I have been seeing a few posts in various threads bringing up the topic of slow playing. I think most people agree that playing slowly/taking your time during a game in a NON tourney environment is just fine and can be a nice relaxing way to spend a weekend. In a tourney environment I think is where the contention comes into play.

To finish a 5 turn game in 2 hrs, you must average 12 minutes per player turn.
To finish a 5 turn game in 2.5 hrs, you must average 15 minutes per player turn.

To finish a 6 turn game in 2 hrs, you must average 10 minutes per player turn.
To finish a 6 turn game in 2.5 hrs, you must average 12.5 minutes per player turn.

To finish a 7 turn game in 2 hrs, you must average 8.5 minutes per player turn.
To finish a 7 turn game in 2.5 hrs, you must average 10.7 minutes per player turn.

Of course we know that some turns take literally no time, especially if you use reserves.

This doesn't take into consideration set-up and deployment, which if handled slowly can reduce the total game time from 15 to 30 minutes.

There appears to be 4 types of slow players I have encountered in a Tourney.

1) The intentional slow player.
This guy sees your 1,000 tyranid horde or Orks and has his 50 man shooty Marine army. He knows if he takes it slow(both in deployment and turns) he can kill a lot of your stuff before you can get into assault, then boom times up.

2) The slow player that brings the relaxed "non tourney" attitude.
This type of player is really just in the tourney for fun and not necessarily for hard competition. Therefore he doesn't care to play fast or doesn't realize the importance of it.

3) The new player.
This player hasn't been playing very long so plays slow due to no familiarity with his army or even the rules. Also takes longer to make decisions because of unfamiliarity with game consequences.

4) The thinker
This player thinks through every possible move 3 to 4 times then goes over it again before making a move.
(edit..added 4th from thread input)

Maybe there are more, but I'm wondering how you manage to "speed" people up who are types 2 and 3 and 4. I understand you could call a judge over for type 1, but how can you really prove he is slow playing? I have been burned a few times by really slow Guard horde armies due to the massive amount of shooting they have.

Do you just out right ask the guy to speed up his play? Do you just play extra faster your self?

I'm just looking to generate some dialogue to help us educate each other here.

GG

....edited for typos

I was so going to start this topic! I start by kindly letting my opponent's know that there's only x time left, so I'm going to start hurrying on my turns. That usually prompts them to say "Oh, I'll hurry to!" if it'as unintentional or apologize if they see what you were trying to do with that. If that doesn't work the first time, I do it again. After that I ask them to hurry directly. I ran into a new guard player at Ard Boyz second round, and I helped speed up the game by asking if he'd like me to help him get the right number of dice for his First-rank-second-rank-slow-the-clock-forever shooting. He could see I was trying to be helpful and was glad to let me (and it was certainly better than waiting for him to pick out 126 dice). In casual games I've asked if opponents want help moving their hordes if I know them at all, and I've never had someone say no (just let them move the first few and move the rest to keep the same shape, asking if any specific guys need to be up closer or not).

Try to watch the clock for half-time (1 hour, 1.15 hour, whatever) and then say something like, "Hey, half our time is gone, and we've only gotten 2 turns in." I also wouldn't be afraid of giving types 2 and 3 the post-game commentary that "you really need to learn to play faster for a tourney. maybe time your practice games."

I like the idea of saying something after deployment like, "Wow we only have 1.5 hours left, were going to have to play pretty fast to get a full game in." Basically just a freindly reminder that playing faster would be nice.

Also I've never heard a TO make an announcement before the tourney about the need to play faster than normal due to the game time limit. I know that the BOLSCON guys have made a direct announcement about play speed for their tourney, but that's the only time I have ever seen a TO or group mention the time factor.

So I think TO's making a point and encouraging faster play would be helpfull.

GG

I hate playing Guard armies in tournies. So many models to move and shoot. Throw in a slow player and you are screwed.

Twice I've played Guard and only gotten through about 4 turns. I would have won the game had we gone 5 or 6 turns. One time the guy literaly took an hour to deploy. He'd put out his models 1 at a time. Then move the unit somewhere else.....1.....at...a..time. My eldar were beating him, and I needed my turn to contest objectives with skimmers, but time ran out.

The other time I had 2 units of Sword Brethern with furious charge and a crusader squad ready to charge into 3 squads of guardsmen....kill them, massacre into the objective and I win. Time ran out though.

TO's should recognize this and put a warning in....if you are running a horde army, you should be a fast player.

My last tourney, I played a Guard player who simply did not know what he was doing, or what the rules were. EVERY turn he had to look up how to use mortars. And looking up what he needed to roll to hit. And the strength of lasguns....

I ended up being pushie and telling him what to do....

dietrich wrote:Try to watch the clock for half-time (1 hour, 1.15 hour, whatever) and then say something like, "Hey, half our time is gone, and we've only gotten 2 turns in." I also wouldn't be afraid of giving types 2 and 3 the post-game commentary that "you really need to learn to play faster for a tourney. maybe time your practice games."

Of course they are full within their rights to tell you to kiss their ass too. There's a time limit but not a time requirement in the book. Sorry!


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generalgrog wrote:I like the idea of saying something after deployment like, "Wow we only have 1.5 hours left, were going to have to play pretty fast to get a full game in." Basically just a freindly reminder that playing faster would be nice.

Also I've never heard a TO make an announcement before the tourney about the need to play faster than normal due to the game time limit. I know that the BOLSCON guys have made a direct announcement about play speed for their tourney, but that's the only time I have ever seen a TO or group mention the time factor.

So I think TO's making a point and encouraging faster play would be helpfull.

GG

Back in ancient times when I ran tournaments we would definitely give time increments and reminders that everyone had to have a complete final turn.

Bring a time-clock, like in Chess. Talk to your opponent prior to a game and explain how long each player turn can take before the game will be finished early.

Use skirmish trays.

What if they don't?

I had a player at 'Ard boyz in my last round that was either type 1 described above or type 2. That or he just can't memorize statlines very well. He took forever to decide whether he wanted to go first or second (which I can understand, really), and then had to look up his stats like over and over.

It was my first tourney, so I didn't know if he was stalling or not. What I did know was that there was no way in hell that with him going first and 30min left we were starting turn 4, because I wouldn't have gotten to go.

I'm only now (on reading this thread) fully realizing how much his stalling may have cost me, not that I was really a contender for the top 3 or anything.

Frazzled wrote:

dietrich wrote:Try to watch the clock for half-time (1 hour, 1.15 hour, whatever) and then say something like, "Hey, half our time is gone, and we've only gotten 2 turns in." I also wouldn't be afraid of giving types 2 and 3 the post-game commentary that "you really need to learn to play faster for a tourney. maybe time your practice games."

Of course they are full within their rights to tell you to kiss their ass too. There's a time limit but not a time requirement in the book. Sorry!

You are correct. But, I think most people who are trying to be sporting will either: 1) try to play faster in the second half of the game to get at least 5 turns in; 2) take constructive criticism as what it is - not nasty, but something constructive.

I tend to be a slow player. Having played orks in third edition, I learned to play faster (especially after getting a 'win' in like Turn 4 vs. a friend at a GT, and he was right - if we had gone another 1-2 turns, he would have won and deserved to win). I don't play that often anymore, so I've lost some of that skill. But, to me, being a good tourney player also means that you try to get a full game in during the time limit, because some armies do better early game and some do better late game.

Some people will only ever get 4 turns in during a tourney game, but some people will try to learn how to play fast enough to get 6-7 turns in.

We're in agreement on those points Dietrich.

But I see, and would react negatively if someone:

1. brought a timer and tried to keep me to THEIR standard. I'd really slow down for that one. If the TO used one that would be cool however (did that in a nontourney pre-Apoc multiplayer game and it worked great).

2. Made comments after the game. With equal enthusiasm and social wit I'd provide useful advice on what they need to do with themselves and the parental units. I'm not known for being shy in that regard.

Nurglitch wrote:Bring a time-clock, like in Chess.

Personally I like this idea (American Basketball and Football have play clocks), however I doubt there are many people that would agree to this, and may even find the suggestion offensive. I think there are less confrontational ways to speed the game up.

I think it's more about educating the masses. I mean there are times in the past I can remember myself, taking a long time to make decisions, before I realized how my slow play could be affecting my opponent, I.E. I just didn't realize the impact my slow play had on others.

GG

There's an article on Bell of Lost Souls about practising playing fast.

It's kind of funny to think of Warhammer players training for competition, but that's why all other competitive sports from swimming to poker train - so that they're ready and able to perform correctly when the time comes.

Nurglitch wrote:There's an article on Bell of Lost Souls about practising playing fast.

It's kind of funny to think of Warhammer players training for competition, but that's why all other competitive sports from swimming to poker train - so that they're ready and able to perform correctly when the time comes.

Can you provide a link?

thnx

GG

Its an editorial. Multiple negative comments about it as well.

There is a forth kind of guy too.
The Guy thats just thinks too much (has to do all the mathhammer in his head before proceeding). not his fault he's an overthinker just too smart for his own good.

I think mb I'd fall into 3 though saying I'd be completely clueless with my stuff wouldn't be accurate. I try to come prepared with all my stats written on a separate sheet of paper for easy reference so I usually don't need to flip through my codex at all during the entire game.

I don't think I'd enjoy playing against someone who brought their own personal clock and would ignore it entirely. Until that's a standard for all tournaments (which I wouldn't have a problem with) I'm certainly not going to allow one player to run the game. I wouldn't mind however someone just telling me what I needed to roll to hit them to make things go faster.

Nurglitch wrote:
It's kind of funny to think of Warhammer players training for competition, but that's why all other competitive sports from swimming to poker train - so that they're ready and able to perform correctly when the time comes.

Hey, I've spent a couple hours just guessing distances when I started useing Dwarf Cannons.

2 of my 3 games at the 'Ard Boyz had me concerned. Round 2, the SM player took 45 minutes to deploy and move in round 1 (against Daemons, in a Dawn of War setup). Of course, he quit in round 2, which made the whole time issue rather moot.

Round 3 was vs. a green tide: 180 models, spearhead deployment, and lots of finicky deployment to let every unit snake back to the single KFF in the back corner. I helped him with movement & dice throughout the game (removing "misses" from the dice tray sped things up significantly), and we finished the game in time. Of course, it helped that a good chunk of my army mishap'd itself to death....

Over-thinking something doesn't mean you're too smart for your own good. It means you're too stupid to reason efficiently. The whole point of lots of game theory, for example, is to circumvent wasting time on Liar's Paradox style recursions in favour of quick, back-the-napkin calculations.

Fast Play Bell of Lost Souls.

I think everyone should play have tournaments like the UKer and have army lists be 1500pts

If you cannot get a game done in 2.5 at 1500 you might have other problems :p

Since I hate the concept of 'Ard Boyz in general I can only imagine the fun people had over the weekend.

satanslandlady wrote:I wouldn't mind however someone just telling me what I needed to roll to hit them to make things go faster.

The way I'm used to playing there's a constant dialog between players about this sort of thing, where one player declares an action or solicits information, and the other player agrees that the action declared is being done right, or supplies the requisite information.

"20D6, hitting on 4+. Those are WS4, right?"
"Yup. WS4, hitting on 4+"
Roll, 4+ dice are extracted, lined up, counted.
"12 hit"
"Yup, 12 hit, roll to wound"
And so on.

It's hard on the throat, but you learn to keep a bottle of water around.

I am mainly a fantasy player so i can only speak from experience there. I play quite possibly the largest army in fantasy: skaven. I am a very time conscious player as a result, and plan my movements accordingly. And when my opponents says done. I immediately rolling charges, and movements, rally etc.

40K is different. I also played guard... looks like a trend... but if I needed to move i'd ask an opponent but give the disclaimer "please move them a full 6 inches." And tell the opponent during the i reserve the right shift my models per need.

Lastly, even though i have horde armies, I play about 10-12 tournments per year across the Warmachine/ Hordes- Warhammer system. The key is respect of opponent and game. I have no problem reminding an opponent, "hey we've got 2 hours, we're only on turn 2 and we are an hour in." I also have no problem advocating to the TO that i'm being slowhammered. All in all, at the Grand Tournment level, its obvious if your bring slow gamed, and its not offensive to say something.

I blame the tournament organizers. They want to play games with a lot of points, and play a RTT in an afternoon.

Let’s talk about how 5th edition has slowed down the game.

TLOS- You now have to stoop over the table to see if you can see a bit of a model, then if there is a dispute you have to move to you opponents side of the table to check it out etc.

Running- New to 5th edition the “run” phase. How long does it take to roll for the distance for each squad, and then to move a horde army?

Wound Allocation- You do not think about it, but this takes a long time. I was running 3 War Walkers, 2 with scatter lasers, and one with star canons. So I would do about 7-9 wounds and then they would allocate the wounds and they would try to get it so that all of the AP2 hits would be on one model, and then they roll the saves for each model etc. This would take quite some time.

Hordes-5th edition is the rise of horde. Orks and IG means that there are going to be a lot of time setting up and see above for running that many guys. Add to this that the IG got a new time waster…orders. So it takes some additional time to do that.

There are a lot of other factors that you do not think about either. Like the guy who packs up his army after every round and then has to unpack it to set up. (I bring a tray with me to carry my army around between rounds)

Tournaments need to go down to 1500 to 1750 points and be at 2 to 2.5 hours.

I would have won my 'Ard Boyz if I was able to get to turn #5 in my final game.

Nurglitch wrote:Over-thinking something doesn't mean you're too smart for your own good. It means you're too stupid to reason efficiently. The whole point of lots of game theory, for example, is to circumvent wasting time on Liar's Paradox style recursions in favour of quick, back-the-napkin calculations.

Fast Play Bell of Lost Souls.

Pretty underwhelmed by that. I was expecting a long thesis....not a blurb, explaining what we allready knew.


GG

Blackmoor:

By the way you describe it, at least as much blame must be ascribed to the players, such as the guy who packs between games by your example. Certainly GW bears some responsibility for the organization of the tournaments it runs, but that comes at a cost.

When I was in swimming during the 90s, for example, it costs somewhere around C$8000 a year, with each weekend meet costing a couple hundred dollars to enter, on top of accomodation, fuel, etc. I don't think GW tournament players have the funds or willingness to pay for professionally organized competition.


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generalgrog:

Well, it is Bell of Lost Souls, not the Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy.

Blackmoor wrote:I blame the tournament organizers. They want to play games with a lot of points, and play a RTT in an afternoon.

Let’s talk about how 5th edition has slowed down the game.

TLOS- You now have to stoop over the table to see if you can see a bit of a model, then if there is a dispute you have to move to you opponents side of the table to check it out etc.

Running- New to 5th edition the “run” phase. How long does it take to roll for the distance for each squad, and then to move a horde army?

Wound Allocation- You do not think about it, but this takes a long time. I was running 3 War Walkers, 2 with scatter lasers, and one with star canons. So I would do about 7-9 wounds and then they would allocate the wounds and they would try to get it so that all of the AP2 hits would be on one model, and then they roll the saves for each model etc. This would take quite some time.

Hordes-5th edition is the rise of horde. Orks and IG means that there are going to be a lot of time setting up and see above for running that many guys. Add to this that the IG got a new time waster…orders. So it takes some additional time to do that.

There are a lot of other factors that you do not think about either. Like the guy who packs up his army after every round and then has to unpack it to set up. (I bring a tray with me to carry my army around between rounds)

Tournaments need to go down to 1500 to 1750 points and be at 2 to 2.5 hours.

I would have won my 'Ard Boyz if I was able to get to turn #5 in my final game.

Blackmoor makes some great points here.

The mechanics of 5th edition are working to slow the game down. Which only highlights the basic problem, I.E. makes it worse. I think the points levels definately figure into the equation, but people have said that they tought themselves how to play faster even in this 5th edition environment. How may people actually work at playing faster? Besides sportsmanship, people that play Non Horde don't really have much incentive to play faster.

GG

Honestly, it just depends on the other person. With some people, it's never worth commenting on anything.

Frazzled wrote:1. brought a timer and tried to keep me to THEIR standard. I'd really slow down for that one. If the TO used one that would be cool however (did that in a nontourney pre-Apoc multiplayer game and it worked great).

I don't bring a timer, but I'll occassionally check my watch. I wasn't suggesting a timer, but I think it's fine to occassionally check your watch. I've even gone the other way, "Hey, we have an hour left, and we're at the end of Turn 4."

2. Made comments after the game. With equal enthusiasm and social wit I'd provide useful advice on what they need to do with themselves and the parental units. I'm not known for being shy in that regard.

Again, it depends on the player. Some players want constructive criticism, some don't. Based on the descriptions of Types 2 and 3, I would guess they're generally more open to constructive criticism. Some casaul and new players seek out constructive comments. Some don't want to hear anything. And I know that I've probably hurt my own sportsmanship score at times, but sometimes you have to call someone out on something, "Hey, can you decide which of your six lascannons you're going to use to kill a lone ork boy with?"

I play horde orks, and try to be as fast as possible (colour coded bases, mobs go into zip lock bags when dead so they just get poured out for next game, consider my moves for next round during oppenents turn and generally think fast). I also happily accept offers of help. Therefore, it really annoys me to play a marine player who takes longer than I do. I tend to tell them flat out they need to hurry up and learn to play faster. Of course, with some gits, that results in intentional slow play. At that point I'm tempted to bring out my phone stopwatch and time our turns, keep a record and then call over a judge. Haven't done it yet, but the more I encounter that behaviour, the more I think it's a good plan.

Blackmoor wrote:I blame the tournament organizers.

Tournaments need to go down to 1500 to 1750 points and be at 2 to 2.5 hours.

I agree. When organizing a tourney, I'd rather have the problem of a little too muich time each round than the problem of not quite enough.

The slow player that brings the relaxed "non tourney" attitude

Noun 1. Tourney - "a sporting competition in which contestants play a series of games to decide the winner"

There are no requirements to run fast turns that I am aware of, nor scoring points for finishing a game within so many rounds.

If a game goes to at least one complete turn and then ends then it’s done.

