Email:
We all want a standard tournament format. We're kicking, screaming, pissing and moaning. GW won't step up to the plate. Someone won't do it for us. This is something that we as a community know.
I've been discussing a ambitious goal with some friends locally, so bear with me on this please. It's bold, it might belly flop, get shot down.. But I think it has merit.
Generally speaking, a standard tournament format is going to take a serious shit-ton of work. Here are my thoughts on getting it going:
Step One: Get a small group or "think tank" together from tournament veterans. Preferably together once or twice a week via ventrillo or chat to discuss and hammer out a format. Also making a universal FAQ and scenarios at this point.
Step two: Once the format is hammered out, figure out a system of ranking players.
Step Three: Take the format and ranking system and make a web-site. Open to all, but results may only be entered by sanctioned tournament organizers.
Step Four: Present the format to the gaming community at large. I'm beginning to think that saying we want it, discussing it and making suggestions nothing will ever happen.
People are generally lazy, followers, just want to debate or talk it into the ground. If this group just says "Hey guys, here is the format. This is what is called, this is how we do it now. Come get it on it..." I think the community at large may accept it in time.
Now as with all things, I don't expect it to be met with immediate sucess, and I do imagine it would be slow going at first. However, I think the more people that jump on board and use the format over time, the more and more accepted it will be. Kind of like how the yak-faq came out. Like it or hate it, they just tossed it out there and said thats how it is for all their tournaments.. And for the most part people accepted it.
I wouldn't mind being on the initial "think tank". I have a bit of talent for running events and designing tournament scenarios.
Here are some ideas I've had for a format:
1. First and foremost, a ranking system. Similar to what WOTC used for MTG, it matched players based on their rank and adjusted accordingly from game to game.
2. Standard scenarios. A pool of 10-20 scenarios every tournament uses for a given "tournament season". When the season is up, the scenarios change. In order to do a "sanctioned game" you must use one of these scenarios as dictated by the tournament organizer.
3. Standard points values. Pretty simple really.. Pick a point value for the season, thats what everyone uses.
4. Standard terrain. Be it play on a battle-board, with gw terrain, the amount of pieces and so on. The number of pieces can be set per season, arranged by players however (as I personally think a player can jockey terrain for an advantage, which is part of being a good general).
Now, in the example above with a format established.. Pockets of gamers could then do something like this:
1. Sanctioned tournaments. These would allow players to get their rank going, collect some prizes and "qualify" for the next round of tournaments. Wether tournaments are over a period of time where you play each of your opponents in a best of 3 enviroment similar to magic, or one off events would be up to the group to decide.
2. Qualifiers would last for a few weeks. The 'Ard boyz format of top 3 go to the next round should not be used. Stores that have tournaments with only 5 to 10 players advance people while guys in a 50 man tournament mostly got knocked out. I would say maybe 1 person in 10 should be allowed to qualify as a starter.
3. People winning in qualifying tournaments now move onto the next round of play, hammering each other for say a state finals. Again, a period of several tournaments and not just a one day event would be ideal. Maybe 2 or 3 tournaments for states.
4. States then go to a regional tournament, this probably wouldn't be able to last more than a weekend due to people having lives and not being able to travel and play warhammer for a week straight. Regionals to nationals, nationals to international and so on. Once the season is over, take the rankings and wipe them to start over. That way there isn't a group of "top dogs" who never budge in the ranks. It also gives people new to the system a chance at advancing.
All it would take is making the format and tossing it out there. Rather than hope Games Workshop will do it, lets do it ourselves. Lets make it, use it ourselves and encourage any groups to push for it in their own areas. If they want to be a sanctioned tournament organizer, please do.
We can start small and go from there to test it.. You guys in Utah, all of us in Phoenix, get some guys from California and Nevada on board and poof. We have a "regional". Post our results. 2 or 3 people representing each state for the initial drafting of the format would probably be ideal. After we have our region doing it, it wouldn't be hard to add another and so on.
If the format meets with sucess, others will join. We know that is a fact. If it doesn't, we at least tried which beats discussing it to death and nothing ever happens.
We will never create an enviroment as competitive as something like MTG, but we can make ours worth a shit. I think these one-off "major events" are meaningless. A format like this might just bring some meaning back to the table. Its a crap shoot right now either with polotics or who got lucky.. Lets get a system where the best can say theyre the best and be absolutely correct in that declaration.
So.. I'm in. Are you?
Reply:
Well, I should probably finish up my own format which due to RL issues will probably be put off till the weekend. Assuming the wife doesn't ahem override me again.
