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Hey folks!

I had a thought that may have been instigated by someone else, but which I stole and ran with and thought deserved its own thread. There's a lot of discussion about soft scoring in tournaments, and I honestly think that the problem comes down to wording. This problem has been started by TOs, and can be fixed by them just as easily.

I think it comes down to the awarding of the title "Best Overall." A tournament should have a tournament champion. To reward hobbyists, it should also have categories for painting rewards. Also a fluffy/backstory reward / player choice kind of thing.

I heartily disagree with sportsmanship awards. You come to a tournament, you treat your opponents respectfully, you make new friends, and if you can't behave like an adult, you get kicked out. If you cheat, you get kicked out. Sportsmanship might be part of the score, but the SVDM did very well without it and there weren't any shenanigans with any of the games. And I definitely think that giving someone an award for being the best behaved is insulting, demeaning and unwarranted, and makes some bad implications. ><

Anyway, my point is that instead of "Best General" and "Best Overall" I think that the division would be HUGELY taken down by relabeling these as "Tournament Champion" and "Best Hobbyist." To go to a tournament, to play in a tournament, and to win a tournament, and not be "Best Overall" is insulting. It wasn't a painting competition, and hobby elements are welcome, but the tournament needs a tournament winner. A Champion.

Honestly, it seems silly, but I honestly think that it would fix, or go a long way towards fixing the division. Whether "Best Hobbyist" includes battle points or not is up for discussion, but there should be a Tournament Champion award, and a hobbyist award. And since it *IS* a tournament, the tournament champion award should be as large or bigger than the best hobbyist award. Do away with "Best Overall" at tournaments and best general. The person who wins the tournament, who wins the most games, who does the best should be the tournament winner.....and the person who had the best painting, and the best fluff, and the best composition if you insist, or any of those hobby-related things not directly related to the competition itself should win the title "Best Hobbyist" or "Hobbyist winner"

If I were to run a GT, I think my categories would be as follows:

Tournament Champion: Whoever did the most ass-kicking, and this is the biggest prize.

Best Painted Whoever has the best technical arm and paint, hopefully in something golden-demon worthy.

Player's Choice Every player votes for the army they like the best. At the SVDM, it was a desert ork theme where the killa-kans had rubber duckies and pool gear, and it was all 100% converted models...it was great.

Best Hobbyist This is whomever has the most total points for painting, sportsmanship, composition (if used), player's choice votes, and battle points.
------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The flip side of this is that if you include battle points in part of the best hobbyist, which you need to do - then tournaments cannot artificially deny the title/prize to the people who won it. One person can win more than one award. Yes, it should be possible for one person to show up to a 5 round GT, get 5 massacres, have a golden-demon army that wins best painted, and get the most votes for player's choice, and take first in all those categories (second/third would go to others).

Otherwise you run into situations where you are trying to award "Best Hobbyist" or best overall as it was previously known to the tournament winner, and give the title "Tournament winner" to someone who didn't win the tournament. Or, you could separate the tournament winner from the best hobbyist by not including battle points into the calculation, but you should still not disallow someone from taking first in multiple categories if they earn it.

Anyway, these are my thoughts. Call a fish a fish. The guy or gal who wins a tournament should be labeled as the tournament winner, and not be overshadowed by someone who pay have painted better than them who gets "best overall." Its a tournament.

Please refer to earlier threads where numerous people explained how a tournament with soft scores included is still a tournament.

I’m a competitive gamer. Winning games is what I’m always trying to do. I’m a decent painter BECAUSE the rules for events forced me to become so. My armies now are more pleasant for my opponents to look at, and better represent the hobby to potential new players. This has value, and is part & parcel of the tradition of wargaming. In many places around the world you will find players who refuse to field an unpainted unit, even in a friendly game. This is a good thing, IMO, and events should teach and encourage elements of the wargaming culture, including painting and sportsmanship.

I have no objection to there also being tournaments which do not include painting or sports scoring, but I am not in agreement with any general effort to co-opt the name of tournament, or to glorify the players of such events as in some way greater than players who bring the whole package.

If I were to run a GT

Keep going with that point. I'll bring my (non-pink) orks down for it, and take a day off.

Dash, this is a largely "live and let live" subject. You ask a person who puts their emphasis on playing/winning games, and they'll state that Most Battlepoints should be the biggest prize. You ask a painter/fluff bunny and they'll tell you that "Best Hobbiest/Painted" should have the biggest prize.

