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This came up in a thread on Sportsmanship scores a little while back and it got me to thinking. I wrote a short piece about it on CnC, check it out in my sig if you like. But I wanted to throw it out there in a poll. The basic idea was that getting Tabled by an opponent in a tournament means you can ding their sportsmanship score. Nothing else goes wrong in the game other than you get tabled, can/should you knee cap them? Let's keep it civil please I would prefer a good discussion as opposed to a locked thread...

No. You should give them a low sportsmanship score if they are being a douchelord, regardless of the game's outcome.

Take it like a man and give the guy who whooped your donker at least a 4/5. Even if the game was a polite basic game with no real issues. You get beat, you get beat. Deal with it nerd

We play 40k. It's little plastic figures that go pew pew and you roll dice to represent lasers firing. For the most part your playing with large middle age men who have wives/careers/more important things to get butt-hurt over.

If I got utterly thrashed by someone but they were a good sportsman about it, then I wouldn't give him a bad score. Docking someone for beating you, whether it's tabling you or just beating you to a less extreme extent; is dick behavior. Like you would actually deserve to be kneecapped on a literal level for being such a whiny baby.

That was sort of my point originally. That knee capping someone on sports for tabling you when the rest of the game was fine is ACTUAL poor sportsmanship not the other way around.

I never give bad sports scores if I get massacred.... normally.

The only exception to this, is if the tournament asks me to rank my opponents, I almost always give my opponents who table me the lowest score, unless one of my other opponents is a jerk.

I generally just give max score to everyone unless they are dicks.

This is why I am strictly against players scoring each other for sportsmanship. A buddy of mine lost a tournament due to beating a National qualifier then getting dinged on sportsmanship points, all because my buddy was misinformed, had come to the tournament 250 points short, tabled his first opponent, then refused to redo his army after it was pointed out he was short, saying that no one else got to redo their army, why should he? Mr. National Qualifier was butt-hurt by losing to a handicapped opponent and busted my buddy, costing him any chance of placing.

Why would you ding someone's sportsmanship score if they weren't a bad sport? Sounds like you'd be the one needing a kneecaping on your score. Just because they beat your face into the dirt doesn't give you the right to hamper them. All it means is you need more practice. If you get your feelings hurt by getting beat down, stay out of the tournament scene.

I'm not sold either way on being pro or con for comp scores, but when it comes to stuff like sportsmanship, which are completely subjective, it's just a bad idea.

Giving someone a low sportsmanship score because they beat you in terrible ways is like giving them a low painting score because their GD quality army makes your grey hordes jealous.

no, one of the best games I ever had I got tabled (it was close but still, thats not the point)

I ding everyone's sportsmanship since I think it's a dumb system. Hey, you give me an opportunity to put my competition behind, yippee.

I voted no.
I don't think a Sports score just be affected by whether you win or lose.
If the guy is cool, give him a good score; if he's a dick, give him a bad score. It's that simple.
Sadly, giving out a poor Spots/Comp score just because you lost is a very common/popular thing to throw around. A lot of players feel that if there is no Comp score, you dock Sports points for the list, or dock Sports/Comp points just because they lost, or had a draw and wanted to keep the other guy from placing.

Horst wrote:
The only exception to this, is if the tournament asks me to rank my opponents, I almost always give my opponents who table me the lowest score, unless one of my other opponents is a jerk.

So the person who beat you/ you lost to the worst you give the worst score to?

What are they supposed to do? Stop shooting, and stop attacking?

Getting tabled usually means either really bad dice rolling, making really bad tactical decisions, or just having a really poor matchup vs your opponent.

Now if they are jumping up and down, fist pumping every wound, making loud and obnoxious comments on every dice roll, acting like the computer geek terrorist in die hard.. "And the quarterback is toast!" Then I can see giving bad sportsmanship.

But an honest game, where for whatever reason your army just sucked, and you penalize the guy? thats just wrong.

Should you? No

Will you? Yes, cause no one likes losing

I've lose very few games... If I get tabled its a rare thing... Out of the possible 100+ tournies i've been to (locals and GTs) i've only ever given 2 bad scores. One to a buddy of mine who I even told him he was being a jerk (later on he agreed with me...) and one to some guy who ran a slaneesh deamon bomb army out in a hellfire gaming club tourny. The guy was so "fakey" nice and cheated every chance he could... worst game ever.

If you're the kind of person who would manipulate sports scores by knee capping you're pretty much a jerk

For reason like the above, sportmanship scores at tournies are the most [stupid] thing possible. You will always get people given low score for getting battered.

Please refrain from making absolute statements. It makes the discussion less interesting and less friendly, and makes your own opinion look uninformed and hyperbolic.

I voted no, and in my own sportsmanship scoring system I specifically note to the players that the outcome of the game should have no bearing on their vote.

