Sportsmanship

[ColCorbane]

I'm not normally a blog whore on forums, but as there's quite a lot a tournament players on the forum, I wondered if you'd take the time to have a look at my blog post about sportsmanship and scoring.

I'd really like to hear your thoughts on it as my gaming community are all casual players and they only do one casual tournament a year.

http://corbaniaprime.blogspot.com/2010/01/sportsmanship.html

Thanks guys.

[Denzark]

Hey Colonel

I went to Throne of Skulls in Oct 09. Sportsmanship if I recall, was not a score as such that affected results - I believe there was a check box for 'difficult player'. If you got more than 1 difficult player the judges would come and sort you out - possbly ask you to leave if you carried on being a tw*t.

In the main, there was no need for any concern. Everyone tended to point out rules for their own codexes, and there were no significant rules haggling as the players were all reasonably experienced. I wasn't too happy playing vs Tau for the first time in 5ed, because I didn't know all their rules - marker lights do what? But you just go with.

My friend who went with me, did have a problem with a foreign player - but felt he didn't want to protest too hard when this fella's English started to get flaky...

I only had one occasion to get a judge over - I told my opponent that it had been FAQ'd that Chaos Rhinos had 2 fire points. He hadn't seen this, I didn't have the print out. It was fairly crucial - I had a Soulgrinder bearing down and 2 meltas inside. The judge was asked, got the print out in his judges book, showed opponent, jobs a good'un. I respectfully disagree with your take on no sportsmanship scores for the people on the wrong end of, because sometimes you need a judge in cases like these - neither of us were dicks aout it.

I would say my top tip is not to worry about sportsmanship - concentrate on fixing as best you can, your MES (lol I know where you're coming from) and play as many games as possible against as many different armies as possible - try and make sure any funny minority codex rules won't surprise you. Also you will see spam max lists with 9 vendettas and 3 fire prisms so don't hold back at all in list construction.

[MVBrandt]

Sportsmanship can be gamed. Scoring high on sports is a "game" in and of itself.

There are no foolproof ways to do it so long as it is a component of overall or general scores. If you segregate it from those scores, but make it a place where you can lose your chance to win anything based on POOR sportsmanship, more akin to the Throne of Skulls ref. above, you're more likely to be OK and not have it gamed.

Fact of the matter is there are some people who can make a fantastic impression while cheesing the rules and kicking the teeth of their opponent in, and some people who can mean well in every way but come off like a total rules lawyering ****. What are you attempting to judge? Affability + skill or simply skill?

I tend to be a pretty affable guy in person, so I don't mind sportsmanship ever ... I'd be shocked if I scored "poorly" on it and have been in tourneys where I've tabled every single opponent but won best sportsmanship to boot. I'm not nearly as nice on the "intarweb."

I think sportsmanship helps ensure a more pleasant time, but it also has a potentially negative impact in the minds of people who are afraid they will score poorly on sportsmanship for w/e reason. Gain skill enough to beat the ever living bejeezus out of someone so extensively that you don't NEED to ever call them out on little rules gaffes or extra measurements. Then you not only score all your battle points, you don't lose any sportsmanship points for being a nitpicker.

*shrug*

This one - like sportsmanship in and of itself - is a question whose answers are all entirely subjective.

[BuFFo]

Keep Sportsmanship scores out of tournaments.

They have no place in a tournament where winning is the goal.

I have had a person dock me points just because I won the game, and this affected my over all score, and cut me from the top three. Even though during the game this idiot was cheating, I was too worried about sportsmanship to call him on it.

Looking back, I was totally being the tool and he the bully, and he got away with it.

And you know what that did to me for a while afterwords? The next two tournaments I went to, I was paranoid. I docked everyone and anyone with low sportsmanship and comp scores, justifying it anyway I could to make myself feel better about it. I got burned bad, and it ruined me for a while.

This was back in 2006. Since those last two tourneys, I have not attended one tourney that has sportsmanship/comp scoring, and you know what? I have more fun at a tourney that everyone knows the goal is to win.

I got tired of forcing a fake smile to cheaters so I could scrape up scores.

As you can tell, I had a very traumatizing experience with abusers of such a system, which in turn turned me into one of them for a short while. I am fully aware that most gamers have no big problem with sportsmanship scores, so you could probably dismiss me as the minority.

The system you want in place, to me, seems to be very abusive. I get docked points because I thought I knew a rule? Basically, I get in trouble for calling a judge?

I don't know the right answer, but, best of luck to you. I hope whatever you do, the event will be fun for all parties involved.

[gcsmith]

2 things should be out of tournie scores, Comp scores and sportsmanship. Now i have no problem with kicking a douche from a tourney but being a douche accidentaly cus ur naturally competative shouldnt dock u points, specially when as Buffo says above the system is abused. And since this is about Sportsmanship ill not go onto comp

[B_Steele]

I can't speak for everywhere or everyone (nor would I want to), but in my 20 some odd years of playing miniature tournaments I have found that the people who cry out the loudest against Composition and Sportsmanship scores are often the ones that would suffer the most from them due to their play styles.

It is very possible to be competitive both in army selection and gameplay style without resorting to "cheesy" or "beardy" army builds and playing your best and hardest game without being arrogant, unsportsmanlike or otherwise a big jerk. In fact, I would say such a gamer is what everyone should strive to be - both fun and skilled without having to rely on power-gamey tactics or the "internet army of the month".

Of course, this is all just my opinion, but I love Sportsmanship scores and Composition Scores - as long as the latter is judged BEFORE games are played. You can tell what you would grade a Comp score by looking at someone's list; it should not be adjusted based on how the game played out.

Cheers all,
Bry

[david5th]

I
It is very possible to be competitive both in army selection and gameplay style without resorting to "cheesy" or "beardy" army builds and playing your best and hardest game without being arrogant, unsportsmanlike or otherwise a big jerk.

Cheers all,
Bry

First time i have seen the use"beardy" in a long time.

Sportsmanship should be taken into account. If you and act like a a**s or lose and make every excuse under the sun it chould affcet your score.

PS not a football/soccer fan but if this was true Arsene Wengers Arsenal would win nothing. Wait the have'nt.:)

[gcsmith]

Comp scores are ridiculous, B_steele. After all, reducing your score for taking the best list you can when winning is the objective is ridiculous anyway. Sportsmanship should not be used to reduce your overall score because its too easy manipulated.

[MVBrandt]

I think you have to walk a very fine line in trying to get rid of sportsmanship altogether.

Even professional athletes are held to rigorous standards of sportsmanship, but it's important to understand exactly what kind of a standard you are looking for.

I am all for competition ... I'll be the first to challenge anyone to a game on Vassal or elsewhere, or to brag about a near flawless victory record, or what-have-you, but any of it done outside the bounds of sportsmanship doesn't belong in a game.

This is not war, nor is it schoolyard brawling ... fighitng for the sake of TAKING from your opponent is not something that a competitive gaming or sporting event should encourage. Rather, you should be encouarging people to rise to their OWN level of excellence, to win as a proof of skill and not as a proof of superiority. That subtle difference is very important.

There should be a standard of sportsmanship, it's almost critical that it be present. The real problem is not whether it should be there, but how it is managed. To presume that sportsmanship should ahve no bearing on an event meant to have a winner like a tournament (to quote BUFFO) is to presume that we are not playing a game at all anymore. This is not the business world, but even there ethics should have a place.

What should probably NOT have a place, however, is a sportsmanship system so arcane, so vulnerable to the impacts of subjectivity that it becomes a game in and of itself, or becomes subject to the "playing" of others upon someone's score. That is to say that in a game of professional football (for example), you cannot be penalized for playing well, or for being far superior to your opponent.

What I mean is, if you beat the everliving snot out of someone while following the rules of the game and not resorting to insults, fighting, spitting, etc., you are not punished. If a team defeats another by a score of 100 to 0 and says not a word, they should not be penalized for not being flowery and friendly beyond their nature. On the other hand, if a team is constantly kicking the dirt, questioning every single call angrily at the ref, and being a general bunch of angry ornery whiney louts ... expect a few penalties to be thrown, and expect these to have an impact on the course of the game.