TBH, the category that encompasses the most aspects should have the biggest prize, as it requires you to excel in multiple areas. Excelling in just one area (Whether it be Battlepoints or Painted) is simply not as impressive as kicking tail in all of them.

mikhaila wrote:If I were to run a GT

Keep going with that point. I'll bring my (non-pink) orks down for it, and take a day off.

http://www.dakkadakka.com/dakkaforum/posts/list/284952.page

You don't even have to travel.


Automatically Appended Next Post:

Gornall wrote:Dash, this is a largely "live and let live" subject. You ask a person who puts their emphasis on playing/winning games, and they'll state that Most Battlepoints should be the biggest prize. You ask a painter/fluff bunny and they'll tell you that "Best Hobbiest/Painted" should have the biggest prize.

TBH, the category that encompasses the most aspects should have the biggest prize, as it requires you to excel in multiple areas. Excelling in just one area (Whether it be Battlepoints or Painted) is simply not as impressive as kicking tail in all of them.

@Mannahnin: My armies are also painted. I am not suggesting a GT that allows unpainted armies. Nor that allows jerks. Painting requirements are absolutely welcome; armies should be fully painted and based to play in a GT. Honestly, even at GTs with separate painting requirements, you don't see people throwing down $50-60 and travelling distance to bring an unpainted grey army to play - that's unique to 'Ard Boyz alone, and is the result of the prolific nature of the preliminary rounds and the lack of barrier to enter.

Sportsmanship should be a requirement, not a reward. It is simply absurd to give best sportsman awards. Didn't see you or anyone else in here trying to argue how important it is, but wanted to reiterate that.

And I'm not trying to separate out the people who attend an event and cater to one or the other. Instead, I just want people to relabel what they award. While I don't want a tournament to be only battle points, you must admit that people use the words, "I'm going to go play in a tournament." Its not, "I'm going to go submit my army painting to a tournament." You go to play in a tournament. There are hobby related scores and evaluations surrounded and permeating throughout the tournament, but the tournament itself is the competitive part - the games.

In whatever form you want to award them, in whatever percentages....do so. But change best general to Tournament Champion, and change Best Overall to Best Hobbyist. One person won the 40k tournament, and one person won the best of everything. But best overall is derogatory to the tournament champion, and everyone who shows up to a tournament is there to play.

Here's an example:

Last year I went to the Rumble in the Cage. Battle Points, Sportsmanship, Painting, with additional bonuses for "favorite army" "favorite player" and "favorite theme."

At the end of everything, my scores looked like this:

Battle Points: 64/64
Sportsmanship: 26/30
Painting: 21/30

I had 111 out of 124 points. I won best general. Best Overall was awarded to a player with the following:

Battle Points: 34/64
Sportsmanship: 30/30
Painting: 30/30

This player also pulled in votes for favorite theme and favorite player, which gave enough bonus points to somehow beat me by two points. He's a great hobbyist and a terrible player; he had one win and two losses. And yet he's the tournament winner. If TOs want to use "Best Overall" and "Best General" then don't punish the person who wins Best Overall if they also happen to be the Best General. If I have more total points than everyone else, and I also have more battle points than everyone else...then I have rightfully won first in both categories.

The reasonable alternative for people who want to give prizes to as many people as possible, even if its artificially earned by denying it to whomever properly won it, is to use "Tournament Champion" and "Best Hobbyist" Make them distinctively part of the same event, but with their obviously different purpose.

Dashofpepper wrote:Here's an example:

Last year I went to the Rumble in the Cage. Battle Points, Sportsmanship, Painting, with additional bonuses for "favorite army" "favorite player" and "favorite theme."

At the end of everything, my scores looked like this:

Battle Points: 64/64
Sportsmanship: 26/30
Painting: 21/30

I had 111 out of 124 points. I won best general. Best Overall was awarded to a player with the following:

Battle Points: 34/64
Sportsmanship: 30/30
Painting: 30/30

This player also pulled in votes for favorite theme and favorite player, which gave enough bonus points to somehow beat me by two points. He's a great hobbyist and a terrible player; he had one win and two losses. And yet he's the tournament winner. If TOs want to use "Best Overall" and "Best General" then don't punish the person who wins Best Overall if they also happen to be the Best General. If I have more total points than everyone else, and I also have more battle points than everyone else...then I have rightfully won first in both categories.

