Having played a few tourneys and having read a lot of battle reports and tournament reports in the last couple months, it seems that slow playing by opponents, deliberate or otherwise, has been a significant issue. It affects not only the enjoyment of the game, but also, in a timed round, risks influencing the outcome of the game in an artificial way. If done deliberately, a stalling tactic is every bit as much against the spirit of the game, if not an outright attempt to cheat by not playing with the intent of deciding the outcome on the table. Some people play slower than others, for sure, and I'm not advocating that we move at the speed of the fastest, most reckless players, but we also can't unduly penalize normal play because it takes someone 20 minutes to deploy one empty Rhino from reserves. There is often little recourse during a game. You can encourage people to go quickly (which will generally be ignored) and try to get the tournament organizer involved (but they often are unable/unwilling to intervene), but generally you are at the mercy of the slow player.

My proposal, then, is that tournaments should require a turn timer that measures out the round in even increments, assuming 6 turns per player. If done quicker, a random mission length game could go 7, but in a tourney situation, this is often not an option even between two quick players, so it seems that 6 would be the logical target point. I could see two basic options: 1, timed rounds with evenly-divided turn lengths; or 2, timed rounds with front-loaded turn lengths, meaning that the early turns would be longer than the later rounds to account for more models being on the table early and less later.

A 2.5 hour even-length round would look something like this:
Roll for sides/deployment zone
10 minutes - Player A deploys
10 minutes - Player B deploys
Player turns: 10 minutes each (6 per player, 12 total)
Remaining 10 minutes: overtime/wrap-up

A 2.5 hour front-loaded round could look something like this:
Roll for sides/deployment zone
10 minutes - Player A deploys
10 minutes - Player B deploys
15 minutes - Player A turn 1
15 minutes - Player B turn 1
15 minutes - Player A turn 2
15 minutes - Player B turn 2
12 minutes - Player A turn 3
12 minutes - Player B turn 3
10 minutes - Player A turn 4
10 minutes - Player B turn 4
8 minutes - Player A turn 5
8 minutes - Player A turn 5
5 minutes - Player A turn 6
5 minutes - Player A turn 6

I realize there are logistics involved in keeping track of and enforcing the rounds, but they do make timers that can be programmed or you could simply keep a "turn log," with each player putting in the start/end time of their turn on an official scorecard. This way, if a player is running long, you can take to the TO and show proof that the turn started, say, at 11:15 and now that it's 11:30, their turn needs to be over. The TO can then enforce accordingly.

I would think you would need some kind of "two-minute warning" at the end of each segment so that you don't get cut off immediately, but at the end of the player's allotted time, their turn is over except for wrapping up any actions (such as assaults) that have been declared but not yet resolved. If there's a discussion/dispute, the player whose turn it is should be allowed to "pause" their turn to clarify and then resume.

What are people's thoughts? In favor? Too complicated? Unnecessary? Better idea for keeping tournament play running smoothly?

No. I've finished games in 3 turns, but it took both players playing quickly for all 2 hours because the amount of carnage was so high.

Some armies get all their stuff done in the first couple of round (shooty armies), others have to wait till turn 5-6 before they come to grips with the enemy.

What about games when both players start everything in reserves? Do they sit around and twiddle their thumbs for the first hour?

Nope, can't be done, nor would I participate in a tournament which used them. And that being said from someone who virtually always finished his games in tournaments.

I don't care how long any individual turn takes, so long as each player gets half of the total time allowed. Chess clocks would work.

Absolutely not. Why should I be penalized for your actions? Allow me to explain. I play primarily IG. My movement and shooting is quickly resolved, usually in 10-15 minutes max. So as long as there are no close combats, I don't have any time issues. But then YOU want to assault my units, and that combat carries over into my turn. Now we're have to use my time to resolve an action you initiated. So peeler, whose time does resolving that hth come out of, yours or mine? I sure as heck didn't want it or initiate it. But you want to take the time used for it out of my half, right?

So no, no timers.

chess clocks are a good idea to identify problem players. Don, while you point out that assaults in your turn may 'run the clock,' the idea of the chess clock is that it will still take more time for your opponent to move his models into assault, and he will have more attacks and more models at the start of the assault on his turn, thus it will still take longer. Also, since you dictate the pace and order things are resolved in your own turn, he cant draw out an assault phase any longer than you allow.

So yeah, your opponents actions might cause your turns to take a bit longer than normal, but you will still always be faster than him if he is a slow player. So the chess clock is a valid and VERY useful tool to identify slow players. As the chess clock is not an option in the poll, however, I feel the poll needs to be updated.

I'm not sure timers would work, and really aren't necessary. If a simple warning from the TO doesn't help, then maybe if a person gets enough complaints (and you can tell whose games don't finish), they should be asked not to come back until they play faster.

DevianID wrote:chess clocks are a good idea to identify problem players. Don, while you point out that assaults in your turn may 'run the clock,' the idea of the chess clock is that it will still take more time for your opponent to move his models into assault, and he will have more attacks and more models at the start of the assault on his turn, thus it will still take longer. Also, since you dictate the pace and order things are resolved in your own turn, he cant draw out an assault phase any longer than you allow.

So yeah, your opponents actions might cause your turns to take a bit longer than normal, but you will still always be faster than him if he is a slow player. So the chess clock is a valid and VERY useful tool to identify slow players. As the chess clock is not an option in the poll, however, I feel the poll needs to be updated.

Yep, the whole point of a chess clock is that you can tap it over to your opponent when it's his responsibility to move things, make decisions, or roll dice.

My main concern would be the pettiness of hitting the clock back and forth when someone is rolling dice, but perhaps that's the motivation needed to speed up things like allocating wounds to Nob squads.

I'm really not sure buying clocks, and making the game less pleasant most of the time is the solution here. Most big tournaments have mechanisms to deal with it, the only problems I've had with slow play were generally in smaller events where the TO is too nice a guy to really crack the whip.

Actually allocating wounds on Nob squads is easier than any unit except completely homogeneous units. You pick up a die (or dice), point to a model, roll, and then repeat until finished. No need to count generally. It's units that have 3-4 different equipment that I find take the most time.

Devian, by it's very nature, hth combats take longer to resolve. It'sa n additional movement phase in his turn, then a single hth can have 2, 3, or more initiative phases quite easily, each one having to be resolved separately. I don't get to dictate any "pace" on that. All I can do is say which order the combats are resolved in. The actual mechanics for resolving the combat are laid out and I can't change them. Time my moving and shooting if you want, but not the hth. That's something I can't control.

And the 'front end' timed rounds idea goes out the window should you be playing all-reserve riposte armies. Deployment, all in reserves, these units in these vehicles with these ICs attached. Takes what, 3 minutes? Turn 1, OK, I'm done, 5 seconds. Turn 2, now it starts taking longer, and if I'm unlucky on my reserves rolls, I start getting units in on turn 3 or 4, but now I have less time?

Point being, there are too many variables, too many army types, for any one 'timer' idea to cover them all fairly. Is it really fair to tell a player with over 100 models that he gets the same amount of time per turn as a player with 28 models? (Loganwing army I saw at the tourney this weekend, so yes that's a real 2K army number of models) Think someone is dawdling? Have the judge keep an eye on him, and penalize him if you decide he is stalling. But don't punish everyone else for the actions of a few.

barontuman wrote:No. I've finished games in 3 turns, but it took both players playing quickly for all 2 hours because the amount of carnage was so high.

Some armies get all their stuff done in the first couple of round (shooty armies), others have to wait till turn 5-6 before they come to grips with the enemy.

What about games when both players start everything in reserves? Do they sit around and twiddle their thumbs for the first hour?

Nope, can't be done, nor would I participate in a tournament which used them. And that being said from someone who virtually always finished his games in tournaments.

Understandable. The concept of a chess timer has been raised and is a valid one. The point is not to "sit around twiddling your thumbs," but rather to have some enforceable means to accelerate the play of deliberate/unnecessarily slow players, which is a problem. Deliberate slow play, IMO, is damn near as much cheating as loaded dice or fudged movement measurements.

CatPeeler wrote:I don't care how long any individual turn takes, so long as each player gets half of the total time allowed. Chess clocks would work.

I agree, but therein is the core issue: one player getting significantly more than half the time. When two players are of roughly equal speed and number of units, this isn't a problem, but this is rarely the case, it seems.

don_mondo wrote:Absolutely not. Why should I be penalized for your actions? Allow me to explain. I play primarily IG. My movement and shooting is quickly resolved, usually in 10-15 minutes max. So as long as there are no close combats, I don't have any time issues. But then YOU want to assault my units, and that combat carries over into my turn. Now we're have to use my time to resolve an action you initiated. So peeler, whose time does resolving that hth come out of, yours or mine? I sure as heck didn't want it or initiate it. But you want to take the time used for it out of my half, right?

So no, no timers.

Fair enough point, but not really that significant an issue. Why? Number one, by the time you reach a gunline IG (my assumption, based on your post), the assault army is probably down several units. If not, the combats probably won't spill into your turn much because you will be ruthlessly slaughtered on my charge. If they do carry over, it's a matter of a little dice rolling, not analyzing the situation, measuring charge move, moving models, etc. Attacks, hits, wounds, saves. Done.

Further, during your shooting phase, when you pop a transport and the guy fiddles for 10 minutes deploying his squad out of the wreck, THAT comes out of your time as well. If the game was measured so that this sort of thing was accounted for, would that not improve your turn as well?

And again, the concept of timers or measured rounds is more to set a baseline, an expectation, and an enforceable means to combat the slow player.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Polonius wrote:I'm really not sure buying clocks, and making the game less pleasant most of the time is the solution here. Most big tournaments have mechanisms to deal with it, the only problems I've had with slow play were generally in smaller events where the TO is too nice a guy to really crack the whip.

I agree. It's usually smaller events, but you do run into TFG at big events and higher-end tourneys. Most TOs have enough on their plate that dealing with time issues gets pushed down on the agenda and more often than not comes down to, "You guys figure it out." Slow play, IMO, is against the spirit of the game, when done intentionally. If you're just slow, there should still be a means to keep the round time fairly distributed.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

don_mondo wrote:And the 'front end' timed rounds idea goes out the window should you be playing all-reserve riposte armies. Deployment, all in reserves, these units in these vehicles with these ICs attached. Takes what, 3 minutes? Turn 1, OK, I'm done, 5 seconds. Turn 2, now it starts taking longer, and if I'm unlucky on my reserves rolls, I start getting units in on turn 3 or 4, but now I have less time?

Fair enough. Again, the "timed rounds" was more of a concept than hard rule. IMO, it's difficult to enforce the concept of slow play without some guideline as to what constitutes slow play. At least providing a framework for a turn gives some feedback.

don_mondo wrote:Point being, there are too many variables, too many army types, for any one 'timer' idea to cover them all fairly. Is it really fair to tell a player with over 100 models that he gets the same amount of time per turn as a player with 28 models? (Loganwing army I saw at the tourney this weekend, so yes that's a real 2K army number of models) Think someone is dawdling? Have the judge keep an eye on him, and penalize him if you decide he is stalling. But don't punish everyone else for the actions of a few.

You know what, as an ork player who has 100+ models on occasion, it is ABSOLUTELY fair to tell me I have only half the game to do my actions versus a Loganwing army or what have you. You think it's fair that some horde player can just assume, by the nature of his army, that he deserves 60-70-80% of the game? No way in hell is THAT fair. If you're going to play horde, you learn to move faster or don't play them.

I fully support some kind of timer.. Having the TO issue warnings never works because its all subjective

You need to have a fully objective way to make players play faster..

As Ive said many times, any tournament in which games do not go the full amount of time is devoid of any competitive value.. Im sorry, but ork and nid players should NOT get a pass just because they play horde armies (cry me a river)..