What do others think of this?
Home Tournaments Warhammer 40k » Tournament Format?
Thursday, November 05, 2009
Tournament Format?
By
Stelek
Labels: Tournaments, Warhammer 40k
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
25 comments:
Like it's already been stated... this will of course be quite difficult. To organize such a large amount of people over such a great amount of space will take a ton of work. Will it be worth it? I definitely believe so. But the biggest problem I see, and the most difficult task to do will be step number 2- "figure out a system of ranking players"
I just don't see how we can do this at the moment. We are talking about a game that you actually need to be face to face with the person you are playing, and I don't know how we could organize that many games with such a great amount of people to really have a ranking system. I just have a feeling that we will have a vast number of people will be in the very bottom rankings, while a very select few will be able to play frequently enough to move up the ranks. I just feel like the people in the top positions will just be the ones with the most time and money to go across the country and play rather than the individuals that are actually more skilled. Does any of what I'm saying make sense? If so, what solution could we have to fix this? I know the analogy isn't perfect, but what does MTG do to rank players?
I would be 100% on board. Every time discussions about a tournament pop up I want to write something like that haha...glad someone took the time to do it.
If you are looking for volunteers - you found one here.
Additionally since I just spammed the post button...
I think a good thing to come up with is a "faction" leader in the think tank. Someone who can devote the time to think through scenarios for each faction and see if they can break it. Then play test it - see what advantages and disadvantages each faction has for each scenario. Also - I think 10-20 would be far too much, a list of 5 should be sufficient and wouldn't require near the time that balancing 20 scenarios would.
Have set rules and links to the FAQ's for each TO that they can point to before/during tournaments so everyone has a fair chance to look at them. If there is ANY doubt on a ruling, have the community or TO's vote on it and THAT is the rule for THIS tournament season.
I could keep going and going...
I think it's a good idea. It will take time to get together and even more to have the massess accept it, but something is better than nothing.
I agree with Tyler re: rankings. Not everyone can afford to travel across the country playing different people. Something like regional and national rankings made separately would be interesting, kinda like the brackets in NCAA basketball.
Fantastic Idea Stelek.
I think, as a solution to the problems Tyler brought up, we should set some period of time (1 month? 3 months?) during which each "heat" takes place. During this period, you could take part in as many sanctioned events as you like. But only your top 5(?) scores will count for your rankings.
Done this way, the ladder/league system could work even without formal "Tourney" events. You would just have to go to a store that's sanctioned to hold a ladder game, follow the setup/deployent/objectives for that heat period, and then find an opponent you haven't played yet during that heat. Opponents with lots of reported games (and thus a reputation) could count for more than someone who's only played 1 or 2 ladder games. This would discourage people from "newb hunting" to get better scores.
SandWyrm has a good idea with the application of your top five scores for each heat.. It would give a better feel for who is doing well VS. who is floating by.
I'd be fine with either a ladder/league format or tournament format. I wrote the above letter with tournaments in mind, as I imagine in a ladder system, you may have people tailoring their lists (which is a whole other debate).
I feel with a tournament set up, we will see more "all comers" lists and displays of better tacticians, rather than seeing who could bring rock to the scissor fight.
Just to correct one thing:
MtG does not pair players in a tournament by their 'ranking'. It's swiss format, random round one and paired in further rounds by how well you did in the previous round.
If you obtain a high enough ranking, you get an invite to pro tour events without the need to place in a PTQ.
All ranking systems will be relative, and won't matter outside the local/regional areas anyway. Made up numbers here, but a number 1 ranked guy in the "insert regional area here" wouldn't be near as good as another's, and you won't know that until they get together and play.
I suggest a serious look at regional ranking systems.
Possibly use the BCS Conferences in College Football as examples. It won't work perfectly, as South Carolina and Clemson are both from South Carolina, but are in 2 different conferences. So you might have to cut some out, maybe make it like the NCAA tournament as has been stated above, so you have the East, Southeast, Midwest, and West.
Even saying that, I live in Atlanta, and I doubt I would go to Florida for any events. Maybe Alabama, Tennessee, or the Carolinas, but Florida will mostly have stuff on the Southern end of the state, and Im not into driving down there for anything thats not a Regional Qualifier or higher.
I also don't think I would establish set terrain rules, most places will do their own thing anyway, just have the national events stick to whatever is decided and let the smaller regional stuff do its own thing.
Also, using your top 5? How long of a season are we talking here? If it's a year long, then ok. If it's supposed to be 6 months or less, then 5 is way too many.