I have no doubt there are despicable folks who will look to see it they are ahead and try to slow things down and thus not allow another turn if they are ahead on whatever turn they are on at the moment. But they are few compared to those who will play at their normal rate of speed.

Telling horde players or any one else they 'Must" learn to play faster is rather foolish. It may be a tourney but it is also a game that folks play for enjoyment. Tourneys do not require one to "Move Faster" as a condition and if they did where is the fair standard of measurment to judge a player against if they were to try such a thing?

If one's game plan depends on one getting at least four turns of play to win I suggest that the one start looking for tourneys that allow a certain number of turns each game in spite of the time it takes, very unlikely now days, or adjust one's strategy. The "I will hold everything in reserves until turn 3" plan may be a problem if one only gets to the end of turn two.


A tourney that tries to run too many rounds and not allocate enough time for normal players to play up to 5 or 6 turns with Horde armies at their normal playing rate may as well add a "SIW" sticker to the front of their signup page.

Indeed. To play devil's advocate here there is no requirement here. Offering your "helpful advice" is just trying to impose your own problems on the other player and he may tell you just that.

A standard game of 40k plays for 5 to 7 turns. If you're playing less than that, some armies are penalized and some are rewarded. Would you line up to play a friend's slow-horde army and quit in Round 3 when ahead?

Sometimes, you just can't complete a game in the time alloted. Sometimes, it's because the orgnaizers didn't budget enough time for the point size. Sometimes, it's because your opponent isn't as 'tourney-savvy' and doesn't care if they finish.

But, I think if you want to have good sportsmanship, you need to recognize that some armies are penalized by not playing 5 to 7 turns, and that you should do what you can to get at least 5 turns in during a tourney. That's not being mean or nasty, that's just trying to be fair to your opponent.

I don't consider an opponent's slow play to be just my problem, it's everyone's problem. Like BO, or radioactive gonads.
He can feel free to tell me to eat my dice for telling him to hurry up, I won't be too put out. I will consider him a gobshite however, and won't be likely to socialise with him outside the tournament if at all possible.

Da Boss wrote:I don't consider an opponent's slow play to be just my problem, it's everyone's problem. Like BO, or radioactive gonads.
He can feel free to tell me to eat my dice for telling him to hurry up, I won't be too put out. I will consider him a gobshite however, and won't be likely to socialise with him outside the tournament if at all possible.

Would he care?

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

The slow player that brings the relaxed "non tourney" attitude

Noun 1. Tourney - "a sporting competition in which contestants play a series of games to decide the winner"

There are no requirements to run fast turns that I am aware of, nor scoring points for finishing a game within so many rounds.

If a game goes to at least one complete turn and then ends then it’s done.

I have no doubt there are despicable folks who will look to see it they are ahead and try to slow things down and thus not allow another turn if they are ahead on whatever turn they are on at the moment. But they are few compared to those who will play at their normal rate of speed.

Telling horde players or any one else they 'Must" learn to play faster is rather foolish. It may be a tourney but it is also a game that folks play for enjoyment. Tourneys do not require one to "Move Faster" as a condition and if they did where is the fair standard of measurment to judge a player against if they were to try such a thing?

If one's game plan depends on one getting at least four turns of play to win I suggest that the one start looking for tourneys that allow a certain number of turns each game in spite of the time it takes, very unlikely now days, or adjust one's strategy. The "I will hold everything in reserves until turn 3" plan may be a problem if one only gets to the end of turn two.


A tourney that tries to run too many rounds and not allocate enough time for normal players to play up to 5 or 6 turns with Horde armies at their normal playing rate may as well add a "SIW" sticker to the front of their signup page.

So you don't think that both players have a responsibilty to play fast enough to try to get a full game completed in the allotted time?

Let me make an anlogy. Your playing tennis or raquetteball or some other two player sport. You only have a certain bit of time to play because you both need to do some errands or something later. One of the players takes 2 or 3 times as long as you do to get their serves in or to take their turn, or to towell off their sweat, adjust their goggles or whatever. Because of this you can't complete your game. Isn't the guy who took longer to serve, similar to the guy who takes 45 minutes to deploy his army?

Same concept right? If you are going to play a 2 player game you have entered into an informal social contract to play a game. Therefore you should, IMO, do your utmost to try and complete a full game in the time constraints given you.

GG

Frazzled wrote:

Da Boss wrote:I don't consider an opponent's slow play to be just my problem, it's everyone's problem. Like BO, or radioactive gonads.
He can feel free to tell me to eat my dice for telling him to hurry up, I won't be too put out. I will consider him a gobshite however, and won't be likely to socialise with him outside the tournament if at all possible.

Would he care?

Probably not. I mean, I don't care enough to think about it past that.

generalgrog wrote:Same concept right? If you are going to play a 2 player game you have entered into an informal social contract to play a game. Therefore you should, IMO, do your utmost to try and complete a full game in the time constraints given you.

Agreed. The intent is to play a game, not a partial game. I've never seen a tourney advertise a 4-turn limit, or "come play the first half of three games." I'd be like calling the Superbowl with 10 minutes left in the game, because Janet Jackson took too long to expose herself at half-time.

There isn't a time limit on tennis IIRC, or golf, or poker.

There is no stated time limit on turns in 40K only absolutes on the MAXIMUM amount of turns in a game.

Again I'm playing Devil's advocate, and have had more than one game where my IG turn went faster then their marine turn to my chagrin. However, the thought of some kid thinking they can tell me how to play is at best a humorous concept.

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

In both the games you mentioned who ever is ahead when the time runs out wins. :}

If new rule changes slow down the game and the tourney orgaizers decrease the time allowed per match whose faoult is that if the games do not get completed?

Sorry for the edits , messed up with the edit and post :}

Faster doesn't equal better, just faster. You as a musician should also know that.

Frazzled wrote:However, the thought of some kid thinking they can tell me how to play is at best a humorous concept.

Next thing you know, that kid'll be on your lawn! Dern kids!

I figure that I'm enough of an old fart that I can get away telling those dern kids how to play the game right. Back in my day, if you didn't finish, your opponent could smack you across the face with the second edition Carnifex.....

You have nothing to worry about, everyone knows not to mess with the crazy old attic dweller of Dakka!

Frazzled wrote:There isn't a time limit on tennis IIRC, or golf, or poker.

There is no stated time limit on turns in 40K only absolutes on the MAXIMUM amount of turns in a game.

Again I'm playing Devil's advocate, and have had more than one game where my IG turn went faster then their marine turn to my chagrin. However, the thought of some kid thinking they can tell me how to play is at best a humorous concept.

I have a lot more patience with slow horde players. Slow marine armies bug me, cos they are generally low model count and have few wacky rules, and tend to shoot a lot anyway, which doesn't take as long as moving.

I would think the intent of a 40K tourney would be:

1. Both players in a match haveing a good time.

and

2. Who is the best tactical genius at 40k.

Nowhere would I judge point or award prizes for

1. Who can move figures on a board the quickest.

or

2. Who can deploy the smallest figure count army.

or

3. Who can badger their opponent into "moving faster" at the cost of allowing them to plan their moves or have a pleasant gaming experience.

Not slamming those advocating faster opponents, just pointing out theres no practical way to do it, we need to go to more time per round , not less IMO

Tactical genius has a time component.

dietrich wrote:

Frazzled wrote:However, the thought of some kid thinking they can tell me how to play is at best a humorous concept.

Next thing you know, that kid'll be on your lawn! Dern kids!

I figure that I'm enough of an old fart that I can get away telling those dern kids how to play the game right. Back in my day, if you didn't finish, your opponent could smack you across the face with the second edition Carnifex.....

You have nothing to worry about, everyone knows not to mess with the crazy old attic dweller of Dakka!

This is true.



Just don't drop that screamer killer model-its so choice!

Frazzled wrote:... the thought of some kid thinking they can tell me how to play is at best a humorous concept.

That's why we are talking about ways to ease in the suggestions to play faster, you old coot!! Actually... I may be older than you.

I've been thinking of the chess timer concept...It would be fun to have a few games where chess timers where introduced. Basically you have a certain amount of time to complete your turn, based on the average. If you complete a turn early the remainder of your time gets added to the next turn, up to the maximum allowable time. And if you don't complete a turn in the alotted time you miss your chance at shooting or moving next turn, or some other penalty.

Just a thought, may be fun to try it sometime.


GG

Da Boss wrote:Tactical genius has a time component.

Having done over 22 years in combat arms I can tell you as a dead fact tactical genius does not have a time component. Rushing about when people are getting dead is a good way to increment the count.

I don't think there's any kind of universal requirement you can use. I play fast, and hassle my opponent to go faster if they are slow, but I recognize that this costs me sportsmanship points, and makes some people dislike me. On the other hand, I've gotten a full game in every round for the last year and a half of highly active tournament play.

I'd also like to address the myth that its only bad or new players that slow play. Some accomplished tournament scene types are slow players, you can run into em in any round.

generalgrog wrote:

Frazzled wrote:... the thought of some kid thinking they can tell me how to play is at best a humorous concept.

That's why we are talking about ways to ease in the suggestions to play faster, you old coot!! Actually... I may be older than you.

I've been thinking of the chess timer concept...It would be fun to have a few games where chess timers where introduced. Basically you have a certain amount of time to complete your turn, based on the average. If you complete a turn early the remainder of your time gets added to the next turn, up to the maximum allowable time. And if you don't complete a turn in the alotted time you miss your chance at shooting or moving next turn, or some other penalty.

Just a thought, may be fun to try it sometime.


GG

It works very well for multiplayer games fyi. A certain period of time for every phase. Its chaos but fun on occasion.

40kenthusiast wrote:I'd also like to address the myth that its only bad or new players that slow play. Some accomplished tournament scene types are slow players, you can run into em in any round.

Good point, I guess there's a 4th type who is just plain slow, the guy who thinks twice or thrice about every move. I may add that to the OP.

GG

A possibility for a tourney might be if the tourney awarded both players additional points for getting to a complete round 6 or complete destruction of one side before the time runs out?

Do not get me wrong, I support longer times for matchs but do see a problem coming if something is not done about the longer time it takes to play with the rule changes.

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

Da Boss wrote:Tactical genius has a time component.

Having done over 22 years in combat arms I can tell you as a dead fact tactical genius does not have a time component. Rushing about when people are getting dead is a good way to increment the count.

Sitting paralysed by indecision sounds like an excellent way to do it too.
But rah rah rah for appeal to authority, and extra points for being such a tough guy.

Answers to some of the reasons given for slow play. Keep in mind these won't apply to the people using it to their advantage in the games....

I play slow because I play a horde army.
Move your front row first, and the other just fill in behind. Bring more than 20 Dice when you can have like 60+ Attacks/Shots! Realize you play an unavoidably slow army and do what you can to speed the process up.

I play slow because I like to think my moves/deployments out.
Well Napoleon so do we all, but the best laid plans change once the shooting starts. Basically thinking about things too long can often hurt you more than help. Also it does not take 30+ minutes to deploy a <2500pt army. Apoc games I would say sure.

I play slow because I like to enjoy the game and get to know my opponent.
Can't fault this, because I run my mouth/take cig breaks all the time in local games or tournies with no time limit. Fact is this is not any of those things and there are huge breaks between rounds to chatter.

I play slow because I am new to the game.
Maybe a tournament with such a high points cost, comp level, and time limit is not for you? Or maybe just not yet.

I play slow because I don't want to make mistakes.
Trust me I can understand this. In my 1st game in the prelims (game did not make it past rnd 3) I was rushing because we were running very low on time and I assaulted with one of my three units that planned to and just started rolling. Rushing hurt me bad there, but it might have been avoided had he not taken 40 minutes to deploy and 5 or more minutes to decide where to drop each pod. He won that game against me and will be advancing along with me to the Semi's. Just that I had to massacre my next opponents, and he only finished one of his games to the full 6 and it went over alittle as the bottom of the round was half done when time ran out.

That is just to address a few mentioned. Seriously though just like the situation I found myself in first game, it could have easily been avoided if there was a clock like the one used in Chess. Sure put a 2.5 hour time limit on the tourny, but make sure its not one guy using 1:45 and the other guy less than half that. I am almost positive that ratio or something near it happened on many occasions in this round. Maybe the Semi's will have most of them weeded out. With the reports of slow play winning games for some people I may be wrong though.

K

How about "I play slow because I feel like playing slow, now shut up and prepare for your beatdown." Its as valid as your other statements.

Just pointing out that "convention wisdom" stuff that gets bandied about by folks on something they do not do as part of their job in real life is often not the convention wisdom to those who do do it for a living.

By the way, I have never been "paralysed by indecision" in any of my firefights, even when I got dusted, so yeah that does make me a tough guy, even before you said so.

Frazzled wrote:How about "I play slow because I feel like playing slow, now shut up and prepare for your beatdown." Its as valid as your other statements.

"Beatdown" would imply the fight finishing. Not taking 45 minutes to put your bookbag down while trash talking, and the bell ringing before it can start.

Playing slow because you feel like playing slow in a timed tourny is just on this side of cheating IMO, and that depends on if you do it to win or just to be a kack. Opinions differ.

Its like cheating except, its not.

"Its like cheating except, its not."

LOL, love that

I'm a fan of timed turns for tournament play, regardless of the game actually being played.

Not only does it prevent deliberate slow playing, it also takes those of us who over think things and kicks us square in the pants. Timed turns have actually made me a better Warmachine player, and I don't see why the same wouldn't work for 40k or fantasy.

blue loki wrote:I'm a fan of timed turns for tournament play, regardless of the game actually being played.

Not only does it prevent deliberate slow playing, it also takes those of us who over think things and kicks us square in the pants. Timed turns have actually made me a better Warmachine player, and I don't see why the same wouldn't work for 40k or fantasy.

So this is allready being done in warmachine tourneys?

Interesting.

GG

generalgrog wrote: I2) The slow player that brings the relaxed "non tourney" attitude.
This type of player is really just in the tourney for fun and not necessarily for hard competition. Therefore he doesn't care to play fast or doesn't realize the importance of it.

So you would rather play against a wound up dill weed who puts unwarranted importance in pushing around a bunch of dollies?

^^^^
SIGH.......

NM....not going to take the bait.


GG

generalgrog wrote:So this is allready being done in warmachine tourneys?

As far as I know, only in the Hardcore format. Timed turns could work well in something like Gladiator or Ard Boyz.

Frazzled wrote:Faster doesn't equal better, just faster. You as a musician should also know that.

True, but who is better the one who can play both fast and slowly, or the one who can only play slowly? The ability to play faster does mean you're better.

P.S. Dream Theater owns us all.

Nurglitch wrote:Bring a time-clock, like in Chess. Talk to your opponent prior to a game and explain how long each player turn can take before the game will be finished early.

Depending on the armies involved and the opponent's social skills (or lack thereof), I might be quite annoyed.

Eventually, this could reach a "OK, I'm playing as fast as I can. BTW, have fun with ZERO soft scores for rushing me..."
____

Frazzled wrote:Faster doesn't equal better, just faster.

Nurglitch wrote:Over-thinking something doesn't mean you're too smart for your own good. It means you're too stupid to reason efficiently. The whole point of lots of game theory, for example, is to circumvent wasting time on Liar's Paradox style recursions in favour of quick, back-the-napkin calculations.

Fast Play Bell of Lost Souls.

Wow, thats an actual horrible article for listing reasons for fast play.

I played against some slow guys once... then I build my 5 LR daemonhunter army complete with grey knights. suffice to say that my turns are averageing 5 mins or so. good thing is that against most hoards, we get done on time, against everyone else, I get done super early. they say 5th ed is rise of the horde, I say it is also rise of the mech, with tank survivability higher, expecially armor 14.

I think if you can't reach turn #5 you should both get a loss.

That way you both have an incentive to hurry up, and if one person is winning they can't stall.

That's not a bad idea, but it only works if you start out with a reasonable amount of time to begin with.

I only got to turn three in the first round of my last tournament. I should probably work on setting my army up faster. (I tied the game, and probably would have won if it continued, so at least I didn't cheat the other guy out of a win or anything.)

Also, it may be difficult to enforce, depending on the players.

Blackmoor:

I think that's a good idea. It encourages players to co-operate to finish the game in a timely fashion. Maybe reduce each player's score proportionately, by the number of turns they potentially didn't play.

I actually lost a tournament because of a swarm army. The guy was new as well so I couldn't really give him a hard time about it.

Personally if someone takes their sweet time in order to force you to lose, they need to be banned from the tournament.

I have actually developed denial army lists that do absolutely nothing but hide all game. In this way it would be completely obvious that someone is taking their time to cheat in a tournament. I can finish my whole game in under 15 minutes, and we had 2-2 1/2 hours??? How in the hell am I supposed to compete then?

Ork swarms are incredibly good at doing this, and a "pro" Ork player can simply take too long for you to react. They time their Waagh to get flags and KP before you can even shoot them. Battlewagonz and Nob bikers can just bee-line towards you while the rest of the army sets up for the Waagh. Extremely unfair, perhaps timers are necessary. I would consider taping my games (which is perfectly fine in tournaments) just to be able to review and entirely shut down any nonsense the judges may present.

Yes I think it's time for "The 40k Channell". Where we get to watch tournament play with popcorn and soda, in the privacy of our own home on our own sofa in our own under.... NM

We could then throw popcorn at the TV whenever we see someone playing slow, like the way the Italians do in Worldcup.

GG

I will have to talk to pay-per-view for that... how does 49.99$ sound?

Telling horde players or any one else they 'Must" learn to play faster is rather foolish. It may be a tourney but it is also a game that folks play for enjoyment.

Agreed. It's a game, not a fething job.

If getting to turn 5 is really that important to you then might I suggest not playing 2500 fething points?

NM....not going to take the bait.

Pff, this whole thread is bait. "Hey, if you can't play fast, GTF OUTTA MY TOURNAMENTS!"

So, I'll just make a few points.

If you want to play a game with time constraints- fire up any of the quality RTS games available these days.

If you are coherent enough to complain about time running short, you should be cognizant enough to adjust your tactics accordingly. If you go in with a set plan of what happens on each turn like schedule, you deserve to have problems when the game doesnt run 6 or 7 turns.