Thats like saying a sporting match should just end because one team had too many injury time outs and the game has gone on long enough

Chess clock is a great way to do this.. Or atleast guarantee one player does not monopolize all the time

If you play a slow army you should have TWO options

1 ) Play faster
2 ) play a different army

NOT 3 ) Only get to turn 3 and force your opponent into a draw thus skewing the entire results of the tournament.

I get very tired of hearing that we must respect the rights of people to play what army they enjoy or that its their right to play how they want.. What about the rights of their opponent to get a fair tournament game?

So, you think it'll be easier to get TO's to adopt clocks than to simply enforce a relatively simple standard?

I don't' buy that slow play is subjective. Moving models takes time, but standing and thinking (the real killer), is easy to spot and doesn't take long.

Make it clear that if a player gets multiple complaints, and the TO verifies that the player is taking longer than needed, they'll be told they can't play any longer at those events.

CatPeeler wrote:I don't care how long any individual turn takes, so long as each player gets half of the total time allowed. Chess clocks would work.

EXACTLY!!!

This is what we are talking about doing in my local club.

You have... say 45 total minutes to play your side. If you only use 30. GREAT. If you run out of time, then that sucks for you.

It encourages people to know their armies and rules, and it encourages fast gameplay.

Kirasu wrote:

I get very tired of hearing that we must respect the rights of people to play what army they enjoy or that its their right to play how they want.. What about the rights of their opponent to get a fair tournament game?

They paid the points for a tourney legal army they are allowed to take that many models. Just because some people are taking armies that completely avoid movement and assault phases and focus on shooting only, now they want those who use all 3 phases to be 'punished' or be told not to come to the event?

So scissors wants to ban Rock and only have paper allowed to play.

Basically defensive armies use less time. Aggressor armies have to do a lot more movement and a lot more assaulting and use a lot more time. There is no fair way to clearly determine 'who' is wasting 'what' time on paper... If you have a ton of shooting and I have to roll a ton of armor saves... is that your time or my time? When you pile in on my assault is that your time or my time? Are we going to be clicking chess clocks?

Not to mention none of this is supported by the rules, nothing says the game is required to be 50/50 timewise.

I had a 260 model ork army at 'ardboyz and we never had a problem finishing a game. I played fast but by some of the arbitrary rules some people would ban my army before the game began or even if the game was played fairly they would want 50% of the time as an arbitrary setting. Frankly the longest phase I had with opponents was opponent shooting phase. It took much longer to resolve *HIS* blasts on my hoard than it took me to move and run with accurate measurements. Is it now my fault because he brought too many guns or my fault because I have too many bodies to get shot? And now we have 'too many' what determines 'just enough? I thought codex legal armies were the end all, be all of what should be played?

People know when time is being wasted and there is no way to measure that validly. But to try to say hoards or assault armies who use more time than gunlines somehow should be removed from play... that sounds like 'comp' scores to me... You know... Applying arbitrary and unfair rules to specific lists that are codex legal but punish them for playing in the event.

I still find it funny that people feel they have the right to 50% of the time. When my opponent is making actions I am still playing the game. Both players are using 100% of the time.

I don't think anybody wants to ban armies that take long to play, which are seldom the problem. The problem are players that take too long.

Polonius wrote:I don't think anybody wants to ban armies that take long to play, which are seldom the problem. The problem are players that take too long.

Exactly. If someone is running a 250+ model ork army, playing fast, and giving their opponent their fair share of the time, then there's no problem. Experienced horde players can move models with great skill, so I hardly think that's the issue, or that anyone is suggesting banning certain armies or builds. As suggested by others, it's almost always a player issue rather than an army-build issue.

What is being suggested, and I think is fair, is simply establishing some kind of structure to ensure equity of time distribution. The reason you see that TOs don't do an adequate job in enforcing is that there is no structure to enforce. What is too long? What is deliberate slow play? You need some kind of structure, even if it's just a maximum time per player turn because the TOs also can't sit like a hawk at every table ensuring smooth gameplay.

I consider time being wasted when your opponent takes longer than 5 mins to decided where he wants to move his squad, what unit he wishes to assault, what psychic power should he use, pacing every member of every squad exactly 2 inches away from each other so that blast weapons won't be as damaging, etc...

You should be planning your turn while your opponent is taking his, I also agree that a chess clock would be best for stuff like this cause I hate it when my opponents become undecided on what to do and you can never tell if their stalling or really can't decide what they should do. But I would only want chess clocks at very competitive tournaments like GT's and ard boyz, its a little to much for local tournies and RTT's as chances are you will probably be facing new players than you would at a GT or a ard boy's semi or final round.

The slowest players I've ever encountere have been two differe SoB players, and a guy running foot eldar. Oh, and one ork player that was clearly new to the hobby.

There's no real correlation between how many models a player has and how long their turns take. Some stuff takes longer (counting attacks and then dice, moving so many modes), but most players quickly learn the tricks. things like rolling the run move and adding to movement on turn 1 for orks and nids, knowing exactly how many dice are in a brick, etc.

Polonius wrote:The slowest players I've ever encountere have been two differe SoB players, and a guy running foot eldar. Oh, and one ork player that was clearly new to the hobby.

There's no real correlation between how many models a player has and how long their turns take. Some stuff takes longer (counting attacks and then dice, moving so many modes), but most players quickly learn the tricks. things like rolling the run move and adding to movement on turn 1 for orks and nids, knowing exactly how many dice are in a brick, etc.

Right in time they learn to play faster which is fine for local tournies and such but when you start doing GT's and such (not that GW has official tournaments) you need to know these kinds of things.

I think the chess timer would work, provided you stop it when close assault begins. Essentially, the only time a player 'wastes' time during his turn is planning movement/shooting priority. When the assault phase hits, it's pretty hard to waste time without blatantly rolling the dice slow....

So, time the moving/shooting phase...then when the assault phase hits take off the timer.

Luthon1234 wrote:

Polonius wrote:The slowest players I've ever encountere have been two differe SoB players, and a guy running foot eldar. Oh, and one ork player that was clearly new to the hobby.

There's no real correlation between how many models a player has and how long their turns take. Some stuff takes longer (counting attacks and then dice, moving so many modes), but most players quickly learn the tricks. things like rolling the run move and adding to movement on turn 1 for orks and nids, knowing exactly how many dice are in a brick, etc.

Right in time they learn to play faster which is fine for local tournies and such but when you start doing GT's and such (not that GW has official tournaments) you need to know these kinds of things.

I don't think it's fine for any tournament. I think if you don't know how to play your army in the time alloted, you shouldn't be allowed to play, regardless of army.

The last pre-Ard Boyz tournament I played in was 2000 points. In the second round, I played a... gentleman... with a tervigon spam army.

We barely finished 5 turns, of which I'd played--literally--12 minutes. I refuse to play that idiot again.

I now have a stopwatch that I bring along to tournaments. If my opponent is cool, I don't bother with it (I stopped timing things after the 2nd round of each of my games in the preliminaries, for example). If my opponent is TFG and intentionally slow plays me, I am now able to point to my stopwatch if I need to complain to a TO.

I voted for hte chess timer.

G

Slow play might be the single most annoying and difficult to stop form of cheating possible.

Anything else, you can at least move past it, but if you're slowed... You can't even play.

Reasonable play time can be practiced. If you find that you take too long (either due to amount of models or remembering rules, etc), then that's what you should practice when you play casual games.

Example, for my Orks, I used to sometimes take a long time calculating my attacks when I charged into close combat because I'd count each Ork in the combat. Now, I keep that mob's casualties together so it's just a simple matter of subtraction and then multiplying how many attacks I get. To make sure that I'm taking as little time as possible, I've even made a habit of practicing how quickly I can count all my dice for the roll, by making them easily accessible to hand, etc.

I can understand an inexperienced tournament player slow playing unintentionally, but it should only happen once, then it's player responsibility to make sure it doesn't happen again.

I don't think any form of turn timer would work. Chess timer....I'd have to see it in action.

As an ork player at 2k points, my turns generally go like this:

Turn1 Move: 2 minutes.
Turn1 Shoot: 3 minutes or less.
Turn1 Assaults: 2 minutes.

Turn2 Move (and disembarking): 10 minutes
Turn2 Shooting/running: 10 minutes.
Turn2 Assaults: 30 minutes.

Turn3 Move: 2 minutes
Turn3 Shooting: 2 minutes
Turn3 Assaults (continuation of turn 2): 15 minutes.

Etc.

That's a pretty general format.

I chose other as some of the most fun tournaments I played were out in the Seattle area where a FLGS used this method. Each player had 10 minutes to deploy and 15 minutes to complete each game round. However, each table noted the total time they took for a round and it carried over into a bank.

So If I took 3 minutes to deploy and 6 minutes to complete my turn1 I had 16minutes in the bank so to speak that I could use when it was important.

In that situation I never had to worry about an excessive assault phase due to banked time.

There were some exceptions made to ensure that assaults were completed and neither player penalized where the TO was directly involved. Rounds lasted 2 hours 40 minutes and the TO had 20 min between rounds. She stole from this time if needed.

Now this wouldn't always work but it did encourage players to be thinking ahead of the game and knowing what they were going to move where before they started touching thier figures. That fact alone sped up the entire process so much many people stopped keeping track because everything was so much smoother.

It does take a more competitive or mature mind set for these things to work usually. And it doesn't work in all situations but almost all games were finished at thouse tourneys and players seemed to have lots of fun!

Dashofpepper wrote:I don't think any form of turn timer would work. Chess timer....I'd have to see it in action.

As an ork player at 2k points, my turns generally go like this:

Turn1 Move: 2 minutes.
Turn1 Shoot: 3 minutes or less.
Turn1 Assaults: 2 minutes.

Turn2 Move (and disembarking): 10 minutes
Turn2 Shooting/running: 10 minutes.
Turn2 Assaults: 30 minutes.

Turn3 Move: 2 minutes
Turn3 Shooting: 2 minutes
Turn3 Assaults (continuation of turn 2): 15 minutes.

Etc.

That's a pretty general format.

So, as I suggested above, a chess timer that starts at the top of your turn and ends the moment close assault hits would suffice?

I sponsored a thread on this issue last year and we had a nice long discussion on chess timers. You can read it here. http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/248150.page

I am on the side of instituting some sort of a timer. There are a few HUGE logistical problems that would need to be overcome before they should be used.

1: Assault phase..oponents are operating in the others phase and can eat up a large portion of time if they wanted too. How do you prevent this?

2: Rules arguments. People can just "rule stall" you, during your turn. How do you overcome this?

3: Timers are expensive, and you would want the decent electronic ones so they won't "break down" during a game.

4: People don't necesarily know how to use chess timers, they would need to be trained before attending.

5: What is the penalty for running out of time? Forfeit?

The good thing about chess timers is you have a bank of time, so you could effectively play real fast during some turns to try and save time for later turns.

I have been meaning to buy one to test it out, but haven't got around to it.

GG

I have still yet to see where the rules say a game should be 50/50 timewise or any evidence that any of the GW armies are balanced around 50/50 playtime.

Many armies are clearly designed to require more shooting or movement and more time to play than others...

This is nothing more than arbitrary 'army composition' by basically forcing everyone to play armies that are designed around 50/50 time split or suffer the penalties of punishment or possibly being unable to play competitively and using the time needed to actually play the army and complete all the actions of the units they had paid for. What happens if I assault you and we have a massive assault, is that all my time? What happens if you assault me and we have a massive assault, is that your time? Does that mean now I may want to forgo an assault and set up for you to assault me simply to save my time now? Can I build a whole army around forcing actions on your turn to ruin your clock usage and deny you actions because you run out of time?