I concur Clay; if it's a year long "season", let the rankings simply determine who moves on to the next round, whether it's 3 or 8 or 40. So you play for say, 3 months at your store; top X move on to Sub-Regionals. You could have a circuit there, say 3 months to play at Y different stores. That would be preferable, but given the constrained travel options for most, unrealistic. Either way, end the sub-regional round with a Sub-Regional tournament; send the top X to Regionals. A regional circuit is impossible without sponsorship, so move straight to a National tournament from Regionals. All tournaments would be Swiss format. At the end of 9 months, you'd have a National champion; and 3 months off so organizers could relax, and players could work on new builds, etc.
Concurrently, as things develop, one could then begin to work on a ranking system a la MtG, which could be used to create a pro-circuit of some kind. I'm against that however, without sponsorship, as I don't believe a few folks with a bunch more disposable income should have the monopoly on bragging rights simply because they can afford to travel.
Besides, strategically, I think it makes more sense to try to develop a manageable system, and start running it, and show that it’s viable as a volunteer model. Even if it’s fairly simplistic, with a minimum number of rounds, managing that kind of complexity would be a big step in the right direction. Once that’s successful, it could potentially be marketed to GW for support. Or even simply built to thrive on its own.
This post appears to be addressing two different things. 1) A universal sanctioned tourney ruleset and 2) a tournament circuit system.
It's kinda pointless to worry about #2 when we can't even get #1. Figure out #1 first:
1) What point total to play at.
2) What types of terrain to use and how much.
3) What scenarios to play.
4) How to do tournament scoring.
Regarding terrain, it should be completely standardized. That means only official terrain that everyone can have access to should be used. Citadel Woods, Hills, 40k Bastions etc... should be the only stuff legal. No homemade terrain. Sorry.
Basically if it's not on this page you can't use it.
http://www.games-workshop.com/gws/catalog/armySubUnitCats.jsp?catId=cat390003&rootCatGameStyle=
Then you can assign strict point values to the terrain depending on size and that can add up to a certain number. When determining terrain to use you can use no more and no less than an agreed upon value. All terrain pieces have uniform rules regarding what they do. All forests offer 4+ cover and are difficult for example. All bastions are impassable. All craters are LOS cover only. You could even write all these rules down on paper, bind them together and then make copies and perhaps sell them for currency.
I think that terrain placement rules should be put into the game for players and not judges. Before deployment players take turns laying out a standardized pool of terrain. Placement must be further than 6" from any table edge or any other piece of terrain. The prevents tournament players from blaming stupid TO's on poor terrain placement.
Regarding scenarios they should be uniform and standardized for the season. Select 5 scenarios. Everyone plays the same scenarios for the entire tournament season. Again, they should probably only be GW approved scenarios. If it's not in a GW book or White Dwarf it probably shouldn't be used if for no other reason that this allows everyone to have the same access to the scenarios that are at least playtested.
Tournament scoring should be the same across the board. Swiss scoring. W/L/T. 3 for a win, 1 for a tie, 0 for a loss. Generalship only. No comp. No paint scores. Or have comp. Or have Massacre scoring. Whatever. Just make it uniform for the season so EVERYONE is playing the same thing.
So your have your seasons lined up. Example:
Season 1: 1500 Points, W/L/T scoring, Scenarios A,B,C., January - March.
Season 2: 2000 Points, Massacre scoring, Scenarios B,D,E. April - June.
Finals: 1750 Points, W/L/T scoring, Scenarios C,D,H, July 15th Chicago
Season 3: 1750 Planetstrike, W/L/T scoring. Comp Scoring, Scenarios F,G,A July-Sept.
Season 4: 1850 Cityfight, Massacre scoring. Scenarios A,E,C Oct-Dec.
Finals: 1500 Points, W/L/T scoring, Scenarios G,D,F, Jan 7th Vegas.
Each season runs for a couple months all over the world. Any tournament that is run in that time period adheres to the rules of that season to be sanctioned. Tournament winners and finalists (Final table?) are qualified for the next available finals.
You get the idea.
Nash said:
<span>Again, they should probably only be GW approved scenarios. If it's not in a GW book or White Dwarf it probably shouldn't be used if for no other reason that this allows everyone to have the same access to the scenarios that are at least playtested. </span>
Surely you jest. 5 shitty scenarios does not a competitive system make.
So I know this is vaguely off topic. Or re-directing topic. And I'm probably going to sound like a negative nancy. But my brain reads this article and the comments and it says "T00 BIG! TOO BIG!!"