Improvise, adapt, overcome. If you cant do that, why are you playing a turn based tactics game?

And stop blaming the horde players, as thats just more excuse making.

I cant count the number of tourneys I had people twiddling thumbs and rechecking moves (amongst other time wasters) to keep my green tide of orks from making it to assaults.

In the RTT format you could dock your opponent Sportsmanship points for this. But most people pushed, and are more supportive of Ard Boyz and its WAAC vibe. So, its pretty obvious that people will short play the games if it increases thier chance of winning- or even not losing as bad.

And comparing timed rounds for Warmachine to 2500 pt 40k games is kind of....slowed, seems like an apples/oranges sort of comparison.

Sidstyler wrote:

Telling horde players or any one else they 'Must" learn to play faster is rather foolish. It may be a tourney but it is also a game that folks play for enjoyment.

Agreed. It's a game, not a ****** job.

If getting to turn 5 is really that important to you then might I suggest not playing 2500 fething points?

NM....not going to take the bait.

Pff, this whole thread is bait. "Hey, if you can't play fast, GTF OUTTA MY TOURNAMENTS!"

The point of the thread is to talk about an acknowledged problem in the tournament scene. To say "Just don't play in 2500 pt tournaments" Is absurd, as the fact is there are tournies at those levels, and people will want to attend them. Saying "it's not a job, it's a game" is fine when playing relaxing non tourney games. The thing that people are missing is, that tourney play is not relax and shoot the breeze play. There is nothing wrong with encouraging or reminding your opponent that this is a tourney and we need to play faster than normal to get in a complete game.

GG

At 'ardboyz I only had one game where time was a factor. Game 2 we only played through 4 turns, but it was already a massacre in my favor and playing one or two turns more wouldn't have changed anything (except allowing me to pick up an extra bonus point). Game 3 we played through 6 turns.

Game one though - Mech Orks (me) vs an all-infantry SM force (with one DP). Very nice guy to play against - except his army was all in cases at the start of the round and it took him 32 mintues to deploy. It took me 4 minutes to deploy. We only got through 3 turns. My turns were averaging 12 minutes - I played a grand total of 36 minutes and he had the rest. I recognized that when 2 hours was called we only had time for one more turn and planned accordingly - I moved into position to hold more objectives and got the massacre.

I did mention to him as he was packing up his figures into his cases to move to the next table for the next round that the store had trays he could probably use.

I really don't get people at timed tournaments who pack up their figures between rounds.

I'm mostly getting a vibe from the tourny scene that says "Guard and other horde armies stay away please"

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

Da Boss wrote:Tactical genius has a time component.

Having done over 22 years in combat arms I can tell you as a dead fact tactical genius does not have a time component. Rushing about when people are getting dead is a good way to increment the count.

You’ve misunderstood him. What you just said actually supports his point.

His point was that if you can’t get the right plan put together fast enough to matter, it’s useless. Someone might be a “tactical genius” away from the battlefield with unlimited time on their hands to think and ponder. But it’s not useful in the situation unless the information can be processed and a good plan put into action in a timely manner.

Same deal for tournament wargaming. We have a time limit. If I can’t think and play fast enough to get a complete game in within that time limit (assuming my opponent is using up no more than half the time), I am not a good tournament player. If I'm doing it deliberately, I'm a bad sport. This is the only checkbox on the Adepticon Sportsmanship list worth a multiple-point deduction. Slow play is simply not appropriate in tournaments.

Most well-organized tournaments nowadays communicate to the players that they are expected to play a full game. To make every effort to get in the entire game-limited number of turns. If your local tournament venue doesn’t, it’s worth speaking to the organizers so they can communicate the point neutrally to all participants.

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:

Frazzled wrote:Faster doesn't equal better, just faster. You as a musician should also know that.

True, but who is better the one who can play both fast and slowly, or the one who can only play slowly? The ability to play faster does mean you're better.

P.S. Dream Theater owns us all.

Only if you sacrifice none of your technique and accuracy in order to play faster (as a musician). If you sacrifice either, you're not better merely because you have faster fingers.

Andres Segovia is an example of playing both fast and slow, without losing anything in the faster speeds. Also, he, unlike so many of the current rock guitarists, does more than merely playing arpeggios, scales, or taps in order to seemingly increase speed of playing, or merely fretting a chord with the left hand and picking away quickly with the right (without changing chords). If you watch Segovia, he is often changing his chord fretting with almost every note he picks with his right hand. Unfortunately, if you don't appreciate classical guitar, you probably wouldn't like Segovia.

Anyway, to topic, I think the best way to address it is to not merely put the issue on the other player, even if he/she is solely at fault.

If, after a turn or two, I feel that my opponent is foot-dragging, I would say something like, "Oh, wow! We only have an hour to play and we just finished turn two. We really need to hurry up." During my turns, I would make an effort to demonstrate how I'm trying to hurry up by making my moves and decisions decisively without undue contemplation. I would continue to mention the movement of the clock, and try to demonstrate that I am sincerely concerned that we will not finish the game; I'd try to appear anxious rather than annoyed. Unfortunately, I think that merely saying, "Hey, hurry up" would result in sportsmanship dings.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Oh, another thought. Anyone think it might be interesting to develop a chess-clock type device that you could set to, say, one hour limit per side? I wouldn't say that someone that uses all their time before the end of the game loses, like in speed chess, but there could be some other penalties, like scenario points or something?

To address the point about thinking faster. The human brain is an amazing thing. If you teach it to think faster it will adapt. I know this for a fact as in some of my jobs I have had to react fast to solve problem's which if I didn't could literaly cost my company millions. I had to practive thinking fast on small problems to get my brain adjusted to thinking quick. I'm sure the military trains their men to do the same thing.

Sure you may miss a few moves, at first, while you are getting your brain adjusted to the quickness factor, but you can practice this skill in nontourney settings, even using a chess timer to check yourself.

GG


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Saldiven wrote:Andres Segovia is an example of playing both fast and slow, without losing anything in the faster speeds. Also, he, unlike so many of the current rock guitarists, does more than merely playing arpeggios, scales, or taps in order to seemingly increase speed of playing, or merely fretting a chord with the left hand and picking away quickly with the right (without changing chords). If you watch Segovia, he is often changing his chord fretting with almost every note he picks with his right hand. Unfortunately, if you don't appreciate classical guitar, you probably wouldn't like Segovia.

As a guitarist I love classical guitar. Not necesarily listening to it in the car or anything, but I love watching it live as I'm amazed at the skill involved, much like bluegrass guitar.

GG

Saldiven wrote:Anyway, to topic, I think the best way to address it is to not merely put the issue on the other player, even if he/she is solely at fault.

If, after a turn or two, I feel that my opponent is foot-dragging, I would say something like, "Oh, wow! We only have an hour to play and we just finished turn two. We really need to hurry up." During my turns, I would make an effort to demonstrate how I'm trying to hurry up by making my moves and decisions decisively without undue contemplation. I would continue to mention the movement of the clock, and try to demonstrate that I am sincerely concerned that we will not finish the game; I'd try to appear anxious rather than annoyed. Unfortunately, I think that merely saying, "Hey, hurry up" would result in sportsmanship dings.

Yep. This is usually the best practice. Sometimes an inexperienced or not-usually-a-tournament-player player will solicit suggestions for how to speed up play, too. When appropriate I occasionally help out more directly, if my opponent is willing. Maybe helping assemble the appropriate number of dice for a big roll, or using my fingers or dice to count the results while they roll several batches. Or even helping move large units; as occasionally horde army players could use a hand. You have to be very careful to make sure you’re obeying their instructions/best interest in moving the models, though.

Best results for me have come from being polite and engaged with the TO and judges in a tournament. I ask how they will handle issues like stalling, so I will know when to find them. Almost invariably, TO's have been quite firm about players who deliberately slow play. I'm sure they have been victims of it before, but they care mostly because they want their events to run smoothly and on time.

The same approach with my opponents is also a big help. I'm 45 years old and a father, so I've gotten pretty good at spotting heel draggers and sneaky people (you kids know who you are!). If I offer a handshake and my name, give my opponent my list and ask for his, and propose terrain effects and ground rules, right away I'm letting him understand I intend to move the game along. If you wait till late turn two or three to make a complaint, it's too late to save the game for yourself.

In the end, 2500 point tournies will not result in 6 turns of play among all the matches one might get unless a lot of time is allocated or a time is set inbetween matches for something else that the longer matches can use to finish their match or we just end the game at a set time which is what most tournies do now.

This means do not plan for getting any turns past 3 in most matches and be happy when you do get to all the turns.

There are slow players and no law against it. Horde armies take longers, and game rule changes can increase game time needed.

Getting pissed at a slow horde player, or worse a new player who may never come back after what he feels is harrassment is self defeating to the game in the long run.

Face it, some tournies are heading into a storm over this.

How they weather it will make for interesting reading in the future.

Lets hope not too much cargo (newer players) is lost in the voyage.

Automatically Appended Next Post:

Saldiven wrote:Andres Segovia is an example of playing both fast and slow, without losing anything in the faster speeds. Also, he, unlike so many of the current rock guitarists, does more than merely playing arpeggios, scales, or taps in order to seemingly increase speed of playing, or merely fretting a chord with the left hand and picking away quickly with the right (without changing chords). If you watch Segovia, he is often changing his chord fretting with almost every note he picks with his right hand. Unfortunately, if you don't appreciate classical guitar, you probably wouldn't like Segovia.

As a guitarist I love classical guitar. Not necesarily listening to it in the car or anything, but I love watching it live as I'm amazed at the skill involved, much like bluegrass guitar.

GG

"I had to practive thinking fast on small problems to get my brain adjusted to thinking quick. I'm sure the military trains their men to do the same thing."

We sure do, it is mixed with reaction drills under close combat situtions and it's generally not fun. Most of the time its dangerous and every once in a while deadly.

We do not do it for a game.

No offense to anyone, but this is a game we are talking about.

It may be a tourney, but it is also a gaming tourney and those who think fun should be sacrificied over reaction , or reaction speed are too close to the trees.

The solution for fun and full competitivness is either less points or more time for matches, it really is that simple.

Would you really like to win a tourney if the method in which you rushed your opponents caused them to quit the hobby?

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

It may be a tourney, but it is also a gaming tourney and those who think fun should be sacrificied over reaction , or reaction speed are too close to the trees.

I ond't know what that means, but its sounds great!

Filthy stinking trees...

This happened to a friend of mine during a tourney. He fought the "intentional slow gamer." Now this guy is well-known to pull these tricks so he'll win (he plays a DakkaFex nid army so he'll win while still being a slow), and managed to pull a draw while my friend could have won if this guy had played faster.

This is also the guy responsible for getting a WFB tourney cancelled at my FLGS because everyone else was getting tired of his need to win.

I haven't seen my friend since that tourney, I'm assuming this guy might be responsible for my friend quitting 40k.

Nurglitch wrote:Filthy stinking trees...

LOL

Cover save?

Nofasse 'Eadhunta wrote:This happened to a friend of mine during a tourney. He fought the "intentional slow gamer." Now this guy is well-known to pull these tricks so he'll win (he plays a DakkaFex nid army so he'll win while still being a slow), and managed to pull a draw while my friend could have won if this guy had played faster.

This is also the guy responsible for getting a WFB tourney cancelled at my FLGS because everyone else was getting tired of his need to win.

I haven't seen my friend since that tourney, I'm assuming this guy might be responsible for my friend quitting 40k.

Thus the other side of the coin is cast.........

I.E. one side of the coin = speeding up play may cause newbies to quit

The other side = slow playing may cause players to quit.

Not saying I totally agree with either one mind you.


GG

"The other side = slow playing may cause players to quit."

Do you mean slow playing or running out of time for the points allocated?

The second part (after the word "or") is easily fixable.

BrookM wrote:I'm mostly getting a vibe from the tourny scene that says "Guard and other horde armies stay away please"

The point I have been trying to make is that because of horde armies tournaments either need to increase the time for each round, or decrease their points. Tournament organizers seem oblivious to the need to get in a full game and have unrealistic point levels and time.

But since the tournament organizers will not change point limits or time, if you are playing a horde, you better play fast.

People want to play a full game of 40k, and are frustrated when they can’t. I play shooting armies that sit back and shoot for 4 turns and then I move out to claim objectives. Is it fair to me that I lose every game because orks are all over the objectives in turns 3 and 4 and if the game goes short I automatically lose?

In another thread I pointed out that BoLSCon has 2 hour rounds at 2000 points. It is unrealistic to think that you can get in a 2000 point game in 2 hours with a horde army.

If you quit 40K because of one tourney you've other issues with the game besides a slow player frankly.

I am thinking of new players and yes 3 rude opponented in 3 rounds would do it I think for a lot of new players, espically if it is observerd to be the typical response, you do not agree?

I'm thinking it would make me reconsider tournaments.

Wait a rude opponent in each game? Sure it wasn't him?

Not an actual event I am just saying what if..

Sorry to confuse.

Understand now, belay my earlier comment.

This is not as much of an issue as KP imbalance, but when you add the two together it basically means your playing the whole game on a razor and your opponent can lay comfortably in their lazy boy.

I would just forfeit the match, and take the loss quite frankly; win at all costs is just not applicable to WH40k. In smaller games specifically IG can pull tricks that would make you pull out your hair, and orks can nearly always get the assault, and end the game because you just lost the one KP that would have won you the game, AND the other player took more than 75% of the game to play.

I could care less about opinions on this, it is flat out cheating, and if the tourney coordinators don't do anything about it I can either play elsewhere or just quit the game entirely, it is my decision.

Organizers definitely are responsible to allocate proper times for their rounds, to intelligently assess their audience, and to communicate effectively with their attendees.

When I ran a series of tournaments at a store where I knew there would be several new players in attendance, and players for whom 40k was not their primary game, I stayed down at the 1500pt level and allocated 2.5 hrs per round.

With experienced players, 2 hrs is more than enough for 1500pts. And 2.25 or 2.5 hrs works fine for larger games. On Saturday only one of my games had to end on turn 5. In the other two we got six turns with time to spare. I was fortunately not playing any horde armies, though my first round opponent had a lot of infantry and was not very experienced.

as the fact is there are tournies at those levels, and people will want to attend them.

And those people wanting to play them need to come to a few realizations first. You can't play 2 hour games in a 2500 point tournament and make it to turn 7. Even if you can, most people obviously don't feel like playing that god-damned fast. If you want to ensure that you play a full game, then you need to:

1) Play fewer points.
2) Play longer games.

And apparently, no one is willing to do either one, everyone wants to bust out their entire model collection and rush through a game in 3 minutes flat.

If you insist on playing tournaments at this level, with huge games and no time to play them in, then you'll just have to learn to deal with slow play or try to get the TO's to do smaller tournaments. And like it's been said time and again, the game is supposedly the most balanced at the 1500 point level anyway, so if trying to find out who the "best" is so imperative then that's the way to do it. 1500 point games, with plenty of time to finish the whole game.

To address the point about thinking faster. The human brain is an amazing thing. If you teach it to think faster it will adapt. I know this for a fact as in some of my jobs I have had to react fast to solve problem's which if I didn't could literaly cost my company millions. I had to practive thinking fast on small problems to get my brain adjusted to thinking quick. I'm sure the military trains their men to do the same thing.

Sure you may miss a few moves, at first, while you are getting your brain adjusted to the quickness factor, but you can practice this skill in nontourney settings, even using a chess timer to check yourself.

You keep trying to apply this idea to 40k, but you've utterly failed to convince me why 40k is so god-damned serious that it warrants this kind of thinking.

I really don't give a gak if it's a tournament or not, the reason I play this game at all is to try and relax, to get my mind off high pressure bs like that and just chill. 40k is a game, even at the tournament level it is only a game, and the prize payouts at these tournaments are NEVER worth that kind of stress. This is not life and death, there aren't millions of dollars on the line, it's plastic fething toys and dice. I don't need to play fast, and this thread so far has done feth all to convince me otherwise.

Not to mention that comparing this game to competitive chess or even real life military tacticians is just outright laughable. 40k is not meant to be that damn competitive (and it certainly isn't that important), if that's what you're after then you need to be playing chess instead, methinks.

Would you really like to win a tourney if the method in which you rushed your opponents caused them to quit the hobby?

I'm afraid a lot of people here simply wouldn't care. The attitude that winning is all that matters seems more and more prevalent in society now and it's a little disheartening. Doesn't matter how many people get stepped on, so long as you're the one on top.

The other side = slow playing may cause players to quit.

INTENTIONAL slow playing. I hope you didn't miss that part.

@ sidstyler

So your the #2 type of tourney player I assume. I agree with you points about lower point games. However I disagree with your suggestion that playing faster is somehow not funner or somehow makes the game suck. It MAY be for you that this is the case, but it also MAY be just you being hard headed about the whole thing? Also it has nothing to do with being so serious, it has to do with just trying to encourage people to realize that their slow playing has consequences, and the game is not just about themselves but their opponent as well. Your oponent has the right to a complete game, and you are obligated to help them achieve that. If you willingly sign up, for a tourney of 2,000 pts in 2 hrs, you have a responsibility to yourself and your opponent to try to complete a full game. No one forced you to sign up for the tourney right?

GG

generalgrog wrote:@ sidstyler

So your the #2 type of tourney player I assume. I agree with you points about lower point games. However I disagree with your suggestion that playing faster is somehow not funner or somehow makes the game suck. It MAY be for you that this is the case, but it also MAY be just you being hard headed about the whole thing? Also it has nothing to do with being so serious, it has to do with just trying to encourage people to realize that their slow playing has consequences, and the game is not just about themselves but their opponent as well. Your oponent has the right to a complete game, and you are obligated to help them achieve that. If you willingly sign up, for a tourney of 2,000 pts in 2 hrs, you have a responsibility to yourself and your opponent to try to complete a full game. No one forced you to sign up for the tourney right?

GG

The responsibility thing is a good point, I wouldn't really want to be playing inexperienced players at a tournament (no offense), and that is really the only reason I would be okay with someone taking ages. My first games were with a friend who was getting back into the game, I was just trying to enjoy myself. Long story short the game ended up taking somewhere around 5 hours total, not counting pointless arguments over rules we didn't even fully understand. Taking longer made our game miserable, and skipping a few things here and there for a friendly game is just fine. In a tournament I would have gotten angry about the confusion, regardless of who's fault it was.