Slow Play does not mean that 50/50 play is valid. Address the slow players by confronting them and not by hiding behind some clocks that don't actually address the issue and are not actually supported by the rules of the game.

@nkelsch.

The basic rule book isn't a rulebook geared towards tourney play. We all know that. It is geared towardas casual game play, so 50/50 doesn't matter. That's why they don't mention it.

However, if a tournement is instituting a timed round of say 2.5 hours, then its certainly the TO's right to enforce a 50/50 format,

Afterall.. game time limits are not in the rulebook either, but tournaments need them to run smoothly.

Unless we were to play unlimited time limits, like they do in some Chess tournies.

GG

generalgrog wrote:@nkelsch.

The basic rule book isn't a rulebook geared towards tourney play. We all know that. It is geared towardas casual game play, so 50/50 doesn't matter. That's why they don't mention it.

However, if a tournement is instituting a timed round of say 2.5 hours, then its certainly the TO's right to enforce a 50/50 format,

Afterall.. game time limits are not in the rulebook either, but tournaments need them to run smoothly.

Unless we were to play unlimited time limits, like they do in some Chess tournies.

GG

I don't think the armies are balanced for 50/50 play and due to the ebb and flow of the game, many times one particular assault turn will take much longer than all the other simply of when the 'clash' of the forces happens. This isn't slow play... this is how the game is played and one person should not be penalized because it just happens to be on his turn a lot of units were in the correct place for multiple assaults to kick off. (or outplayed his opponent to gain an advantage by coordinating assaults, now he is going to be punished for time?)

Slow play is its own issue and 50/50 time doesn't actually solve it especially since a majority of the actions in the game are 'both players' time. Like resolving assaults and shooting which would be unfair and unreasonable to allocate to only one player's time allotment.

I think instituting 50/50 time is just as arbitrary as comp scores... And a TO can use them... but they are a way of putting an artificial limit on specific kinds of armies or playstyles that the TO doesn't like.

Why not just call slow players on being slow and deal with it?

nkelsch wrote:Why not just call slow players on being slow and deal with it?

I have to agree with this. Timers will cost money, annoy people, upset some people, and be a fairly large hassle for the TO, all to prevent, at most, a few warnings and a dismissal to a slow player.

I'm not sure 50/50 time is inherently unfair, after all you could make the case that bringing an army you can't play quick enough in half the alloted time takes time away from your opponent, but I don't think the hassle to make this system work is worth the effort.

I totally agree with you on the assault phase problem, and that's why I listed it at the top of my list of "huge" logistical problems.

I also agree with you that 40k isn't balanced for tournement play, it's designed for casual play.

However it's a fact that people want to play tournements, so the dilemna has always been "how do you take a game that isn't designed for tournement play and still run a fair and balanced tourney".

That has always been the issue.... from day one. That is why they instituted comp. (I'm not a fan of comp either)

GG

A chat before the game starts is the first line of defense. My opponent can see that I mean business, and it clears up some issues they may otherwise have argued over later. If I see a tendency towards slow play I get proactive turn one if possible, starting with gentle reminders, "We've only got two hours for setup and play, so we'll need to move quickly", or "Can I help you move those orks/gaunts/guardsmen forward, under your direction of course".

If slowness persists I move on to "I understand you have some decisions to make but we really need to move things along if we want to finish". If I think my opponent is deliberately foot dragging I tell the judge and try and get someone to babysit the game.

I think that a chess timer could be a valuable tool even if not part of an enforcement. My 1st real game in over a decade was at the prelim 'Ard Boyz. I had 50 shoota boyz and 15 lootas to start. I was pretty quick on my decisions and movement (to the point of making some mistakes) but my turns still took forever. Then there was a game when one of those blood claw terminators managed to get to a 30 man shooot squad... L:(.

But those are different issues (comp and slow play). I think it is beyond debate that this game doesn't have a FOC that is balanced in terms of play speed and that makes the issue kind of a moot point.

I can't see how it could work, to be honest.

Turn timers work in games where each player has a turn in which only they have to do anything, as what happens in that turn is entirely up to that one player. So if they take up too much time, or run out of time, the fault is entirely their own.

In 40K, your opponent has all sort of things that they can or have to do in your turn. The assault phase, as mentioned, is all about both players. But the shooting phase also involves your opponent... a player taking his time rolling saves, or figuring out wound allocation, or removing casualties, or dithering over specific rules is going to very quickly eat into your time.


So I would put it into the 'good idea in theory, but practically impossible to put in practice due to the complexity of the 40K turn structure...'

insaniak wrote:
So I would put it into the 'good idea in theory, but practically impossible to put in practice due to the complexity of the 40K turn structure...'

QFT

You could do it...but it would take a massive amount of rules minutia that would make star fleet battles seem like go fish.

I'll admit I've never played in a 40k tourney, timed or otherwise. But I have played in chess tournements. The 50/50 rule is BS. In chess each person is alloted a certain amount of time which happens to make a game to a maximum time limit. If the rule is that you can't use more time than me then what happens when I play "speed chess" (taking less time to think and just move the piece)? If you use more time than me can I cry "foul"? Chess is not a game about moving pieces and rolling dice it's almost purely intellectual. Chess players need a prod so that the game doesn't drag on for days. 40K has a time limit so that X number of rounds can be played in a day. It's a different purpose and needs a different answer. If my opponent plays an army with only 20 pieces should I have to match his speed of play? As long as I play as fast as reasonable why should I worry how much time I'm using? The game goes until it's over by time or scenerio. This whole thing seems to me, to be like the argument about should someone concede a game that they're losing. The comparision to chess is unfair to the game and the players. If there is a problem that's what TOs are there for. If they can't handle the problem then they shouldn't be running the tourney next time.

Let's say we use the clock run. What happens when a players time runs out? Do they get a automatic loss?

Crush all their models into dust imo.. Ironman 40k

Honestly Id prefer more TO's and stricter time rules over a clock.. but most tournaments Ive been to have what, 1 judge for 20 people? How many were on the floor constantly during adepticon?

If you can find a way to eliminate the subjective nature of "stalling" and have more enforcement present on the floor (You often waste more time trying to get a judge) then I think it can work

I don't think the armies are balanced for 50/50 play and due to the ebb and flow of the game, many times one particular assault turn will take much longer than all the other simply of when the 'clash' of the forces happens. This isn't slow play... this is how the game is played and one person should not be penalized because it just happens to be on his turn a lot of units were in the correct place for multiple assaults to kick off. (or outplayed his opponent to gain an advantage by coordinating assaults, now he is going to be punished for time?)

Disagree, ive never seen a well skilled and highly knowledgeable player be also a "slow player".. From my experience at 10 years of tournaments they are fairly mutually exclusive. Slow play generally involves either not knowing your rules completely or not knowing your tactics well enough to execute them in a timely manner. Personally I dont think I've run out of time during any tournament games, but I see it all the time on other boards

Tournaments give a SET time to finish your game in. How can it can be fair if you allow someone to play slow and break one of the above stipulations? IE finishing the game. Okay sometimes games do drag on longer than normal, but a lot of slow players have a very distinctive pattern. That pattern is that ALL of their games take forever, Im sorry but both players have a right to a full game not just the guy who plays an army he cant even finish a game with

None of what I said assumed tho that the player is doing it on purpose.. I havent seen an example of this personally but Ive read it does happen especially with ork armies

I'm not sure how the timer thing would work. If after 15 minutes, if I'm not done with my turn, it's forfeit, that leaves a lot of room for shenanigans.

During my turn, someone could drag their feet deciding what guys to take off in the shooting phase, reducing my assault phase time. If the point is to avoid dodgy players, this doesn't quite do it.

Your best bet is to tell the TO about slow players or tell the other guy to hurry up.

Timers aren't the end point of the discssion--that role still falls to the TO.

What timers can do, though, is help convince a TO or judge that he needs to watch a particular game.

Case in point: last years Semi's at Ernie's Games in Kirkland, WA.

A notorious cheater (the same player that had his 'win' stripped at the last Seattle GT) slowplayed rednekgunner in the 2nd game. I think they finished three turns.

Judges were alerted between the 2nd & 3rd game, and they had one judge watching the entirety of Nathaniel's last game.

Oddly enough, that game finished with plenty of time to spare...

If a timer / chessclock / stopwatch does nothing more than prompt the scrutiny of a judge, it has done its job.

CatPeeler wrote:If a timer / chessclock / stopwatch does nothing more than prompt the scrutiny of a judge, it has done its job.

Surely, though, the slow player's opponents complaining to the judge would have the same effect, without the TO needing to purchase a whole bunch of timers...

insaniak wrote:Surely, though, the slow player's opponents complaining to the judge would have the same effect, without the TO needing to purchase a whole bunch of timers...

In an ideal situation, sure. If you need to convince a judge that there's an issue, though, having some form of documentation can only help.

"Judge, this guy is slow-playing me. Can you watch / get him to speed up?"

vs.

"Judge, I've played 8 minutes & 32 seconds of the last hour and ten minutes, can you watch the rest of the game to help things along?"

My digital stopwatch cost me $9 at the sporting goods store--less than what I've spent on dice & templates. If you can't be bothered to spend ten bucks to help nip slow playing in the bud, your cell phone or watch may even have a timer built in. As far as I'm concerned, every tournament player should add a timer to their kit.

Yeah, he said / she said rarely works anywhere.. Better to have evidence

Kirasu wrote:Yeah, he said / she said rarely works anywhere.. Better to have evidence

And you showing the TO a watch is different how?

Leo_the_Rat wrote:And you showing the TO a watch is different how?

Are you being deliberately obtuse, or do you seriously believe that a TO wouldn't give any more credence to a complaint with a stopwatch than to one without any documentation?

CatPeeler wrote:Are you being deliberately obtuse, or do you seriously believe that a TO wouldn't give any more credence to a complaint with a stopwatch than to one without any documentation?

I wouldn't, if I was running the event.

A stopwatch displaying a couple of times means what, exactly? That the player has been timing the turns? Or that they have simply been running a stopwatch and stopping it at random times? How is the TO going to know?

And, again, even if you accept that whatever is shown on the watch actually relates to the game, it doesn't take into account the fact that a single player's turn does not consist of actions only taken by that player. You can't accurately time how long a single player is taking, because so much of the game isn't about that single player.

insaniak wrote:I wouldn't, if I was running the event.

A stopwatch displaying a couple of times means what, exactly? That the player has been timing the turns? Or that they have simply been running a stopwatch and stopping it at random times? How is the TO going to know?

Which, again, is why you ask the TO to come and watch the game and decide what actions (if any) should be taken. I wouldn't expect a stopwatch alone to disqualify anyone--it can, however, lend at least *some* degree of weight to a complaint.

I think that we can all agree that, by it's nature, slow play may be difficult to 'prove.' Unfortunately, I've seen plenty of occasions where a judge has been apathetic or dismissive about complaints.

By keeping a stopwatch visible, I'm convinced that I have two things on my side:

1) Obvious warning against slowplay shenanigans for a would-be cheater.
2) A tangible increase in the likelihood of a judge taking closer notice after a complaint.

Does a stopwatch "prove" anything? For the reasons already noted, of course not. I am convinced, however, that it presents enough "documentation" to get an otherwise lazy judge off his butt. And if the simple presence of a stopwatch nips an intentional cheater's slow play in the bud, it's already done its job.

If you're blessed by either a decent opponent or a competent judge, the watch can go back in the case.

CatPeeler wrote:Which, again, is why you ask the TO to come and watch the game and decide what actions (if any) should be taken. I wouldn't expect a stopwatch alone to disqualify anyone--it can, however, lend at least *some* degree of weight to a complaint.

That, I think, is where we'll have to disagree. Asking a judge to oversee the game is really the best option... but the stopwatch doesn't make your complaint any more weighty. It just means you have a stopwatch.

