After much thought, I have decided, 3 months into the ladder, about making some reforms, and the reasons why.
- Run the Ladder on an annual rather than a 6-month basis. The reason for this matches are not being completed quickly enough nor at a large enough rate to make the 6 month time enough. Case in point, I haven't even completed my 2nd match yet and we're already halfway through; some people haven't even finished their FIRST match.
- Alternatively, the Ladder and the coefficients will be permanent but points awarded for wins and draws will be weighted according to the difference in the ladder positions of the combatants.
- Nominate a committee of sub-refs. Refs appear to be having difficulty meeting the 3-day time limit, therefore, any ref on the committee may jump in to ref a single round if a sub-ref request is made in the thread. If the original referee fails to referee the round after the sub-reffed round, a new referee will be selected.
- Scrap the permanent team idea, but instead at the beginning of each battle, each combatant must send their teams of 6 and their first Pokemon to the referee. This is intended to stop the disadvantage of being the first person to send a Pokemon out.
- Lower the reffing rank limit to Rookie. However, consistently poor reffing may lead to you being disallowed from reffing Ladder matches.
- Enable Abilities. They seem to be working so no reason why we shouldn't use them.
That's about it for the main changes.
If you have any suggestions, comments or criticism, please post your remarks in this thread. It'd be good to get a read on what you feel is working and what isn't.