The reasonable alternative for people who want to give prizes to as many people as possible, even if its artificially earned by denying it to whomever properly won it, is to use "Tournament Champion" and "Best Hobbyist" Make them distinctively part of the same event, but with their obviously different purpose.

Sorry, but this just sounds like sour grapes on your part.

You went to an event with a known scoring system. Someone scored more under it than you. You came in second. Thems the breaks. Trying to get an individual event organizer to change a label on a title seems really flippin petty. If you don't like the conditions, don't attend. If you run your own event, call it whatever you like.

The reasonable alternative is to accept the conditions of the events you enter and the results they lead to.

You went to an event with a known scoring system. Someone scored more under it than you. You came in second. Thems the breaks. Trying to get an individual event organizer to change a label on a title seems really flippin petty. If you don't like the conditions, don't attend. If you run your own event, call it whatever you like.

When I criticize these events my argument is said to be invalid because I choose not to attend the events and therefore can't possibly understand them. When Dash criticizes these events his argument is said to be invalid because he shouldn't be attending these events in the first place.

An interesting catch 22, and again we're left with the "If you don't like it go start your own!" non-constructive silliness.

So you're saying that because you beat him in one category, so you deserved "Best Overall"?

That's the type of weighting and emphasis that I'm talking about. In your mind (and in many peoples'.... myself included), battlepoints is the most important aspect of a tournament, so because you maxed them, you feel that you should have "won" the tournament. Well, you actually did win that portion... the battlepoints. However, this other player maxed out the other areas and pulled ahead of you, taking "Best Overall." That's just how it works.

If you don't like the labels, simply just change them in your own head... because that's a more reasonable solution than having GT Organizers change the labels for their events.

Dashofpepper wrote:


In whatever form you want to award them, in whatever percentages....do so. But change best general to Tournament Champion, and change Best Overall to Best Hobbyist. One person won the 40k tournament, and one person won the best of everything. But best overall is derogatory to the tournament champion, and everyone who shows up to a tournament is there to play.

How is Best Overall derogatory to Best General, let alone anybody? Best General is the most battle points, and the person who gets the most gets rewarded for it. Same goes for the person who has the most overall points, hence the name.

Derogatory
–adjective
tending to lessen the merit or reputation of a person or thing; disparaging; depreciatory: a derogatory remark.

Nothing about a Best Overall score lessens the merit for whomever gets Best General, because you still got Best General you were awarded for your achievment. However, Best Hobbyist, or whatever you would like to call it, is derogatory for the person who wins the most overall points, you are actualling lessening the merit of their achievement, especially if you award the biggest prize to someone who wins only one of many categories. By your own logic, the person who technically did less deserves more than someone who does well in multiple categories.

If Best Overall is indeed the best overall (by the event's standards), why change the name and cheapen the accomplishment? Nothing about Best Overall cheapens the Best General's award.

*edit: typo*

As noted, wargaming tournaments frequently include multiple scoring categories, and in many of those events, your total aggregate score determines the Overall winner.

In my experience events with such a high range of soft scores that a 1/2 W/L record can beat out a 3/0 record are vanishingly rare. Check out the recent Adepticon Championship thread for a more (IME) common and representative correlation of Battles score to Overall placing.

I didn't talk about a minimum painting requirement, though I probably wouldn't pay to play in an event without one (the 'Ard Boyz final being the only exception I've made that I can think of). I think painting scoring is a good thing as it encourages people to paint beyond the minimum, and to be actually good at it and have good-looking armies if they really want to compete at being the Overall champion. My first army met minimum requirements. My subsequent armies and units have gotten nicer and nicer, because a) I want them to look good and b) I want to win Overall.

I disagree with you entirely about Best Sportsman awards. A common element in the Indy GT circuit for Warhammer is that the winner of Best Sportsman frequently wins free admission to another GT. Sportsmanship is an important element of our hobby, and it's well worth encouraging.

I don' think this solves (or really addresses) much of anything. I mean, is it THAT important to argue semantics over organizer created categories that exist outside the boundaries of the rules? Best Overall is simply a reflection of the type of event in which it present and follows a 10+ year precedent set by GW.

Scoring wasn't announced or known until after the event. I got a rude shock at the end when they announced that there were special scores that had impacted the tournament scores, and thus I hadn't won.

This isn't the point though.

