Forum adverts like this one are shown to any user who is not logged in. Join us by filling out a tiny 3 field form and you will get your own, free, dakka user account which gives a good range of benefits to you: No adverts like this in the forums anymore. Times and dates in your local timezone. Full tracking of what you have read so you can skip to your first unread post, easily see what has changed since you last logged in, and easily see what is new at a glance. Email notifications for threads you want to watch closely. Being a part of the oldest wargaming community on the net. If you are already a member then feel free to login now.

Janthkin wrote:

Nurglitch wrote:Janthkin:

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

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

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

Janthkin:

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

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

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


Automatically Appended Next Post:

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

Come for the tournament, stay for the rape?

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

Something along the lines of this.

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

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

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

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

"Silly noob, tournaments are for Space Marines!"

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

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

BINGO!!

Nurglitch just won the thread.

Now the question is how to accomplish this.

GG

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

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

generalgrog:

Maybe something with similar proportions to the following scoring system:

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

There's that argument again...

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

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

Sidstyler wrote:

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

"Silly noob, tournaments are for Space Marines!"

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

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

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

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

Tournaments is serious business.

BrookM wrote:

Sidstyler wrote:

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

"Silly noob, tournaments are for Space Marines!"

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

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

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

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

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

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

QFT.

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

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

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

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

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

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

1) Lower point cost/longer time limits

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

To be fair he did start with this...

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

Kinda obvious how I could take it the wrong way.

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

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

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

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

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

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

1) Lower point cost/longer time limits

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

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

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

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

NeedleOfInquiry wrote:

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

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

Wrexasaur wrote:

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

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

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

Crazy_Carnifex wrote:

Wrexasaur wrote:

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

GG

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

@Generalgrog

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

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

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

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

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

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

GG

BrookM wrote:

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

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

Revenge porn solves nothing, and is truly distasteful.

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

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

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

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

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

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

JohnHwangDD wrote:

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

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

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

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

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

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

Kaotik wrote:

JohnHwangDD wrote:

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

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

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

To which, I say, SO WHAT?

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

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

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

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

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