In all honesty though playing in a 10-person tourney with 2 IG armies and 3 Ork armies is really no fun if both of these types of armies are played by total dips. They can basically eliminate everything that isn't 5th ed. and that would be most of the game. When you add all this stuff up, lit just makes no sense how these problems are not addressed sooner. I am not sure how the Ard' boyz tourney was set up ( I did not play, 2500 points are you freaking kidding me???) but I have heard a lot of people complaining about the Ard' boyz tournies in general, apparently they got a few things right this year though.

It was 2 and 1/2 hours each round. At the site I was many armies did not finish but did get to round 3 at least.

That "was" 2500 points too, LOL.

Almost all of the games that did not make it to completion involved Horde armies and/ or players inexperienced with either their army under 5th edition rule changes or more commonly their opponents armies.

A large tourney with players who do not know each other is going to lead to longer rounds in my opinion as well.

Why is it that the people saying slow play in tournies is OK, always seem to have the mindset that the other person should just deal with it? Tournaments are setup within a set of rules, time limits, and regulations that are made to level the field for all armies. In a tournament situation where there are set rules you just should not be able to pull the "It's just a game and I will play how I want" card.

Simple fact is the only way to fix it to where it is FAIR FOR BOTH PLAYERS is to use something like the clock and allot 1:15 per player, and if you run over your time into the other players you sacrifice pts for it. Simple as that.

Also I doubt the "New Player" thing came into play too much here. With the points limit so high, barring people using other peoples armies I doubt they had the models for the points. Or I should say the shouldn't have, but then again there were paper drop pods and cardboard tanks floating about when WYSIWYG was stated MANY times, so who knows.

Ard Boyz this year seems to be very well run from the GW side of things. And it's the 3rd year so things are finally starting to get smoother now that they have an idea of what they are doing.

It all depends on what your standards are, seen lots of people abusing this with their shooty armies (sometimes hordes, sometimes just shooty marines etc.) If they slow roll you, they will shoot you to bits and you wont be able to use their weakness against them. Even if you make it into CC you will have a hard time making up the kill count before the time is up. Add to that the fact that these people always play ultra slow thus making it impossible to tell if they are cheating, or just slow.

To everyone who sais: Adapt and overcome, you dont know what your talking about. You can beat the clock and if the guy doesnt listen to you asking him to play faster (and the trournament doesnt have a rule fore it) You are dead by default, no excuses or anything, just the way it will play out.

Honestly the hostility from some of the people advocating its okay to play slow in this thread is kinda of amazing...

anyways...

Playing slow in a tournament is cheating. Should you be forced to play faster than comfortable? Nope. But if it takes you 2 hours to get through deployment and turn 1 honestly You should be kicked out of the tournament. Honestly even at 2.5k points if you cant make it to turn 4 in under 3 hours you are slow. I have seen plenty of horde players (IG/ORKS/NIDS/LOTD) make it to turn 4 in under 3 hours with that many points.

Most good players I know can finish a 2kpoint match in under 3 hours 6 turns played. 2.5k is more like 5 turns played.

The 2-3 turns played in 'ard boyz this year was unacceptable. It favors shooty armies and penalizes hand to hand armies.

I literally saw a 50 model marine army stall first turn decision, stall which side to deploy on, stall deployment and then roll each shot individually after spending 5-10 minutes thinking about which units his squads would shoot at, considering his opponent had only 3 units on board at start which were identical it was ridiculous. He literally stalled so that when the game ended it was the end of his turn 2 and the other player didnt get past their turn 1.


Shooty armies benefit from unfinished games (games that didnt make it to turn 5) because they are effective from turn 1, all hand to hand armies and especially foot slogger ones need to spend a least 1-2 turns just to get into hand to hand, then it takes them 1-2 turns to make up for their shooting casualties.

Honestly I think if a player is stalling they should lose regardless of their score. If they stall for more than one round in a tournament they should be counted as losing all their games for the day, they can still play they just dont win. Afterall if you play slow and take your time and shouldn't be told how to play because its just for fun you don't need to win a tourney your just having fun playing, right?

and for the people who don't like being told how to play.

I dont like being told I have to make a shooty horde army to compete with the 1-3 round max tourney scene, sorry.

The game is designed to last a certain number of turns before random turns set in, army balance is designed that way. taking that out by making the game last less turns is wrong.

I 100% disrespect people playing overly slow when they do not need to with me, I don't care if your OCD or want to tell me the story of how your model earned his blue striped pants, don't walk away in the middle of a turn to go get a bag of chips and a soda and talk to your friend about how your a tool.

Get back to the table so I can continue killing your models.

Deleted by frazzled as being inappropriate.

deleted as responding to above inappropriate post.

Christ, can't we all just wait until after BoLSCon has passed?

I have played enough 40K to know the stats of most models, and as such I know what I'm going to roll before I roll . . . plus learning all the table helps . . .

Also in other games where there are cards with stats on, having a look at the opponents cards while waiting is also useful for speeding up play.

But then again, admittedly I have slowed down play, to spite the other person as they wanted it played quicker, to unsettle their rhythm as it gives me an advantage, or to waste time. But in the tourneys I play we always play that 10 minutes before time up last turn is announced, this means that even if players go over the time limit whatever turn they are on, it is completed to allow both players to have the same amount of turns.

Deleted by Frazzled as hostile.
Internet tough guys who shout 'cheater!' at the drop of a hat set me off.

There are a wide variety of factors that would cause a game not to make five turns.
Your conclusion is not supportable.

blaktoof wrote:Honestly the hostility from some of the people advocating its okay to play slow in this thread is kinda of amazing...

anyways...

Playing slow in a tournament is cheating.

You have got to be kidding us.........

it should be worth noting im only talking about playing slower than you need to for the amount of models you have.

I dont expect a IG player or ork player with 180 models on table to finish their first movement phase in 5 minutes, but I expect them to finish it in under 45minutes.

im talking about purposefully playing slow to reduce game length.

Mmmm, there we are in agreement.

For future reference I'm just going to ask every opponent every game what turn they want to get to, and remind them if we're falling short of that. It still seems ridiculous that someone would try for anything less than a full game. And by not trying specifically for a full one, you are passively trying not to finish.

On the flip side, as GW allows n00b players to field large hordely things, then a GW tournament should build in enough time for such n00bs to play their hordes.

this is a problem for new players. Typically new players don't know the rules and spend longer thinking about whether or not to do something with a unit. And some new players are interested in hordey armies (orks come in AoBR, IG is the "new codex on the block")

You can't really tell someone that is going as fast as they can but that's still painfully slow that they need to go faster. AFAIK no one has had the balls or gaul or whatever you want to think of it as to say "sorry you don't know the rules enough and are disqualified" to new players that may be slower because of lack of understanding of whats going in in the game, or with their models.

In my experience the only thing that counteracts this is GW marketing. The starter box set is basically foot slogging orks with 3 deffkoptas versus marines with terminators and a dreadnaught. For pretty much its kinda hard to win against the marines that come in the box with the orks that come in the box. That said most new players like to win and tend to pick the marines over the horde army (orks).

In 18 years of playing 40k I have only seen one new player who wanted to play the horde army as their first army. and that kid was 8. His army was awesome and had all kind of scratch built fw-esque fighter bommaz and stuff that was not tourney legal and he wanted to do stuff like steal you units bikes to ride around on after he killed your biker unit. He never played in a tourney and honestly I loved playing that kid occasionally for his crazy as hell made up rules.

I don't think anyone has a problem with the newbs (maybe the noobs). I think the problem is not having a gold standard to know when someone is slow playing or just playing "casually" in a way that benefits their army. Granted I benefitted some from my opponent's slow play at Ard Boyz, but it was still annoying. I wanna play games.

I've been playing since 1993 and I still play abysmally slow. I solved my slow tourney playing by not playing in tourneys anymore

JohnHwangDD wrote:On the flip side, as GW allows n00b players to field large hordely things, then a GW tournament should build in enough time for such n00bs to play their hordes.

Indeed, especially when GW puts in their rulebooks that tournaments are a great place to learn how to play the game and meet other nice people.

Huh? They said that?

That's what they list in the back of their rulebooks.

First, I will start with this. I, usually, am a slow player. I play very many casual games, so there is no real need to rush.

But, in a tourney, I do believe that

A: You should play the game quickly.

Don't rush, but play at a relatively quick speed.

B: You should know your list in and out.

You should have practiced with your list, your need to search up rules or somesuch should be limited. (I'm not saying you can't look up anything, but doing so more than 20 times is pushing it)

C: Newer players, generally, should enter tourneys with caution.

I'm not saying that new players should avoid tourneys, it's just that if you are going to enter a tourney, you should be prepared.

Overall, I don't play in tourneys so I might be wrong. To each his own.

Blackmoor wrote:

BrookM wrote:I'm mostly getting a vibe from the tourny scene that says "Guard and other horde armies stay away please"

The point I have been trying to make is that because of horde armies tournaments either need to increase the time for each round, or decrease their points. Tournament organizers seem oblivious to the need to get in a full game and have unrealistic point levels and time.

But since the tournament organizers will not change point limits or time, if you are playing a horde, you better play fast.

People want to play a full game of 40k, and are frustrated when they can’t. I play shooting armies that sit back and shoot for 4 turns and then I move out to claim objectives. Is it fair to me that I lose every game because orks are all over the objectives in turns 3 and 4 and if the game goes short I automatically lose?

In another thread I pointed out that BoLSCon has 2 hour rounds at 2000 points. It is unrealistic to think that you can get in a 2000 point game in 2 hours with a horde army.

What about the other side of this coin?
What about the shooty armies that spend a hour setting up and thinking about every shot to try to stall so that the hoard cant waaaa and kick there punk ass.
I have had people stall me and im on them like a rash, if I can move 150+ orks faster than your grey knights(gay knights for shane)then you are either a beginner and I would be glad to help you or are trying to stall and get a minor win on me.

Personally, I like the ideas that have been put forth of offering to help deploy, help move, help get dice ready. The guy can always say no, but I think it's a good idea to at least offer, and it also is a not so subtle way of letting your oppoenent realize how important getting a full game is to you.

GG

Ok
I got one here
I will play orks with 3 loota units ,3 units of cannons ,1 units of gun truks and two unit of death copters,2 big meks with shock attack guns and some boys in trukks
If I go first I take 1 hour + to set up and than the rest of the time to do my turn, if its kill points I easilly have 2 + and get a major win if its objective based I hwill hold three and you will have zero my copters will contest the others with you.
so at the worst I get a minor win and try and pick up a bonus point or two.
If you go first I just take the rest of the time to do my first turn.

so this would be considered goood tactics since there is nothing in the rule book about stalling

guard could do this even easier with valkeries and all there fire power.
so my sportsmanship would suck but i win so who cares?????????

there needs to be a common sence approach to this....

I have moved almost 200 bugs faster than a deathwing army once, i was like you got to be kidding me.....

whaty answers do we have for this, minus points if you dont finish your games???
I play hoards fast so anyone can do it, time isnt the answer its people not playing the game.

I don't know how many times I have been thinking to my self, you have three units left what are you going over in your mind for the last five minutes...........who knows.............

thats my thoughts

I had a pretty hard time putting that all together Stormboy97.

Yeah...

I have no problem with people playing slow . . . unless they are purposefully doing so. Sometime you reach a point where you can tell they are just killing time, and you just want to walk round the table and slap them in the face . . . and then it hits me . . . maybe I would be doing the same in their situation.

Krak_kirby wrote: If I offer a handshake and my name, give my opponent my list and ask for his, and propose terrain effects and ground rules, right away I'm letting him understand I intend to move the game along. If you wait till late turn two or three to make a complaint, it's too late to save the game for yourself.

This seems reasonable, non-confrontational and effective.

That being said, if I was playing in a "serious" tourney I would have no problem with a timer. Sure it's "just a game" but no matter what kind of game you're playing there is an unspoken agreement between the players to make it enjoyable for everyone. This is particularly true when playing against strangers. I'm not saying that when the buzzer goes off your turn ends immediately, but I think it's reasonable to use it as a reminder, at least. My enjoyment of the game is no more or less important than my opponent's. If using a timer seems too competitive then maybe a tournament is not for you.

I agree with the folks pointing out that you should know your army in general and list in particular before playing in a tournament.

I play horde-ish IG, and what I've found helpful is to make a plan from the start and stick to it as best as possible. It sounds obvious but from reading this maybe it isn't obvious to everyone. Of course there will be surprises and adjustments will need to be made. However, when I start adjusting too much is when I lose the initiative and start reacting rather than acting. I want to dictate how the battle unfolds, and I find being decisive helps me do that. Besides which, if it turns out my plan was a bad one, taking forever on my turn trying to improvise probably isn't going to change things and it's better to stick with it so I can see where I went wrong rather than flail around prolonging the inevitable. Also it seems like the less 2nd-guessing I do, the better I do.

As for deploying, I think most people probably do this already, but what I tend to do is just put down a sergeant and HW squad then fill in the cannon fodder while my opponent decides where to deploy their next unit, or even as I move them in the 1st turn or during my opponent's 1st movement phase.. If they want to know exactly where a certain unit is, they can just point them out and ask and I can go ahead and fill that one in. When playing a 100 model infantry list I find it helpful.

Also someone mentioned mortars, I've made a double blast template out of clear plastic that is useful for quickly determining wounds from their scatter. In fact if you draw a line through it lengthwise it's easier to line up with the arrow.

I play hoards fast so anyone can do it

First of all, it's "hordes".

Second, that statement is so full of bs it really isn't worth responding to. Needless to say, "If I can do it you can do it" is not a very good argument.

Sidstyler wrote:

I play hoards fast so anyone can do it

First of all, it's "hordes".

Second, that statement is so full of bs it really isn't worth responding to. Needless to say, "If I can do it you can do it" is not a very good argument.

No, it's a perfectly good argument, for a small child . . .

Secondly, the double blast template is a genius idea, *disappears off to the garage to forge a new blast template* . . . mwa ha ha! My creation is complete!!! =p

Yell: "SpeedHammer SpeedHammer!"

I actually used to do this with my friend.. when hed dotter about thinking...

karnaeya wrote:Yell: "SpeedHammer SpeedHammer!"

I actually used to do this with my friend.. when hed dotter about thinking...

So you got beat up a lot playing 40k?

I have no solution to feet draggers.

Other than looking them in the eye and saying..

"My 8 year old brother has an Army very similar to yours. We practiced before the tourney so I could get some skillz...how old is your little brother?"

/jk

The only thing you can do do if the opponent is playing slow, is use their turn to plan your moves, and then play your turn as quick as possible, just to try and average out the time back to something reasonable.

akira5665 wrote:I have no solution to feet draggers.

Other than looking them in the eye and saying..

"My 8 year old brother has an Army very similar to yours. We practiced before the tourney so I could get some skillz...how old is your little brother?"

/jk

Here's the first thing that popped into my head:

"Today is little Timmy's bitrthday. He would have been nine today. I came here to try to take my mind off it. Thanks. WHY TIMMY WHY!!!!"

I had this problem when I went to the GT in 2006, though thankfully with only one opponent. It was infuriating as I had a relatively hordey Nid army, yet I was getting my turns done a lot faster then his small model Nurgal CSM army. He kept doing that thing where he picked a squad, thought about it, then measured the distance, paused, moved one model from the sqd forward, thought some more, then moved it back to where it was, then measured a new distance and moved the squad in another direction entirely. Now if you can imagine him doing that with every squad/vehicle he had. There should be a 'chess' rule in tourny 40K which states once you've moved a model and let go you can't move it back and re-take the move. Even a referee came and watched for a few moments and prompted the guy that he would need to get a move on as time was marching on.
I was on the verge of killing him as we had to end at his turn five (he went first) so I lost a whole turn! It didn't help that the tables either side of us had finished their games long before us.

I'm not a competative gamer usually and I'm going to this years GT for fun, however I am aware of the time limit and I also want as much 'game' as possible per gound. That's why I always try to conduct my turns as efficiently as possible. In terms of getting around the problem I can only suggest friendly prompting of the time if your opponent seems a friendly sort or praying the night before the event that you are one of the lucky ones who doesn't face a slow gamer.

Wannabe Writer wrote:I had this problem when I went to the GT in 2006, though thankfully with only one opponent. It was infuriating as I had a relatively hordey Nid army, yet I was getting my turns done a lot faster then his small model Nurgal CSM army. He kept doing that thing where he picked a squad, thought about it, then measured the distance, paused, moved one model from the sqd forward, thought some more, then moved it back to where it was, then measured a new distance and moved the squad in another direction entirely. Now if you can imagine him doing that with every squad/vehicle he had. There should be a 'chess' rule in tourny 40K which states once you've moved a model and let go you can't move it back and re-take the move. Even a referee came and watched for a few moments and prompted the guy that he would need to get a move on as time was marching on.

Actually in any tournement game I play in, I generally don't let people take back moves. I always thought every one did the same?

GG

I do, but we follow a 4.5 second post-move brainfart window.

I laugh my butt off at this topic, since people try and stall out against my HtH Nidzilla army all the time. Unfortunately, I am experienced enough with my army and my own turns go so fast that I invariably finnish my games with time to spare. In nine games at the Hard Boyz, spanning three oh the years it has ran, I have never failed to end a game with time remaining. If your opponent is stalling, do your thinking during his turn and your turn should go by lightning fast. The new edition has slowed the game down, but you can also build your army to speed things up. In my army, liberal use of implant attack and S10 makes wound allocation go a lot faster against complex units and my practically non existant shooting phase keeps my first two turns to under 2 minutes each, if that. Other armies can do similar things, mostly through agressive play or focused list building.

If I do feel a guy is stalling intentionally, I will imediately stop letting little things like "takebacks" slide and just put more pressure on the person, in general. If they are stalling, then they believe they are losing, which is something you can take advantage of in the game.