There's a freaky long thread elsewhere about what a tournament is. Its a competitive event. Please, announce a winner(s) for the tournament, and another for the hobby section. My army is nicely painted. Took ages. I hated doing it. I don't give a rat's tail about paint jobs, although I will occasionally comment on someone with something unique or spectacular. I get 26/30, and 7-8/10 type paint scores. Technical requirements are all met, except for multiple shading coats, and that's not because I'm not willing to do them, but because it would diminish the bright, vibrant colors of my army. I can deal with getting docked painting scores because what I like and what a judge likes are different.

If you don't like the idea of having a tournament and a tournament champion separate from the hobby portions, then how about folks start announcing that they're hosting a 40k hobby day? Downplay the fights, the competition, the lists...see how many folks show up to ogle painting jobs and pat each other on the back for being such good sports.

90% of your time at a tournament is spent battling; the fact that the battle points are often 50% or so is incredibly out of proportion, but at least...at LEAST meet halfway and distinguish the tournament champion from the hobby master.

Danny, its only silly because you choose to not accept it as a viable option. What I find silly is that you want events to change because they are not acceptable to you, a player who doesn't play in events he doesn't like.

It's not a catch 22. On an individual level, your arguement fails because, at best, you are a potential participant...you might play, if, the rules were changed to fit your preferences. You are not a previous participant offering suggestions on how to improve the event/experience. I do not know of one TO that wouldn't go "thank you for your opinion, but I'm not sure our event and your desires are a good fit." and then move on with his day.

Dash's arguement is basically "If they wouldn't have counted all the points that they said they were going to count in determining who won, well, I would have won!" He felt they should have only counted the categories that he feels were important, and not surprisingly, he would have come out on "top". It's not that he didn't win "something", its that he didn't win what he considered the best "thing" to win.

I'm just befuddled by the thought process in it all. All of a sudden there appears to be this "movement" that feels the established tourney community should bend to their whim. They approach it from the position that their arguement is more pure and that -years- of established history, even history established by the creators of the game has bastardized the hobby. And when presented with the suggestion that they should make the event they would want to see happen, the response is "I shouldn't have to."

It's rediculous.

Dashofpepper wrote: 90% of your time at a tournament is spent battling

And 100% of that time is with mini's that have been assembled and painted.

Dashofpepper wrote: There's a freaky long thread elsewhere about what a tournament is. Its a competitive event.

Painting is competitive. Why doesn't it belong in a tournament then?

As someone said earlier "best overall" means the player that did the best at the most categories. If you eliminate painting/hobby criteria then there can be no "best overall" because there would no longer be multiple competitive categories to compete in. Why not just eliminate the "best overall" prize and have prizes for best general, best painted etc. and concede that each requires a high level of skill and is competitive within its own sphere?

theHandofGork wrote:

Painting is competitive. Why doesn't it belong in a tournament then?

I presume you're being inflammatory and not serious, but just in case....

Painting can be competitive. Bringing painted models to a competition is not competitive. If you sit there with a number of other people and have X amount of time to paint a model to the best of your ability (painting/converting contest) - and those do exist, that's a painting competition. The models you bring to a tournament may have been painted by you, may have been painted by someone else...may not be painted at all. That's not competitive.

If I travel to a GT type event I like to play against painted armies. As has been noted painting can be competitive and should not be cast in lesser light versus other categories such as purely battlepoints.

G

Isn't this beating a dead horse?

It's once again just coming down to an argument over whether what is usually referred to as "Best General" should be the overall tournament winner.

I (and most people I know) don't think this should be the case... as well as the clear majority on this forum.

That doesn't mean it's not a valid opinion, just that it's in the minority. And there are events that cater to this kind of gaming ('Ard Boyz, and the NOVA Open tournament recently posted and filling up fast). Just not every event... since again, most people seem not to favor this.

Dashofpepper wrote:

theHandofGork wrote:

Painting is competitive. Why doesn't it belong in a tournament then?

I presume you're being inflammatory and not serious, but just in case....

Painting can be competitive. Bringing painted models to a competition is not competitive. If you sit there with a number of other people and have X amount of time to paint a model to the best of your ability (painting/converting contest) - and those do exist, that's a painting competition. The models you bring to a tournament may have been painted by you, may have been painted by someone else...may not be painted at all. That's not competitive.