Sportsmanship should be akin to the way penalties function, and players should be actively penalized IN THEIR GAMES by OFFICIALS for violating a clear-cut, objective, ENFORCEABLE and CONSISTENT set of standards of behavior. Silent Bob should not be penalized simply because he is not Affable Andy. On the other hand, Rules Lawyer Randy SHOULD be penalized for being a right ******* every time his opponent did something he had even the slightest inklings of "WAIT A MINUTE YOU CHEATAR!" about.

What it all boils down to is that if you are having opponents judge someone via a score that actually has a bearing on the final winner/loser of a tournament, your system is probably flawed in some way. On the other hand, if you think that sportsmanship should have no bearing on your result, you're probably clueless about how competitive games and sports function vs. how wars or schoolyard brawls function. The rules in a competitive event must by definition extend to the manner in which people comport themselves. BUT they must be rules enforced by event administrators, not the judgment calls of peers.

[Lerra]

I like the way Adepticon does sportsmanship. Each question is worth one point when the battle results are worth 50 or so - enough to break ties but not enough to drop someone from competition if they had an opponent who was a sore loser.

* My opponent was prompt to report for the start of the round
* My opponent came prepared to play and brought all required items to play
* My opponent appeared to measure movement and assault distances accurately
* My opponent put forward a good faith effort to play in a timely manner
* Rules issues that may have arisen during the game were handled amicably by my opponent
* I would voluntarily play this opponent again

It's really hard to get a 0/6 for sportsmanship, so if an opponent tanks you, the judges will have a chat with that player and determine if the score is appropriate. Even a jerk who plays by the rules should get a 4/6. It also lets judges know exactly what to watch for in future rounds from problem players. Someone who is consistently a problem player gets ejected from the tournament.

[Madness]

Keep Sportsmanship scores out of tournaments.

They have no place in a tournament where winning is the goal.
And that sir, is why you get no Sportmanship points. You simply don't get it.

[MVBrandt]

See, that kind of reply is equally unsporting.

Sportsmanship should not be a popularity contest, or a judge of whether someone views the game the same way, and it all too often is.

If someone is a "power gamer" that doesn't make them a bad person, or someone who is not sporting. That someone does not think sportsmanship has a place in a tournament may (or may not) be a sign of ignorance of what a competitive event is vs. a war or battle or "fight" ... but it maynot ... and either way it isn't really relevant. Sportsmanship should be governed by rules, and penalized when those rules are violated. As it stands now, it's a popularity contest and/or a revenge play, where you win points for being affable, and lose points for being rough-edged or winning too handily.

No sportsmanship =/= a solution, but neither is ballcup sportsmanship.

[Fizyx]

Sportsmanship is a tough cookie for a variety of reasons:

-You are being scored by a person that de facto wants to score better than you
-The sportsmanship scores, even ones that are more of a check-list, are still entirely subjective. Even worse, they are subject to the opinion of the person that, again, would like to win.
-Beside the fact that you are being judged by your opponent, you know that you are being judged by your opponent. The fear of retaliation is sometimes greater than the fear to lose due to obvious cheatng, leading to the "bullying" situation decribed earlier.

There are more, but those are the big ones for me. The reason those are important to me, is because sportsmanship calls like that happen all the time in casual sports. In tennis, more often than not, your opponent has a better view of whether a ball was in or out than you do. If you are playing a friendly game with someone you know, this is not a huge deal. If you are playing a competitive game with someone you do not know, then even if they are completely trustworthy, you still might have some nagging suspicion that they might have been lying, even if they are not. Even if they call shots out that you know were in, it is very difficult to call them out on it without calling a judge over to watch.

Which is why the higher level of sports have judges.

Should a GT have judges per table? I really do think so. Judges should not be passive, and especially during the last couple rounds the top tables should be watched very closely. This isn't a complete solution, but it is better than dropping sportsmanship altogether.

[Aenir]

Ive never played a tournament game outside of some little fun tourneys

but to me it seems rather silly, why not make Sportsmanship extra credit?

IE you dont get docked, but you can get some bonus points for being a "good" Guy

[MVBrandt]

That's a problem too, unfortunately.

Should Cal Ripken's team have been given an extra run every game b/c he was such a good guy?

Sportsmanship is based off SPORTS, and at its fundamental level is related to playing fairly and by the rules of the game. There are numerous adjectives applied ... fairness, determination, winning and losing gracefully. Sportsmanship is NOT playing with a weakened army to appear more composition-friendly, nor is it "being such a great person and making everybody love you." It's been *******ized into that, which is where you get the conflict.

Sportsmanship is NOT carebear play ... a tourney heavy on comp and playing their own version of the game in as "light" a fashion possible is as far from sportsmanship as a cutthroat no holds barred steel cage deathmatch.

The word itself should not be so hard to grasp ... but the proper implementation naturally is.

[DarkLink]

Sportsmanship scores just give smart cheaters another way to cheat. Bad players will probably give lower scores on average than friendly players, hurting the friendly players instead of helping them.

If you catch someone actually cheating/being a [explitive], they should simply be removed from the tournament by a judge. No need to bring an inefficient system like sportsmanship scores in.


I like the way Adepticon does sportsmanship. Each question is worth one point when the battle results are worth 50 or so - enough to break ties but not enough to drop someone from competition if they had an opponent who was a sore loser.

* My opponent was prompt to report for the start of the round
* My opponent came prepared to play and brought all required items to play
* My opponent appeared to measure movement and assault distances accurately
* My opponent put forward a good faith effort to play in a timely manner
* Rules issues that may have arisen during the game were handled amicably by my opponent
* I would voluntarily play this opponent again

It's really hard to get a 0/6 for sportsmanship, so if an opponent tanks you, the judges will have a chat with that player and determine if the score is appropriate. Even a jerk who plays by the rules should get a 4/6. It also lets judges know exactly what to watch for in future rounds from problem players. Someone who is consistently a problem player gets ejected from the tournament.

This is the most I'd ever want for a sportsmanship score. In large tournaments, this would be acceptable, as it allows judges a quick and quantifiable way of judging sportsmanship. In small tournaments even this isn't necessary.

[DarkLink]

And that sir, is why you get no Sportmanship points. You simply don't get it.

Tournaments are supposed to deterimine the best player. Not the nicest player, the friendlyiest player, or the player with the best attitude. The best player.

Cheaters and people given to offensive public disturbances aren't allowed, but beyond that sportsmanship has no bearing in a tournament. Simply having judges capable of ejecting problem players is enough.

[Lord Anubis]

The problem with determining the "best" player is you have to define what you mean by best. Is Michael Vick one of the best NFL players? Is he a shining example of the image the NFL wants to promote? Bennedict Arnold was one of America's founding fathers and arguably best military commanders, yet we don't seem to celebrate all his decisive victories and strategies, do we?

There are players I've lost to at tournaments who I couldn't wait to play again, even knowing they'd probably beat me again. And there are people I defeated who you could not pay me to stand across a table from one more time.

As Mkerr pointed out in his excellent editorial this morning, a large part of the game is what both players are expecting to get out of it. There's nothing wrong with building a killer, ultra-competitive list. Nothing at all. However, if you can't adapt to the fact that the person across from you was looking for slightly more than a series of dice rolls and target declarations, you aren't the best player. You're limited and inflexible.

If the only aspect of this hobby that counts is "who wins" then we've all been wasting a lot of money on miniatures, a lot of time on painting, and a lot of effort building up our individual gaming communities. You don't need any of that to win.

But you do need a lot of it to be the best. At least in my opinion.

[Duke]

Tournaments are supposed to deterimine the best player. Not the nicest player, the friendlyiest player, or the player with the best attitude. The best player.

Cheaters and people given to offensive public disturbances aren't allowed, but beyond that sportsmanship has no bearing in a tournament. Simply having judges capable of ejecting problem players is enough.

I am going to have to disagree a bit here. Yes the goal is to find the best player... But here is how I see it.

I have been an athlete all my life and Sportsmanship is always a part of the game. There are certain things that you cannot do without getting a Red Card. Look at Drogba after the Champions League Final last year. His actions were after the game, but they were so unsportsmanship-like that he was banned from two games for the next season. I don't think that anyone would argue professional sports are not trying to find the best players/teams... But Sportsmanship has a place in every competition (Hell,even in war there are ROE! which is another term for sportsmanship.)

Long Story short, being the best player doesn't mean being a soft little bunny, but it does mean that you act in a responsible, fair and sportsman like way.

