Grand Archery Tournament

BACKGROUND

The Grand Archery Tournament, GAT for short, is a system that allows all the archers in the Knowne World to compete in local tournaments and compare their performance to archers elsewhere in the SCA. Many archers shoot Royal Rounds, IKACs, and similar standardized competitions where the target type, ranges, and number of ends are the same whenever shot. A means needed to be devised to record scores and compare archer s resulting standings in non-standardized tournaments as shot at most large events where archery is included. The GAT is an attempt to address this need.

CONCEPT:
The concept of the GAT was based on the PGA's Golfer Rankings. Where each golf tournament gets a difficulty defined by who plays the tournament. The the golfers who played it are given a score based on how they played against each other. These scores are then compiled to define the overall ranking. The PGA doesn't base their international ranking on how the players do at a predefined driving range where they can practice what they are shooting it. As such the GAT is attempting to provide a ranking based on the dynamic environment found at SCA Archery Events as opposed to the traditional rankings based on each Kingdom's Royal Rounds which are highly standardized and never change.

INTENT:
The intent of the GAT is therefore to allow scores obtained during non-standardized event shoots to be recorded, and competitor's final standings to be calculated based on their performance relative to the other shooters, and displayed for comparison. The hope is that the vast majority of GAT scores will come from unique event based shoots. However, so that everyone in the SCA may participate, even if there are no shoots close to them, the four yearly SSAC shoots will be included as they are somewhat similar to an event shoot in that they are generally not shot at a standard Royal Round/FITA target. The IKAC will also be included to maintain a strong cross kingdom comparison. In this way every archer will have access to at least five shoots for them to build their yearly GAT ranking. It is strongly encouraged to submit every local shoot to the GAT.

ORGANIZATION:
For the sake of simplicity and fairness, at this time the GAT is divided into two Target Archery divisions, one for handbows, and one for crossbows. Plus a third division for Combat Archery. A Grand Archery Tournament consists of one or many shoots, each with a numeric score. The GAT is meant to be an advanced tournament, but, all archers are welcome to compete regardless of age and ability. The GAT standings are presented as four lists;

• Archers with a Crossbow Standing
• Archers with a Handbow Standing
• Archers with a Standing in Both TA Weapons Forms
• Archers with a Combat Archery Standing
• Kingdom Statistical Comparison

FORMAT AND REQUIREMENTS

Any archery competition can be designated a GAT. However, if the resulting standings are to be calculated and posted to the official GAT scores page, the following criteria must be met.

