Thepianohasbeendrinking

Well thanks for the response Lemkin. I'll just say that with as difficult as the admission process is, having gone through it before, it makes sense to be a bit mercenary about this kind of thing. I do agree with you that it probably depends, but what I was trying to get to was whether anyone had any insider knowledge about particular programs and the way they distribute offers.

What subfield(s) get the most applications? Is it generally a good strategy to manipulate your application based on the perceived competition (i.e. applying for methods rather than IR, or something)? Do most schools even admit based on subfield, or just rank applicants and see how they shake out?