Duke

[Madness]

Huge fail everywhere.

Sportmanship is necessary to keep the hobby entertaining, if no sportmanship is required and the only thing important is winning people can be complete jack"donkeys" and get a considerable edge.

Because a person can get on your nerves in order to win, forcing you to make a mistake, I could invade your personal space while you play, I can be an obnoxious nitpicker, I can be a slow player on purpose, I could eat raw garlic and speak in a very low voice forcing you to get close, I could force you to check every rule for every action you take, I could contest every bit that looks slightly unofficial (hey he used 10.54% of plasticard on that mini, that clearly can't be fielded)...

The list goes on. Trust me, I've met my fair deal of munchkins in my time, and if winning is the only thing that matters, you can take this hobby and do nasty things with it.

Sports and games are also social events, not just ways to compensate what's missing in one's life. The spirit of the game MUST be preserved.

Also sportmanship is not about nice and popular, it's about fair and respectful.

I'd rather lose an enjoyable tournament than win the "biggest dou***" cup.

[Shavnir]

Huge fail everywhere.

Sportmanship is necessary to keep the hobby entertaining, if no sportmanship is required and the only thing important is winning people can be complete jack"donkeys" and get a considerable edge.


I've ran into a considerably larger number of d-bags playing in sportsmanship judged tournies than non-sportsmanship judged tournies. Then again I usually lose points for doing things like pointing out that my opponents army didn't have enough core choices. :(

[Madness]

@Shavnir, you can't blame the organization problems onto a system, personally I like the karma-normalized sportmanship system, basically you value less the opinion of a guy who rates everybody low.

There are also statistics formulae able to extract other abuses of the system, like a guy who rated decently only those he defeated.

Also, pointing out errors is totally fine, as long as you do it respectfully.

[MVBrandt]

Madness, the way in which you are so quick to jump on opinions not your own with comments like "fail" encourages me to rate you poorly in sportsmanship. Since I rate more open minded people highly, there's certainly no bias or ill intent behind my scoring. Sorry that your opinion has thus been trampled by the system.

Objective, judgeable rules should govern sportsmanship, nothing more and nothing less. Player-judged sportsmanship is ... ahem .... fail.

[Madness]

And if this was a tournament you'd be right to do so.

But it isn't and we're not playing together. I assure you I'm a player way more concerned with having fun and playing fair than winning.

Player judged sportmanship is usable, with a pinch of salt (and some math).

[DarkLink]

The problem with determining the "best" player is you have to define what you mean by best. Is Michael Vick one of the best NFL players? Is he a shining example of the image the NFL wants to promote? Bennedict Arnold was one of America's founding fathers and arguably best military commanders, yet we don't seem to celebrate all his decisive victories and strategies, do we?

There are players I've lost to at tournaments who I couldn't wait to play again, even knowing they'd probably beat me again. And there are people I defeated who you could not pay me to stand across a table from one more time.

As Mkerr pointed out in his excellent editorial this morning, a large part of the game is what both players are expecting to get out of it. There's nothing wrong with building a killer, ultra-competitive list. Nothing at all. However, if you can't adapt to the fact that the person across from you was looking for slightly more than a series of dice rolls and target declarations, you aren't the best player. You're limited and inflexible.

If the only aspect of this hobby that counts is "who wins" then we've all been wasting a lot of money on miniatures, a lot of time on painting, and a lot of effort building up our individual gaming communities. You don't need any of that to win.

But you do need a lot of it to be the best. At least in my opinion.


I am going to have to disagree a bit here. Yes the goal is to find the best player... But here is how I see it.

I have been an athlete all my life and Sportsmanship is always a part of the game. There are certain things that you cannot do without getting a Red Card. Look at Drogba after the Champions League Final last year. His actions were after the game, but they were so unsportsmanship-like that he was banned from two games for the next season. I don't think that anyone would argue professional sports are not trying to find the best players/teams... But Sportsmanship has a place in every competition (Hell,even in war there are ROE! which is another term for sportsmanship.)

Long Story short, being the best player doesn't mean being a soft little bunny, but it does mean that you act in a responsible, fair and sportsman like way.

Duke

Personally, I'd assume that a Michael Vick equivalent would get kicked out of the tournament by a judge for the type of displays you're pointing out. Same for any cheater. If someone starts cussing out their opponent, or cheating, kick them out. If someone's fudging measurements and rolls and similar "cheaty-like" stuff, give them a warning, and if they keep doing it, kick them out.




@Shavnir, you can't blame the organization problems onto a system, personally I like the karma-normalized sportmanship system, basically you value less the opinion of a guy who rates everybody low.

There are also statistics formulae able to extract other abuses of the system, like a guy who rated decently only those he defeated.

Also, pointing out errors is totally fine, as long as you do it respectfully.


Huge fail everywhere.

Sportmanship is necessary to keep the hobby entertaining, if no sportmanship is required and the only thing important is winning people can be complete jack"donkeys" and get a considerable edge.

You seem to be acting on the presumption that competitive players are willing to let others get away with cheating and vulgar displays. We don't, any more than you do. But those are grounds for stern warnings and/or being removed from the competition. No need to write a computer program to statistically analyse sportsmanship scores.

You also seem to be missing the whole "tournament" thing. In a normal game, I won't play against a rude player twice, or even once if I can help it. But I come to a tournament to try and win it. So even if another player isn't very likeable, I'm not going to worry about it. And if he cheats, or acts inappropriately, then it's time for a judge to give him a talking-to at the very least.


So don't get me wrong. Sportsmanship is important. Sportsmanship scores aren't, I feel. I'm willing, in a tournament, to put up with a rude person because it is a competition. And if they step out of line or cheat, it's time for them to go. And in a casual game I'd just pack up (not that I've ever played anyone who was bad enough, or even close to bad enough, to warrant that).

[BuFFo]

And that sir, is why you get no Sportmanship points. You simply don't get it.

Oh wait a second....

So, for Golden Demon, the player who brings the Multi Melta squad gets points over a player who brings a Landraider because Meltas beat Land Raiders?

How about a Diorama of a beautiful Dreadnaught waling through rubble with the best paint job lose to a diorama of a crappy Carnifex barely painted at all?

If you are going to force comp scores and sportsmanship in a tournament where the object is to win, why don't you force unit power and strength in a painting competition?

Why is it okay to force all the hobby down your throat during a tournament where winning is the goal, but you cut out the actual game itself out of a painting competition?

You, do not get 'it'. The hobby has four main aspects to it;

1) Painting
2) Collecting
3) Converting
4) Playing

So when a tournament has 'playing' as the goal, you force the other three down my throat, but when the tournament is just painting/converting, you cut out the playing part?

This does not compute. Never has.

I am glad GW has 'Ard Boy competitions. 'Ard Boyz is the single best 'thing' to happen to the game, ever.

Why don't you give Dark Eldar a try in a soft score tournament? Go ahead. Watch as ALL ALL ALL ALL your opponents dock you for spamming dark lances and warrior/wych squads when that is ALL you can take. It gets VERY tiring making a fluffy Cult list of all wyches, only to be accused of cheese and getting docked by JUDGES whos crappy opinions assume my list isn't fluffy.

F--K those judges. I am getting pissed just thinking about it. How dare some moron dork tell me that my list doesn't conform to his taste of fluff. Why don't you dock me points for wearing a Blue shirt. How about 6 points for not wearing brown shoes?

As you pointed out, I got no sportsmanship points not because you think you are being witty in assuming I am an asshat during my games. I am a perfect gentleman, yet I get slammed every friggin time because my opponents can't stand 3 Ravagers. What the F else am I supposed to take? Seriously you tell me what I am supposed to take to a tournament with Dark Eldar and not waste my time.

/rant

[Subject Keyword]

Why don't you give Dark Eldar a try in a soft score tournament? Go ahead. Watch as ALL ALL ALL ALL your opponents dock you for spamming dark lances and warrior/wych squads when that is ALL you can take. It gets VERY tiring making a fluffy Cult list of all wyches, only to be accused of cheese and getting docked by JUDGES whos crappy opinions assume my list isn't fluffy.


Sh*t, dude. F*ck those people.

Yeah, Sportsmanship scores sound like bullsh*t to me.
I say do away with them and instead have a system where people who are running around hooting in peoples faces, putting them down, cheating, and just generally being an armpit are docked points, and just leave everyone else alone.