I think that we can all agree that, by it's nature, slow play may be difficult to 'prove.' Unfortunately, I've seen plenty of occasions where a judge has been apathetic or dismissive about complaints.

So, to turn the question around, if the judge is already apathetic or dismissive, do you honestly think they're going to be any less so just because you have a stopwatch that displays some (so far as they can see) random numbers?




But again, how do you actually time the game? Are you going to start and stop the split every time either player takes an action? Or just time the phase and hope the other player's actions in that phase don't skew the times too much? Because very little of the game is actually a single-player-at-a-time affair. So unless you're stopping and starting the clock for every individual action, you're not actually getting an accurate representation... so it's essentially meaningless. All you're actually timing is the length of time that both players are taking to complete a phase.

As being the one slow played by Nathanial last year, I can say that I did complain, and I got a whole lot of nothing. The short version of the story is that Ernie at last years Semifinals had to take off for some reason, and I heard him tell his friend " I gotta go, watch things for me." I took this as the guy watching the store was a judge, and during my game when TMFG Nathanial walked over to the mission brief to read it 3 times and spent almost 20 minutes deciding what psychic powers to use, the "judge" was right there watching my game. I pointed to my watch and looked at the judge, and all I got was a shrug. I took this as the home team advantage, and played on, despite the gross flagrant cheating in every other phase ( He was recorded at the Seattle GT doing the same things). I ended up loosing the game only because we ended on T3, and I was playing mech marines, he had mech eldar w/2 council jetbike squads. I then told Ernie after he got back, and all I got was thanks for the info.

I told this story, because if I were to have had a stop watch I could have said exactly how long I had played and fought harder to get him DQ'ed.

We could always start a website devoted to posting pictures, names and armies of slow players.. Shaming worked for certain organizations for a thousand years!

The problem is still the lack of judges and at times lack of caring how a tournament is run.. Either just being dismissive or being overworked (After all it is usually a volunteer thing)

I think timed turns are good, but I dont know how to enforce it very well without more judges. Its like knowing how to properly stop crime in a city but never having another police officers to do it..

Perhaps a solution could include making sure the top tables are watched more closely during the final round. That way you can atleast use the judges you do have more efficiently.

As being the one slow played by Nathanial last year, I can say that I did complain, and I got a whole lot of nothing. The short version of the story is that Ernie at last years Semifinals had to take off for some reason, and I heard him tell his friend " I gotta go, watch things for me." I took this as the guy watching the store was a judge, and during my game when TMFG Nathanial walked over to the mission brief to read it 3 times and spent almost 20 minutes deciding what psychic powers to use, the "judge" was right there watching my game. I pointed to my watch and looked at the judge, and all I got was a shrug. I took this as the home team advantage, and played on, despite the gross flagrant cheating in every other phase ( He was recorded at the Seattle GT doing the same things). I ended up loosing the game only because we ended on T3, and I was playing mech marines, he had mech eldar w/2 council jetbike squads. I then told Ernie after he got back, and all I got was thanks for the info.

I told this story, because if I were to have had a stop watch I could have said exactly how long I had played and fought harder to get him DQ'ed.

Yeah good story.. It illustrates another problem that is not unique to judging.. Peoples unwillingness to confront others. Often people just want to ignore something that doesnt affect them rather than speak up or take a side. Doing so would require him to do more than just making a ruling on a rule, he would have to rule *against* the actual player not just the interpretation of a rule

Kirasu wrote:Yeah good story.. It illustrates another problem that is not unique to judging.. Peoples unwillingness to confront others. Often people just want to ignore something that doesnt affect them rather than speak up or take a side. Doing so would require him to do more than just making a ruling on a rule, he would have to rule *against* the actual player not just the interpretation of a rule.

And herein is a very important truth. A lot of TOs, in all honesty, don't have the skills necessary for the job. In an ideal world, yeah, you either just remind the other player to play faster or get the TO and have them make a ruling if they don't. But the vast majority of the time, the TOs are the store owner or employee, perhaps not even that knowledgeable about the game, and not able/willing to make that call. Add to that the fact that most gamers are not... adept... in the social graces and you have the potential for abuse. All the more reason that some kind of structure should be in place, if only to give the TO some tangible rule they can point to in order to enforce these sort of issues.

insaniak wrote:So, to turn the question around, if the judge is already apathetic or dismissive, do you honestly think they're going to be any less so just because you have a stopwatch that displays some (so far as they can see) random numbers?

I do, actually. As has been mentioned in several threads, people are generally non-confrontational--TO's included. I think some of the bad judging out there is due to that desire to avoid unpleasantness. In that case, having a timer gives them an 'out,' in the sense that there's at least something he can point to as the basis for a ruling, other than himself. "I'm not saying you're cheating--the stopwatch is saying your cheating. You two better Play Nice, or the mean ol' stopwatch is going to disqualify you."

But again, how do you actually time the game? Are you going to start and stop the split every time either player takes an action? Or just time the phase and hope the other player's actions in that phase don't skew the times too much? Because very little of the game is actually a single-player-at-a-time affair. So unless you're stopping and starting the clock for every individual action, you're not actually getting an accurate representation... so it's essentially meaningless. All you're actually timing is the length of time that both players are taking to complete a phase.

In actual practice (at least, in my experience), such precision is entirely unnecessary. I time the entirety of my deployment, and the entirety of my own turns. Slow play typically becomes obvious long before the game gets to the point where a complicated assault has even begun.

Guys like that are tough to handle if the Judges won't do anything about it. I have been in a similar situation before where I went directly to the TO and told him what kind of cheating happened and how and then very clamly and directly asked that either a judge be present to watch the game to prevent the cheating or have us both disqualified. The TO looked at me like I was insane but I simply showed that I would lose if the cheating continued and rather than let my opponent get away with it I would like us both disqualified for cheating to ensure that he could not inflict that on any other opponent. The judge stood by the table for a few minutes and nothing went awry on my turn and started to leave, i convinced him to stay once more andhe saw how theis player who was supposed to be so great didn't actually know the rules. He had cheated so often and consistantly he didn't actually know how to play the game legit with any skill. So he spent the rest of that round moving between all other tables and ours to make sure that the game was played correctly. It was so bad for the cheater that he accused the TO of fixing the tourney and not knowing the rules. The TO ended up DQ'ing him and giving his other two opponents prizes for having to play him since it was the final round of the tourney. That was at the Game Matrix in Seattle a few years ago.

On a side note, the 15 minute player rounds I discussed earlier your turn was ended if you exceeded time but since you could bank slow rounds it only happened once or twice. As long as all assaults were already in progress at the ding, thats where the TO would add extra time to the table just to make sure that things were moving quickly. If someone was slow in assault they were not given the extra time. It could be unfair to some but as I said made things move much more smoothly overall.

[quote=CatPeeler
Are you being deliberately obtuse, or do you seriously believe that a TO wouldn't give any more credence to a complaint with a stopwatch than to one without any documentation?

But the major problem is you assume 'slow play' happens on the slow players turn.

Sure when it comes to 'movement' or shooting order' that is his turn, but rules disputes, Assault, measuring and determining LOS to HIS models happen on YOUR turn as well.

So how does this 'clock' solve any of that? How are you going to capture him Quibbling about cover and LOS to all his units? How are you going to capture when he asks you to measure *EVERY* distance even ones clearly in range? What about when ie fights over rules on your turn? Those are all huge 'slow play' issues that are not on his turn and won't be captured with a chess clock.

If the TO cares about slow play, he is already aware of it and will confront the player.

The issue is TOs many times won't and people think a stopwatch or chess clock will not force a bad TO to confront people... They will still avoid it.

Chess clocks solve nothing as the real issue is Tournament organization... And I still don't agree with the premise the game is balanced or designed for 50/50 play as a single assault can take up way too much time when it is both players involved.

The premise of the game isnt entirely relevant considering the premise ALSO does not include tournament play

Accommodations and restrictions must be used to facilitate well coordinated games. Since a time limit is used then a way to enforce said time limit should be implemented, it's fairly simple

When you institute a law in a society you must also create a mechanism for enforcement of said law. To do otherwise is to permit exploitation of the law.

In a normal game you can say "I wont play you" and that in itself can solve the problem and at the same time provide a deterrent to adverse behavior. (Ex. the offending player has less people to game with). This does not hold true in a tournament because if you concede out of principle well you just handed him an easy win and ENCOURAGED bad behavior on his part

Again, every rule needs a mechanism for fair enforcement. If 40k had a real competitive scene like MTG you could hire judges who are vetted and trained, but alas not gonna happen

I just time how long it takes me to play a turn, that is it. If by turn to a great deal of time has expired and I have only used a fraction, THEN I go and get a TO to either make them speed up or something. In most cases it is not necessary, because in general people are not @#@holes.

You know to be honest, I havent played in a lot of tourneys but it seems to me that the movement phase is where people tend to slow stuff down. Maybe some kind of timing dynamic focused on that?

Flogging perhaps?

Kirasu wrote:The premise of the game isnt entirely relevant considering the premise ALSO does not include tournament play

Accommodations and restrictions must be used to facilitate well coordinated games. Since a time limit is used then a way to enforce said time limit should be implemented, it's fairly simple

This is called Arbitrary Army Composition rules. Instituting an arbitrary time limit or system that assumes the premise that 50/50 play is fair for all armies is a form of army comp as you tell players who use all 3 phases or do a lot of movement or shooting that if you have a list that takes longer than other lists you will be penalized even though your codex allows your list to exist.

So someone who piles everything in transports may take 1-2 minutes to move while someone who has the same units but all on foot may tay 4-5 minutes to move. If you require 50/50 play or hold all armies to the speed of the faster player per phase or per turn you are basically instituting 'army comp'. What if I am a gunline of pieplates? I have no movement and can resolve my shots quickly while my opponent may very validly have lots of movement and shooting to do and could take much longer... It isn't his fault I took a list that minimizes time and his codex requires more time-consuming actions to be played the way the codex writes intended. And if someone wants 180 spinegaunts, they have the right to take it in the rock/paper/scissors and they should not be punished for taking a competitive and legal list. And while they shouldn't take 30 minutes to move, they should take longer than a mech army and that is OK and should be allowed by a TO as longas it is not abusive. It sounds like some players want specific types of armies punished as a way to enforce comp.

Any type of penalty for him or benefit for me is an army comp rule for armies that minimize time usage via list building.

And no one has ever answered whose 'time' is eaten if there is a particularly large and well coordinated assault on one side which could take 20 minutes to resolve simply because lots of independent actions are going on... Assault involves both players equally and should not be classified as part of the time penalty for only one of the players.

And this all assumes that you could legitimately 'do' something if someone does waste time... If the TO isn't willing to confront slow play what makes anyone think arbitrary limits are going to do anything as a TO still needs to confront the person.

nkelsch wrote:This is called Arbitrary Army Composition rules. Instituting an arbitrary time limit or system that assumes the premise that 50/50 play is fair for all armies is a form of army comp as you tell players who use all 3 phases or do a lot of movement or shooting that if you have a list that takes longer than other lists you will be penalized even though your codex allows your list to exist.

Yeah, it's restriction. But what happens if your slow-to-play army runs into another slow-to-play army?

Tournaments with time limits (which is pretty much all of them) have always had the general issue of "some legal armies can't be used 'cause they're just too slow." It's not an arbitrary restriction - in most cases, there are real timelines that have to be met, such that the length of a particular game MUST be limited to around 2-3 hours. And if you bring an army that requires 30 minutes to setup, and 15 minutes per movement phase, then you're going to have relatively little chance of playing your games to their natural completion, within the fixed time limits.