An idea was brought up in a previous post that I think would be a solid jumping off point with a lot less restrictions to being involved. And that's really what my issue is here when I scream "Too BIG" there's too much responsibility from the players, and gamers are lazy dude! We need a system that starts small, easily accessible, and most importantly transparent. Ladies and Gents I suggest 40kFacebook.
There will be profiles, with Geographical information, army lists, game history etc.
So Joe 40k signs onto 40kfacebook, he creates his profile, one of the sections is current army list, or lists. And Joe posts up his List. One section is table availability, maybe Joe lists the stores he currently plays at, maybe he has a good table at home, and posts up some pictures of his terrain etc.
He heads over to the search area to find some other gamers in his area. He finds out Henry 40k lives only 3 blocks from him, great maybe he can get a game in... But first he wants to make sure he's not wasting his and Henry's time. So he goes to Henry's Game history section where each confirmed game (more on this later) Is listed, the player he played against, and both their army lists for the fight. (maybe a picture of the table and or the armies as well? but that might be asking too much) So he can get a sense of Henry's level of play. Then contact him via a messaging system and see if they can get a game together.
Great Henry and Joe scheduled a game for later that week. Henry show's up at Joe's house and they have fun Playing the game. Maybe 1 game maybe 3, it's up to them. Now the day of fun is over and it's reporting time. How will this work? I see it very similar to confirming a friend on FB. The players or one player makes a game history page, both armylists with be put up, mission type and deployment, (once again a couple pictures here would be AWESOME) win and loss record, and then both players will 'confirm' the information is correct thereby locking it.
Post game comments, and Feedback pages and systems will be implemented as well.
Are there flaws? Oh yes a whole hell of a lot. Can people choose not to confirm games that they lost? Hell yeah. But will that behavior eventually come to light? Damn Skippy, and people will notice and slowly that player will be ostracized, great job cheater! Can two players make up battles as many pretend battles as they want Suuuuure, but who cares! You should be able to see bloated and fakes pretty quick, and if not, one game will make it pretty clear.
Ranking systems can be implemented overtime, i'm less interested in ranks (especially due to the regional limitations and corruptibility of my suggested system) and more interested in a place people can go post their win loss record (EVEN IF THEY ONLY PLAY WITH THEIR TWO FRIENDS IN THEY'RE BACK ROOM!!) A player can come look at their entire game history and army list and know within 3 minutes if it's an opponent worth contacting for them.
Tournament Events can post and people can RSVP
If we get players easy like this at first, using it as their local score boards, and out reach. From there we have the player base already on the internet together in the same place, and we can start to expand to more controlled tournament and ranking systems.
Anyway my 2cents.
Start small, get people hooked and then ramp up the regulations and rule sets for the official ladders. But get people all playing and scoring (no matter how corrupt) in the same place first.
okg
GT in Germany has a few heats, the top 10 or so from each heat are invited to the final. At leeast it was that way last time I played, been a while though. I was so dissapointed with how it was run I have no desire to go it again.
@nash
Only GW terrain? Are you nuts? LFGS's are supposed to literally spend 100's of dollars PER TABLE for terrain?
This idea alone could kill this before it could even get off the ground...
I think folks would settle for standardized missions and rules. Try to get to that point before trying to kill this via economic means...
I think people have a lot of great ideas - but no sense of what it would take to do them.
This process needs to start very simply with a small, simple structure. Rules.
Rules on what scenarios there are. There are 5 scenarios, this is what they are, print it out, take it to the tournament, that is how it is played.
Rules on the tournament system. It is played in a swiss format. 1st round is random, W=3, L=0, T=1. After the random round you use a simple seeding system to place people - there are plenty available. This is also where the cost of entry would be standardized, as would the prize support. A $15 tournament entry for 8 people yields $120+whatever the LGS can provide, which is a pretty significant prize pool and around the standard number of people you could hope to fit in most game stores comfortably. As we have seen lately on YTTH, standardizing prize's is also something that will need to happen, so 1st/2nd/3rd all know what they can expect. You would also need to clarify rules on painted vs unpainted and rules on WYSIWYG. The WYSIWYG can be remedied by requiring printed out army lists (there is NO way you can hold a valid tournament without this rule. each player must have absolute knowledge of what they are playing against, even if they do not know what that bio-morph or piece of wargear does - they have the option of asking and reading books/codices just like everyone else does).