Seriously. Can you imagine if Soccer (Football) teams got penalties for going ten minutes without hugging the other team? No. You can't imagine it. Because it's a motherf*cking competition.

[DarkLink]

Why don't you give Dark Eldar a try in a soft score tournament? Go ahead. Watch as ALL ALL ALL ALL your opponents dock you for spamming dark lances and warrior/wych squads when that is ALL you can take. It gets VERY tiring making a fluffy Cult list of all wyches, only to be accused of cheese and getting docked by JUDGES whos crappy opinions assume my list isn't fluffy.

F--K those judges. I am getting pissed just thinking about it. How dare some moron dork tell me that my list doesn't conform to his taste of fluff. Why don't you dock me points for wearing a Blue shirt. How about 6 points for not wearing brown shoes?


Playing Grey Knights, I'm in a similar position. I've heard of tournaments that will change the force org chart, for example, or dock players for taking duplicate units. That cuts the legs out from under any viable Grey Knight lists (and we sure don't need it). If you want to play Grey Knights, you need Land Raiders. Multiple Land Raiders. At least two, often three. Fill them with Grey Knight Terminators. Then spam IST melta squads in Rhinos. Does it fit within comp score limitations? Not even close. Is is competitive? Barely.

Why is it that comp scores would weaken what is already the weakest army in the game, while still allowing powerful armies to take highly competitive lists? Because comp scores don't work.

I can accept absolute minimum sportsmanship scores, like the adepticon example above. But any form of comp, painting, etc that is factored in to the final tournament score in any way, shape or form, I will not. I may not use profanities, but I fully agree with Buffo on this.

[RocketRollRebel]

The last GT I went to there was only one person out of 60 who got a poor sportsmanship score and I played him and he was indeed a douche. One of those trying to pull ignoring rules and then when you kill things (ie:all of his long range AT in a turn and you are playing mech vet IG:p) goes on about how "I meant for you to kill that. That was part of my plan. You are effed!"...

Anyway for the most part people are very friendly at large tournament events. When I go to one I bring the most face smashing list I can and I pull no punches because I am trying to place in the top. But I also love to chat with my opponent about his gaming background and his army and I am by no means a jerk about anything. I hand him my list, ask him how familiar he is with the army and offer to explain any special rules that my army has.

As for comp I just ignore it for the most part because it normally doesnt count for all that much overall and isnt worth handicapping yourself for.

[Madness]

@BuFFo: BIG difference between an art competition and a game tournament. VERY big. There's a whole level of interaction you're not considering.

I'm not implying anyone is rude or anything, but as much as a gentleman you might be, the sole fact that you complain about not winning the event is a revealing trait of unsportmanship conduct, because even being a good loser is an act of sportmanship. Play the game for the game, not for the gratification of getting a prize.

You could field only warriors on foot and enjoy the game, if you consider losing a "waste of your time" then stop playing.

@DarkLink: No, what I'm saying is that a GAME tournament is also a social event and disregarding sportmanship will make it become an expo on how unbearable a person can be. I assure you that no matter how trained you are if you let one of the ubiquitous munchkins have it his way he'll find a way to make you suffer so much that you're either going to concede the game just not to have to bear his presence anymore or at the very least make errors because he managed to get on your nerves.

About tournament/friendly games, tbh I see it the other way around, in a friendly game I can be cheesy just for fun, I just have to be upfront about it, in a tournament my army list/play style/behavious is something that people will HAVE to endure, and should therefore be as much bearable as possible.

In general: playing a game with someone that can't take a loss, that won't shake my hand smiling at the hand is just plain awful, it's a frickin' game, a game spun from a role playing game system even, the mood of the game is everything. I remember games in which I had a heartfelt laugh because the threadhead ig guy made silly noises while shooting with his tanks (while still being a solid player) more than I do remember games in which I or the other player used some wicked awesome tactic.

And I'm mostly speaking as a person with organizer/manager experience.

Players who end up playing more for the thrill of the victory than the journey of the match itself make me feel sick.

[Aldramelech]

Goodbye

[plasticaddict]

Something a little different that we did localy was to put sportsmanship scores on their own. In our tournaments we had First, Second, Third, Best Painted and Best Sportsman. Some guys only play to win and that's ok, others play to show off their armies and smoe play to have a good time. By giving a seperat prize for painting and sportmanship you can reward players of all types. Even the hard core "win at all costs" guys tone it down a bit when there is a prize for being a good sport.

[Rapture]

Sportsmanship and Comp scores are like Communism, perfectly fair for everyone involved with no opportunity for abuse.:rolleyes:

[DarkLink]

Something a little different that we did localy was to put sportsmanship scores on their own. In our tournaments we had First, Second, Third, Best Painted and Best Sportsman. Some guys only play to win and that's ok, others play to show off their armies and smoe play to have a good time. By giving a seperat prize for painting and sportmanship you can reward players of all types. Even the hard core "win at all costs" guys tone it down a bit when there is a prize for being a good sport.

So long as it's separate, it's fine. In fact, I like having some bonus awards. The last tournament I was in, I tabled a Tau player with only a few casualties because I killed all his railguns turn 2, and for him it was a grueling game, but he was such a good sport about it I wished there was an award for it.

Though we have a golden daemon winner in our group, so we'd have to make him judge the painting contest if anyone else wanted to win it...


Sportsmanship and Comp scores are like Communism, perfectly fair for everyone involved with no opportunity for abuse.:rolleyes:

:D +1

[BuFFo]

Something a little different that we did localy was to put sportsmanship scores on their own. In our tournaments we had First, Second, Third, Best Painted and Best Sportsman. Some guys only play to win and that's ok, others play to show off their armies and smoe play to have a good time. By giving a seperat prize for painting and sportmanship you can reward players of all types. Even the hard core "win at all costs" guys tone it down a bit when there is a prize for being a good sport.

I agree with you and Dark Link.

As long as each 'category' is separate, I am all for it.

[ColCorbane]

Well, that's what I call a response.

So, basically, go with a smile on my face, don't worry about and just try to enjoy myself?

[Duke]

I actually like having the sportsmanship score seperate. Not only does it reward people who genuinly deserve it without them winning, but it does one thing I don't like about the currently accepted system.

That problem with the current system is this: I have seen people knock a certain players Sportsmanship scores just because they don't like him and don't want him to win. That is so wrong it isn't even funny. If you seperate the scores you can get ganged up on, but your still encouraged to be nice.

Duke

[Madness]

... to no avail tho, a person who gets a low sportmanship rating probably doesn't care about it. It's a failed deterrent.

Player submitted data is the most viable way to gather information, making it count towards the victory condition is an effective deterrent for those who would ruin the spirit of the game, normalizing the resulting data is the right thing to do, and any social studies major would tell you that.

[Duke]

In all honesty it sucks that we have to have this conversation last so long. People should understand that wanting to win doesn't mean you can be a D**K. It really shouldn't be that big of an argument.

Duke

[BuFFo]

... to no avail tho, a person who gets a low sportmanship rating probably doesn't care about it. It's a failed deterrent.

Player submitted data is the most viable way to gather information, making it count towards the victory condition is an effective deterrent for those who would ruin the spirit of the game, normalizing the resulting data is the right thing to do, and any social studies major would tell you that.

You assume all people are fair and honest, and that couldn't be farther from the truth.

Player submitted data can easily be just vindictive. I have felt that sting personally.

[Madness]

Nope, I assume they are predictably mean. Also it's not MY assumption, it's what gets used in psychological/social studies.

[BuFFo]

Nope, I assume they are predictably mean. Also it's not MY assumption, it's what gets used in psychological/social studies.

You are contradicting yourself....

First you say that it's good to combine sportsmanship and game play, and now you admit it's a bad thing.

I must not be understanding what you are trying to say? Do you believe Sportsmanship scores and general game play victories should be combined, or separate?

[Lerra]

He is arguing that they should be combined. He says that the unfairness of sportsmanship scores can be reduced by using statistical methods to determine which players are consistently giving low scores, and giving those data points less weight.

I understand the argument, and Madness' method would work well in a league format, but the sample size isn't large enough to be practical for a one day tournament, imo.