There are plenty of tricks to help speed play up - several sets of different-colored dice helps with complex saves/shooting, a dice tray keeps your dice together while rolling, deployment trays for your units makes it much easier to grab all 20 genestealers off your display board for deployment, a display board cuts down on deployment time, measuring sticks of predetermined lengths are much faster to use than tape measures, and etc. Inside-out knowledge of your army's stats and rules, as well as the to-hit and to-wound tables, makes a huge difference.

The problem isn't really people who want to bring insanely huge armies to tournaments; they quickly learn whether they can play an army in the time allotted, or not, and will generally adjust. The problem is people who are intentionally slow-playing.

nkelsch wrote:This is called Arbitrary Army Composition rules. .........

I disagree completely. It is more than reasonable to assume that if a given game is allotted 150 minutes to play, each player should expect 75 minutes in which to do so--regardless of what army they are using.

The idea that some armies aren't capable of completing 5 turns within that time is simply not true. I've played several games against 175+ model armies at 2500 points--most of these using 100+ models myself--and completed five turns with time to spare.

It would be more accurate to say that some players aren't capable of completing 5 turns within the allotted time. In that case, I would argue that they should either practice using their army of choice until they are able to do so, or switch armies.

I played a guy at a recent event who was the slowest player. Took him 20 minutes to complete a turn, when all he had on the table were 5 sanguard, 10 assault marines, and 4 attack bikes. He spent 5 minutes in an assault phase where he charged a termagaunt squad with sanguard. I had to roll no dice. I really feel that was unfair, had the game gone on one more turn I would have tabled him, and though I had almost 4 times his models I played much faster.

I do think even times could work against certain armies, mainly horde lists. I think that slow play should just be reported to the judge. If your horde orks are taking 30 minutes a turn, you shouldnt have brought them to the event in the first place.

I often feel I am a slow player, and I've been trying to play with a chess clock just to keep myself moving, and also to check for myself if I'm really the problem if a game doesn't finish. As has been mentioned, the CC phase of each turn becomes a problem because the superior CC army in any game has what amounts to extra turns.

This is not an argument against turn timers however. Just because you're rolling dice on my turn doesn't somehow entitle you to more time. If you can't handle figuring out who is attacking which squad or how many attacks you have in a timely manner...my timer is the one who will suffer for it on my turn. I'll try to provide you the same courtesy. If it really bothers you, we can hammer that chess clock between initiative rounds or turn if off when we're both attacking.

If your army has trouble playing its half of the game in half the time allotted to a tournament round...you either need to learn how to play faster, or play a different army. Thems the breaks.

Half the problem I have seen is people taking so long to roll dice. Get big dice, get dice that are easy to read, and learn how to pick them up fast. I play bugs, my army has 73 models. Itll take me a good 10-15 minutes to get everything out of the box and deployed. But my turns are about a 50-50 split between less then 5 and less than 10 minutes, rarely going to 15. Even with large coordinated assaults. A lot of it is knowing how to pick up dice, what to move, and how to move it. I have played six turn 2500 point games in under and hour and a half. standard 2000 point game takes about an hour for me, more time if I am bullshitting with the homies.

I have a proposal. Boxing timers, because they are loud as gak. 10 minute turns. If that timer rings I get to punch you in the face until your turn is up.

I grappled the shoggoth wrote:Half the problem I have seen is people taking so long to roll dice. Get big dice, get dice that are easy to read, and learn how to pick them up fast. I play bugs, my army has 73 models. Itll take me a good 10-15 minutes to get everything out of the box and deployed.

Loose the box. For tournament play, use a tray - one will cost you less than $5, and should cut your deployment by 10 minutes over unpacking figures individually every game. Every minute saved is significant!

I used to have one for my eldar. But alas I left it at a store 100 miles from my house, and decided returning for it wasnt worth it. Ill get one sometime soon. Even then, the actual placing of models on the table still takes me about 5-10 minutes.

NO, a turn timer will only slow down the game when WAAC players are involved.

Timed turns will only encourage a WAAC player to do everything possible to slow the game down during their opponents turn when the game is on their opponents timer. Timers only work in chess because there is no way to cheat the system and slow the game down on the opponents turn. Timed turns allow WAAC players slow down their opponents turn by bringing up rules arguments, demand proof the weapons that are obviously in range are in range, slow play their armor/cover saves, and/or slow play removing models from the table when the game is on their opponents timer. Abhorrent behavior as previously described would significantly benefit a WAAC player, and there is nothing anybody can do about it.

Schadenfreude, How does the current system not already allow for all of this to happen?

I think it really depends on the penalty for going over your turn timer. It isn't set in stone that it has to be some kind of forfeiture of the game, it could just be an out-of-game penalty to battle points for the offending player. Perhaps with some room for the judges to decide if a penalty is even deserved. It is still on the player himself to call over a judge if the other player is deliberately slow playing on his turn, etc.

lambadomy wrote:Schadenfreude, How does the current system not already allow for all of this to happen?

It can certainly happen under the current system... but that's kind of the point. If the timer isn't actually going to make any difference, there's not much point including it.


To be perfectly honest, I think a better option than pushing for timers on tables would be pushing for tournaments to employ qualified judges. Yes, GW is never going to set up an official play program with approved judges the way more companies producing more competitively-oriented games have done... But tournament organisers, particularly those co-ordinating the larger events, could always work towards putting something similar in place themselves.

At my prelim event if people were willing and ready they would already establish sides and who was going first. This sped up deployment considerably. To decide all that before the timer starts is huge and would speed up the game alot. Some people are arguing about ork players. The worst case of slow playing I have ever seen was against mech IG at 1750 points. I barely finished turn 3 before it ended. I went first and the opponet asked if I was running berzerkers I answered yes. Take in mind I finished my entire first turn in 7 minutes. Out of 2 hrs and 30 minutes I used less then 30 minutes. It was discusting and that was the worse case I have ever had of stalling and really opened my eyes to it.

I think stalling is worse then loaded dice! It takes the fun from the game. I

There is also the fundemental flaw with the time imposing structure is that some people take their time so they are thorough and announce everything they are doing clearly so that no mistakes and misunderstandings are made. There's been plenty of times where I was underneath the gun for lack of a better phrase where I mistakenly didn't move a squad or something along that lines and it cost me the game completely so if you force players to constantly be worried about how much time they have to move all of their stuff because they want to be thorough and clear about everything that is done I feel that it favors people who can formulate good twitch based strategies and move all their units in precise measurements. And the whole thing gets screwed up if you have an argument.

Like for instance you are moving and I go wait a minute, you cant move that far. Lets check the rules. No I dont think those guys have that wargear, lets check. No I think you moved the guys too far, clearly you cant assault me. Blah blah blah. Burning through all of your time and either you do the same to me to level the playing field or ignore it and take the handicap. I know I doubt any of this will happen but it could.

No timers. It's been a very rare day that I've not been able to finish a complete game within the allotted time. After years of tourneys, I think I've a keen enough eye to spot the slow play shenanigans. When it does crop up, it's when I start looking at Sportsmanship scoring.

Timers will also suggest that there will be no issue whatsoever regarding rule interpretations, LOS questions, complicated assaults etc...

Another option is for TOs to really look at the amount of time they are allotting each round of a tourney. If folks aren't finishing games, then they need to add time. If this isn't an option (business hours etc...), then they should lower the point value of the tourney to help ensure full games can be played.

lambadomy wrote:Schadenfreude, How does the current system not already allow for all of this to happen?

I think it really depends on the penalty for going over your turn timer. It isn't set in stone that it has to be some kind of forfeiture of the game, it could just be an out-of-game penalty to battle points for the offending player. Perhaps with some room for the judges to decide if a penalty is even deserved. It is still on the player himself to call over a judge if the other player is deliberately slow playing on his turn, etc.

It can happen, but in a timed turn tournament it will happen more often. The common benefit in a non timed tournament is to prevent a turn 5. The benefit in a timed tournament is when the players time ends their turn ends. Nasty WAAC behavior escalates from attempting to prevent additional turns to attempting to ruin every single turn an player takes by causing it to end before they are done. The benefits & reward from the WAAC behavior of stalling the game would increase tenfold, thus the occurrence of turn stalling behavior from WAAC players would also increase also.

Timed turns would not work in a 40k tournament, the cure would be worse than the disease.

I see, I agree with that - but I'm not really advocating timed individual turns.

One of the possibilities presented is the chess clock. Say you had 2 hour rounds. You give 50 minutes to each player for their turns, and a general 20 minutes of extra time. The expectation is that both players complete their 5-7 turns in their 50 minutes allocated time each. The penalty for going over your 50 minutes is simply a loss of points in the game (which is separate from any more severe penalties for deliberately slow playing which should involve a judge)

This would give exactly the same amount of opportunity for the other player to slow play you as a regularly timed game.

I completely agree that something where each turn has a hard timer is completely unworkable. A chess clock may also be unworkable, but I don't see it as being obviously worse than the current system - it may just not actually provide any benefit.

An idea that cropped up while I was talking to my wife about this in the car this evening...

Impose a time limit on the game, as generally happens now. Obviously, the onus here is on ensuring that rounds are actually long enough for the size game being played, including time to find your opponent and table, set up, and sort out results afterwards.

But: If you haven't finished the game by the time the round ends, you keep going until you do finish... and forfeit your next game.

At first glance, it seems a bit harsh on the player who's not playing slow... but on thinking about it, it removes any real benefit to playing deliberately slowly... playing the delay game may gain you a win this round, but that's balanced out by the automatic loss next round. Assuming the tournie is using swiss pairing, players are playing someone (after the first round, anyway) from a similar part of the ladder to themselves, so have nothing much to gain from deliberately sabotaging the other player at their own expense either.

I could see potential issues where a player who knows they're not in with much of a chance finds themselves paired against a top tier player in the first round... deliberately giving yourself a loss in round two to sabotage a top tier player might seem a more attractive option to a particular mindset.

The last round also obviously has no penalty involved... but it's generally not as much of a problem if a game runs a little over in the last round anyway.

Or am I just crazy? Thoughts?

insaniak wrote:An idea that cropped up while I was talking to my wife about this in the car this evening...

Stop... just stop right there!

Your wife can hold an intelligent conversation about wargaming tournament policies?

That. is. awesome.

CatPeeler wrote:

nkelsch wrote:This is called Arbitrary Army Composition rules. .........

I disagree completely. It is more than reasonable to assume that if a given game is allotted 150 minutes to play, each player should expect 75 minutes in which to do so--regardless of what army they are using.

The idea that some armies aren't capable of completing 5 turns within that time is simply not true. I've played several games against 175+ model armies at 2500 points--most of these using 100+ models myself--and completed five turns with time to spare.

It would be more accurate to say that some players aren't capable of completing 5 turns within the allotted time. In that case, I would argue that they should either practice using their army of choice until they are able to do so, or switch armies.

You can disagree, but you would be wrong.

And yes, experienced players can and do finish games with large numbers of models within set time limits quite easily. Played in a 4 game tourney Saturday, 2K points, 2.5 hour time limit, finished all my games (6 turns each) in time, three of them in under 1.5 hours. But I'm an experienced player and know my army and usually my opponent's armies quite well. So basically, you just want to nerf the newbs?

Oh, and to respond to a statement on the first page. When someone assaults my IG, it's seldom over in one round. A 30-man blob with Commissar takes a lot of killing............... If you can manage to do it.

CatPeeler wrote:

nkelsch wrote:This is called Arbitrary Army Composition rules. .........

I disagree completely. It is more than reasonable to assume that if a given game is allotted 150 minutes to play, each player should expect 75 minutes in which to do so--regardless of what army they are using.

The idea that some armies aren't capable of completing 5 turns within that time is simply not true. I've played several games against 175+ model armies at 2500 points--most of these using 100+ models myself--and completed five turns with time to spare.

