100% with you on this. Personally I think double elim is technically more fair but to the point of ridiculousness, and becomes unfair given some choices in how to resolve the upper bracket-vs-lower-bracket-who-you-already-beat dilemma. I like single elim for most tournaments and then possibly some nac -style or even league style tournaments for fairness would be occasionally great. Award a small prize per game to make sure every game counts.Nah I don't think it compares. Take St4rk. He beat Yo in an epic 5-games set which was the biggest upset of the tourney seeing Yo was seed 2 (St4rk 31). He then lost a forgettable 3-1 against Vinchester.
The story is St4rk upsetting Yo. If Yo has the opportunity to come back in a lower bracket, then it's not a story at all.
I don't see why it is fairer to allow all players to lose once before coming back. You should be playing your top level from game 1 of the first match knowing that if you're not at your best you could simply be out. It sets the tone right away.
Sure there are some lower bracket stories as well, you took the example of MoA 3 and so I'll bring up MoA 5 where TaToH lost to St4rk (him again!) in the first round of the final bracket but clawed his way back from the loser bracket, got revenge against St4rk and was the only player to convincingly oppose resistance to Viper (who only dropped one other game that tourney, against a Vinchester trush).
I think single elimination is tougher which makes it more competitive (but nobody agrees on the definition of competitiveness). I think protecting the top seeds too much is not needed (I already don't like the fact that brackets are entirely seeded, it would be more exciting if they were random after seed 4 for instance) and that single elimination events are much more entertaining and exciting.