They do use methods like Madness mentions in the sciences, but you don't see very many papers published with an N of 3 (N= sample size). The accuracy is too low to get around the problems that BuFFO mentions. Not to mention that it's a lot of additional work for a TO who likely doesn't have any experience with statistics.

[Madness]

A tournament of 3 players has bigger problems than sportmanship tbh. :P

Jokes aside, the actual math was done by my ex IT teacher who is one of the founders of a large gaming club and resident math dude.
The ideas was:
1. Every player has a ratio of 1
2. Locate those players who rate according to bad trends and decrease their ratio (like by .1 points for each recognized bad behavior)
3. Multiply all the scores of the players by the ratio and sum, creating a first draft of the scores.
4. Decrease/increase the ratio according to the draft, people who got a good rating will go up to 1.2, people who got a bad one will do down to 0.7 (including the other minuses)
5. Multiply the scores given by the players to their ratio, and sum obtaining the second draft
6. Normalize to a gaussian distribution
7. Add to match score.

Of course he had a tool to make the calculation and he was pretty confident it work, the system is actually quite similar to Google's pagerank fundamentally. It's also complex enough so that people will eventually give up trying to cheat with sportmanship scores.

Oh, by the way, yes, I think a combined score is the way to go unless you can have a guy standing at each table and since warhammer 40k is such a terrible system that allows for extremely cheap builds, I'm also for composition scores.

Heck I'd even punish players for bringing an army too similar to the other ones present.

[Lerra]

3. Multiply all the scores of the players by the ratio and sum, creating a first draft of the scores.

I'm assuming here that by "sum" you mean the sum of the sportsmanship points earned by the player, not the sum of points given. Correct me if I'm wrong. If that's the case, then this system penalizes you for getting tanked on sportsmanship by making it more difficult to earn sportsmanship points in your other games. If you get zero'd by an opponent or two, you are likely to be near the bottom of the rankings and get set to that 0.7 multiplier.

Another issue: How accurate is a "bad trend" established in only 3 games? Let's say a player always gives full points to opponents that he defeats and zero points to opponents the he loses to. If he wins all three games, he is indistinguishable from a fair judge. If he wins two out of three, he's likely still statistically indistinguishable from a fair judge. Similarly, a sporting player with bad luck could face two jerky opponents, give them both bad scores, and get heavily dinged by the system.

[Madness]

Ah, that's what you meant by N=3.

TBH I can't answer to those questions as I have no idea, since we're talking not just of a tournament but a circuit of tournaments they might be keeping the data.

About the multiplication, say you award x points to player A and your ratio ends up being y, the effective score awarded to A will be x*y, to be added to the other evaluations.

[Aldramelech]

Goodbye

[Lerra]

The system would work a lot better in a circuit of tournaments :) Most tournaments are just one-day affairs, though, or two days at most. You'd probably need a different system for that.

Imo, it's easier to just give players a checklist for sportsmanship at small single-day tournaments, and assign judges to keep an eye on problem players. Eject anyone who causes problems. 90% of players at the tournaments around here are great to play with, and the 10% who are bad apples don't last very long. I imagine you'd only need a complex sportsmanship scoring system if sportsmanship was a major problem, and in that case it's easier to get a firm judge who is willing to kick people out, imo.

[Madness]

Yeah the whole thing has a place in sizeable situations, an event won by a guy after 3 matches hardly proves anything. :P

[Denzark]

Maths is a science and sportsmanship is a concept. How can you apply a quantifiable amount to a concept? My concept of sportsmanship is probably different to say, Adolf Hitler's.

There is some serious brain hurt things being posted.

[Aldramelech]

Goodbye

[Madness]

Good god, he went godwin's on me.

Sorry sir, but concepts, feelings, situations are fickle things, but models help us create rules and get hard data, it's called science.

[Denzark]

Mr A, I concur.

Before I leave I must quickly postulate that all imperial players are always sporting ... I mean to condescend to get close to xenos scum instead of blasting them under mass basilisk barrage from 30 miles out - or even taking off and nuking them from orbit - what more do they want?;)

[Sangre]

Hitler has entered the building. Repeat, Hitler has entered the building.

[Denzark]

Just as Elvis was leaving too...

[Subject Keyword]

I play this game to have fun. Some people who play in tournaments are not interested in fun, only in winning. I do not take part in tournaments.

Thank you for being a real human being.:o

[Inigo Montoya]

I have no issue at all with sportsmanship / competative scoring.

Played a doubles tournament today, and one of the teams we faced was a friend and an aquaintance playing khorne csm and daemons respectively. I have historically done very well with comp scores. The aquaintance got pissed off and I took one of the lowest single comp scores i have ever gotten from that game. I know it was them because i saw the other 2 fill out the scores.

My partner and i won te tournament anyway. One bad apple will not cost you the tournament if you are honestly a solid, friendly player. I think comp scores are not a problem to friendly, solid players. It is the whiners that run net lists and cannot general a self built army compatitively that seem to scream the loudest.

[Shavnir]

I have no issue at all with sportsmanship / competative scoring.

Played a doubles tournament today, and one of the teams we faced was a friend and an aquaintance playing khorne csm and daemons respectively. I have historically done very well with comp scores. The aquaintance got pissed off and I took one of the lowest single comp scores i have ever gotten from that game. I know it was them because i saw the other 2 fill out the scores.

My partner and i won te tournament anyway. One bad apple will not cost you the tournament if you are honestly a solid, friendly player. I think comp scores are not a problem to friendly, solid players. It is the whiners that run net lists and cannot general a self built army compatitively that seem to scream the loudest.

Small internet. At this tournament I got just about the highest set of sportsmanship scores I've ever gotten. Guess I can only do well when its the 40k crew and not the fantasy crew.

[Inigo Montoya]

Other than the one guy in the one game, everyone there was great. In the many tournaments i have played there, this is the only negative instance i can remember. That is saying something.
It is a great group of people and I play there out of choice, not necessity. :)

[Shavnir]

Other than the one guy in the one game, everyone there was great. In the many tournaments i have played there, this is the only negative instance i can remember. That is saying something.
It is a great group of people and I play there out of choice, not necessity. :)

I drive two hours for those tournaments and they rarely dissapoint :) (except the fantasy ones)

But back on topic I think they're just too subjective.

[SombreBrotherhood]

The tournaments that I usually play in have a very similar soft score structure to the Adepticon Qs listed earlier in the thread with some phrasing changes. Also included are opinion questions about things like 1-dimensional armies (did they all use the same kinds of units) or 'cheesy' combos (fatecrusher?). These are totally judgement based. If you bring an all-Tzeentch demon army, you'll see tons of horrors, b/c they are the only true tzeentch troop choice. Can you honestly get dinged for bringing multiples of the same units? Yep. Would I, if I brought that list, expect it? Yep.

It beats me how a player or team of players can get sore when I honestly answer the questions from that Adepticon list or the tournament score sheet and the answer happens to be "no". 3x Veterans in Chimeras with 2 meltas each is 3 identical units. When the guard have 3 troop choices to choose from, I'll take that point away.

I was the 'acquaintance' you mention in that tournament, too, and if you want to contact me off-list, or via a PM, Inigo, I'll enumerate each and every reason why I dinged you on points for every soft score, because your team was the most experienced team I played against, and I honestly felt that you had some gameplay issues. Paramount for me is that all players involved in a game know the rules of the game and their attendant armies. I don't have to know all of your rules, but if you don't bring your codex/rule book and are able to point a finger at some backing for what you're doing on the table at a tournament when I have a question, then you've got some issues. The bar is higher for those players that have more experience under their belt.

[entendre_entendre]

wow. this ^ might get heavy.

here's my checklist for soft scores:

Painting:
1. does the army have 3 or more colours on it? y/n
2. is the army based? (i.e. base covered either by modeling material and/or paint) y/n
3. can you tell which models belong to which unit? (i.e. not just one big pile of unidentifiable plastic guys) y/n

Sportsmanship:
1. was you opponent a D-Bag in their behaviour? (i.e. rude, mean, cheating, etc) y/n
1a. if yes, what was it about your opponent that made them a D-Bag? Explain why you think this. ____________


the painting is done at the beginning of the tournie by judges, with the players doing the normal after game sportman cards, forms, etc. the results are then tallied at the end by the judges looking for any trends/inconsistencies in the sportsmanship department. in utopia, they would cross-check the people who received low scores and those who gave them out to see if anyone's trying to exploit the system (by marking everyone down for example). judgment of exploitation would follow to any transgressors.

but who am i kidding? like a tournament organizer is going to go through all that work just for a few points in the standings.:rolleyes:

the way i look at it, it's much easier to just check 0's in every box than to write exactly why you think your opponent does not deserve sportsmanship points. while this might not discourage people from marking others down entirely, it may deter some of the lazier ones who don't want to write down excuses to not give SP to their opponent. and if your opponent is a D-Bag, the player who truly feels this would write it down, but maybe that's just me.