1. In order for the keeper of the scores to be able to calculate valid standings, a minimum of 5 *RANKED* Handbow, Crossbow, or Combat Archery competitors must enter the tournament.
   • JUSTIFICATION - If too few ranked competitors enter either division, the scores for that division will not be comparable to other shoots and will not be calculated and posted to the official GAT scores page.
   • CONSIDERATIONS - What if you don't have enough people to hold a GAT in your area?
     1. Shoot an SSAC, at the end of the season all those archers will now be ranked
     2. Invite skilled competitors from surrounding kingdoms
     3. Design a competition made up of shoots that can be reproduced or relocated to shoot at several events in several locations. So long as the locations provide similar conditions, the standings can be accurately calculated. As an example, if there are only 6 crossbow shooters in your entire kingdom, devise a tournament that can be set up at two or three events that all six crossbow shooters can attend. Announce on your kingdom calendar that a GAT will be shot at the X, Y, and Z events. Once the shoots are complete, submit the accumulated information to the Keeper Of The GAT. For the sake of fairness, if most people shoot a tournament once, while one person shoots multiple times, only the first score shot ought to be used. The rational for this is, it prevents the person who shot multiple times from gaining an advantage by learning the range, elevation, and windage of the shoot. If everyone shoots multiple times, the method of compiling scores is up to the marshal in charge, with the understanding that the shoot must be designed with fairness in mind. Practice rounds prior to shooting for score are fine, but may not be appropriate in all cases, and are therefore not required. So feel free to include surprise rounds with unknown ranges.
2. To be official, the GAT must be shot at an event listed on the Calendar of the kingdom in which it will be held. Unlike Royal Round and IKAC shoots, GATs may not be shot at unofficial gatherings even if enough participants are present.
   • JUSTIFICATION - This rule has been added to assure the maximum number of participants the opportunity to compete.
   • CONSIDERATIONS - What if you have too few people to hold a GAT in your area?
     1. Shoot an SSAC, at the end of the season all those archers will now be ranked
     2. Invite skilled competitors from surrounding kingdoms
     3. Design a competition made up of shoots that can be reproduced or relocated to shoot at several events in several locations. So long as the locations provide similar conditions, the standings can be accurately calculated. As an example, if there are only 6 crossbow shooters in your entire kingdom, devise a tournament that can be set up at two or three events that all six crossbow shooters can attend. Announce on your kingdom calendar that a GAT will be shot at the X, Y, and Z events. Once the shoots are complete, submit the accumulated information to the Keeper Of The GAT. For the sake of fairness, if most people shoot a tournament once, while one person shoots multiple times, only the first score shot ought to be used. The rational for this is, it prevents the person who shot multiple times from gaining an advantage by learning the range, elevation, and windage of the shoot. If everyone shoots multiple times, the method of compiling scores is up to the marshal in charge, with the understanding that the shoot must be designed with fairness in mind. Practice rounds prior to shooting for score are fine, but may not be appropriate in all cases, and are therefore not required. So feel free to include surprise rounds with unknown ranges.
3. Equipment that is allowed in your kingdom according to your rules may be used to shoot a GAT.
   • TARGET ARCHERY DIVISIONS - All equipment must meet your Kingdoms Target Archery rules and customs.
   • COMBAT ARCHERY DIVISION - To qualify for the Combat GAT the shoot must be conducted in full SCA Legal armor, using SCA Combat Archery legal Bows and Arrows with SCA accepted Tips and APDs, just as if you where headed to the Combat Field. However the CA shoot is run, each archer must end up with a unique score(ties acceptable), be that 2 points for a win / 1 point for a loss, or a true scoring system does not matter. There is no separation of Handbow and Crossbow for the Combat Division, since on the Combat field the combatant you shoot at does not care what you use only whether you hit or miss (and they would *really* prefer you miss!).
4. Certain basic information must be recorded and provided to the Keeper Of The GAT by the responsible marshal. This is to include The date or dates of the shoot, the place or places where the shoot was held, consisting of kingdom and group, the names of the participants, their home groups, their home kingdoms, their division (bow type), and their numeric score.
   • CONSIDERATIONS - Ties do not present a problem. If a participant was unable to complete the shoot for some reason, the partial score will be provided. If no partial score is provided, a score of zero will be assigned. As each year's scores are based on a sum of standings shot, and not an average. So non-completion of a GAT due to illness or an equipment failure will not increase an individual's score, but it also will not adversely affect an individuals posted standing.

CALCULATIONS

The formula the Keeper Of The GAT uses for calculating standings is as follows.

The Event Difficulty will be calculated based on the Ten Best Archers by their existing GAT Ranking (the % column on the Standings page) for each bow type independently. This will be calculated as an average of the Archer`s Percentage, divided by 2. This will give a Difficulty between 50 and 1.

Based on each archer's actual score, a GAT Score will be calculated to normalize out the target point values.
GAT Score = (((Score - Lowest-score) / (Highest-score - Lowest-score)) * 99) + 1
This will give a GAT Score range of 100 down to 1 for each Event attended. In a GAT where eight crossbow shooters turned in numeric scores of 33, 29, 20, 20, 19, 13, 12, and 8, the resulting GAT Scores would be 100, 84.1, 48.5, 48.5, 44.5, 20.8, 16.8, and 1

The GAT Standing, or each archer's Rank within the overall community, is based on multiple scores over multiple years. One great year can bring an archer well up the ranks, but to reach the very top they must be a consistent performer. For each of the most recent 4 years the archer's top five Event Scores (GAT Score * Difficulty) will be added together. Each year's worth of scores will be valued at double the previous year (current year=10, previous year=5, third=2.5, fourth=1.25 ).
Standing = (Year Value * (Sum of best 5 Event Scores from current year) ) + (Year Value * (Sum of best 5 Event Scores from last year) ) + ...

KEEPER of the GAT