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From Dave Taylor:

"The typical problem that most organizers and players will find is that the question of "How can I improve my painting" always comes at the end of the tournament once score sheets are the only things available (ie. no recollection of army by the Paint Judge, particularly with 160+ armies being judged for 40K, and the player has packed their entire army away and there is no way to get the entire army out. So, this year, starting in Las Vegas, we asked our paint judges to make comments regarding the army so that we could provide some small measure of feedback for those players who wanted to ask about their painting at the end of the tournament."

I asked one of the painting judges at the Chicago GT what are they looking for when they judge an army while she examined mine. She spent about five minutes or more answering my question in detail. Why can’t you do the same rather than pass the buck?

- G

Well put, Orion.

Indeed, I do want "something else".

thehod wrote:A win is a win. The tournament is over and Good Game for those who participated.

Now for the 2008 season lets talk about the standardization of the painting scores or go with what Paul suggested.

I have to reinterate what Hod posted. What options do we have for painting and how can we address the issues that are on the table? Let's move to a move constructive thread. The issues that are at hand are:

1. Scoring armies that are painted by another person.
2. Paint scoring not being as straight forward.

So the question is 'what are the proposed solutions?'.

There are limits to what GW's employees can say, and it seems to me they've been very cordial. Don't drive them away.

I do think a discussion would be nice, but I don't know how much impact it will have on a paint scoring scheme due to be released in January.

It may not have an immediate impact. However, this is a subject that many have tried to address over the years with very little across the board success. I believe AdeptiCon has the best results consistently on paint scoring and is a beacon to look to.

Malice,

I'd suggest:

A) you can't address your first point. Players will either be honest about painting, or they won't.

B) Paint scoring as it is now, caters (In my opinion) towards extremes like boards, banners, outfits, etc that don't actually represent the *hobby*.

C) I think people willing to go "all out" or "get stuck in" as GW UK likes to call it, should be in a seperate category and the actual army painting/conversion work should end up on the tables themselves.

D) Since all armies should be painted in order to be eligible to play, shouldn't we remove the ability of players to procure pro-painting services and advance in a competition supposed to be of their own doing? Things are different now than in 2001 or 2002 (when several winners were highly questionable), but the rules don't reflect this. Sorry, a check box just isn't good enough if you want people to really feel like this is a competition.

Just some ideas.

Mr. Sutton:

Here is a link to another page containing your results, we'll do our best to get these and all of the 2001-2002 results we can recover into our GT section soon:

http://web.archive.org/web/20030116154843/us.games-workshop.com/news/us/events/GT-2002/coverage/LA/results/40kresults.htm

Thanks,

Rich Curren
GWUS Web Manager

Inquisitor_Malice wrote:It may not have an immediate impact. However, this is a subject that many have tried to address over the years with very little across the board success. I believe AdeptiCon has the best results consistently on paint scoring and is a beacon to look to.

Where do they have their paint scoring rules? I can't find them.

Thanks Rich. If you'd like me to get my old excel sheet with my scores from 97-04, I think I have it on CD someplace.

Only 9 more to find. lol

I'll see if I can find a pic of myself, I hope someone recognizes me. I know you, but I'm sure I'm just a face in the crowd to you.

Found one. Yikes!

Hello:

No problem. We won't need any further information. We won't be posting any pictures from those years. That coverage is indeed too incomplete to recover and too time intensive to reconstruct reasonably. One of the reasons we didn't carry it over in the past is that our site structure changed so much (new style, technology, layout) that reconstructing it was too labor-intensive to make it worthwhile. However, we will be posting the stat sheets and winner lists that we have so people can look back on those GTs. Note that it is around 20 tournaments (counting WH as one, 40K as another) in those 2 years. Considering the number of GT events we have held in the last decade or so I would say our coverage is quite extensive.

Thanks,

Rich Curren
GWUS Web Manager

paidinfull wrote:
If we make the guidelines clearer, as sportsmanship and general are, this would kill this issue dead.

Hi Chris

Here, here! I agree 100%. Clarity where ever possible. Honesty from all parties in everything, and setting aside egos that may be bruised in the honesty.

The following is NOT directed at you Chris, or anyone else who has posted in this thread, but is a general philosophy I've always followed.