[DarkLink]

Also included are opinion questions about things like 1-dimensional armies (did they all use the same kinds of units)...

The last tournament I was in, I had 3 Land Raiders (godhammer), 2 Grey Knight terminator squads, and 2 Grey Knight squads in power armor.

Do you really think Grey Knights need to be docked points, because I lacked the models to include variety? Because my list has a limited selection of effective units? Echoing BuFFo's words: [string of expletives deleted by order of the Inquistion] that. Grey Knights don't need any [another expletive] nerfing because of some [more deleted expletives] soft scores.

And what if the theme of the armylist is around mechanized elites, like veterans? What if those are the only models he owns? Do you expect him to go out and spend a few hundred dollars just to fill out his troop slots to your satisfaction? If I played guard, I know I'd probably only use veterans for my troops, because I much prefer the elite squads to the lesser infantry platoons.

There is absolutely no reason to dock players points for reasons like that, other than potentially pissing them off.

[Madness]

Suppose I was a player who enjoyed facing a variety of enemies and builds, suppose I met copycats of the same army list over and over. Why should I be docked because people wants to play boring but effective lists?

[Lerra]

I really dislike the penalty for "one dimensional armies." If every space marine player used a one-of-everything list, the game would become boring. I enjoy playing against the all-scouts list or the list with Master of the Forge and 6 dreadnoughts. We have a ton of space marines around here, but at least half of those armies are specialized somehow (White Scars with bike spam, Deathwing with terminator spam, Blood Angels with assault squad spam, etc.). I much prefer playing against the specialized lists versus the one-of-everything "normal" space marine lists. It also seems silly to penalize an army for spamming the units that it is based around . . .

If someone wants to make an Imp Guard list based around Veterans or Penal Legionnaires or whatever, more power to him. I'm tired of seeing Infantry Platoons anyway ;)

The penalty for spam also hurts the old codices more than the new ones. You could run Space Wolves without doubling up on any units and still have a competitive list. Necrons, Grey Knights, Sisters, Dark Eldar, etc. need to spam because they have so few effective units available to them. There are fewer units in some of those codices than there are HQ choices in the Space Wolves codex! The last thing we need to do is penalize them for sticking with their outdated codex.

[DarkLink]

Suppose I was a player who enjoyed facing a variety of enemies and builds, suppose I met copycats of the same army list over and over. Why should I be docked because people wants to play boring but effective lists?

You aren't docked. Don't claim that you are. You don't get points knocked off of your score because you "didn't like the other person's army". However, soft scores let you do exactly that. You have no right to tell me what models I should buy, or what lists I should play. I play what I want, and you play what you want. You're on the same level as everyone else. Don't try and force yourself above other players.






The point is, soft scores piss off some players. Myself, Buffo, most of my local gaming group, etc. Yet they accomplish nothing. There are very good reasons not to include them, and no reasons to include them.

Add 2 and 2 together, and I don't understand why anyone who actually thinks about it wants soft scores included in tournament scores.

[Inigo Montoya]

I still like comp scores overall though...

[MVBrandt]

Sportsmanship as a method of "nailing" people on army builds is really, realliy wrong. There's a wild variance of opinion on what represents a good list ... some people think variety or rare-used units = it, some people think "whatever doesn't own me in the face" = it, and some people think "redundancy and incredibly solid list building" = it. The very fact that the above story exists, where someone lost SPORTSMANSHIP for taking ... meltavets in chimeras ... or whatever really, is absurd.

Giving power to your opponent to ding you (or give you more points, also) based upon their opinion of the way you're playing the game of 40k within the rules is dead wrong.

Soft scores have a place, but that's not it.

[Bean]

Like adjusting the template to maximize hits? Right or wrong (and I followed your opinion to the letter, did I not?) it is a house rule - EVERYONE at the GP (including the tournament director) does do it. I watched it being done in 3 other games with no one taking issue

For what it's worth, when firing template weapons (flamers and such) you're not allowed to adjust the template to maximize hits; you're obligated to do so. The rules clearly require that you place your template so that it covers as many models as possible in the target unit. There's no way to ensure you're following this rule without adjusting the template (unless you're just really lucky with your initial placement).

I'm not sure which side of this discussion you were on, but now you know! You can find the relevant rules under the heading for Template on page 23.


On topic, I mostly agree with MVBrandt. It irritates me that soft scores are often a mechanism by which players can arbitrarily penalize their opponents. Even when the soft scoring system is a rubric, players are basically being restricted by the opinions of the designer of the rubric.

Some soft scores are appropriate. I don't particularly mind a subjective sportsmanship score, and I think most people appreciate a painting or appearance score, but what I would like is for these scores and match results to be kept separate. When I'm going to a tournament, I'm going to play competitive games and see if I can win. I'm not going to enter a popularity contest or a painting contest. If you want a popularity contest or a painting contest, that's fine, but I think it would be more appropriate to have three separate contests rather than one.

[DarkLink]

For what it's worth, when firing template weapons (flamers and such) you're not allowed to adjust the template to maximize hits; you're obligated to do so. The rules clearly require that you place your template so that it covers as many models as possible in the target unit. There's no way to ensure you're following this rule without adjusting the template (unless you're just really lucky with your initial placement).

I'm not sure which side of this discussion you were on, but now you know! You can find the relevant rules under the heading for Template on page 23.


It sounded to me like SombreBrothehood misunderstood the rules, and accused Inigo of abusing them. Then SB went on to take off points on Inigo's soft scores, for that and a few other BS reasons. Despite the fact that Inigo was willing to oblige SB's misunderstanding of the rules.

Now, I wasn't there, so I don't know exactly what happened. But if that's what really happened, then that's a classic example of why I can't stand soft scores.



On topic, I mostly agree with MVBrandt. It irritates me that soft scores are often a mechanism by which players can arbitrarily penalize their opponents. Even when the soft scoring system is a rubric, players are basically being restricted by the opinions of the designer of the rubric.


Agreed. What right does my opponent have to decide what sort of list I should bring for a tournament? Absolutely none. Quite the opposite. I have every right to bring exactly the list that I want, so long as it is a legal 40k list, with no regard for other's opinions about said list. And everyone else has that right as well.

When you start letting people punish each other for BS reasons like this, no one wins. Except the people who are willing to abuse the system.

[Shavnir]

Personally I've never liked the "multiple identical squads" just because I couldn't really think of a good way to vary my trukk boy squads without making them worse.

[Bean]

I think it's pretty clear that the goal of the "no identical squads" criteria is to force players to make worse armies. In fact, I'm pretty sure that's the goal of all composition scores. Why that seems like a good goal is really beyond me, though.

[rle68]

Oh wait a second....


I am glad GW has 'Ard Boy competitions. 'Ard Boyz is the single best 'thing' to happen to the game, ever.

Why don't you give Dark Eldar a try in a soft score tournament? Go ahead. Watch as ALL ALL ALL ALL your opponents dock you for spamming dark lances and warrior/wych squads when that is ALL you can take. It gets VERY tiring making a fluffy Cult list of all wyches, only to be accused of cheese and getting docked by JUDGES whos crappy opinions assume my list isn't fluffy.

F--K those judges. I am getting pissed just thinking about it. How dare some moron dork tell me that my list doesn't conform to his taste of fluff. Why don't you dock me points for wearing a Blue shirt. How about 6 points for not wearing brown shoes?

As you pointed out, I got no sportsmanship points not because you think you are being witty in assuming I am an asshat during my games. I am a perfect gentleman, yet I get slammed every friggin time because my opponents can't stand 3 Ravagers. What the F else am I supposed to take? Seriously you tell me what I am supposed to take to a tournament with Dark Eldar and not waste my time.