What is your definition of "competitive"?
Competitive: relating to, characterized by, or based on competition (Webster)

Say there is an event which offers a prize for painting your plastic toys. You want to win this prize. So you practice how to paint, read up on painting on the internet, and do your best so you can be better at painting than the other people at the event. How is this event not a competition? How is your practice, patience, and hard work not competitive? Before you answer go through the scenario again and replace "paint" with "play." There really isn't much of a difference.

RiTides wrote:Isn't this beating a dead horse?

Not at all, this is not the same horse. I'll admit that I'm a bit frustrated that what I'm writing apparently isn't being read very well - so I either wrote it poorly or am being intentionally ignored.

Best General should not be a sub-category of a tournament, where the purpose of the tournament is to have a multi-round tournament. It should be parallel with the hobby awards. That's all.

Dashofpepper wrote:

RiTides wrote:Isn't this beating a dead horse?

Not at all, this is not the same horse. I'll admit that I'm a bit frustrated that what I'm writing apparently isn't being read very well - so I either wrote it poorly or am being intentionally ignored.

Best General should not be a sub-category of a tournament, where the purpose of the tournament is to have a multi-round tournament. It should be parallel with the hobby awards. That's all.

And I'd argue that at most it is basically equal in prize support to Best Painted and normally much higher than Best Sportsmanship. However, most tournaments also go a step further and reward a Best Overall that encompasses all of these aspects.... INCLUDING Best General.

Dashofpepper wrote:Not at all, this is not the same horse. I'll admit that I'm a bit frustrated that what I'm writing apparently isn't being read very well - so I either wrote it poorly or am being intentionally ignored.

I just wanted to say that (as far as I can tell ) I'm definitely not intentionally ignoring what you're saying, and hopefully my post wasn't inflammatory/antagonistic. There's been enough of that over this issue, already.

That said, I don't see what's different about this from the previous round of discussing it... it appears to be a suggestion to "downgrade" overall, to be the equivalent of "best general"... whereas most people seem to want overall to encompass painting and sportsmanship, as well.

Dashofpepper wrote:

RiTides wrote:Isn't this beating a dead horse?

Best General should not be a sub-category of a tournament, where the purpose of the tournament is to have a multi-round tournament. It should be parallel with the hobby awards. That's all.

You are yet again re-defining the 'purpose' of tournaments to fit your whims and your personal wants.

"Best General" has always historically been parallel and equal to "best appearance/army". The person who PLAYED the best wins best general, The person who models/paints the best wins "best appearance/army".

Best Overall is the person who does on average the best of the two. And in your event, apparently the TO gave a single point 'bonus' for every person who voted an army 'favorite' which gave him the 18 points to beat you. If that is how the tourney was being scored, and 18 participants voluntarily voted that this other fellow's army was thier favorite than he won best overall.

What you and many of the other vocal severe minority want is 'best general' = 'best overall' so you get the most prizes and to continue to erode the need for appearance as part of the event. There are people who hate painting and I get that, but when you boil it down, a severe majority of players still feel it is a highly important part of the game as a whole and continue to want it to be supported and promoted.

I wonder if your outcry would be the same if there was not monetary prizes involved? It sounds like you want to get rid of 'best overall' so the only two prizes left are general and appearance and you can win the treasure trove. I would think being 'best general' is a high enough honor to show your skill at playing and your choice not to take appearance any farther than 'tabletop quality' and would be success enough. It sounds like a cash grab to me and doesn't seem genuine. It rings just as hollow as if a Golden Demon winner tried to remove battle points from best overall so he would have better chance at wining Prize $$.

I do like the whimsical logic on how painting and modeling is not competitive and is not a valid skill to measure in a competition, but somehow playing this horribly inaccurate, unbalanced, poorly written, random dice game of 40k is the true pinnacle of skill. The only game which would be a true measure of mental skill and tactician is a chess tournament. Of all the possible games of being legitimate for true balance and fairness and tactical skill, 40k is near the bottom. So excuse me if the concept of 'hardcore skill-filled competitive tourneys' doesn't ring true. Every dice rolled in a game is an erosion of skill and an addition of chance into determining the winner and 40k does a lot of dice rolling. If I can shoot every model of your army off the board in one round due to grot blastas by rolling 300 6's in a row, that isn't skill. That is luck. And I am sure you would have something to say about that if your loss was and the hands of a statistical impossibility. Every game is severely impacted by chance and not every game is won by skill. So the idea that somehow it is clearly the most important aspect of a competitive tourney is pretty laughable to me. Warhammer is a game of risk mitigation and odds manipulation... Even the best tactical decisions can utterly fail while the worst tactical decisions can succeed brilliantly... And while Odds manipulation and risk mitigation takes some skill, it doesn't mean that the best player wins in all situations... Just the majority of the times when the odds are in the favor of the decisions made.