For those of you complaining about slow players, remember we're complaining about you too. Are you the loud mouth at the tourny who is constantly harping on how slow another person is? Always with the "are you done yet?" "Can we get to the shooting phase?" Why aren't you done yet? Hurry up hurry up hurry up. Believe me, we hate you for it. The times this has happened to me has been so the offending player can take the majority of the time to plan and play their turns. And if somebody actually brought a chess timer to a tournament with them, I'd probably ask them if they were lost.

I'm one of those people who plays games for the fun of it, I don't want to be the best in the world, I don't even want to be in the top 100 in the world . . . I have a life too, and play games to have fun and relax . . . so when I go to a tourney and someone is playing without the thought of the fun in the game then it pisses me off. . . when people play too competitively that it's no fun, why play? Cos you want to crush the little guy? Winning isn't everything . . . but maybe this has only been my philosophy due to 10 years of Dark Eldar . . . 7 of which went without a win =p

@ Frazzled- lmao.

"Oh, the Humanityyyy!!"

Sarge wrote:For those of you complaining about slow players, remember we're complaining about you too. Are you the loud mouth at the tourny who is constantly harping on how slow another person is? Always with the "are you done yet?" "Can we get to the shooting phase?" Why aren't you done yet? Hurry up hurry up hurry up. Believe me, we hate you for it. The times this has happened to me has been so the offending player can take the majority of the time to plan and play their turns. And if somebody actually brought a chess timer to a tournament with them, I'd probably ask them if they were lost.

So you are complaining about 2 people or so in this thread. I have had games where I said NOTHING, just finished my turns and I still run out of time because of how slow my opponent is.

NOT FAIR!!!

Why would you generalize everyone into a neat little package so you can deliver some sort of group insult. I am confused why people are getting offended when they hear that Swarm armies are slowing my games down. In a tournament I have no choice but to play you, and I will take all the precautions possible to keep the game at a fair pace. If you need 15 minutes more than me per turn, you should really be asking the tournie masters for suggestions on streamlining your process and possibly even setting up rules for swarms in tournies.

I do not like to play swarms in my fun games, I will usually just turn them down because I find the games immensely boring. A speed freaks Ork list is simply not a swarm, whereas a 2000 point foot slogging army with 180 ork boyz most definitely is. So you take 30 minutes every turn, plus the fact that you already have 5-6 nearly unbreakable scoring units, WHAT MORE DO YOU WANT FFS... Those are the armies I am talking about, not the "hybrid" swarms that balance numbers with tactical efficiency. Add in Ghazghull and I have no pity for the new Ork codex swarms, just unfair.

There are a few things which can be done to ensure that players get a full five turns in a tournament:
a) lower the point limits. Two 2500 point horde armies playing a two hour game. Seriously?!?
b) timed turns. Complicated by the need for chess clocks and determining what get counted against each player.
c) summary execution of slow players. I've hemmed and hawed at tournaments, so I know I'd be dead by now. On the plus side, think of all the fun the organizers and judges would get to have, but how do you decide who's a slow player?

solkan wrote:There are a few things which can be done to ensure that players get a full five turns in a tournament:
a) lower the point limits. Two 2500 point horde armies playing a two hour game. Seriously?!?
b) timed turns. Complicated by the need for chess clocks and determining what get counted against each player.
c) summary execution of slow players. I've hemmed and hawed at tournaments, so I know I'd be dead by now. On the plus side, think of all the fun the organizers and judges would get to have, but how do you decide who's a slow player?

They all look exactly like this... no contest.

solkan wrote:There are a few things which can be done to ensure that players get a full five turns in a tournament:
a) lower the point limits. Two 2500 point horde armies playing a two hour game. Seriously?!?
b) timed turns. Complicated by the need for chess clocks and determining what get counted against each player.
c) summary execution of slow players. I've hemmed and hawed at tournaments, so I know I'd be dead by now. On the plus side, think of all the fun the organizers and judges would get to have, but how do you decide who's a slow player?

If a player cannot complete 5 of their own turns in two and a half hours (an average of 20 minutes, including setup time) then they really need to stick to picku games until they can. No offense to newer players, but I am not going to be their 40k tutor during a tournament. I would be happy to show said person the ropes in a pickup game, where time is not a factor, but if you show up to a tournament and your play pace could be charitably described as "glacial", then you frankly do not belong there. Plenty of people can bang out a game in under the assigned time limit with horde armies. I don't lay out an entry fee just so that I can play two turns and eat a minor loss to someone's slow playing horde guard/ork ass. I am especially amazed at people who cannot even seem to coherently deploy their own army and fit it into their deployment zone in a reasonable amount of time. I don't know about you, but this is the first thing I do with an army when I am practicing with it. How the hell can you not know how to fit your own army comfortably into a deployment zone?

Timed turns I cannot agree with, for two reasons. First, turns tend to vary in length throughout the game. A fast moving assault army might be doing nothing but moving the first two turns or a bloodbath battle might have only a handful of models acting in the last couple of turns. Second, the way the assault phase is setup, a lot of decisions and action need to be made by the player who's turn it is not, so there would be room for chicanery on both player's part there. I guess an overall time limit for all turns equal to half the allotted time would be an option, as long as deployment were included.

I agree that timed turns is going too far . . . unless they were unfeasibly long to cover all possibilities . . . but then this would screw up the rest of the game.

But as I said earlier use their long turns to plan your turn, then your turn will take no time at all and the problem is solved. It works for me with a range of armies.

I can't even stand slow playing in friendly environments...

During the enemy turn, I'm planning out my turn. The longest pauses I make might be around 5 seconds to decide whether to Lascannon your Dreadnought or your Land Raider, or maybe to look up a rule query.

I can't stand people who take half an hour to get through what takes me three minutes.

Case in point - half past five last monday, my club's "Captain Slow" was preparing to play. The board was ready, his models were half set up, his opponent was waiting to deploy.
In two hours I found an opponent, agreed to play Planetstrike, wrote a 1,500pt list, borrowed everything we needed (terrain, dice, etc), set up the board, played a six turn game and packed away again. Captain Slow was on turn four.

I find a slower paced game can be quite relaxing in a friendly environment. Play a game, have a chat with your friends, relax after a hard days graft.

Obviously this changes in a tournament environment, then I'm not only playing to have fun, I'm playing to not finish in the bottom half, and to actually try and get enough turns in to reach a suitable conclusion in the game.

On the other hand if I'm up against someone who is completely comfortable playing at 100mph, but when the pace drops frustration creeps in, and mistakes are made, then surely it is a sound tactical decision to make some delays, get the game going at a pace that unsettles my opponents rhythm. It's all about gaining that tactical advantage.

One nice thing about slow-play in a friendly environment is that it gives you time to make a sandwich, read your opponents army list/comic book collection, and/or have a smoke.

lol sometimes I walk round the tables and have a look at the other games going on while they do their movement phase, makes for a nice relaxed atmosphere and makes a nice social area =]

Frazzled wrote:
1. brought a timer and tried to keep me to THEIR standard. I'd really slow down for that one. If the TO used one that would be cool however (did that in a nontourney pre-Apoc multiplayer game and it worked great).

A good chess clock can be set to record total elapsed time rather than setting a turn time limit. Then, when you're half-way through the game and he's used twice as much time as you, you can point it out.

TBH, I don't know why tournies aren't run on clocks just like chess - both players should have the same amount of time to play.

Scott-S6 wrote:TBH, I don't know why tournies aren't run on clocks just like chess - both players should have the same amount of time to play.

Too simplistic a view point. Unlike in chess, my opponent must do various things during my turn which may take notable time. (Wound allocation & saves for complex units comes immediately to mind.) And who is "billed" for CC time in any given turn? (Why is it that my hypothetical ork opponent is rolling his models individually in my turn, and all together during his? Could it have anything to do with this hypothetical chess clock, where my time is getting rapidly diminished during his attacks?)

Wait, you're saying the problem with using a clock, to solve the problem of slow play, is that your opponent might slow play you?

Nurglitch wrote:Wait, you're saying the problem with using a clock, to solve the problem of slow play, is that your opponent might slow play you?

Hmmm... I think we are making this too complicated, a clock is a solution not a problem .

I doubt there needs to be anything besides allotted time limits. If someone goes to a tournament with a huge swarm, they should know how to use it. There could be special instances when someone really (like, REALLY!) needs an extra 5 minutes per turn, but that would be rare indeed.

You chose the army, and quite frankly it is unfair to say that you should not be "penalized" for YOUR choice, whereas you have no problem taking extra time from your opponents game. See the double standard here?

Just learn to be fast or simply do not play at tournies, I think that is more than fair.

Holy cow!! I actually agree with something Wrex said...the apocalypse is truly nigh.


GG

I'm not a slow player, I don't think I've ever had a problem finishing a game at a tournament in the allotted time that I can remember, but I know that if someone showed up with a chess clock and expected it to be used for turn timing, I'd say "good game", and pack it up right there. That sends all kinds of crazy signals and suggestions that I really would find incredibly offensive. Intentionally slow is one thing, but other than that people are just there to play, and they may need some more time than someone who is used to playing 3-4 games a week.

The most direct compromise is evenly shared time limits.

Not sure how someone would get offended by this, it is two people sharing a set amount of time, in a Tournament no less.

In a friendly game there are no requirements but what each player can agree to. Therefore no clock would ever really be needed.

The insinuation of putting a clock down and expecting an opponent to use it is that A: they may intentionally try and stall the game even if they are not, B: they are dumber than you, C: your time is more precious than theirs, D: expecting them to play to your speed even if it puts them at a disadvantage and may not be appropriate to the army.

People come to play and have fun, not to get badgered about how they go about playing their game. If there's a huge issue leave it the to TO's to decide.

Sorry, but certain armies will play slower than others. I'm not saying that they shouldn't be moderately quick about things when able, but expecting a Green Horde army to get through turns as fast as Space Marines, or Guard to get through movement and shooting as fast as Eldar, is a bit much. My Chaos Space Marines can probably get through all of their turns faster than my IG army can get through 3 turns of shooting as there are far more actions to perform, expecting the IG player to compress their playing time just to match the CSM army would be unfair.

With Player types 2 and 4 you can probably make the game get in under time just through going fast with your own turns if you are up to it, and with new players you can help them by saying "you need 4's for this, 5's for the next roll" and helping them move units and suggesting better methods of doing things and stuff like that, speeding things up. It shouldn't be too much of an issue, I've never seen it become an issue except for one new player who was playing an entirely different army than what they started with as they were encouraged to play in the event but didn't have a big enough army of their own.

Now, I think it should be reasonable that nobody is intentionally stalling, and that a player should be able to make it through at least 5 turns in 120 minutes in a 1500pt game, but leave time enforcement up the the TO's.


I personally have never had a game where time was really an issue. I don't think I've ever failed to get to at least turn 6 in a 1750 tournament in 2 hours.

It sounds like the horde armies need extra time that is not subtracted from their opponents.

This is not asking too much, I have lost a tournament before simply because people took too long. It is unfair to me and other players, why should the horde armies not make a concession as well?

We are talking about a tournament here, I keep hearing situations that would better be applied to a friendly environment. Not to say a tournament can't be friendly, just that there is a certain level of game-play that most would expect.

Vaktathi wrote:I personally have never had a game where time was really an issue. I don't think I've ever failed to get to at least turn 6 in a 1750 tournament in 2 hours.

The Ard' boyz tournament was 2500 points in 2 1/2 hours, I think that was a huge mistake. I have played 1000 point games in 5 hours among friends, and we had fun, but it just took too long and I got bored. If I ever actually get into Apocalypse I will have to play with people that know how to finish the game up quickly. I would mainly be playing for the sheer spectacle of the game.

The whole clock thing is a bit out of proportion really, I wear a watch, and clocks reside on walls. If the tournament really needs a timer for specific games that could be a good idea, but this would be more of a guideline so to speak that was presented directly to all of the participants; I am not talking about horde armies only, we talked earlier about the different types of stallers.

Something along the lines of this.

Horde armies wouldn't be the ONLY army to be affected by this, it would just be a 50/50 time share, JUST to make it fair. If players feel that someone is taking them too long, they CAN ask their opponent to stick to their general time frame. If someone continues to hog the whole game, note it, and the game will be reviewed later.

I just wanted to ask, are you guys this obsessed with speed when it comes to every other facet of your life? When you go out to dinner with your girlfriend do you choke your meal down and then try to rush her through hers, offering to cut her food up or put the spoon in her mouth for her? When you go home and lay it to her that night (if she lets you after that bs anyway) do you try to bust a nut in 30 seconds? And is she impressed?

And all you guys talking about chess clocks and gak, maybe you should be playing chess instead of 40k? It's a far more competitive game and the rules don't have a million fething holes in them at that.

Sidstyler wrote:I just wanted to ask, are you guys this obsessed with speed when it comes to every other facet of your life? When you go out to dinner with your girlfriend do you choke your meal down and then try to rush her through hers, offering to cut her food up or put the spoon in her mouth for her? When you go home and lay it to her that night (if she lets you after that bs anyway) do you try to bust a nut in 30 seconds? And is she impressed?

And all you guys talking about chess clocks and gak, maybe you should be playing chess instead of 40k? It's a far more competitive game and the rules don't have a million fething holes in them at that.

What does the rest of my life have to do with a tournament of WH40k?

Are you saying that asking to share a pre-allotted amount of time evenly between two people as a general rule for tournaments would be a bad thing to enforce?

Are you always such a nice guy?

Are you saying that asking to share a pre-allotted amount of time evenly between two people as a general rule for tournaments would be a bad thing to enforce?

Nah, I just think putting a fething clock on the table is a douche move.

Augustus wrote:I often wondered what a tourney would be like if they (EDIT organizers) wrote the armies themselves, and published them, and the players had to bring one of the published armies?

I assume people wouldn't like it, but wouldn't that be a great way to level the army issue?

So, would you have to purchase all the models for this event yourself? I wouldn't mind playing in a tournament like this, if the TO provided me with the army to play with that is.

At last year's 'Ard Boyz tournament I faced a 'Nid player that was unforgivably slow. We ran out of time at the bottom of T2. No comp/sportsmanship score so no recourse...

olympia wrote:At last year's 'Ard Boyz tournament I faced a 'Nid player that was unforgivably slow. We ran out of time at the bottom of T2. No comp/sportsmanship score so no recourse...

You should've alerted a judge.

Better yet, you should have fired some rounds into the air. It would defintiely have speeded up things.

Actually a tourney where everyone had the same list from the same battlebox would be cool. I might actually go to that one.

'Ard boyz is simply too crunched for time anyways. I can never understand why set up time is part of the game time. It takes horde army players 30 minutes to set up

Janthkin wrote:

Scott-S6 wrote:TBH, I don't know why tournies aren't run on clocks just like chess - both players should have the same amount of time to play.

Too simplistic a view point. Unlike in chess, my opponent must do various things during my turn which may take notable time. (Wound allocation & saves for complex units comes immediately to mind.) And who is "billed" for CC time in any given turn? (Why is it that my hypothetical ork opponent is rolling his models individually in my turn, and all together during his? Could it have anything to do with this hypothetical chess clock, where my time is getting rapidly diminished during his attacks?)

I'd say that this is another example of why 40K is poorly suited to competitive play.

It's not that 40k is unsuited to competitive play, it's that the proposed solution isn't addressing the underlying issue.

Proposed solution: if a game is unfinished when time is called, both players receive '0' for the round, unless both players agree to score it anyway. If two of your games go unfinished in a tournament, you're disqualified, unless at least one of those opponents is willing to speak for you.

Too harsh?

If I face a slow player I try and take my turns faster to get the rounds in that I need to set up the win . If he is slow playing on purpse I tank him in marks sports , comp , and painting , so takes his chances of taking the win for over all away .

Slow playing on purpose is cheesy and a real douch thing to do to someone who want to get in a good fair game .

I've never faced a slow player in a tournament, but I have faced slow players in friendly games . . . it's not their fault, they're not doing it on purpose, they just take more time to think about things, I wouldn't advise them to play to a time limit as it just wouldn't work.

Janthkin:

Someone else (BrookM?) suggested something similar, and I think that suggestion and your suggestion are the best ones on the thread because they recognize that 40k is co-operative as much as it is competitive. Penalizing both players for not finishing in the time limit means that neither player has an incentive to slow play each other's turns, and that they both have incentive to finish the game on time. I think it would also discourage slow-players from entering tournaments until they learn to play at full speed.

The only thing I suggested was that horde armies and newbies aren't welcome one bit at these events due to large number of models, slow play and fiddly new rule systems.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
I also stated that the biggest babies should wait until the results are in from BoLS-con, the big spark to all this discussion.

Blackmoor wrote:I think if you can't reach turn #5 you should both get a loss.

That way you both have an incentive to hurry up, and if one person is winning they can't stall.

It turns out it was Blackmoor. "Blackmoor" and "BrookM" both have bs and ms in them...

Nurglitch wrote:Janthkin:

Someone else (BrookM?) suggested something similar, and I think that suggestion and your suggestion are the best ones on the thread because they recognize that 40k is co-operative as much as it is competitive. Penalizing both players for not finishing in the time limit means that neither player has an incentive to slow play each other's turns, and that they both have incentive to finish the game on time. I think it would also discourage slow-players from entering tournaments until they learn to play at full speed.

The problem is that a truly jerk-like opponent who was going to lose anyway could take you down with him, but that's the sort of player that tournament organizers need to locate and eject anyway.

Janthkin wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:Janthkin:

Someone else (BrookM?) suggested something similar, and I think that suggestion and your suggestion are the best ones on the thread because they recognize that 40k is co-operative as much as it is competitive. Penalizing both players for not finishing in the time limit means that neither player has an incentive to slow play each other's turns, and that they both have incentive to finish the game on time. I think it would also discourage slow-players from entering tournaments until they learn to play at full speed.

The problem is that a truly jerk-like opponent who was going to lose anyway could take you down with him, but that's the sort of player that tournament organizers need to locate and eject anyway.

Preferably with a large phallus shaped object lodged in the rear.

Janthkin:

I agree. An easy way to ameliorate that problem would be mentioning in this problem in the tournament rules and encourage players to call on judges to do something if a player is taking another down with them.