/rant


while i dont disagree with you entirely.. i will point out to you i won the 2007 best sportsman award at baltimore games day with a dark eldar army.. so i wont subscribe to your i play dark eldar i get screwed everytime.. but the rest of your "rant" is pretty valid

[Lerra]

For what it's worth, when firing template weapons (flamers and such) you're not allowed to adjust the template to maximize hits; you're obligated to do so. The rules clearly require that you place your template so that it covers as many models as possible in the target unit.

Just to clarify, this is true for flamer templates but not for blast templates.

[MarshalAdamar]

It is very possible to be competitive both in army selection and game play style without resorting to "cheesy" or "beardy" army builds and playing your best and hardest game without being arrogant, unsportsmanlike or otherwise a big jerk. In fact, I would say such a gamer is what everyone should strive to be - both fun and skilled without having to rely on power-gamey tactics or the "internet army of the month".

Mr. Steele; you are the man, BUT I have to disagree with you here. The main issue I have with "resorting to "cheesy" or "beardy" army builds" is that it’s subjective and that kind of subjective scoring does not belong in tournament scoring.

The idea is to win. What would people say if during the super bowl the Saints only threw the ball, didn't run it once, and only used their best players, no second string guys? Should they be docked points because only throwing the ball is cheesy? I mean they are supposed to play to win right???

Besides what makes a list cheesy? Is it two land raiders? Is it Fate weaver? Is it lash? What constitutes a cheesy list? The answer I hear most is "I don't know but I'll know it when I see it” REALLY?? I usually find that they "see it" the moment they get their butt handed too them by the offending player. hmmmmmm

So really who decides what’s cheesy? And what about people who have "cheesy" elements in their list but the over all list doesn't rise to the level of Velveeta? Do they then get the benefits of their cheese but a whole cheese list gets docked?

BOO I say.. BOO

If the organizers of the Tourney want to ensure some variety they can put limits on the army comp before the tournament. Like only one HQ, must take one unit from each category or whatever to help make sure lists are not so fine tuned.

Missions can be designed to even the playing field. But to just say, Joes list is “cheesy” because he’s running two chaos land raiders with Fate weaver and a sorcerer with lash so he loses automatically is balls in my opinion.

The units have rules and points values for a reason, which supposedly is to help balance them out.

Now sportsmanship, that’s another matter. I totally think for this hobby a sportsmanship score is a good thing. Douche-baggery should not be tolerated. And being amicable and fun to play with/against should be rewarded. You don’t have to be an a$$ just because your list is tuned up to win which means maximizing your advantages and minimizing my disadvantages.

In the end it would be great if people would not bring lists are that are not fun to play against, which most people would call cheesy. But to try and force that through some kind of penalty mechanism is wrong in my opinion.

[Bean]

Just to clarify, this is true for flamer templates but not for blast templates.

You are absolutely right, though it's worth noting, further, that the rules reserve the word "template" for "template weapons" which are basically flamers. When talking about Blast weapons, they use the word "marker" (as in blast marker). Calling a blast marker a template is incorrect, as far as the rules are concerned, even though I know it's very common.

So, I suppose that Inigo could have used the word mistakenly to talk about massaging the placement of a blast marker--which is illegal.

To sum up:
Flamers and other template weapons use templates, not markers.
Battle cannons and other blast weapons use blast markers, not templates.

[BuFFo]

while i dont disagree with you entirely.. i will point out to you i won the 2007 best sportsman award at baltimore games day with a dark eldar army.. so i wont subscribe to your i play dark eldar i get screwed everytime.. but the rest of your "rant" is pretty valid

Well, then I wish I was playing your opponents instead of the greedy fockers I had the misfortune of playing.

I am not asking you to subscribe to anything. You had a good experience, so of course your view is different than mine, but your good experience doesn't somehow make my bad experience vanish into thin air. It happened, and it still happens even in friendly games when my opponents see 18 dark lances and roll their eyes.... My options include Dark Lances and, um, two storm bolters glued together.... What ever shall I take?!?!

[Duke]

I gotta say that in some ways I agree with Buffo... When I run my Blood Angels and people scream cheese at Dante-Corbulo it gets kind of old. Should I take Lamartes and a generic captain to make them happy?

Duke

[Shavnir]

My only complaint about the tournament that has been a tad hotly contested was that as a team tournament it had a point for how well the two factions made sense fluff wise. Barring taking nothing but Imperium is there any fluff acceptable pairing? Should I just be screwed out of a point if I want to team up with a friend and none of my friends play orks (mostly because I started orks).

[rle68]

Well, then I wish I was playing your opponents instead of the greedy fockers I had the misfortune of playing.

I am not asking you to subscribe to anything. You had a good experience, so of course your view is different than mine, but your good experience doesn't somehow make my bad experience vanish into thin air. It happened, and it still happens even in friendly games when my opponents see 18 dark lances and roll their eyes.... My options include Dark Lances and, um, two storm bolters glued together.... What ever shall I take?!?!

I didnt mean to infer your opinion was any less valid i was simply trying to provide the possibility it isnt like that everywhere.. i have had people ***** about 15+ dark lances then i look at them with 3 land raiders and i go uh huh yeah sure shut the @#$% up!

its pretty easy to see those that whine are the ones that get caught with poor builds as a general rule of thumb more often then not

[BuFFo]

I didnt mean to infer your opinion was any less valid i was simply trying to provide the possibility it isnt like that everywhere.. i have had people ***** about 15+ dark lances then i look at them with 3 land raiders and i go uh huh yeah sure shut the @#$% up!

its pretty easy to see those that whine are the ones that get caught with poor builds as a general rule of thumb more often then not

Yeah, well, I am still jealous of you...

[MVBrandt]

I think the issue is more whether sportsmanship has as big a place as it does in many tournaments, not whether some people are better at gaming the system than others.

Whether you game it intentionally or are just a nice guy, or a little bit of both, when you have a measurable score that's opinion based, it's a "game" in and of itself that is played by both sides during each game - intentionally "downscoring" someone you don't like or don't want to win, or being nicer than you otherwise would be in order to get more points.

As soon as it is a "game" via subjective player-grade sportsmanship, you're not enforcing a code of conduct at all ... you're just adding another "rule" to the competition. It's disingenuous and doesn't actually reward good PEOPLE at all ... so I fail to understand why so many people are such fans of it for the reasons they put forth ... it actually encoruages UNETHICAL behavior.




Example ... the law school I attended had this giant honor code that they expected everyone to follow, and were so "proud" of it that they'd give everyone RE-USED, UNSEALED envelopes with their exams in them 30 minutes prior to the actual exams, and tell them ON THEIR HONOR not to look at the sheets inside. Well, guess how many stalls were occupied by kids with their laptops in the 30 minutes prior to their exams in this wireless-enabled campus? Yeah, all of them, apparently everyone had to take a dump right then and there. The system rewarded the unethical, instead of encouraging the ethical. Anyone who already had a code of honor of their own was following it, and everyone else was "faking" it.

If people are willing to cheat at something so huge and with as much risk when caught as that, what makes anyone think that people won't routinely cheat when they get to SCORE THEIR OPPONENTS with an entirely subjective score? Vice versa, what makes you think people are being genuinely good sports when they have a pre-set guideline of behavior to measure themselves up against and behave in pursuit of the score for?

When you have a clear, enforced CODE OF CONDUCT, rather than the crap that is player-judged and points-enumerated sportsmanship ... you have a much better chance of getting people who actually are being good sports (as opposed to acting like over-sappy sycophants), and you have no chance of people abusing the system to harm people they don't like or don't want to win.

[DarkLink]

I think the issue is more whether sportsmanship has as big a place as it does in many tournaments, not whether some people are better at gaming the system than others.

Whether you game it intentionally or are just a nice guy, or a little bit of both, when you have a measurable score that's opinion based, it's a "game" in and of itself that is played by both sides during each game - intentionally "downscoring" someone you don't like or don't want to win, or being nicer than you otherwise would be in order to get more points.

As soon as it is a "game" via subjective player-grade sportsmanship, you're not enforcing a code of conduct at all ... you're just adding another "rule" to the competition. It's disingenuous and doesn't actually reward good PEOPLE at all ... so I fail to understand why so many people are such fans of it for the reasons they put forth ... it actually encoruages UNETHICAL behavior.