Rules on amount of terrain. How much of the board needs to be taken with terrain. It doesn't have to be an exact measurement, but something STANDARD. We do NOT need to buy GW-only terrain, that is a huge expense that a small, simple structure can't handle (yes, it would be nice if this gets going to be able to petition GW from a registered store for terrain support, but thats WAY down the road).
RULES rulings. Using the GW FAQ's and have them available at each tournament. Any ruling issues are brought up and ruled on by the community. Everyone needs to be able to KNOW what each rule is, prior to the tournament, NOT during the 3rd game of it.
So how do you get all these things? A website is the easy answer. Someone mentioned Facebook - but that is just far too open an environment for something like this. A meeting place for gamers, sure. Not useful for a standardized tournament setting. So somebody needs to dedicate the time to create a website that can host the above information and provide a forum for documenting tournaments run in the format. How many people were there, what they were playing, a copy of their list, and a posting of the standings. It is easy to do, if the TO's just document what they do. It would require far less from a TO then having to do everything from scratch, and the players would encourage him to post the tournament for recognition/standing/rating etc.
I'm not sure if this is going to all fit in one post! But I think the next thing I am going to do is create a bullet list (haha...and then promote some synergy...) of items that need to be addressed. If anyone is interested in helping, you can shoot me an email at t_nerpel@yahoo.com and we can try to get something organized...gotta start somewhere!
T.N.
My thinking is similar to okg's. What we really need first is a formal ladder system/website with a standardized mission/deployment for each month(?) . The tourney system can then be built on top of it.
As for the verification mechanism, you could set it up so that for a game you have to have 2 players who haven't yet played in the same heat, and a judge. Results could be posted by any player, but would require confirmation by either the other player or the judge.
Allegations of cheating and such would require confirmation by BOTH one player and the judge. Cheaters would be "fined" X number of game results, which would then be erased by the system. And a cheater would have his ability to judge a match revoked for a Y period of time.
We'll never be able to dictate what terrain people use, but we can specify how it's deployed with a mission diagram.
Legally, would there be any issue with actually making money off of this? For this amount of effort it seems essential to get some reward for those who organize it - could the tournaments for the regional finals (ala Fiesta Bowl, Rose Bowl, etc) be used to pay for the efforts of the site and give something to the people that run it.
Should there be an annual registration fee for the site as well (ala Freeboota's on 40k radio)? This can be used for prize support or organizer bonuses.
"<span>Surely you jest. 5 shitty scenarios does not a competitive system make."</span>
It's still a better option than the disaster that was the wild west shootout. It's much easier to get the entire community to adopt GW scenarios than yours Stelek.
"<span>Only GW terrain? Are you nuts? LFGS's are supposed to literally spend 100's of dollars PER TABLE for terrain?
This idea alone could kill this before it could even get off the ground... "</span>
Then enforce strict sizes and "counts as" rules to save on cost. Problem solved.
Quality rises above trash eventually, Nash.
What about using a system similar to Gamebattles' where players register, get a default rating score, use the site to arrange games using pre-determined rules/scenarios, then report and confirm the results of their match and their rating scores are modified based upon the relative rating score of their opponent. (big increase for a win over a much higher ranked opponent, small if any increase for a win over a lower-ranked opponent).
Then after each 6-12 month 'season' organize an invitational tournament for the top-ranked players in each region.
That's something I'd certainly love to participate in if it were well-run and sufficiently abuse-proofed. You'd likely have to limit games reported per-week and the number of times one player could report scores against the same opponent in a season. You'd definitely have to limit the number of accounts any one person/ip address could register.
-GK
I'd love Jervis Johnson to get his walking papers too. If I hold my breath waiting for that I'm going to turn blue. Let's try to crawl before we walk. Semi shitty scenarios that are standardized and everyone is using is a better situation than what we have now where scenarios are all over the fucking spectrum and the metagame is completely incoherent because no two tournaments have anything in common.
It doesn't take a million people to come up with some effective guidelines and scenarios. I'm working on standardizing tournament missions but it will be a little while before I'm ready to post something.
So for you CG, it takes 1,000,000-1? ;)
All I'm trying to say is don't worry about the project not being feasible, just take a chunk of the project and run with it. When someone has something ready for peer review it can be more of a group effort at that point.
For figuring out a ranking system, just copy a successful model (Stelek like to bring up Magic and Chess rankings, why not copy them?) To keep track of it, give each approved TO access to uploading battle points stats to a website.
Assigning players a number like WOTC's DCI system shouldn't be too hard, maybe people will ahev to be ID carded when they first sign up to count down on potential cheating.
Post a Comment