It's like on these forums when people complain about lax moderation: the way it works is that posters need to be active in reporting posts that break the rules rather than expecting the moderators to comb through the forums seeking it out themselves.

Another solution might be to make not finishing a game worse than losing, so that losing a game is preferable than slow playing.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

BrookM wrote:Preferably with a large phallus shaped object lodged in the rear.

Come for the tournament, stay for the rape?

Wrexasaur wrote:It sounds like the horde armies need extra time that is not subtracted from their opponents.

This is not asking too much, I have lost a tournament before simply because people took too long. It is unfair to me and other players, why should the horde armies not make a concession as well?

We are talking about a tournament here, I keep hearing situations that would better be applied to a friendly environment. Not to say a tournament can't be friendly, just that there is a certain level of game-play that most would expect.

Tourneys however are supposed to still be fun, and if simply bringing a larger model count army means you don't have fun as a result of forced time constraints, then all you are going to have is SM and Eldar armies at events.

If it's an issue because of army sizes, then it's the TO's responsibility to allow longer times, not force the players to speed up when the new codex means they are putting 20-30% more models out just to get to the same points level. If that means adding an extra 90 minutes to the days event, it won't be the end of the world.

The Ard' boyz tournament was 2500 points in 2 1/2 hours, I think that was a huge mistake.

I can see where that could cause a problem, but then again, if you are going to an event like that I'd be prepared for just about anything. If they added 30 mins to each game that probably would suffice. I have no problem doing 2000pts in 2 hours usually with my Imperial Guard personally.

I have played 1000 point games in 5 hours among friends, and we had fun, but it just took too long and I got bored. If I ever actually get into Apocalypse I will have to play with people that know how to finish the game up quickly. I would mainly be playing for the sheer spectacle of the game.

It's not that hard, I just played an Apoc game on Wednesday with about 20,000pts of stuff on the board, and we got through 5 complete turns in 7 hours with 5 players. (big blast templates tend to mean the game speeds up turns 4 and 5)

The whole clock thing is a bit out of proportion really, I wear a watch, and clocks reside on walls. If the tournament really needs a timer for specific games that could be a good idea, but this would be more of a guideline so to speak that was presented directly to all of the participants; I am not talking about horde armies only, we talked earlier about the different types of stallers.

Something along the lines of this.

Horde armies wouldn't be the ONLY army to be affected by this, it would just be a 50/50 time share, JUST to make it fair. If players feel that someone is taking them too long, they CAN ask their opponent to stick to their general time frame. If someone continues to hog the whole game, note it, and the game will be reviewed later.

Horde armies are already penalized by KP's, adding a time component isn't "fair" when much of that time is simply used by moving models and rolling dice. If I don't get through a shooting phase because the clock dings, I'm pretty much boned. That's not an accurate reflection of generalship or tactical skill, which is what I think much of the point of a tourney is about. If I lose a game simply because it takes too long to get through my armies actions, thats not reflective of my capabilities or my armies ability, it's a technicality thing at that point, meaning I might as well cut 300pts from the list and play a smaller army.

Again, if time is an issue with armies, the TO's need to be harsh with people intentionally slowing the game, and allow more time than they recently have for players that maybe are just slow or have huge armies. If it's a consistent problem of players not finishing within time limits, then the event needs to add time.

BrookM wrote:The only thing I suggested was that horde armies and newbies aren't welcome one bit at these events due to large number of models, slow play and fiddly new rule systems.

"Silly noob, tournaments are for Space Marines!"

Seriously, people with bigger armies "aren't welcome"? That's pretty fethed up.

Nurglitch wrote:Another solution might be to make not finishing a game worse than losing, so that losing a game is preferable than slow playing.

BINGO!!

Nurglitch just won the thread.

Now the question is how to accomplish this.

GG

I like the idea of zeros for both players if the game is called on time - most of the time the players would choose to score the game anyway, but if one of the players was intentionally slow playing, I'd bet most opponents would choose the zero instead of giving that guy a point.
As a TO, you can be sure I would have a judge looking at what happens in the next game for both players.

Speaking of horde armies, I think it was mentioned in another thread that a poster named Redbeard had, somewhere, explained how to play fast using a horde. I believe he cleaned up at some tournament using 180+ Orks and finished every game. Someone (not me) wanna look this up?

generalgrog:

Maybe something with similar proportions to the following scoring system:

Win Game: 3
Tie Game: 2
Lose Game: 1
Didn't Finish: 0

There's that argument again...

Okay then, I want someone to prove god. Mankind split the fething atom and made it to the moon, there's no excuse not to have discovered omnipotent, extraplanar beings by now. Stop being lazy.

Yeah, so it's not exactly the same thing, but I still fething hate that argument. "If I can break cinderblocks with my bare hands, you can too! If I can pull a semi with just my nipples then you can too!"

Sidstyler wrote:

BrookM wrote:The only thing I suggested was that horde armies and newbies aren't welcome one bit at these events due to large number of models, slow play and fiddly new rule systems.

"Silly noob, tournaments are for Space Marines!"

Seriously, people with bigger armies "aren't welcome"? That's pretty fethed up.

Well this is the general vibe I'm getting from tourny players and how things are set up.

TBH I think slow playing should be punished with the death penalty.

karnaeya wrote:TBH I think slow playing should be punished with the death penalty.

Tournaments is serious business.

BrookM wrote:

Sidstyler wrote:

BrookM wrote:The only thing I suggested was that horde armies and newbies aren't welcome one bit at these events due to large number of models, slow play and fiddly new rule systems.

"Silly noob, tournaments are for Space Marines!"

Seriously, people with bigger armies "aren't welcome"? That's pretty fethed up.

Well this is the general vibe I'm getting from tourny players and how things are set up.

I play mostly foot Guard, and I feel welcomed. I think you're reading something into tournaments and the reactions that just aren't there.

Not horde armies or noobs. Just horde armies played by noobs Basically if you can play your horde even moderately fast your welcome at a tournament. If you can't play it moderately fast bring a different army. Most of the guys I know don't play an MEQ army and generally run Orks, Nids, and Guard. We all finish in the 2.5 hour allotment 9 times out of 10. All the armies are pushing 100 Infantry plus big bugs/vehicles.

I've never started to set up across from someone and had them sigh when I pulled out my 'nids. I've never had an opponent have to rush me. To be honest sometimes I do rush my opponent when his turns take longer than my horde turns and he's playing MEQ. It seems the less stuff you put on the table the more time some people have to spend thinking....

Sarge wrote:For those of you complaining about slow players, remember we're complaining about you too. Are you the loud mouth at the tourny who is constantly harping on how slow another person is? Always with the "are you done yet?" "Can we get to the shooting phase?" Why aren't you done yet? Hurry up hurry up hurry up. Believe me, we hate you for it. The times this has happened to me has been so the offending player can take the majority of the time to plan and play their turns. And if somebody actually brought a chess timer to a tournament with them, I'd probably ask them if they were lost.

QFT.

Just be sure to giv them the zero sports that they deserve.

If I have understood the last post, it is unfair to ask someone to speed up at all?

I am not sure I have interpreted this right, but is sure as heck sounding like simple double standards.

I have been complaining SPECIFICALLY about people who intentionally slow a game down OR are slow enough in general to take more than a fair amount of time (however the match and players define that). Who cares if you don't want to go fast, I just want to be able to play a full game. How would it be unfair to ask someone to speed it up a bit, and why the heck are you generalizing so underhandedly? I am starting to get slightly offended.

I will simply not attend tournaments with unrealistic time limits, it is just a waste of effort.

So, reading this thread makes me think there are three potential fixes for tourneys:

1) Lower point cost/longer time limits

2) T.O. has a clock. when time is up, your turn ends. your opponent then may choose to resolve any assaults in their time limit, then start their turn.

3) Reward unfinished games a 0. If you only fail to finish one game, and your opponent fails multiple, you recieve a number of points equal to the average score from other rouns.

Of course, 1 can be combined with 2 or 3.

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:
Reward unfinished games a 0. If you only fail to finish one game, and your opponent fails multiple, you recieve a number of points equal to the average score from other rouns.

I think this could work okay, although I am not sure I understand the second part. I think you are presenting a way to find the people who are stalling games regularly.

Wrexasaur wrote:If I have understood the last post, it is unfair to ask someone to speed up at all?

The context is of some WAAC TFG rushing his opponent so he can notch a Massacre, rather than merely a Victory.

To be fair he did start with this...

Sarge wrote:For those of you complaining about slow players, remember we're complaining about you too....

Kinda obvious how I could take it the wrong way.

It seems the less stuff you put on the table the more time some people have to spend thinking....

Well if you think about it, it makes sense. My units aren't as disposable and numerous as yours, every loss counts for me whereas you can most likely charge blindly across the table without a care (in the case of Orks and Tyranids anyway, I don't think Guard ever move). So of course I need to play smarter, rushing could easily lose me a game.

But then again maybe that's the whole point, put pressure on the other guy and make him screw up by not thinking his moves through.

For those of you complaining about slow players, remember we're complaining about you too. Are you the loud mouth at the tourny who is constantly harping on how slow another person is? Always with the "are you done yet?" "Can we get to the shooting phase?" Why aren't you done yet? Hurry up hurry up hurry up. Believe me, we hate you for it. The times this has happened to me has been so the offending player can take the majority of the time to plan and play their turns. And if somebody actually brought a chess timer to a tournament with them, I'd probably ask them if they were lost.

I will simply not attend tournaments with unrealistic time limits, it is just a waste of effort.

Exactly, play in tournaments with realistic time limits so that speed is never an issue. Stop trying to play huge ass fething games in an hour.

1) Lower point cost/longer time limits

This is my favorite solution. 1500 point games are interesting in my opinion, they're not too small or too big, and you really have to think about your list because you can't take everything like you can at 2000 or more. As for time limits, I'd prefer too much time rather than not enough. 2 or 2.5 hours sounds good for 1500 points, but not 2000+.

I think the ideal point level would be 1750, which is/was the standard for a while wasn't it?

In the end this is often the fault of the Tournament Organizers who put too many points into too few hours.

The better question is why they are doing it and where will it stop, the 3000 point game with a hour time limit ? lol

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

The better question is why they are doing it and where will it stop, the 3000 point game with a hour time limit ? lol

Simple, They want you to buy more stuff in order to have the large army.

Wrexasaur wrote:

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:
Reward unfinished games a 0. If you only fail to finish one game, and your opponent fails multiple, you recieve a number of points equal to the average score from other rouns.

I think this could work okay, although I am not sure I understand the second part. I think you are presenting a way to find the people who are stalling games regularly.

What I mean by the second part is that if you anhilate your opponent in 5/6 games, but hit a slow player, it is not fair to say oops, you get 0, and loose the tournament to someone with a pair of draws. Instead, the T.O. says "well, you smashed your opponents in 5 games, but your 3rd opponent failed to finish every single game they played, so we will award you your average score to prevent his/her incompitance from hurting your record.

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:
Reward unfinished games a 0. If you only fail to finish one game, and your opponent fails multiple, you recieve a number of points equal to the average score from other rouns.

I think this could work okay, although I am not sure I understand the second part. I think you are presenting a way to find the people who are stalling games regularly.

What I mean by the second part is that if you anhilate your opponent in 5/6 games, but hit a slow player, it is not fair to say oops, you get 0, and loose the tournament to someone with a pair of draws. Instead, the T.O. says "well, you smashed your opponents in 5 games, but your 3rd opponent failed to finish every single game they played, so we will award you your average score to prevent his/her incompitance from hurting your record.

First, that matchup won't happen. In the final round, you're talking about pairing a guy who's gone 5-0 against a guy who went 3-0-2 and got a lot of bonus / scenario points?

How does that pairing happen in a Swiss match, especially if the weighting is 3 pts win, 1 pt draw? He's coming in with a 5-0 record for 15 match points, the dark horse 3rd place winner had to have 13 MP and win for 16 MP. But 13 MP isn't enough to have 2 draws - the most draws would be one (4-0-1 record).

Now, in round 1, this kind of pairing is possible. But if it does, the smart money is on the player with the horde army to demand a Draw, because otherwise, they both start 0-1, and the horde guy could care less about being in the bottom bracket.

Frankly, at this point, I'm more concerned that you're rigging the matches for your buddy so that he can steamroller his way to the win over weaker opponents.

So I played at the first tourney I have been to in 2 years (I recently got back into 40k after a 2 year hiatus). Anywhoo it was the Necronomicon Gt. It was 1850 pts in 2 hrs and 45 minutes.
I used a friends dark angels army with a fairly a low model count. 5 termies, belial and termy chaplain, 2 preds, 1 vindy, 1 dred, 2 tac squads with rhinos, and a raven wing squad(3 reg bikes and 1 attack bike)

1st game was vs MechTau lasted 2 hrs 15 minutes
2nd game was vs eldar lasted 1 hr 30 minutes
3rd game was Imperial Guard semi horde 2 hrs 30 minutes
4th game was vs chaos space marines 1 hr 45 minutes
5th game was vs SOB and witch hunter allies 2 hrs.

All of those games could have easily been finished in 1.5 hrs. But with 2 hrs and 45 minutes I didn't feel the need to play fast excepting the games vs guard and tau.

The only game that had me worried was the guard game. The guard player wasn't slow playing intentionally at all, he just took his time to make decisions, but if he had played faster we could have also finished in under 2 hrs possibly 1.5 hrs. The biggest slow down factor for the guard was the orders. The orders seemed to really bog down his turn in trying to decide how and which unit to give the order to. Once I killed one of his commanders the game sped up a bit. I found myself asking "is that it?" quite a bit to get him to move on to the next phase.

So since I don't play Dark Angels and am fairly unfamiliar with the tactical nuances of them, I had no problem playing faster and it didn't hinder me at all. Nor did I feel like it took away from my gaming experience.

I just don't see the aversion, besides fear of change, to playing faster.

GG

My mood determines my speed of play, sometimes I just feel like blasting through 3 games in 4 hours . . . sometimes I will only get one in . . . it all depends on how I feel and what my day has been like. But then again these are friendly games, and so we've got as long as we need to play them, and you don't have to worry about not getting the last turn in.

@Generalgrog

How did the DA fair in the tourney? And at least your tournament had a reasonable time frame to fit the games into. If you had been at different tourneys you wouldn't have finished games 1 and 3 . . . Sometimes it can all just be hit and miss though . . .

Oshova wrote:How did the DA fair in the tourney? And at least your tournament had a reasonable time frame to fit the games into. If you had been at different tourneys you wouldn't have finished games 1 and 3 . . . Sometimes it can all just be hit and miss though . . .

Then only game I think wouldn't have finished would have been the game vs guard. However I believe if my opponent was more used to the orders system it wouldn't have taken so long. If he had praticed fast playing we could have easily finished in under 2 hrs.

I had 2 strikes against me, as I was borrowing the DA's and am getting back into 40k so I'm a bit rusty. My army was 1-4 ouch! The 4 losses could have been wins if I had more experience with 5th edition. The DA army I had was a very good list, just run by an experienced general. :-(

As far as the other DA's I'm not sure how they did as I wasn't keeping tabs on them.

One funny moment during the tourney was against my guard opponent, he had 3 dark angel armies surrounding him. Me across from him, 1 to his left and 1 to his right.

GG

BrookM wrote:

Janthkin wrote:The problem is that a truly jerk-like opponent who was going to lose anyway could take you down with him, but that's the sort of player that tournament organizers need to locate and eject anyway.

Preferably with a large phallus shaped object lodged in the rear.

Revenge porn solves nothing, and is truly distasteful.

I find that I like to take time at my friends house but if I am out and playing in GW or any time there is a time constraint I kick it up. I don't feel bad about letting people know to move it also in a polite manner to start.

1st "Hey time is flying by here. Only have x minutes left."

2nd "Would you be ok with picking it up a bit. We aren't going to finish."

3rd "Ok, you need to hurry up. Now."

4th I just pull my railgun off the hammerhead (magnetized) and jam it in their eye.

No damn reason to be slow playing like that if you are using SM Rau!

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:If I have understood the last post, it is unfair to ask someone to speed up at all?

The context is of some WAAC TFG rushing his opponent so he can notch a Massacre, rather than merely a Victory.

Not like that could EVER mean the difference in advancing or not....right?

The time limit to points limit ratio in Ard Boyz sucks, its a fact. They will not change it because they want to sell models, yet another fact. They just need to realize that you either have to extend the already loooonnggg day of warhammer another 1.5 hours to allot the extra 30 to each round or make it run over two days.

As far as clocks go. If they were used there should not be a buzzer forcing you to end your turn by any means. However when the game is forced to end on turn 3, and we look at the clock to find you used over an hour and a half and I am around 45 minutes something needs to be in place to adjust scoring for that. Just because you play a horde army or any kind of army there should be no excuses since things can be done to fix the issues. Have 150 attacks on the charge, or 100 shots to make? Bring 50 dice at least. Move models slowly? Move your front row and fill in behind, because I would much rather you gain an extra 3/4" on moving a back rank model than to have the game end 3 turns early due to you taking an hour of the game in your movement phases.

I already said this in the thread, but simply saying you are gonna play slow and the opponent just has to deal with it should not be allowed. At the very least it should be punished in the score department. The people willing/able to play inside the regulations and limits should NEVER be penalized when their opponent can't/won't.

Kaotik wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:If I have understood the last post, it is unfair to ask someone to speed up at all?

The context is of some WAAC TFG rushing his opponent so he can notch a Massacre, rather than merely a Victory.

Not like that could EVER mean the difference in advancing or not....right?

To which, I say, SO WHAT?

If I bring a legal army that inherently takes more time for me to play, I'm playing by the rules. If his objective is simply to get the full number of turns in, then nothing stops him from passing his turns or conceding saves / Ld tests / etc.

My opponent is NOT entitled to a better score at my expense if I am playing a legal, approved army at a reasonable pace. It that takes him out of the running, I really could care less.

I'd be there to play, and play well. If I happen to ruin some WAAC TFG's only shot at 15 minutes of fame, that's too frickin' bad for him. As far as I'm concerned, he should be there to play games, not to extract Massacres.