Mannahnin wrote:Please refrain from making absolute statements. It makes the discussion less interesting and less friendly, and makes your own opinion look uninformed and hyperbolic.

I voted no, and in my own sportsmanship scoring system I specifically note to the players that the outcome of the game should have no bearing on their vote.

I am interested in that. In your experience has this worked? Do you have a method of enforcing/monitoring it?

In general I would not punish someone for totally outplaying me and destroying my army. That's kind of the point of the game right? Defeat your opponent?

Scores should be based on how the person acts while tabling you. If they are a jerk then I give them a low score. If they are nice and best me then they get a max sportsmanship score.

Landrain wrote:

Horst wrote:
The only exception to this, is if the tournament asks me to rank my opponents, I almost always give my opponents who table me the lowest score, unless one of my other opponents is a jerk.

So the person who beat you/ you lost to the worst you give the worst score to?

What are they supposed to do? Stop shooting, and stop attacking?

Getting tabled usually means either really bad dice rolling, making really bad tactical decisions, or just having a really poor matchup vs your opponent.

Now if they are jumping up and down, fist pumping every wound, making loud and obnoxious comments on every dice roll, acting like the computer geek terrorist in die hard.. "And the quarterback is toast!" Then I can see giving bad sportsmanship.

But an honest game, where for whatever reason your army just sucked, and you penalize the guy? thats just wrong.

Very often, i'll have 3 good games in a row at a tournament. I have no problem with the sportsmanship of any of them. However, the tournament then asks me to rank my opponents, 1-3, on who had the best sportsmanship. Well, they are all even in my book, but SOMEONE has to get the bad score. I'll give it to the guy who tabled me, if for nothing more than I probably didn't enjoy the game as much as a closer one.

The issue is, some people assume they got a low score because they beat someone. The truth is, while they did beat someone, they were a douche about it.

I have seen people who wear the shield of 'I tis because I always beat them I got poor scores' and this simply is not true.

A majority of people who 'win a lot' consistently receives high scores. A majority of people who get demolished agree that they don't give bad scores for losing. Most times the sports scores give the TO the pulse of the event and really does clearly show who is being a dick or who is a sore loser and what was just a legitimate bad game between two people. It is uncanny.

There are just some people who really are unpleasant dicks to play against. And they simply 'don't get it'.

I have seen people get all kinds of butt hurt cause their uber list lost. It happens let it go if the person is fun and a good player awesome. If they are a jerk and not fun then that is a different matter.

Also take it one step further would you call a game in a competitive setting if they guy was just plain cheating or being a royal douche?

Why take your bad luck in dice rolling out on your opponent?
You brought Necrons to a tourny and everyone else brought Grey Knights. Whose fault was that?

dkellyj wrote:Why take your bad luck in dice rolling out on your opponent?
You brought Necrons to a tourny and everyone else brought Grey Knights. Whose fault was that?

Mat Wards . No but seriously, you're right on all accounts.

cgage00 wrote:
Also take it one step further would you call a game in a competitive setting if they guy was just plain cheating or being a royal douche?

Why let a cheater cheat call a ffing judge, same can also be said of douches depending what they do

Heck no. Doing so would be cheating, in my opinion.

I don't mind getting tabled by someone if they were cool about it. Now someone that is being a about everything and being a general pain then I would have marked them off on their sport score even if I wasn't tabled. It is just unfair to the other player.

OverwatchCNC wrote:

Mannahnin wrote:Please refrain from making absolute statements. It makes the discussion less interesting and less friendly, and makes your own opinion look uninformed and hyperbolic.

I voted no, and in my own sportsmanship scoring system I specifically note to the players that the outcome of the game should have no bearing on their vote.

I am interested in that. In your experience has this worked? Do you have a method of enforcing/monitoring it?

It is not difficult for a TO to ask all players to explain Sportsmanship scores of 7 or lower (or some sort of benchmark). I know at the ATC, one of my teammates gave one of the other team's members a low score (which he doesn't normally do) and proceeded to explain to the judges why he did so.

Obviously, no (to the poll) as the overwhelming majority has voted- 95% "No" or "I wouldn't", with almost 150 votes recorded in the poll. As puma says, it's easy enough for judges to check on low scores... giving one simply for losing badly is not a valid reason.

Any game that I lose by a landslide usually results in me chatting with my opponent post game for advice on where I need to fix my army, and strategy. Sometimes it's just bad luck with the dice too, all I need to roll was a 3+ invulnerable save on my sergeant with a storm shield to win the game and what happens? I roll a 2 on a non-ap wound, and FNP fails too. If you mark someone down, it should be for catching him cheating intentionally several times, he accuses you of cheating, or the entire game hes making fun of/listing the reasons why your army is unfair.