It would be more accurate to say that some players aren't capable of completing 5 turns within the allotted time. In that case, I would argue that they should either practice using their army of choice until they are able to do so, or switch armies.

I actually do disagree with the idea that it is perfectly fair for both players to expect a perfectly equal amount of time.

It is a simple fact that cannot be disputed that some armies take longer to play than others. For example, Ork models all have a BS2, so to compensate their codex is designed with shooting that involves a bunch of shots, most of which will end up missing due to the Orks' poor BS. It takes time to gather up all the dice, it takes time to roll them (often in batches) and it takes time to separate out the misses from the hits.

On the other extreme, say you take an army like 1Ksons. As an army, they will use much less time to shoot because there are less models that require less dice to roll.

At the end of the day my Ork shooting army and my 1Ksons shooting army may end up killing the same amount of enemy models in the same shooting phase, but it just takes more time to do so with the Ork army.

Are there ways to speed up play? Of course. But at the end of the day it is a simple, inescapable fact that some armies take longer to play than others, no matter how skilled or well-practiced a player is.


There are actually two problems here:

1) There are players out there who are really slow and just will not finish a game no matter what army they play with and how much time you give them (or deliberately slow play). Some of the slowest players I've seen were using an all-drop pod army which didn't even need to use their game time for deployment (or often much for their opponent's first turn).


2) Tournament Organizers keep increasing the amount of points for tournament games without appropriately increasing the amount of time for players to complete their games. This issue often gets overlooked in the rage to penalize 'slow players' but doesn't recognize that some players' call to constantly play larger point tournament games is negatively affecting players who aren't overly slow but who just aren't overly fast or overly familiar with their army.

The mentality that you've brought up (which I've seen many, many, many times) that 'I know I'VE finished games with XXX army in XXX amount of time without any problem' is fine as long as you never want any new players in your tournaments.



Timers are not the solution to anything. The real issue is that tournaments need to be scheduled so that an AVERAGE player playing at a relatively brisk pace with ANY army has a realistic shot of finishing every one of their games. If that means lowering the points values used in games or tacking on an extra 15 minutes if needed, then so be it.

But this idea that everyone just somehow needs to buck-up and play at the speed of a well-oiled tournament veteran is simply insane. Can or should their be specially themed 'speed' tournaments that have very short time windows to play in? Sure, why not. There should be tournaments of every style of game. But the BASE tournament structure should not be pushed to the point (where it tends to be now) where larger armies are marginalized from participation because of improper round allotment.

I agree that the points are too high for the time allowed. My preferred game for 2.5 hours is more like 1500 points than 2500.

kestral wrote:I agree that the points are too high for the time allowed. My preferred game for 2.5 hours is more like 1500 points than 2500.

I always find it odd that the same time formats and schedule for 1500 and 2500 points. I think 'ard boyz time is slightly unreasonable for 2500 points. Two offensive/aggressive armies clashing in assault will take a lot more time to play than two shooty or mech armies. I saw two experienced players with lists have time troubles at 'ardboyz simply because 2500 vs 2500 and lots of actions need to happen.

I think the real issue is if TOs want to do over 1750, they need to extend game time, not punish armies with arbitrary army comp rules or expect 50/50 play. And since events are supposedly a social event, I do not mind downtime for people who finish early over cramming 4 games unreasonably into one day with too high a point value.

If someone is slow playing, then have a staff person call them on it.

Oh, 'ard boyz time limit is pretty unreasonable to be sure.. Especially WFB

yakface wrote:
1) There are players out there who are really slow and just will not finish a game no matter what army they play with and how much time you give them (or deliberately slow play). Some of the slowest players I've seen were using an all-drop pod army which didn't even need to use their game time for deployment (or often much for their opponent's first turn).


2) Tournament Organizers keep increasing the amount of points for tournament games without appropriately increasing the amount of time for players to complete their games. This issue often gets overlooked in the rage to penalize 'slow players' but doesn't recognize that some players' call to constantly play larger point tournament games is negatively affecting players who aren't overly slow but who just aren't overly fast or overly familiar with their army.

The mentality that you've brought up (which I've seen many, many, many times) that 'I know I'VE finished games with XXX army in XXX amount of time without any problem' is fine as long as you never want any new players in your tournaments

In my experience at least, new players that were slow because of logistics tended to accept help to speed things up. Slow players that sit and think don't. If two newbs are playing, sure that game might take a long time, but no vets are getting screwed, so they're less likely to complain. A vet can help count attacks, suggest how to allocate wounds, help with movement, etc. so that even a relatively new ork player can finish.

I agree that hard boys might be a bit much for 2.5 hours, but 1500 is picking up in popularity around me, and there's far less excuse about not being able to finish there.

You also don't need to go to tournaments to become well oiled with your army, although that helps.

I'm not advocating a timer, I'm advocating for making slow play more of a concern for TOs. Help them discern between veteran slow players that are stalling, and new players that could use some pointers.

Also, the level of the event could determine the willingness of a TO to cater to newer players. A small 1500pt store RTT can probably be a lot more flexible than an indy GT.

1500 can be generally completed in 2hours, even by new players - 1750/2000 means that 2 hours is generally pushing it for a lot of people, so it needs to go up.

2.5hours for 2500 points is very, very fast, and people with hordes would be massively penalised by any timesharing system - and it is therefore covert Comping.

yakface wrote:I actually do disagree with the idea that it is perfectly fair for both players to expect a perfectly equal amount of time.
The mentality that you've brought up (which I've seen many, many, many times) that 'I know I'VE finished games with XXX army in XXX amount of time without any problem' is fine as long as you never want any new players in your tournaments...

....The real issue is that tournaments need to be scheduled so that an AVERAGE player playing at a relatively brisk pace with ANY army has a realistic shot of finishing every one of their games. If that means lowering the points values used in games or tacking on an extra 15 minutes if needed, then so be it.

Ah, I see. It seems the disagreement stems from differing expectations about tournament play in general.

I have zero problem with 'average' players in a casual game, or even at a small (8-10 players) tournament at a FLGS. Those are *great* venues for improving one's skill level.

At a larger venue, though, I believe a higher level of mastery is implied, i.e., one generally expects to face "better" players at a competitive event. As far as I'm concerned, each player at a large(r) tournament should--at minimum--be thoroughly versed in their own rules and well practiced in their application.

If, as you mentioned, a TO gears the missions and time allotment so that an 'average' player has a reasonable shot at finishing the game with a horde army... I imagine you'll have a sizeable chunk of the participants enjoying a 90+ minute break between each round.

If you're unable to finish 5 turns in the allotted time, I feel that you're simply not ready to compete at that points level (my main objection to this year's preliminary scenarios was that they were six turns, for this very reason). You can play, sure--but you're not ready to compete. Further, if you choose to use a large or otherwise complicated army, then I think the onus is on you to practice, practice, practice until you can still consistently finish the game in the time provided. If you can't--you're not ready.

The good news is that there's some leeway there. In my experience, most skilled players seem to only need 30-40% of the time allowed (that full mech & reserves are so prevalent in this edition certainly helps). Obviously, this gives their opponent some breathing room... but the catch is that if you have 60-70% of the time allowed, you have even *less* an excuse not to finish the game. In that sense, a hard-and-fast "50% of the time" rule isn't absolutely necessary, but I think that it would serve as a reasonably equitable standard to assume.

This still leaves *plenty* of room for newer players. I think that it's perfectly reasonable to expect that you'll need to start 'small,' as it were, and then work your way up. There are plenty of 1000-1500 point tourneys out there for newer players to cut their teeth on. Once they have things 'down' at that level, they can certainly move up to the next level.

Can I just say. While I don't play tournaments very much (an average of one small one every two years doesn't give me much room to speak.) but the only time I have been slow played. was 300 points, no I didn't miss a zero it realy was 300 points, was because my opponent was to busy talking to the TO to start the game so my army only managed to kill a chaplain on a bike rather than table him. I would however like to point out that I would not have come near winning anyway.

CatPeeler wrote:
If you're unable to finish 5 turns in the allotted time, I feel that you're simply not ready to compete at that points level (my main objection to this year's preliminary scenarios was that they were six turns, for this very reason). You can play, sure--but you're not ready to compete. Further, if you choose to use a large or otherwise complicated army, then I think the onus is on you to practice, practice, practice until you can still consistently finish the game in the time provided. If you can't--you're not ready.

The good news is that there's some leeway there. In my experience, most skilled players seem to only need 30-40% of the time allowed (that full mech & reserves are so prevalent in this edition certainly helps). Obviously, this gives their opponent some breathing room... but the catch is that if you have 60-70% of the time allowed, you have even *less* an excuse not to finish the game. In that sense, a hard-and-fast "50% of the time" rule isn't absolutely necessary, but I think that it would serve as a reasonably equitable standard to assume.

This still leaves *plenty* of room for newer players. I think that it's perfectly reasonable to expect that you'll need to start 'small,' as it were, and then work your way up. There are plenty of 1000-1500 point tourneys out there for newer players to cut their teeth on. Once they have things 'down' at that level, they can certainly move up to the next level.

Two things:


You say that if someone isn't skilled/practiced enough to finish in the amount of time you believe is acceptable to play in then they 'aren't ready to compete'. The problem with that, of course, is that person is also playing someone else. And if you end up drawing this player in the first round of the tournament and there really isn't enough time alloted in the round for that person to finish their game, then *both* players are going to be subject to whatever the outcome of the 3-4 turn game is. So not only does the lack of proper round times affect players who generally aren't fast players, but it also affects the opponents of these players as well.

And if the negative of having enough time for average players to finish their games in a tournament is that some players are stuck waiting for their next game for 90 minutes is this really such a horrible thing? I absolutely don't think so. If you don't want to go take a nice long meal break, then walk around and watch other games in progress, bring a book, etc, etc, etc.

The alternative that is being pushed here (using timed rounds or chess timers) is far, far worse to the overall gaming experience. You are only thinking of how it would apply to players who are genuinely *choosing* to slow-play. Imagine how these tools would actually effect someone who just isn't as familiar with the game or their army. Watching them get really frustrated rushing, making mistakes desperately trying to finish their turns way faster then they are comfortable...they're going to be miserable and that's going to make playing the game against them miserable.


Second, both you and I (and many other people) throw around how they think most people in a tournament are playing, but in my experience, I haven't found any tournaments that actually collect this data. And until we have this data to look at, we really can't figure out if there is an issue and how to address it if it exists.

To that end, I've really pushed the Adepticon guys to, starting next year, include a question on their game results sheet which says: 'Did you finish your game to its natural conclusion within the time alloted? If not, what turn did your game end on?'


I really believe that EVERY tournament should start asking this question routinely. Only once this kind of data has been collected can a TO really start to see if failing to finish games is really an issue or non-issue in their tournament and then they can look to ways to address the issue. Including this question will also let TOs track chronic slow-players to identify whether they are genuinely slow or someone literally trying to slow-play their opponent.

yakface wrote:The alternative that is being pushed here (using timed rounds or chess timers) is far, far worse to the overall gaming experience. You are only thinking of how it would apply to players who are genuinely *choosing* to slow-play. Imagine how these tools would actually effect someone who just isn't as familiar with the game or their army. Watching them get really frustrated rushing, making mistakes desperately trying to finish their turns way faster then they are comfortable...they're going to be miserable and that's going to make playing the game against them miserable.