Now, if the TOs want to ensure that all games finish on time, that's fine. They can ban armies with more than (pick a number) on the board at any given time. They can shrink the points limits. They can extend the playing time.

But if the TOs say an army is legal, then any player should be free to bring any variation of that army, regardless of how long it takes for that army to play a game.

I think one of our local tournaments (run by GW) has decided for next year to turn our 3 games one day event into a 2 game per day, 2 day event. They decided it would be better to have longer game time and allow more time to banter with your opponent. And as an extra plus give more time to talk to new folk.
Since in Belfast gamers done see much of each other

BoW- John

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Kaotik wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:If I have understood the last post, it is unfair to ask someone to speed up at all?

The context is of some WAAC TFG rushing his opponent so he can notch a Massacre, rather than merely a Victory.

Not like that could EVER mean the difference in advancing or not....right?

To which, I say, SO WHAT?

My opponent is NOT entitled to a better score at my expense if I am playing a legal, approved army at a reasonable pace. It that takes him out of the running, I really could care less.

My point is if the person has the materials needed, knows ways to make things faster, and does not need to stop for book/rules checks for the simplest things then the WOULD finish in a reasonable amount of time. This would not even be an issue in games that went to turn 4-5 where things just took longer due to armies. I am talking games like my first round that got to turn 3 because the guy took 5 minutes to decide where to deploy each pod. And about 30 or more minutes to deploy. He was playing BA Drop Pod army which should NOT take anywhere near the time he was taking. Overall I think he used 1:45 of the 2.5 hours where I used about 45 minutes. If your game ends a turn early so be it, but if one guy causes it to end three turns early that's BS, plain and simple.

If you play your army at a reasonable speed and it just happens to be slow then the comments on slow players does not apply to you. The clock I mentioned that is needed should mean nothing unless the game does not reach the halfway mark. That sound about right?

@JohnHwangDD

I think you have mentioned in the past that you don't do tournaments? With your attitude towards slow play, I can see why you don't. I totally disagree with your notion that someone who is trying for a massacre at a tourney where the idea is to get a massacre/max battle points, labels said player as a WAAC TFG. This is the diffference between a tournament minded person and a casual gamer minded person, which I believe you to be the latter.

When you go to a tourney you must leave the casual relaxed "play at my own pace" attittude at the door. When your playing a relaxing game with no time limts, you must leave the "hurry up, we have limited time" attitude at the door. That's the difference that players like you don't seem to get.


GG

Actually I'm in agreement with JohnnyH on this one. If I am playing in a reasonable speed, your desire to go faster is, at best, irrelevant to me. At worst it will make me slow down because you're being a butthead.

If however we're near the end and we need to rush to finish a complete a full turn, and you've not been a butt head then I would indeed rush.

Kaotik wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

Kaotik wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:The context is of some WAAC TFG rushing his opponent so he can notch a Massacre, rather than merely a Victory.

Not like that could EVER mean the difference in advancing or not....right?

To which, I say, SO WHAT?

My point is if the person has the materials needed, knows ways to make things faster, and does not need to stop for book/rules checks for the simplest things then the WOULD finish in a reasonable amount of time.

He was playing BA Drop Pod army which should NOT take anywhere near the time he was taking. Overall I think he used 1:45 of the 2.5 hours where I used about 45 minutes.

If you play your army at a reasonable speed and it just happens to be slow then the comments on slow players does not apply to you. The clock I mentioned that is needed should mean nothing unless the game does not reach the halfway mark. That sound about right?

As an ex-tournament player, I will come prepared to play, knowing the rules, knowing my army, etc. so I think I'd be able to finish in a reasonable amount of time. If somebody is rushing me, it's just going to cost them their sports score, because I don't appreciate that.

If he's stalling, call a Judge - that's why they're there. Stalling is a form a cheating, and Judges can impose full match losses for that kind of thing. But if you're going to suck it up, that's on you.

You can clock me, but I wouldn't care about that - I won't be rushed.
____

generalgrog wrote:@JohnHwangDD

I think you have mentioned in the past that you don't do tournaments?

I totally disagree with your notion that someone who is trying for a massacre at a tourney where the idea is to get a massacre/max battle points, labels said player as a WAAC TFG.

When you go to a tourney you must leave the casual relaxed "play at my own pace" attittude at the door. When your playing a relaxing game with no time limts, you must leave the "hurry up, we have limited time" attitude at the door. That's the difference that players like you don't seem to get.

As above, I've played tournaments in the past, and won more than my fair share of games.

Um, by definition, "someone who is trying for a massacre where the idea is to get a massacre/max battle points" *is* a WAAC player. If they're there simply to get massacre / max battle, then how is that not WAAC?

Does the tournament rules say I need to rush my play? No. Then I'm not going to do so. I'll play at my own pace, and let them play at theirs. It's not like I'm going to go grab a beer or chat up the guy at the next table over.

JohnHwangDD wrote: Um, by definition, "someone who is trying for a massacre where the idea is to get a massacre/max battle points" *is* a WAAC player. If they're there simply to get massacre / max battle, then how is that not WAAC?

Does the tournament rules say I need to rush my play? No. Then I'm not going to do so. I'll play at my own pace, and let them play at theirs. It's not like I'm going to go grab a beer or chat up the guy at the next table over.

I think we are defining WAAC differently. Trying to get max battle points/massacre to me is just trying to win a tourney. To me a WAAC player is someone that bends rules to their advantage (I.E. rules lawyers), cheats, etc. The "all costs" factor being willing to cheat. Much different than someone trying to squeeze as many points out of a round as they can. We are almost getting into semantics here.

If by the consequences of your slow play I don't get full points in our game and thus costing my chance to win a tourney..... YOU are the bad guy(you too Frazz :-) ).... not me. You owe your opponent a full game that's all I'm saying.

GG

Yeah, tho winning at tourney is more than battle points. That's why they also score sports, comp, theme, and/or paint. If the only focus is on battle, then that's WAAC.

Don't blame me for the TO not allotting enough time. Place the blame where it belongs - on the TO for wanting too many points in too little time.

generalgrog wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote: Um, by definition, "someone who is trying for a massacre where the idea is to get a massacre/max battle points" *is* a WAAC player. If they're there simply to get massacre / max battle, then how is that not WAAC?

Does the tournament rules say I need to rush my play? No. Then I'm not going to do so. I'll play at my own pace, and let them play at theirs. It's not like I'm going to go grab a beer or chat up the guy at the next table over.

I think we are defining WAAC differently. Trying to get max battle points/massacre to me is just trying to win a tourney. To me a WAAC player is someone that bends rules to their advantage (I.E. rules lawyers), cheats, etc. The "all costs" factor being willing to cheat. Much different than someone trying to squeeze as many points out of a round as they can. We are almost getting into semantics here.

If by the consequences of your slow play I don't get full points in our game and thus costing my chance to win a tourney..... YOU are the bad guy(you too Frazz :-) ).... not me. You owe your opponent a full game that's all I'm saying.

GG

I owe no one anything.
In a tournament my requirements are to abide by the rules a set down by the TO. Thats it. I do not have to facilitate your winning the tournament. in fact a goal of my is to utterly defeat you doign that by beating you.

JohnHwangDD wrote:Don't blame me for the TO not allotting enough time. Place the blame where it belongs - on the TO for wanting too many points in too little time.

So you take no repsonsibility for signing up to said TO's tourney who, as you put it, "wanted too many points in too little time"? IMO if you sign up for a tourney, knowing the time limits you are just as responsible as the TO.

GG

None at all.

The TO allowed my army, and I'm going to play it.

If time limits mean that we both play fewer turns, so be it.

That's not my responsibility.
____

If the TO wants to ensure that all games finish within the allotted time, then they should allow more time or limit armies to fewer points.

Exactly.

Frazzled wrote:
I owe no one anything.
In a tournament my requirements are to abide by the rules a set down by the TO. Thats it. I do not have to facilitate your winning the tournament. in fact a goal of my is to utterly defeat you doign that by beating you.

It's only sporting to allow your opponent a full game..... if possible. It has nothing to do with you "facilitating" the tourney outcome. In fact if you play slower than you are able, as part of some meta tourney tactic, to deny your oponent battle points (I'm not saying you do this Frazz), thats no different than slow playing as part of your current game strategy.

GG

Quite frankly, if I had the time, I'm now wanting to play infantry hordes for Draw, simply to see how much time could be burned by normal play without having to stall.

JohnHwangDD wrote:None at all.

The TO allowed my army, and I'm going to play it.

If time limits mean that we both play fewer turns, so be it.

That's not my responsibility.
____

If the TO wants to ensure that all games finish within the allotted time, then they should allow more time or limit armies to fewer points.

I think your being disingenuous now.

You signed up to the tourney, you therefore have given tacit approval of the format. Now it is incumbant upon you, the player, to make a good faith attempt to get a full game in.

GG

Lowering the points doesn't matter. It could be a 500 point tourney and by how anyone supporting slow play is talking, you don't even owe your opponent a full game then, so why should you rush? There need to be round time limits or people need to be courteous and fit in a full game. I'm not going to say you owe anyone anything, but it's just as rude s being a rules lawyer to not try to get a full game in. Yay for relative social etiquette.

Myself , was a horde type player . And you know , its not always fair how im treated even if the guy was TFG.

When i used to move my gaunts 1 by 1 , the guy would be like " hey i'll go to the store and buy a pizza " or just do the yawn and streatch motion.

I realize its boring for them to wait , so i just PUSHED the squad as a whole to speed up time , despite they are falling off or in risk of damaged.

Then the guy went on the next lvl of complaints and asked me about unit coherency and if i didnt move them too far.


*screams

Cannerus_The_Unbearable wrote:Lowering the points doesn't matter. It could be a 500 point tourney and by how anyone supporting slow play is talking, you don't even owe your opponent a full game then, so why should you rush? There need to be round time limits or people need to be courteous and fit in a full game. I'm not going to say you owe anyone anything, but it's just as rude s being a rules lawyer to not try to get a full game in. Yay for relative social etiquette.

on the flipside, its just as rude to attempt to rush your opponent, so we are at rudeness empass.

generalgrog wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:None at all.

The TO allowed my army, and I'm going to play it.

If time limits mean that we both play fewer turns, so be it.

That's not my responsibility.
____

If the TO wants to ensure that all games finish within the allotted time, then they should allow more time or limit armies to fewer points.

I think your being disingenuous now.

You signed up to the tourney, you therefore have given tacit approval of the format. Now it is incumbant upon you, the player, to make a good faith attempt to get a full game in.

I'll play at a reasonable pace. If that allows for a full game, great. If not, I don't care.

It is NOT incumbent upon me to rush my play.

If my opponent wants to make an issue of it, well, he's free to concede the game at any time.

JohnHwangDD wrote:

generalgrog wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:None at all.

The TO allowed my army, and I'm going to play it.

If time limits mean that we both play fewer turns, so be it.

That's not my responsibility.
____

If the TO wants to ensure that all games finish within the allotted time, then they should allow more time or limit armies to fewer points.

I think your being disingenuous now.

You signed up to the tourney, you therefore have given tacit approval of the format. Now it is incumbant upon you, the player, to make a good faith attempt to get a full game in.

I'll play at a reasonable pace. If that allows for a full game, great. If not, I don't care.

It is NOT incumbent upon me to rush my play.

If my opponent wants to make an issue of it, well, he's free to concede the game at any time.

QFT.

JohnHwangDD wrote:Um, by definition, "someone who is trying for a massacre where the idea is to get a massacre/max battle points" *is* a WAAC player. If they're there simply to get massacre / max battle, then how is that not WAAC?

You've made a logical jump here.

You went from "trying for a massacre, where the idea is to get massacre/max..." to "there simply to get massacre".

I play every game in every tournament I attend with the goal of getting a massacre and max points. That doesn't mean I have that aim above all other aims (I also aim to enjoy myself, I aim to have pleasant games, I aim not to be considered TFG, and I aim to win best painted as well...). If the goal of the tournament is to score the most battle points, it does not logically follow that in order to pursue that goal, you must forgo all other goals. One can still aim to score massacres while being a decent human being, and that's the difference.

To be a WAAC player, you have to be willing to sacrifice everything (including being a decent human being) in the pursuit of your massacres. Most people go to tournaments with the goal of winning their games, relatively few of those are willing to sacrifice everything to get there.

Does the tournament rules say I need to rush my play? No. Then I'm not going to do so.

Although some tournament rules do say that you should play at a pace that will result in you finishing X turns in Y amount of time. If that pace is one that you considered rushed, then in fact the tournament rules do say you need to rush. What's different here is each individual's definition of rush. I don't play 'ard boyz, because 2500 points in 2 hours is not enjoyable for me - I consider that rushed. I'll happily play 1750 in 2 hours though.

Redbeard pretty much is echoing my views, but is more eloquent than I.

Kudos to you RedBeard

GG

JohnHwangDD wrote:Quite frankly, if I had the time, I'm now wanting to play infantry hordes for Draw, simply to see how much time could be burned by normal play without having to stall.

Really?

You want to go to a tournament with the goal of playing as slowly as legally possible so that you can get a draw?

That sounds like a pretty good working definition of TFG.

Or, you know, he wants to see if people are really squeezed for time or that the people claiming tournament rules are unfair to horde armies are simply slow players themselves.

But hey, by all mean, try to impute JohnHwangDD with the worst possible motives, as it reflects well on your own character.

I would like to play a few games against JohnHwangDD so that we can see exactly how much longer a swarm army takes to finish it's turns.

I see no reason why an experienced horde player couldn't finish just as fast as I could. You would have to factor in the loss of tactics as a horde player as well, and that may be the reason most games seem to go just fine as long as no one stalls on purpose just to waste time.

Horde armies have the advantage of a ridiculous amount of shooting/assault power.

Small armies (Eldar for instance) have the advantage of speed/tanks/advanced weaponry...sort of. SM would probably be a better army to test it with.

IG footsloggers VS SM rhino spam

-or-

Ork footsloggers VS Eldar speedy list

Those would be a good place to start.

I play a fairly hordy Nid list.
Tyrant Unit
2 Carnifex's
28 Genestealers
7 Warriors
Lictor
36 Gaunts.

77 Models total. Not an "Insane" Horde, but not very elite either. I can play quickly, and still do well. "I play a Horde" is a fairly thin excuse for slow play. Admitedly, you will take longer, but it is not an instant "I can take 2 hours out of the 2 1/2 hour game" ticket.

Nurglitch wrote:Or, you know, he wants to see if people are really squeezed for time or that the people claiming tournament rules are unfair to horde armies are simply slow players themselves.

But hey, by all mean, try to impute JohnHwangDD with the worst possible motives, as it reflects well on your own character.

You mean motives like playing in a tournament as slow as legally possible with the intent to draw?


Automatically Appended Next Post:
If he said I want to play in a tournament with a horde army to find out if it can be done in a reasonable time that would be one thing.

But taking an army to a tournament with the intent to play as slow as possible and the goal of getting draws seem like dubious motives.

Perhaps you didn't read the quote

Quite frankly, if I had the time, I'm now wanting to play infantry hordes for Draw, simply to see how much time could be burned by normal play without having to stall.

He flat out states that he just simply wants to see how much time can be burned by normal play and that he plans on trying to draw, not to find out if people are really squeezed for time or if tournies are unfair to horde players.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
@JohnHwangDD

If that was not the intent of your post I apologize.

However, because of the way you wrote your post, it seemed of dubious intent to me.

Contrary to popular belief, there are tactics in 40k, chiefly in terms of decision-making and timing. With a horde, the number of decisions is compounded because you typically need to coordinate actions across several units to achieve the same impact / effect as with a smaller, more elite set of units. Further, sequencing grows in a combinatorial fashion with the number of options.

Playing for Draw means that I don't need to try to optimize every single game decision (and further optimize the sequence of every single action and/or potential action in-game) like I would if I were trying for maximum battle points and scenario points.

Playing for maximum Win definitely takes more time, even for an experienced player who's familiar with the ins and outs of his army.

JohnHwangDD wrote:
With a horde, the number of decisions is compounded because you typically need to coordinate actions across several units to achieve the same impact / effect as with a smaller, more elite set of units. Further, sequencing grows in a combinatorial fashion with the number of options.

I'm going to call BS on this. I've played hordes and I've played elite armies, both successfully, and the decision making process is considerably more involved the smaller your army is, because you cannot afford to make mistakes. The land-raider based Emperor's Children army that I took to Chicago's GT last year had as few as four units on the table at times, but because of that, you're required to consider every ramification of where you move those four units.

Contrasting that with armies like Guard or Orks, and you're taking up so much space, that the smaller decisions don't really matter that much. Your goal is to overwhelm your opponent with numbers, and that's either going to happen or it's not. The time-consuming part of these armies has nothing to do with making decisions, it has to do with moving models. 180 orks is still only six units - big picture wise, you have six units, and they're all going to close with your opponent... then you just have to do it.

Footslogging Guard is slightly different, in that you may have many units, but for the most part, they're staying put and firing. Deployment is where you spend most of your time, your movement phases should be nearly non-existent, and your shooting isn't that hard to prioritize, especially as many times, only a single model will be firing from a given unit.

For 4th, I played a lot of Drop Guard, and I don't agree with you at all about that. There's a lot of decision-making throughout.

Even with static guard, for 3rd, restricted LOS means you need to choose your targets and how you're going to layer firepower, whether it's 1 shooter or 10.

"think your being disingenuous now.

You signed up to the tourney, you therefore have given tacit approval of the format. Now it is incumbant upon you, the player, to make a good faith attempt to get a full game in. "

Laughed out loud at that one. We will get a full game in, just not as many turns as you may like. The tissues are held by the TO's if you feel like crying.

Too many points in too little time is not my problem. That is why the game allows calculations to determine a winner when time runs out.

Simple as that.

I've been laughing and shaking my head at a lot of the attitudes in here. To think some people actually think I owe them a set number of turns, it's fething ridiculous.

The only thing I "owe" you or anyone else, at a tournament or otherwise, is not being a dick. If your idea of bad sportsmanship happens to include "Not playing fast enough", then that's your problem for being an unreasonable jackass with unrealistic expectations.

