptions to the rule. Jeremy suggests we have a committee to decide a list of the exceptions, and I assume that this is going to be based on how people FEEL about the moves (how they feel about the difficulty, the similarity, etc.). The problem is that how people FEEL about all these moves, which moves are difficult and which aren't, etc, changes over time, and so the EXCEPTIONS ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE TOO. This is what happened to the US Men's Gymnastics team. They got screwed because the rules they had to play by were a moving target. Jeremy suggested that these rules could be decided upon well in advance of a given comp, to eliminate that problem, but I think that that is really asking too much of the tournament organizers, who likely have too much to do to have decided exactly which rules will be in effect at the tournament one year later.
Choice number 3 seems best because there are no exceptions, the rule isn't subject to frequent changes based on what moves are currently in vogue, and I've always found it to be pretty easy to understand. Everybody that cares to can understand how they will be scored at the next tournament, and what they have to do in order to get the score they want. Nobody will show up at Worlds and have to ask "So, which rules will we use this year? And which tricks are exceptions this time that weren't last time?" No mysteries. Everybody benefits or is penalized in exactly the same way at each event, every year, and we don't need a committee to compare each trick to each other trick and interpret which ones are unique.
Yes, it leaves out some stuff. But it leaves out the same stuff for everyone, and it doesn't change whats left out and whats not.
There are other reasons, but I don't want to keep going on and on in the wrong thread. I'll just say that lately I've been thinking of the issue as "variety with a little v, vs. variety with a BIG V", and changing the setting surface is a little-v change, while changing the dex/spin direction is a variety with a big V.
Code does, for the most part, what you tell it to do. It doesn't "prove" anything.