Example ... the law school I attended had this giant honor code that they expected everyone to follow, and were so "proud" of it that they'd give everyone RE-USED, UNSEALED envelopes with their exams in them 30 minutes prior to the actual exams, and tell them ON THEIR HONOR not to look at the sheets inside. Well, guess how many stalls were occupied by kids with their laptops in the 30 minutes prior to their exams in this wireless-enabled campus? Yeah, all of them, apparently everyone had to take a dump right then and there. The system rewarded the unethical, instead of encouraging the ethical. Anyone who already had a code of honor of their own was following it, and everyone else was "faking" it.

If people are willing to cheat at something so huge and with as much risk when caught as that, what makes anyone think that people won't routinely cheat when they get to SCORE THEIR OPPONENTS with an entirely subjective score? Vice versa, what makes you think people are being genuinely good sports when they have a pre-set guideline of behavior to measure themselves up against and behave in pursuit of the score for?

When you have a clear, enforced CODE OF CONDUCT, rather than the crap that is player-judged and points-enumerated sportsmanship ... you have a much better chance of getting people who actually are being good sports (as opposed to acting like over-sappy sycophants), and you have no chance of people abusing the system to harm people they don't like or don't want to win.

+10

Like I said. There are very good reasons NOT to include soft scores. And there are no good reasons TO include them. So why are we arguing over this?

[BuFFo]

+10

Like I said. There are very good reasons NOT to include soft scores. And there are not good reasons TO include them. So why are we arguing over this?

Easy.

+1

[Lerra]

Example ... the law school I attended had this giant honor code that they expected everyone to follow, and were so "proud" of it that they'd give everyone RE-USED, UNSEALED envelopes with their exams in them 30 minutes prior to the actual exams, and tell them ON THEIR HONOR not to look at the sheets inside. Well, guess how many stalls were occupied by kids with their laptops in the 30 minutes prior to their exams in this wireless-enabled campus? Yeah, all of them, apparently everyone had to take a dump right then and there. The system rewarded the unethical, instead of encouraging the ethical. Anyone who already had a code of honor of their own was following it, and everyone else was "faking" it.


Arg this reminds me of my undergrad experience that I just have to rant about. My college also had an overdeveloped honor code that started in the law school and trickled down to the undergrads. I took a class known as the most difficult in the department (quantum chemistry) where we were given our tests and told to go wherever we wanted and return in 90 minutes with our finished exams. The idea was to go find a nice comfortable couch in the library or even return to your dorm room to take the closed-book exam.

About 80% of the class cheated on the first exam, and 20% did not. The test was difficult enough that the honest folks got mostly D's and F's and the cheaters got B's and C's. You can imagine how many folks cheated on the next exam when they were afraid of failing the class.

Later in the semester we had a take-home exam that we were supposed to complete over the weekend - closed-book with a timer set to 3 hours. No one in the class finished the exam in under 18 hours, even with books, the internet, and taking the test in groups. Most of the class turned in incomplete exams because they ran out of weekend or no one could find a solution. The professor commented, "I'm amazed how many of your are able to complete this exam in 3 hours. Next year I'll have to add more questions," with an evil look in his eye. I'm pretty sure this professor knew about the rampant cheating and just didn't care. For one, he was constantly commenting about how grades don't really matter. Secondly, the way the class was set up, it was nearly impossible to pass the class without cheating and he knew it (the class did not require multi-variable calculus as a pre-req, you could take Calc 2 concurrently, and it only required algebra-based physics. If you know anything about quantum mechanics, you know this is a recipe for disaster. It's like putting an average 6th grade into a calculus class). The first day of class, we were talking about eigenstates and double integrals and half the class had no idea what either of those were.

Then again, it did prepare me for grad school pretty effectively . . .

[Morgrim]

Secondly, the way the class was set up, it was nearly impossible to pass the class without cheating and he knew it (the class did not require multi-variable calculus as a pre-req, you could take Calc 2 concurrently, and it only required algebra-based physics. If you know anything about quantum mechanics, you know this is a recipe for disaster. It's like putting an average 6th grade into a calculus class). The first day of class, we were talking about eigenstates and double integrals and half the class had no idea what either of those were.

*Coughs. Splutters. Chokes*

Are they INSANE?! Bloody hell, we were only allowed to do basic level quantum until late second year and they had us doing partial differentials first semester and eigenvalues second...

You either had a school that didn't care about the average passing grade or a very cruel and sadistic head of department.

[DarkLink]

The final exam for one of my engineering classes used to be ~14 question multiple choice, with A-Z answers and a 3 hour time limit. I'll point out that these are complex calculations using multiple formulas and complex concepts per problem. If you make a single mistake, punch in one wrong number anywhere, you'd get the whole question wrong, no partial credit or anything.

A significant portion of the class got 0%. The average was around 30%.



Easy.

+1

It's in binary, duh:rolleyes:

There are 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary, and those who don't.

[Shavnir]

There are 10 types of people in this world, those who understand binary, and those who don't.

Why did the Computer Scientist confuse Christmas and Haloween?

Because Oct 31 == Dec 25.

[Lerra]

Sorry for the OT.

*Coughs. Splutters. Chokes*

Are they INSANE?! Bloody hell, we were only allowed to do basic level quantum until late second year and they had us doing partial differentials first semester and eigenvalues second...

You either had a school that didn't care about the average passing grade or a very cruel and sadistic head of department.

Both :P The Chemistry department liked to weed out the biologists by throwing Quantum Chemistry right after the Organic Chem courses. All Biology majors were required to take Organic Chem, and a good portion of them would continue on to Quantum because it's one of two classes separating a Biology major and a Chemistry minor. About 2/3rds of people in Quantum Chem are biology majors - keep in mind that Biology majors do not typically take any math courses beyond Calculus 1 or Intro to Physics. The Chemistry department head wanted to "purify" the chemistry minor by making things as difficult as possible for the biologists, hence the lack of pre-requisites and the difficulty of the class. Then the Chemistry professors LOL at all of the biologists who fail the class because they weren't adequately prepared. Even for the chem/physics majors, this class is crazy, though. The teaching professor told us that he went through this same material while getting his PhD a few years ago, and we were going through it at a faster pace than he did.

[Morgrim]

See, this is the reason I switched from nanotechnology to organic chemistry. That, and I discovered that higher level physics didn't interest me and that's half the course.

[Aldramelech]

Goodbye

[DarkLink]

God there are far more geeks here then I feared! My head hurts now (proberbly from all the Quantum).

If it helps, I can bench press over 300lbs. That might disqualify me as a geek right there. Maybe:rolleyes:.

[MVBrandt]

Nothing disqualifies you as a geek.

I'm a former dolphin trainer. I once wowed crowds with my trim physique in a wetsuit in hawaii, and spent nights wandering the beaches of Waikiki from bar to bar or party to party, hung out with celebs and had a grand ole time of it.

Still a bonafide mega geek. We play with toy soldiers.

[Aldramelech]

Goodbye

[Lerra]

You are in shape Aldra. Round is a shape.

[Kahoolin]

This is difficult question because hobby tournaments are a difficult case. They are competitive events, to be sure, but they are also designed to strengthen the gaming community. After all, if there's no community there's no tourney. So it makes sense to have things like sportsmanship scores for community building purposes.

Only problem is, many competitors are insecure and/or immature and don't realize that by undermining the sportsmanship scoring system they are harming their local gaming community. They are abusing the trust of their fellow players, and creating a situation where sportsmanship ranking (a mechanism for rewarding community spirit) does more harm than good.

So I think the best idea, practically speaking, is to do away with sportsmanship scores. It pains me to say this though, because in a way it is admitting that we as a gaming community can't control our egos enough to keep the contest on the table. It doesn't do much for the image of war gamers as anti-social losers living out their impotent power fantasies through little plastic men.

I'd wager most of you arguing that sportsmanship scores are a good thing have a local hobby community with honest, mature players, and you should count yourselves lucky. Most of the rest of us have been on the receiving end of the other kind :(*

*I once got gimped by a kid with a Deathwing army. I played fairly, I helped him out when he made mistakes, I even made tactically questionable decisions for the sake of fluff because he was obviously outclassed. Unfortunately this was last edition and I was playing orks. He spat the dummy when my choppas nerfed his terminator's save, and I found out later that he gave me 2 out of 10 for sportsmanship.