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I find the 3 listed problems with McMahon pairing to be rather tenuous.
-You can get software to do the pairings for you, the only real decision you make is where to put the bar, and you have to be pretty damn incompetent to make a total mess of that.
-Second 'problem', well there is no declared reason as to why this is a problem
-Third problem, this is just a relisting of the first problem. You may possibly put too many players above the bar, this would only be a problem if you need a clear winner.
In short, are any of these real problems with McMahon pairing? Is there much point in mentioning them here? I made a sub-page discussing McMahon Bar Theory, it looks better to discuss at least two of those 'problems' there.
Agree. To call these "problems" is probably an overstatement, they are more in the category of "minor inconveniences/drawbacks"
Agreed. I think this list of "problems" is a little silly and should be removed. However, it's already been removed once and reinstated, and I don't want to start an edit war.
I'm concerned about the content of the Bar Theory subpage. What is the origin of the "magic numbers" content? It strikes me that the "ideal" promoted there would often result in the bar being set far too low (1024 players above the bar for the European Congress??), resulting in uneven first round pairings and likely ties for the top places, precisely the sort of things MacMahon is supposed to avoid.
Certainly, with an 8 round event making a bar of 2^8 (256 players) would be quite extravagant indeed! For this instance one must look at balancing the two key ideas. I didn't want to treat each idea extensively. That kind of problem is what I was trying to allude to in the final paragraph. Anyway, it is only a first draft, so I am happy for people to alter and improve it.
If nobody actually objects to the removal of the 3 problems I will remove them myself later.