...but I dunno, that's just my opinion. I think it's dickish to start tapping your foot and trying to rush someone through their turn because you want to massacre them, and you're afraid you won't have enough time to get max points because your opponent is playing slightly slower than you are, either because they can't play any faster or they just don't take the tournament and game in general as seriously as you do. Obviously yes, in a tournament the idea is to go for max points and win the tourney, but you can't honestly claim that it's up to me to play to an unrealistic standard because the TO doesn't know what he's doing.

I am coming in late on this, but..

"Reward unfinished games a 0" is a really bad idea. I used to play the Legend of the Five Rings card game, where a system like this was introduced to try to reduce stalling, which was becoming a problem. 3 points for a win, 1 point for a loss, 0 points for a draw (a draw was noramlly the result of a game going to time).

Typically a coin flip or roll off was used to decide a drawn game (you would just report that one player had won rather than the true result of a draw). That meant players would stall a losing game and hope to win the flip, rather than concede. Even more unscrupulous players would then hold their opponent's score to ransom to get a win. "Give me the win, otherwise you'll get 0!".

Sidstyler wrote:I've been laughing and shaking my head at a lot of the attitudes in here. To think some people actually think I owe them a set number of turns, it's fething ridiculous.

But do they owe you extra time to play your army?

I'm strongly of the opinion that time should be split, chess style. If the game is two hours long then each of you gets 1 hour for setup and turns.

Sidstyler wrote:I've been laughing and shaking my head at a lot of the attitudes in here. To think some people actually think I owe them a set number of turns, it's fething ridiculous.

The only thing I "owe" you or anyone else, at a tournament or otherwise, is not being a dick. If your idea of bad sportsmanship happens to include "Not playing fast enough", then that's your problem for being an unreasonable jackass with unrealistic expectations.

First of all, you dont owe anyone anything(But I think most people expect you to play a full game, not just deployment and 2-3 shooting phases with your tau/IG/shooty orc). You can be a dick if you want or a standup nice guy, its all up to you. Not playing the full game but slow playing it is in most ppls heads one of the things that makes you a a-hole.

Well, I think part of my problem with this whole thing is that slow play hasn't been properly defined. Some people say it's the intentional slow-playing that's a dick move, fine, I'll agree with that. But the thread title implies that being perceived as a slower player itself is a grievous sin which I just don't agree with.

Whenever I play, I try to get done quick, I don't dawdle intentionally and try not to spend too much time thinking my moves through. That said, me and my brother usually take quite a while to get through our friendly games, about 4 hours usually. I don't know how it takes so long, and I don't ever intend on playing in tournaments anyway so I doubt it'll be an issue, but still.

Even more unscrupulous players would then hold their opponent's score to ransom to get a win. "Give me the win, otherwise you'll get 0!".

Oh god. I'd be having words with that guy.

If you play at a reasonable pace, then I can't imagine anyone complaining about you using a swarm/horde.

Not sure where your planning on taking this one Sid...

Sidstyler wrote: and I don't ever intend on playing in tournaments anyway

So why are you posting in this thread? You don't have a dog in this race.

The title talks about slow playing at "TOURNIES"

Try to keep up Sid.


GG

This thread makes me laugh. All the people who say "I want to play at my own pace, don't blame me if the TO doesn't give me enough time"

Remember 'Ard boyz? 2500 pts, 2.5 hr games? In the last two years, the only people I have went to time against is ork players. Everyone else I have played has finished easily in that time.

At 2500 points I can finish a turn in about 10-15 mins max. Depending on game state.

I have played with my friend who has horrible rules knowledge and constantly needs to look up stat lines for his army. Any we easily play casual games at 2500 in under 2.5 hrs.

I guess I don't know how much time these TO's allow for a round. But if they give you even 2 hrs at up to 2000 points, and you don't finish, you are slow playing.

Again, my friend, horribly indecisive, and horrible with his memory of the rules. And we still finish in under 2.5 hours. He went to 'ard boyz with me and I think he went to time one game against a swarm army.

Timmah wrote:
I guess I don't know how much time these TO's allow for a round. But if they give you even 2 hrs at up to 2000 points, and you don't finish, you are slow playing.

After carefully considering my words here, I'll just reply with:
Your in depth statistical analysis using er, no data, results in an equaly valid resolution.

Frazzled wrote:

After carefully considering my words here, I'll just reply with:
Your in depth statistical analysis using er, no data, results in an equaly valid resolution.

You are correct, I have no data for this. However there can really be no quality data analysis without a control element (which you don't/can't have).

So all we can really relate to is our own personal situations. I have watched multiple horde army players that finish their turns in 10 mins. Its all about being comfortable with your army and knowing the rules. So in my opinion, (which everyone else is giving theirs in this thread, no actual data) if you can't finish games in a tournament you are probably slow playing, whether it be intentional or not. (outside of extenuating circumstances)

Heck this year at 'ard boyz, I had about a 30 min rules "discussion" with one of my opponents and we still finished about 20 mins early. 2-3 hours for a game is plenty of time for any competent player to finish imo. (I'll add that its my opinion because, while no one else stated their posts were their opinions, I get called out on not having statistics)

So people who don't finish 5 turns are slow playing now?

imo yes. Considering the people I play with, poor memory of rules, constantly looking up stats, very very indecisive. (we are talking like, forgetting what his CSM hit on when shooting)

I guess I am just of the opinion that if I can finish a game in 2-3 hours with these people, that anyone else should be able to.

Timmah wrote:imo yes. Considering the people I play with, poor memory of rules, constantly looking up stats, very very indecisive. (we are talking like, forgetting what his CSM hit on when shooting)

I guess I am just of the opinion that if I can finish a game in 2-3 hours with these people, that anyone else should be able to.

Thats a difficult proposition timmah as we all have differing skill sets, and the argument doesn't hold in that context.

*Some people are more indecisive.
*Some people don't know the rules as well.
*Some people have massively larger armies than you do.
*Some people may employ more tactics and are carefully weighing those to maximize their wins.
*Some may not play that often.

The statement doesn't hold because of that.
As example:
-In good conditions I can literally drive a bullet from a pistol into a one cm target at 10 yards, and put 10 rounds into a 2 cm target. Few people can do that, including many who shoot better than I do. but under your theory, if I can do it everyone should be able to do it.
-In another, I made a bonafide hole in one in golf when I was 11. Because I did it, everyone should be able to do it.

While I agree that personal experiences are not a good basis for an argument.

Now, for the record, I am a very fast player. I make decisions fast and usually have most of the game planned out in the first couple turns.

However I believe that I play against people that do not do this. With the amount of wavering/indecisions my opponents had coupled with their poor rules memory (not a bad thing, we can't all have every book memorized.) I feel that given that they, with their extremely slow pace being able to go to an 'ard boyz tournament and finish every game speaks for how slow you need to be playing in order to not finish a game.

I personally believe that 15 mins is a very reasonable turn length for any point level under 2500.
And if one of the players is playing fast, that gives even more time to the slow player to finish their turn.

However as stated earlier, I think it would be cool to go to a chess like timer just so that you don't get screwed by one guy who slow plays.

The problem with the GW format is that you basically NEED to massacre or major victory all 3+ of your games in order to have a shot at winning. Its kinda a bad format but thats another point. So if you are really trying to win, you need to play fast and try to finish every game.


On a side note

Playing fast doesn't always mean less fun. I personally get really really bored when a 6 turn game takes 4+ hours. idk about the rest of you.

Timmah wrote:
I personally believe that 15 mins is a very reasonable turn length for any point level under 2500.

Maybe you don't love your miniatures very much. Maybe you've never tried to move 200 orks, while maintaining large enough gaps between models that you're not utterly destroyed by templates, while keeping all your units within 6" of the big mek, and then doing it again in the shooting phase as they all run varying amounts...

All armies are not created equal, even for the most decisive and quick-thinking of players.

Frazzled wrote:So people who don't finish 5 turns are slow playing now?

Simple answer: Yes

I'm not a tourney player but I can see both sides to the coin.

Best solution would be timed turns for each player however without a rules referee it could get exploited by TFG if he relentlessly asks and clarifies stuff throughout the turn.

Beating the clock is an aspect in most competitive "sports" and I'm sure there's a few tournaments who've already done it.

Kallbrand wrote:

Frazzled wrote:So people who don't finish 5 turns are slow playing now?

Simple answer: Yes

Simple reply: No

I have played both types of armies, including mech marines to swarm nids (interweaving units for cover ofc)

Yes it takes time, but I have done it and watched many other players do it and finish in a reasonable time.

Armies like orcs really benefit from not going to 5-6 rounds simply because you don't have enough time to kill them all. Just like many armies benefit from going the entire 6 rounds.

If you are going to a tournament you should be prepared to play fast and know that if you don't your screwing some other guy over.

I can't go to tournaments unprepared with a half painted half assembled army. Why should you come unprepared to play your army fast?

No when I go to a tournament I come to prepared to play. Your timeframe is irrelevant to me.

Edit (3 rd time damn fast edit button)

I've played tourney games where we barely made it to three and other games where we made through turn six with lots of time to spare, with the same list. I see to many variables here to take a 'my way or the highway' approach. Most of the time false black/white paradigms are just that: false.

Using a chess timer or equivalent is the only fair resolution aside from the obvious one*.

* Don't play 40k in tournaments. It sucks at it.

Agamemnon2 wrote:Using a chess timer or equivalent is the only fair resolution aside from the obvious one*.

* Don't play 40k in tournaments. It sucks at it.

OK to be fair if the TO had everyone use a timer and a little extra time is set for deployment I'd be down with this. Alternatively if the TO called it out I'd be down with it as well. I'm really just objecting to one player trying to tell the other player what to do.

Frazzled wrote:No when I go to a tournament I come to prepared to play. Your timeframe is irrelevant to me.

I've played tourney games where we barely made it to three and other games where we made through turn six with lots of time to spare, with the same list. I see to many variables here to take a 'my way or the highway' approach. Most of the time false black/white paradigms are just that: false.

The timeframe is not set by your opponent. It is the tournament timeframe, which is were I do not see a leg to stand on for the people advocating not adjusting their play speed in the least because of it. This is one of the RULES of the tournament that was posted before you signed up, and to say you won't even make an attempt to adhere to it is wrong. Your actions are effecting your opponent who does not deserve to be robbed from any chance of advancing, because you could not be bothered to try and play within the limit you signed up for. If you are unwilling or unable to adhere to a set time then don't join tournaments. Some people here have said they do just that, and I thank you. To do so is not only wasting the slow players time when they could be playing a friendly limit free game, but the three people unlucky enough to pull the person who don't deserve to have their score effected as a result. Slow playing tournies just because the person doesn't "feel" like speeding up is unacceptable, spin it however you want.

You are right though that it's not black and white, and I do agree that each army will take varying amounts of time to operate and deploy. This is just fact. However if you had a clock on each persons time taken per game you could easily adjust for horde armies in the case of an unfinished game. Use that clock only then, and take into account whether the guy was playing a horde army. Taking longer to think as a norm, having more decisions to make, not wanting to rush things, etc. should NOT give you more time than me in a tournament. If when the game ends the opponent has used more time and is not playing an army that requires it than there should be penalties.

EDIT: (not the first two for my horrible writing)
Not talking about a forfeit because the person took longer, but a set points reduction for amount of time taken over the opponent. I would bet the majority of the unfinished games end in draws/minors, and if the TO called it as a slow play situation he could bump either up a notch or flip the results. This is one possible fix, and I am sure it like any other has holes in it.

Kaotik wrote:

Frazzled wrote:No when I go to a tournament I come to prepared to play. Your timeframe is irrelevant to me.

I've played tourney games where we barely made it to three and other games where we made through turn six with lots of time to spare, with the same list. I see to many variables here to take a 'my way or the highway' approach. Most of the time false black/white paradigms are just that: false.

The timeframe is not set by your opponent. It is the tournament timeframe, which is were I do not see a leg to stand on for the people advocating not adjusting their play speed in the least because of it. This is one of the RULES of the tournament that was posted before you signed up, and to say you won't even make an attempt to adhere to it is wrong. Your actions are effecting your opponent who does not deserve to be robbed from any chance of advancing, because you could not be bothered to try and play within the limit you signed up for. If you are unwilling or unable to adhere to a set time then don't join tournaments. Some people here have said they do just that, and I thank you. To do so is not only wasting your time when you could be playing a friendly limit free game, but the three people unlucky enough to pull the person who would like to advance if possible. Slow playing tournies just because you don't "feel" like speeding up is unacceptable, spin it however you want.

You are right though that it's not black and white, and I do agree that each army will take varying amounts of time to operate and deploy. This is just fact. However if you had a clock on each persons time taken per game you could easily adjust for horde armies in the case of an unfinished game. Use that clock only then, and take into account whether the guy was playing a horde army. Taking longer to think as a norm, having more decisions to make, not wanting to rush things, etc. should NOT give you more time than me in a tournament. If when the game ends the opponent has used more time and is not playing an army that requires it than there should be penalties.

EDIT:
Not talking about a forfeit because you took longer, but a set points reduction for amount of time taken over the opponent. I would bet the majority of the unfinished games end in draws/minors, and if the TO called it as a slow play situation he could bump either up a notch. This is a possible fix, and I am sure it like any other has holes in it.

Why, it wouldn't be wasting my time at all. I may be having a blast, and even kicking his proverbial teeth. You're assuming my opponent would get the better of me if I rushed.

Again, playing devils advocate here, but absent the TO putting it in the rules, there's nothing saying you have to make X number of turns. As have been noted its your fault if your whole strategy depends on winning the bottom of turn 5. Its just sucks to be that player then.

Frazzled wrote:
Again, playing devils advocate here, but absent the TO putting it in the rules, there's nothing saying you have to make X number of turns.

The game says how many turns there are.

A tournament is a game of 40k in the allotted amount of time.

If you did not finish the game (either turn #6 or random game length) you did not play a game of 40k.

As have been noted its your fault if your whole strategy depends on winning the bottom of turn 5. Its just sucks to be that player then.

I understand your point now. Your strategy should be based on winning turns #3 and #4, while your opponent is playing to win turn #5. I wonder if that would encourage slow play?

Frazzled wrote:


Why, it wouldn't be wasting my time at all. I may be having a blast, and even kicking his proverbial teeth. You're assuming my opponent would get the better of me if I rushed.

Again, playing devils advocate here, but absent the TO putting it in the rules, there's nothing saying you have to make X number of turns. As have been noted its your fault if your whole strategy depends on winning the bottom of turn 5. Its just sucks to be that player then.

In some cases slow play could cost the person doing it points as well, you are perfectly correct. If that was always the case I would say ok. Sadly I think the majority is a mix of people doing it on purpose if they think they can avert a massacre, or it is done because the person can't/won't play at the required speed and that effects the other player negatively.

As for the second part, I play SW which is assault army so I am probably advocating my side of things just as strongly because it effects me the most when a game ends on turn 3-4 and I have JUST gotten to start actually swinging the chain swords. That coupled with the fact I am 95% sure it was done to me in round1 of the prelims.

In swimming at least there are invitational meets where you have to meet a certain standard in order to enter an event. These are called 'invitational' events, as in you're only invited if you can keep up. Of course, the standard is pretty low, except for championships, but the point is to keep out the reccys who would delay the meet and cause heats to go over their alloted time because they're not familiar with the rules.

Blackmoor wrote:

Frazzled wrote:
Again, playing devils advocate here, but absent the TO putting it in the rules, there's nothing saying you have to make X number of turns.

The game says how many turns there are.

A tournament is a game of 40k in the allotted amount of time.

If you did not finish the game (either turn #6 or random game length) you did not play a game of 40k.

Sorry it just means we didn't make it to turn 5.

Nurglitch wrote:In swimming at least there are invitational meets where you have to meet a certain standard in order to enter an event. These are called 'invitational' events, as in you're only invited if you can keep up. Of course, the standard is pretty low, except for championships, but the point is to keep out the reccys who would delay the meet and cause heats to go over their alloted time because they're not familiar with the rules.

I am really hoping the prelims will have weeded the vast majority out as you said. The guy that did it to me first round and only finished one of his games will be advancing though. I cannot believe this did not happen more than once across the tournament, but I can hope that it only happened for 1-2 people at the spot I am going to for the semis.

Blackmoor wrote:

Frazzled wrote:
Again, playing devils advocate here, but absent the TO putting it in the rules, there's nothing saying you have to make X number of turns.

The game says how many turns there are.

A tournament is a game of 40k in the allotted amount of time.

If you did not finish the game (either turn #6 or random game length) you did not play a game of 40k.

As have been noted its your fault if your whole strategy depends on winning the bottom of turn 5. Its just sucks to be that player then.

I understand your point now. Your strategy should be based on winning turns #3 and #4, while your opponent is playing to win turn #5. I wonder if that would encourage slow play?

Actually no. I usually have a defined strategy that floats by turn. But if its turn 3 and we have 30 minutes left to play, I'm surely not going to pin my gaming on what happens in turn 5.

I am just honestly of the opinion that I don't know how it is possible to not finish a 2000 pt or less 40k game in under 2.5 hours.

Usually the games that take longer than that involve one of the following:

Player takes 30 mins to move his 10 troops
Player thinks about shooting for 10 mins
Player doesn't know what his stuff shoots and takes 20 minutes to decide which dice to roll.

Again, I have played with very very slow players that, if allowed, would take 5+ hours to finish a 1500 pt game. And these players are able to run 2.5 hour 2500 pt games with me when they need to.

There is nothing saying that you have to play a full game. It is just polite to do so.

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:There is nothing saying that you have to play a full game. It is just polite to do so.

So if I go 2nd, is it alright if I get to the point I would get a major victory and just stop playing?

Sure, I might lose some sportsmanship score, but I would win a game.


IMO
being prepared for a tournament includes:
Painting
Modeling
Having your list written up
Knowing how to play your army well enough that you can finish in the time alotted.

Again, you wouldn't go to a tournament with a half painted army. Why would you go with one you know you couldn't play fast enough?

Actually I've been to tourneys with lots of half or no painted armies. Thats not helping your case Timmy

TiMMAH!