If this was a Chess tourney, then yes, the top prize should be equivalent to best general. When 40k becomes as balanced and tactical as chess and is not hugely impacted by randomness and odds, then maybe I'll agree. Until then, the game is a silly excuse to push our models around a board and have fun while doing it and neither component is the most important and 'overall' is the person who does the best 'overall'.

nkelsch wrote:

You are yet

I do like the whimsical logic on how painting and modeling is not competitive and is not a valid skill to measure in a competition, but somehow playing this horribly inaccurate, unbalanced, poorly written, random dice game of 40k is the true pinnacle of skill. The only game which would be a true measure of mental skill and tactician is a chess tournament. Of all the possible games of being legitimate for true balance and fairness and tactical skill, 40k is near the bottom. So excuse me if the concept of 'hardcore skill-filled competitive tourneys' doesn't ring true. Every dice rolled in a game is an erosion of skill and an addition of chance into determining the winner and 40k does a lot of dice rolling. If I can shoot every model of your army off the board in one round due to grot blastas by rolling 300 6's in a row, that isn't skill. That is luck. And I am sure you would have something to say about that if your loss was and the hands of a statistical impossibility. Every game is severely impacted by chance and not every game is won by skill. So the idea that somehow it is clearly the most important aspect of a competitive tourney is pretty laughable to me. Warhammer is a game of risk mitigation and odds manipulation... Even the best tactical decisions can utterly fail while the worst tactical decisions can succeed brilliantly... And while Odds manipulation and risk mitigation takes some skill, it doesn't mean that the best player wins in all situations... Just the majority of the times when the odds are in the favor of the decisions made.

I think you're simply being absurd. Please re-read what I wrote; you're wildly missing anything that I've said. Painting and modeling are competitions if you make it so - they are not at 40k tournaments. Showing up with painted and converted figured that may or may not be your own work is not competitive; the competitions are when you paint on the spot, on a timer, and your work at the end of the competition is held up against others.

In other words, you want to get rid of the best overall award.

That's a silly idea. As has been said by many, many others...

Best overall is supposed to be best overall...gameplay, painting, everything. That's why our awards in the Gladiator are "Gladiator Champion" and "Second in Command."

Dashofpepper wrote:Painting and modeling are competitions if you make it so - they are not at 40k tournaments.

But this is simply not true! Painting and modelling are a competition included in most 40k tournaments. Just because it isn't done "on the spot" doesn't make it not a competition... that would be absurd!

Also, most tournament don't allow someone who did not paint their own army to win the "Best Painted" category.

And while it does count towards the "Overall" in some tournaments, many people have expressed that this is a large part of the reason they attend tournaments- to play against other armies that are nicely painted and converted.

Again, there are tournaments that do not emphasize this ('Ard Boyz), but that is not what most people look for in most (not all) tournaments.

Dashofpepper wrote:

nkelsch wrote:

You are yet

I do like the whimsical logic on how painting and modeling is not competitive and is not a valid skill to measure in a competition, but somehow playing this horribly inaccurate, unbalanced, poorly written, random dice game of 40k is the true pinnacle of skill. The only game which would be a true measure of mental skill and tactician is a chess tournament. Of all the possible games of being legitimate for true balance and fairness and tactical skill, 40k is near the bottom. So excuse me if the concept of 'hardcore skill-filled competitive tourneys' doesn't ring true. Every dice rolled in a game is an erosion of skill and an addition of chance into determining the winner and 40k does a lot of dice rolling. If I can shoot every model of your army off the board in one round due to grot blastas by rolling 300 6's in a row, that isn't skill. That is luck. And I am sure you would have something to say about that if your loss was and the hands of a statistical impossibility. Every game is severely impacted by chance and not every game is won by skill. So the idea that somehow it is clearly the most important aspect of a competitive tourney is pretty laughable to me. Warhammer is a game of risk mitigation and odds manipulation... Even the best tactical decisions can utterly fail while the worst tactical decisions can succeed brilliantly... And while Odds manipulation and risk mitigation takes some skill, it doesn't mean that the best player wins in all situations... Just the majority of the times when the odds are in the favor of the decisions made.

