Tourney: EHBPC 2012 - Paris - 2012/07/19-21

You make no sense John, less bigger groups more accurate? If you are trying to sort the top 4 maybe, but you are trying to get the top 32 from 48 in 6 rounds, really? The more games, the clearer the results for the group stages, it's to decide the top 32, have a look at the Euros UK quali results round by round if you need to, some teams started the tourney well and their places were confirmed early on, some teams started slow, just needed a kick in the rear end but made it in the end. The more games the more accurate the results.

I can't be bothered to get into an internet argument with you, going into a discussion with phrases like "You make no sense", really isn't constructive.

So to take your point to an extreme, if you had 24 groups of 2 teams, would that be more accurate? No.

My point is, the bigger a set is, and the lower the number of sets, the more likely it is that the teams in the sets will be equally balanced, before the games start (incorrect seedings are less important as the groups get bigger).
Additionally a group of 16, which will play more total games than a group of 12, is also likely to be sorted better, as freak results carry less weight.
As such the 10th places in groups of 16 are more likely to be of equal ranking, than the 8th places in groups of 12.

Finally, regarding your top 32 point, an elimination tournament should never be used for ranking, it's completely inaccurate. The top 2, maybe, but that's it, below that it's not guaranteed to be even close. If you think the Euros will actually show who the top 32 in Europe are, in the correct order, you are mistaken. Therefore it's not important to actually get the top 32 into the elimination (no split group stages will ever do that, only infinitely repeated RR under perfect conditions can).