I believe this is his whole point about "not being ready to compete." Tournaments shouldn't be about trying out new material; you should be bringing your A game which includes a good working knowledge of the game rules and especially those of your army. It's not unreasonable that these should be baseline expectations that help stem incidental slow down. Hell, at a recent tourney, I was playing ork dreadbash against a CSM plague marine army and it bogged down several times because the guy didn't know basic rules about his army, such as what denied him his FNP (such as deffrollas, rokkits, etc.), how IC characters worked in assault (how my dreads could attack Typhus or plague terminators in base contact, for example), how instant death worked (dreadnought CCW vs typhus), how you only got one attack and hit on 6s with grenades against walkers, and so on. Despite the fact that this guy had played his army many times before, despite the fact that I got the TO to make the correct ruling on each one of these issues, the game bogged down as the guy scoured the rulebook to back up what everyone else knew and was able to take for granted. The back and forth on these issues ate up at least 30+ minutes of our 2 hour slot, and we only finished 4 turns. IMO, that's unacceptable behavior in a tournament; know the rules, especially those pertinent to your army. It's one thing to have a differing opinion on a grey area of the rules, it's another to slow the game down through ignorance. "New to the game" or "new to this army" don't belong in tourneys, IMO. Get more experience, then go to tourneys with the list.

Skarboy wrote: Tournaments shouldn't be about trying out new material; you should be bringing your A game which includes a good working knowledge of the game rules and especially those of your army.

If 40K tournaments were actually perceived as serious competitive events, that would be true.

For many of the people who enter them, that's not the case. A tournament is just a handy excuse to get out and spend a day or two on their hobby... a chance to get in a good solid round of gaming, and not really seen as a great deal different to any other game on any other day.


If you want tournaments to be filled solely with 'serious' competitors, changing the perception of the event is going to be more effective than just adding a turn timer.

yakface wrote:You say that if someone isn't skilled/practiced enough to finish in the amount of time you believe is acceptable to play in then they 'aren't ready to compete'. The problem with that, of course, is that person is also playing someone else. And if you end up drawing this player in the first round of the tournament and there really isn't enough time alloted in the round for that person to finish their game, then *both* players are going to be subject to whatever the outcome of the 3-4 turn game is. So not only does the lack of proper round times affect players who generally aren't fast players, but it also affects the opponents of these players as well.

Was this in doubt? My argument is on behalf of the slow player's opponent. I haven't even really addressed possible sanctions--just that obvious slow play warrants the monitoring or intervention by a judge.

And if the negative of having enough time for average players to finish their games in a tournament is that some players are stuck waiting for their next game for 90 minutes is this really such a horrible thing? I absolutely don't think so. If you don't want to go take a nice long meal break, then walk around and watch other games in progress, bring a book, etc, etc, etc.

If you're playing in a multi-day event, where the players all have hotel rooms to crash in, you might have a point. The vast majority of tournaments (Ard Boyz included), though, are one day / three round affairs. If you allowed 3 & 1/2 hours per round for Ard Boyz, a half hour break, an hour for lunch, and an hour for check-in/table assignments/etc., you're talking about 13 hours. Even if you only extend it to 3 hours a round, you're still looking at nearly 12 hours of tournament time overall. When you factor in travel times at either end (I'll be travelling 2+ hours to the semi's, myself), the numbers rapidly exceed what I'd consider reasonable.

The physical and mental stress of a tournament can be exhausting--should we not aim to streamline things as much as possible? I'd rather have a 10 hour tournament day--with the expectation that the players involved finish all their games on time--than a 12-13 hour tournament designed to facilitate games for slower players. Much as I love 40k, I'm not terribly interested in a 16 or 17 hour day.

The alternative that is being pushed here (using timed rounds or chess timers) is far, far worse to the overall gaming experience. You are only thinking of how it would apply to players who are genuinely *choosing* to slow-play. Imagine how these tools would actually effect someone who just isn't as familiar with the game or their army. Watching them get really frustrated rushing, making mistakes desperately trying to finish their turns way faster then they are comfortable...they're going to be miserable and that's going to make playing the game against them miserable.

Which is why I think that one should reach a reasonable level of mastery before participating at a competitive level. I don't believe that a tournament is the appropriate venue to learn the game--much less one's own army. Again, if you're not able to finish your game in a set time, I don't believe you're ready to compete at that level.

An analogy that comes to mind is golf. A player that is able to complete a given hole in 5-6 strokes is going to have a miserable time if they're paired with a player who takes 10-15 strokes per hole. My point is that the hypothetical second player shouldn't even be playing with the first until he can play at a similar pace. Ever seen Happy Gilmore? Bob Barker's got a mean right cross...

Second, both you and I (and many other people) throw around how they think most people in a tournament are playing, but in my experience, I haven't found any tournaments that actually collect this data. And until we have this data to look at, we really can't figure out if there is an issue and how to address it if it exists.

To that end, I've really pushed the Adepticon guys to, starting next year, include a question on their game results sheet which says: 'Did you finish your game to its natural conclusion within the time alloted? If not, what turn did your game end on?'

I really believe that EVERY tournament should start asking this question routinely. Only once this kind of data has been collected can a TO really start to see if failing to finish games is really an issue or non-issue in their tournament and then they can look to ways to address the issue. Including this question will also let TOs track chronic slow-players to identify whether they are genuinely slow or someone literally trying to slow-play their opponent.

That sounds like a fantastic idea.


Automatically Appended Next Post:
Ah, ninja'd on several of my points...

insaniak wrote:

Skarboy wrote: Tournaments shouldn't be about trying out new material; you should be bringing your A game which includes a good working knowledge of the game rules and especially those of your army.

If 40K tournaments were actually perceived as serious competitive events, that would be true.

For many of the people who enter them, that's not the case. A tournament is just a handy excuse to get out and spend a day or two on their hobby... a chance to get in a good solid round of gaming, and not really seen as a great deal different to any other game on any other day.


If you want tournaments to be filled solely with 'serious' competitors, changing the perception of the event is going to be more effective than just adding a turn timer.

Agreed COMPLETELY. I see no reason they couldn't develop tiers of events or something along those lines to differentiate casual/hobby events from tournaments based solely upon battle results. Even still, I believe there is sufficient cause to develop at least some guidelines for timely play, if not timing mechanisms.

Skarboy wrote:
Agreed COMPLETELY. I see no reason they couldn't develop tiers of events or something along those lines to differentiate casual/hobby events from tournaments based solely upon battle results. Even still, I believe there is sufficient cause to develop at least some guidelines for timely play, if not timing mechanisms.

I feel dice cheating and problems with custom dice is far more of an issue than 'slow play' especially since slow play can be addressed easily. Makes slow play look like a stupid waste of time.

I do laugh at the idea of 'LOL COMPETITIVE' events for a dice game where grown men cheat and somehow they should be elite events free of inexperienced players or something.

One of the major reasons there is 'slow play' is inexperienced players not knowing rules and the ensuing disagreements. Maybe since events are serious business and only experienced players should be allowed to participate they need to do a rules quiz before hand where you need to quote core rules and page numbers from memory or else you are banned from the event or forced to play against the other 'slowies' that don't know the rules. I mean these events should be competitive right?

I do like how somehow events that require painting are now supposedly the dumping ground for inferior players so people who only care about battle points want to be seen as a higher tier or caliber of player/event. Very nice touch.

yakface wrote:.
And if the negative of having enough time for average players to finish their games in a tournament is that some players are stuck waiting for their next game for 90 minutes is this really such a horrible thing? I absolutely don't think so. If you don't want to go take a nice long meal break, then walk around and watch other games in progress, bring a book, etc, etc, etc.

Happens to me all the time. At the Blobs Park tourney this past weekend, I finished three of four games in under 1 1/2 hours, with a 2 1/2 hour time limit. So I spent a lot of time wandering around, drinking beer, catching up with old friends, making new friends, ohhh I dunno, being sociable.

don_mondo wrote:ohhh I dunno, being sociable.

This is very difficult for some people.

Yeah, it's hard, I'm such a shy and bashful type, ya know..............

CatPeeler wrote:I don't care how long any individual turn takes, so long as each player gets half of the total time allowed. Chess clocks would work.

sounds good to me.

I think it's been well addressed why there should not be timers. However, if those who still feel timers should be used, then each player should also use identical armies. That is the fairest way to ensure that each army should take roughly the exact same amount of time to play. my first turn.

And if there's a rules disagreement, the person who loses the disagreement should be penalized for taking up valuable clock time.

It sounds nice, but 40K is really not designed to have timed rounds. Timers just aren't practical.

If people scored Sportsmanship in a more truthful manner rather than giving max or chipmunking scores, I don't think timers would even be an issue. Nobody wants to address another player on what appears to be dubious actions, thus undermining the scoring parameters.

40K just isn't a good system for serious competitive play. It makes for some fun games, but trying to shoehorn 40K into a true competitive enviornment simply doesn't work.

So i actually read all this...

To the people saying assaulty armies will be penalized....
If your an assault based army, will you have alot of shooting? no guess what!? turn 1-2 your time clock barely moved! omg you still have over an hour on your clock from a 2.5hr game..now you get to where you finally assault people, guess what? their clock has less time on it than yours! why? because they were shooting and using their assault phase (those that can move).

In the end your army type be it CC oriented, Shooting oriented, has no bearing on time. Because the shooty army is burning time from the get go, while the assaulters are move, run, done. The only problem that arises is a HORDE army, solution to that? no offense but in a tourny its a competitive format from the word GO, if you can't complete a game in 2.5hrs due to your inability to move/control that many models in quickly enough time, you should not be bringing this army to a timed match unless your able to wield it in an effective manner within the boundaries of a set amount of time to complete your game.

THAT is the issue, if you cant play fast enough to finish a match your penalizing your opponent for your own faults.

I'm of the frame of mind that if you equally broke down a game into chess clocks and actually played a couple casual games with your army of choice. Id bet money youd start finishing games in a very short span, especially if you auto forfiet for running out of time.

Hmmm this is actually a good point that i've thought about before. The opponent can on occasion ruin the game with a ridiculous time waster. But then again people should get to take their time.

TopC - you assume that shooting and assault are equivalent, time wise. That is a fairly unsafe assumption, especially with possibly complicated multi I combats.

I'm generally in favor of turn timers, but I'm intrigued by the time difference arguments.

I say try it out and warn the players in advance. People will have to adjust their lists
to fit the requirements, but from what I've seen, many tournaments have
something going on that force players to adjust their lists or gameplay styles. Why
not test turn timers?

Because of the time skews between early and late game, chess clock
timers would probably be best.

40k was never indented to be at timed game, and thus should not be.

If you really want timed turns play space hulk. That game was designed from the ground up to be a timed game. Also note that just because the marines are the only side to be timed doesn't mean the genestealers can take their time. The faster the genestealer player takes their turn the less time the marine player has to think. I love space hulk because the marines have to fight 2 deadly enemies: the bugs and time it's self.

I think the biggest problem with the time issue is that peoples' perceptions of how long their turns take versus how long their opponents are taking is always skewed.

I ran horde orks (again) this year for 'ard boyz, and in all of my practice games, we made it to the end of all 6 turns, with one game that made it to 5.

Come 'ard boyz, I had one game make it to 4 turns, and 2 make it to 5. The round that made it to 4 had the other player grumbling about time, when, to me, it seemed like HIS turns were the ones taking forever.

A chess clock might help illustrate a time difference, but I also think people make assumptions about the breakdown in turns that may not actually be accurate.

I like the idea of having a stop watch if you think your opponent is a gakker. I have came across this 20 mins left board pretty sparce, saying to opponent lets speed it up to finish, playing our turn in 5 mins , then expecting the same, then he stalls out 15 mins so he doesnt loose the game. stalling is totally against the spirit, and i personally would rather loose than stall in 40k , if you want to stall go play magic the gathering.

kartofelkopf wrote:I think the biggest problem with the time issue is that peoples' perceptions of how long their turns take versus how long their opponents are taking is always skewed. .... The round that made it to 4 had the other player grumbling about time, when, to me, it seemed like HIS turns were the ones taking forever.