I think you're simply being absurd. Please re-read what I wrote; you're wildly missing anything that I've said. Painting and modeling are competitions if you make it so - they are not at 40k tournaments. Showing up with painted and converted figured that may or may not be your own work is not competitive; the competitions are when you paint on the spot, on a timer, and your work at the end of the competition is held up against others.

Just to clarify, you believe that a painting / modelling competition is where you're timed and the person to make the best within that time wins? By that definition, the Golden Demon competition is not actually a competition as people model, convert and paint the model so they can take it to be judged. I just want to make sure that's what you're getting at, because that, to me, seems quite silly to me. A speed painting competition could be run like you're suggesting, but that's not the only way to have a painting competition.

Also, you haven't answered my question I posed earlier. How is a "Best Overall" award derogatory to the "Best General"? How does it demean that accomplishment? I only ask so that I can get a hint of your perspective to see if it makes sense.

Heh, is having the title of "Tournament Champion" that important? Currently you can state "I was Best General"...that isn't enough? I think it would be insulting to have someone win "Best Overall" with a gray primed army, while second place might have a beautifully converted army....but was 1 battle point short of the victor.



So my suggestion;

I think that the title "Tournament Champion of Excellence in 40K and Defender of Our Plastic Men" should consist of 95% painting/theme/sportsmanship and 5% battle points. This should also be the biggest prize.

Other Categories:

Lead Battle Point Getter: Whoever had the most battle points. They can get free Necron Pariahs as prize support.

I may or may not be serious (After all, Pariahs are metal).

Dashofpepper wrote:Painting and modeling are competitions if you make it so - they are not at 40k tournaments. Showing up with painted and converted figured that may or may not be your own work is not competitive; the competitions are when you paint on the spot, on a timer, and your work at the end of the competition is held up against others.

First of all, your 'timer' competition of appearance is an absurd concept. SPEED painting is not the only thing that goes into appearance. Also, your so-called speed concept eliminates modeling, sculpting, converting and all the other things that go into appearance.

And people lying about 'did you paint your own army' is no different than people cheating with dice, misinterpreting rules on purpose, bringing invalid lists, over-measuring, and being a general ass... you don't invalidate appearance because someone somewhere may lie about appearance.

Here is a story on the day I came to terms with 'Tourneys' and figured out what tourneys are all about. It was around 2002/2003 and I was attending my second GT. I had seen what it takes to win and was going to make a Run to 'win it allz!' I am not the worlds best painter but not terrible, my appearance is good enough to place me int he top 25% which means if I can win all 6 games that I *SHOULD* have had a real shot at best overall. I made a feral ork army. My goal was to make an army based on statistical mitigation with the goal that no opponent would be fielding a list to take on this army and by default any army that wasn't made to take me out would fail. Death through numbers was the plan. And remember, this was 3rd edition when Orks had Choppas, No fearless wounds, Multiple combats were awesome and we could Mob up which meant once I started a single endless combat, I insta-win the game through raw numbers and atrition.

The army consisted of roughly:
*Warboss on super cyboar with PK/Burna
*About 7-8 Nobs on boars with Burnas (nob bikers have *NOTHING* on burnaboy cyboar nobz)
*20 Weirdboyz (str 4 boyz wich can be doped to str 5 pregame)
*20 Weirdboyz (str 4 boyz wich can be doped to str 5 pregame)
*20 brutes (basic boyz)
*30 Wildboyz (no slugga, dual CCW)
*30 grots (grots gave cover saves)
*30 grots (grots gave cover saves)
*1 Gargantuan squiggoth, High toughness, step on vehicles, multiple wounds.
*1 Gargantuan squiggoth, High toughness, step on vehicles, multiple wounds.

Can't remember if it had more, maybe some trappas, but it had over 180 models in around an 1800 model army.

Game 1: Armageddon codex Speedfreeks. being an ork player, I knew his tactics and basically his choppas and trukk boyz simply couldn't kill through the meat. STR 5 weirdboyz demolished str 3 regular boyz.
Game 2: Swampy Nids. He was the swampiest Nid army in the event... and I had more models than him. Slowly killed everything, Squiggoths murdered his TMCs, burna nobz killed everything. We were escorting a special model on the board and I had him 60 model escort by turn 2
Game 3: Generic Marines, 4 Turns of being shot, turn 5, assault happened, by end of turn 6, he was basically dead.

