We haven't had any true invitationals in a while (nearly a year). Partly this was due to the queue changes, with invitationals being classified under (the still loosely defined) "Special Games", and of course there are other reasons too.
I have been thinking about them, though, and would like to get some sort of system in place for having regular invitationals (but without oversaturation). Minvitationals in particular I feel do have the potential to be special events for the participants and great learning tools for readers of the games, if they are done well.
So, here are a few ideas regarding this, followed by some questions.
a. All invitationals will be run by proven moderators. Currently, the Special Games requirement is 5 completed games to
b. The most common thought for choosing players for invitationals is to choose the "best" players (whether from the entire site, or some subset of the site)... whatever "best" means. So, my current inclination is to have a yearly Minvitational of the best players on the site. However, I'm not sure what the best way to go about choosing the players would be.
c. jeep suggested that other criteria could also be used to select players. For example, one suggestion which I liked was an invitational for the Scummies winners. We wouldn't want to get too ridiculous with the criteria (as it would defeat the point of having invitationals at all), but I'm sure there are a handful of criteria out there aside from "best players" which we could use on occasion.
d. In addition to a couple Minvitationals a year, there is occasionally a special occasion for a larger invitational. The two I've run were both milestones (Mafia 40 on the GL, and the Five Year Anniversary Invitational cross-site). As it happens, we have another anniversary (this time 5 years for mafiascum.net) coming soon, and I've had a couple ideas for something special to do for that.
Questions:
1. Do you think we should have invitationals at all?
2. About how many invitationals per year is a good number?
3. What type of game should invitationals be (basic normal, themed)?
4. How should the "best" players be chosen?
Other thoughts are of course welcome.