The last time I played in 'ard boyz I had nob heavy orks (not bikers) and the SM player I beat in the first round was complaining that wound allocation was what caused the game to be short. In reality, he had a shooty SM army and he took 32 minutes to deploy his army, he took a long time to decide what each unit was going to shoot and he was slow to rolling dice - he only had one color and so to roll various weapons took twice as long as normal.

Very frustrating to be the one accused of slow play when my turns did not take long at all and my setup consisted of plunking down BWs.

I have encountered players that stall on purpose because it improves their chances of winning. An all infantry guard army players was famous for this. I never saw him play a tourney where he got past round 4 and he won often.

I also have a friend who is disabled and does take a while to move stuff due to this. He also does not usually make it past turn 4-5 because of this reason. He wins some and losses some.

I cannot see instituting a timer as it would ruin the game for one, but help to deal with another. How do you suppose we deal with situations like this when they arise?

In my first match at the semi finals Ard Boyz, my opponent attempted to stall out the game on turn 2 by moving all of his models exactly 1", and then running them all exactly 1" back to the position they were at before moving.

And he didn't care who knew.

And he was playing orks. He took over 40 minutes to get thru his movement and shooting phases, and he didn't fire a shot.

Being that he went first, he was intentionally trying to end the game without giving me a second turn. My second turn, I was given 7 minutes to play before the match ended.

He never once sat back and 'thought'. No he just moved as slow as possible.

I learned my lesson that day. From now on, if someone tried that on me at a tournament, I will be getting ejected from the tournament.

Chess timers on turns will save not only angry opponents, but probably lower court costs afterwards.
I won't get physical over a game. I will get physical over someone blatantly trying to cheat me.

SHarrington wrote:In my first match at the semi finals Ard Boyz, my opponent attempted to stall out the game on turn 2 by moving all of his models exactly 1", and then running them all exactly 1" back to the position they were at before moving.

And he didn't care who knew.

So... why didn't you get a TO?

I really think that's the single biggest problem in re: to cheating/slow-playing is nobody says anything to a TO AS SOON AS something fishy starts to go down.

Everyone wants to be a nice guy and doesn't complain until after the fact... which just makes it impossible for a TO to rectify the situation.

TFG is a bully-- and bullies only back down when they're confronted. By being complacent, you enable TFG to continue to be TFG.

Slow playing when it is being clearly done to give the player a better chance at winning and especially if the guy admits to it is cheating. Although I do not see how him foregoing an entire turn of shooting or doing anything did not give YOU a major advantage that early in the game, but if it continued throughout I can see it being an issue.

Like we talked about at Ard' Boyz though kart, what do you do about a guy that is just ignorant of the most basic rules? You cannot call a TO over to babysit you because of that, and you should not have to since he is trying to deal with everyone else questions as well. It also makes YOU kinda look like TFG in the process.

My first game in the Semi's this year we had to call over the TO 3-4 times and go see him about as many. The time wasted during these stops happened on both our turns, but was 95% of the time him being incorrect on some rule I thought should be common knowledge.

Blaring example being he tried to claim cover for a Leman Russ sitting in area terrain, with less that 25% of the tank covered. We handled this by breaking out the rulebook I was amazed to discover he owned, but this happened on my turn so the turn timer would penalize me there. The only way this could be handled is to mark the time when the dispute started and penalize the player who was WRONG the time spent working it out. This would be fine, but it opens up a whole new pain in the arse that I doubt any TO wants to deal with on top of all the other organizers duties. It seemed hard enough to get everyone to remember to take down VP's each round this year.

Simple fact is like most have been saying this game was not meant to be played inside of time constraints, and I think there is no totally fair way to make it work like we (tournament players) want without spending 12hrs playing the tournament. Or making any major event into a 2day affair which many people are not willing/able to do.

kartofelkopf wrote:

So... why didn't you get a TO?

I really think that's the single biggest problem in re: to cheating/slow-playing is nobody says anything to a TO AS SOON AS something fishy starts to go down.

Everyone wants to be a nice guy and doesn't complain until after the fact... which just makes it impossible for a TO to rectify the situation.

TFG is a bully-- and bullies only back down when they're confronted. By being complacent, you enable TFG to continue to be TFG.

Its quite an easy answer. Calling a TO over is a joke. As anyone can can tell you, 99% of the results is the TO saying "Don't do that again" and walking away.
And they continue to do it. Slow Playing is not enforceable.

It's easier just to enforce it yourself. Which is what I will be doing from now on. I used to think those guys at tournaments that got angry at their opopnents and yelled at them were douches. I'm beginning to see that there might be a valid reason for being like that.

I might be the douche at my next tournament, but I will get a fair game out of it.


*Shakes his head* TO's are a joke. Babysitters who number crunch. In fact, now that I consider it, most of the time I have seen a ruling asked of a TO, he asks another player what the rule is.
I'm willing to bet every single person that has been to a tournament has seen this as well.

Nope
Because stupid feths like me are slow

SHarrington wrote:
Its quite an easy answer. Calling a TO over is a joke. As anyone can can tell you, 99% of the results is the TO saying "Don't do that again" and walking away.
And they continue to do it. Slow Playing is not enforceable.

It's easier just to enforce it yourself. Which is what I will be doing from now on. I used to think those guys at tournaments that got angry at their opopnents and yelled at them were douches. I'm beginning to see that there might be a valid reason for being like that.

I might be the douche at my next tournament, but I will get a fair game out of it.


*Shakes his head* TO's are a joke. Babysitters who number crunch. In fact, now that I consider it, most of the time I have seen a ruling asked of a TO, he asks another player what the rule is.
I'm willing to bet every single person that has been to a tournament has seen this as well.

As a tournament organizer I can say that I have asked other people for assistance with an army specific ruling. The reason for this is two fold. First it is quicker for me to ask someone I trust than to try to find the rule in a book I am unfamiliar with (and no it really isnt reasonable to expect the TO to have every book memorized. Do you?) and second because I have noticed in the years that I have run events that having a second person back your decision cuts down on people bickering when it goes against them. I have had more people attempt to argue their reason for interpreting a rule incorrectly than I care to count. Alot of people just ignore a TO ruling or complain the rest of their games about how it was unfair or it was because they dont like me. I dont really care who a person is. When I call a ruling it is because I felt it was correct not because of something personal.

As to slow playing being enforceable. I can say that on 2 separate occasions I have talked to people for stalling the game. The first was uncooperative and was banned from the next event. He came back afterward and did not stall. The second was very understanding and explained that he was just slow. He got better with his game and confidence and got faster. So I believe that like any other situation that this is completely enforceable. You just have to go about it in the correct manner.

As a Warmachine player of 6 years, I'm highly supportive of turn timers. Steamroller tournaments have been timed (12 minute turns, 100+2d6 minute games at the 50 point level, with a single 5 minute extension) for ages in that game, and I've rarely seen anyone who's had to forgo more than one or two models on a busy turn. While it's true that Warmachine typically features smaller model counts than 40k, the more abstract ruleset of 40k means that turn lengths really shouldn't be any longer.

While I feel sorry for those who for reasons of mental or physical handicap can't manage to keep up with said limits, I'd suggest that competitive play might not be for them. For those without any such disability who can't keep within timed turns, even with an extension, might I suggest you practice more?

Mind you, timed turns don't completely eliminate stalling. It's still easy enough to intentionally use all 12 minutes of your turn when you've got two models left and you know dice down's coming some time in the next three. It's also easy enough to drag out your opponent's turn with nitpicking, unneccessary measuring, and rules questions.

The only real way to solve this problem is to have TOs (and, in Warmachine's case, Press Gangers) willing to actually address problem players and remove them from the tournament. Privateer's historically used a Strike system (or at least my local PGs have), although the current Steamroller rules doc allows for simply DQing people who break the rules, act unsportsmanly, or stall. If your tourneys have these problems and nothing's done about it, the problem is as much your TO as the player(s), and you really ought to get a new one.

Ironically, Sportsmanship scoring isn't new and slow play falls right into it. Historically, this score has been used/abused so much that many events are looking to drop it. However, you still see folks claiming its the TO job to enforce every player at every table at all times.

Not realistic. Players have largely had to govern themselves in various events over the years.

Players have had the ability to control this for years, yet seem incapable of doing so. I've also started seeing this dilemma (slow play) crop up more often b/c of Ard Boyz events and playing 2500 points in 2 1/2 hours.

Basically, it seems like grown men afraid to openly discuss an issue with their opponent and want a TO to be the fall guy.

Timers still won't work. Instead of slow play, these unscrupulous players will just find another way to continue their shenanigans.

Whenever one of those random stupid rules comes up that people just think "WTF!?" at happen . . . the ones people go to the TO for . . . I just say "I know it's stupid and makes no sense, but sadly that's the rules." =/

This generally makes the stupid rule go down a bit better. Also I don't exploit these stupid rules, they just sometimes happen. Unlike TFG or whatever.

Oshova

I for one understand all this but can't realisticly see a way to fix it. One of my biggest complaints this year was in ard boyz where I didn't get to take my last turn, which would have totally changed the outcome of the game. Time was called, I had used 45mins of the total time, where my opponnet who was playing marines used the rest of the time. Normally I see this with horde armies, which to an extent I understand. I mean 200 models takes longer to mover,shoot etc then 50.
Worse yet I have had people have emergencies and during their turn 5 run to the bathroom and not return for 25 mins, and in one case my opponent turned to the table behind him to give his buddy an immediate recap of the epic dice rolls he just made with play by play.

A turn timer will just take more time away from the game, as opponents will argue about how the timer is to be used.

I've run into slow players, but I'm fortunate to be a 45 year old, 200 lb. father of two teenagers, so I'm pretty adept at being no nonsense. I know the BRB and codex rules pretty well. I have my army/list/tape/templates/dice organized and on an army tray. I am polite, but to the point about getting the game going and keeping it moving. If my opponent shows signs of slow play, I offer to help him move his models or look up rules. If he is deliberate about stalling, I call a judge right away. I plan my turn (as much as possible) during his turn.

I'm confident enough about how the rules work that I show no hesitation when I speak. If I am unclear on a rule I know where to find it quickly. I know when something is worth arguing about and when to let it go. I make it clear to my opponent that I am going for a massacre, and it's in his best interests to do the same if he wants to win overall.

Folks on this thread have already called out slow players for what they are, bullies and cheats. Dealing with them is as simple as rules knowledge, preparation, and a no baloney mindset. Crying about the game afterwards never solves anything, and makes you look like a whiner. Walk up to the table and take control. Be fair, but resolute, and look your opponent in the eye.

I think there should be turn timers for sure. I play quickly and have lost games because of being slow played or the other player taking a long time.

ex.

Recently in a tournament. I almost tabled my opponent. He had less then 15-20 IG troops left from his whole army. But I lost the game because we played 4 turns. At the time I had gotten like 13 kill points out of his army and he had gotten 2 out of mine. (It was an objective mission.) But because of slow play we only played 4 turns. In 1 more turn or 2 at the worst I would have tabled him and secured an objective. When given more time and I asked him to play quick he responded with AND I QUOTE. "I don't want to get tabled." So I lost the game though I clearly dominated him because we played 4 turns of a 6 turn game.

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BTW

War Machine Steam Roller Tournaments use turn timers for their games to make sure players have an even amount of time. Usually 10-15 min per player per turn.

Other games take competition seriously you say? Heavens forbid GW games do that!

Said it before and I'll say it again, if a tournament has games that dont go their full length then it has no basis to call itself competitive because its breaking the rules of the game (5 turns + random or 6 turns in some tournaments).. Thats like one team getting 60 mins to play and another team only getting 45 minutes to play the same game.. and the winner is the person who scored the most points in 60 minutes