Then game 4 happened. The mission required you to get your units off the opponents deployment zone. The deployment was corner to coner on a 4"x6" board. *SOMEHOW* I ended up on the 4"x8" road-runner canyon scenic board. (looks like the desert from the looney tunes) It was physically impossible for me to walk my models across the board to my opponents 12" corner in 6 turns. It was a mission that was unwinnable by me no matter what, even If I boardwiped my opponent. He was playing Dark Eldar who could skim off the board without a problem. No amount of supposed 'skill' on my side could possibly win the mission. All my army selection skill, Playing skill, everything was instantly nullified randomly by a mission that happens to be suited against a foot-based army. I was not the only person pissed off, and there was lots of griping but it didn't matter. So I lost game 4.

Game 5 and 6 were the next day... It did not help that game 4 was right before the end of the day so I could stew in my anger and knowing that I could in no way win because of that mission.

I ended up placing 10th overall out of around 250 users and my appearance was in the top 25%, I think 34th overall for appearance and my buddy who I went with thought I should be happy... but I was pissed off. He sat me down and said 'why are you pissed off? People loved your models, you had a good time, you met a bunch of nice people and this is a game based upon randomness... The people who win best overall almost always have some random bit of luck that decided one of thier games which put them on top. I ended up meeting the winner who won all 6 of his games and basically his response was "man, you would not believe how bad my opponent in game 6 rolled. I have never seen such bad dice." And what about my opponents? For many of them, the game was lost before we rolled a single dice. I pulled thier number knowing a bulk of players were going to be assault-oriented armies and that my swamp using a broken chapter-approved WD codex that was barley playtested and written for fun would destroy them. Opponents who faced me lost not due to skill (because this army played itself) but because they randomly became paired up with me.

Ever since then I wondered why I was getting so pissed off about not winning and getting these grand delusions on why I 'shoulda won' and how I was somehow screwed out of something I earned. It simply isn't true. This game, even to this day has such a significant aspect of the gameplay that is randomness, that this can never be considered a truly balanced or competitive event. All I could do is show up with the best army I could and have fun. If I win, then so be it.

The next year I took an army based upon ork units that I liked that are normally avoided. I took Lootas with plasmacannons, 3rd edition Flash gitz, Cyborks, Looted Rhinos, a Warboss with a Rokkit launcha, Tankbustas... It was a really 'shooty' ork army for 3rd edition. It was a step up in appearance and conversions. I practiced the list and became really good with it. I modeled units I wanted to paint, I made things I thought would be fun, and I made a list that defied the metagame and the norm. I ended up winning 4/6 of my games and didn't place as high overall, but they were some of the most interesting games and fun games I ever played at a tourney and my opponents had a blast and I got endless comments on how the game was so interesting because half the types of units they had never seen played before let alone in a tourney... I adjusted my view of the event and my expectations to be 'reasonable' and when i saw what it was really about, I had more fun. (IE: pushing pretty models around the board while trying to play a game that isn't necessarily fair, balanced or functional at times.')

There is more to the tourney than the game and straight battle points. The game itself is fundamentally flawed and is only partially a measure of skill and will never be balanced unless everyone is forced to take the exact same lists. Winning all battle points many times does come down to luck and things outside the control of the player. All you can do is go with the flow and have fun and try your best to enjoy all aspects of it. This is why I feel like 'ardboyz are such cluster-F***s and many people choose never to attend them again... Without the pretty models on the table, the horrible garbageness of what the game becomes is simply unbearable.

Best General = Best Appearance. This is as it should be. Best Overall is and should be the person who performs best on all the aspects of the event. Changing this to be battlepoints only is a comical joke, and only to please people who have delusions of being some masterful skilled player in a game of chance.

Zomro wrote:Also, you haven't answered my question I posed earlier. How is a "Best Overall" award derogatory to the "Best General"? How does it demean that accomplishment? I only ask so that I can get a hint of your perspective to see if it makes sense.

I think it's due to the Flak you get from the CGM if you win Best General...Afterall, if you win your games, you are obviously a powergaming cretin that should be taken outside and beaten.

I really do believe that certain people look down on someone who consistantly wins 'Best General'.

nkelsch +1