In my humble opinion, the most important element that goes hand-in-hand with clarity from tournament organizers is honesty from players with themselves. Before a player drops cash on the ticket and perhaps airfare and hotel, they should take a good look at the tournament rules and determine whether or not they actually will have fun (and will their opponents have fun) at that event. If the answer is yes, then by all means attend. if the answer is no, then do not attend. Look for events in your area (or further afield) where you and your opponents will have fun. If no such event exists, then create it. If the answer is maybe, be prepared for disappointment.

Why do I like going to Adepticon? Because I can see dozens upon dozens of great looking armies with angles that I've never thought of. Will I play in the Gladiator? No, because I wouldn't enjoy being beaten into the ground the whole day, and my opponents wouldn't feel challenged by the Nerf bat armies I like putting together and fielding. I will, however, play in the 40K Team Tournament because my team is more about the fun chatter before the event and the deadline it provides. We don't really have any plan going into each game, and it is fun to see how our armies can be beaten next. The best teams we've played against were The Untouchables and Kryptman's Gamble, fun guys with cool armies and a great approach to the hobby.

I know what I want from an event, and if the organizer tells me they're going to provide something other than what I'm looking for I'll leave the gaming to those that are looking for their kind of thing.

In the future we'll be much clearer with what kind of event we are going to run, and expect that kind of thing from any event organizer.
Please be honest with yourself, so that you and those around you can get the most out of the experience.

Clarity and Honesty.

Cheers
Dave

Green Blow Fly wrote:From Dave Taylor:

"The typical problem that most organizers and players will find is that the question of "How can I improve my painting" always comes at the end of the tournament once score sheets are the only things available (ie. no recollection of army by the Paint Judge, particularly with 160+ armies being judged for 40K, and the player has packed their entire army away and there is no way to get the entire army out. So, this year, starting in Las Vegas, we asked our paint judges to make comments regarding the army so that we could provide some small measure of feedback for those players who wanted to ask about their painting at the end of the tournament."

I asked one of the painting judges at the Chicago GT what are they looking for when they judge an army while she examined mine. She spent about five minutes or more answering my question in detail. Why can’t you do the same rather than pass the buck?

- G

Hi Green Blow Fly

I'm confused? Did I not say that this had been a problem in the past, we took additional steps to address it this year, and when you asked in Chicago, you received feedback from the Paint Judge. How is that me passing the buck? My apologies if I have misread your post.

Cheers
Dave

Painting, like all art, is very subjective, which is in part, the reason i suggested a Presentation category instead of the overall Painting scores. One could categorize it in a number of different ways.

Is there a theme to the army?
Is the army uniformly painted?
Is the painting in lieu of the theme of the army?
Are the squads clearly distinguished and labeled?
Are all the models based?
Are all the bases uniform?
Do the bases have multiple types of flock/paint?
Are there conversions/unique(FW) pieces in the army?
Are there broken models?
Is there a display to go along with the army?
Is this display in theme with the army?
Do the HQ/Character models stand out from the rest of the army?

any additions would help. The idea is to make it less subjective.

@Stelek. I may noy have been playing tournaments for 15 years, but 8 is still a good amount, and I must say I have never heard of your name. And considering I game with some of the best, and my group includes 5 differant GT winners, one holding 5 titles, thats saying something. You are here to insite. You are what gives competative play a bad name. If you want a Gladiator style tournament than dont attend GTs. GTs are for complete gamers, ones who are interested in Battle, Sports, and Painting. Clearly you cant win as you dont have any interest in the latter two. Please stop giving us players a bad name

Woah, let's not be too hasty here, Darkness. He's explained why he gets bad sports (i.e. he doesn't talk much, not because he's an donkey-cave), and he's shown some of his painting and explained the effort he put in. We can wonder about the effectiveness of his efforts, but it is not fair to accuse him of not caring about these things.* We ought to take people's words in good faith unless there's a compelling reason not to.

*Not that everyone must care about sportsmanship and painting.

Glad you've never heard of my name.

I've never heard of your group. Are you a gaming club? Do you playtest for GW? Should I be aware of any other activities that should garner my instant respect? Please note being a multiple GT winner is obviously of little meaning to me. Bring your clubmates to Utah. I'll crush each and every one of them. With a smile, and a well-painted army.

By the way, if I'm what gives competitive play a bad name...what sign is your name on?

paidinfull wrote:Painting, like all art, is very subjective, which is in part, the reason i suggested a Presentation category instead of the overall Painting scores. One could categorize it in a number of different ways.

Is there a theme to the army?
Is the army uniformly painted?
Is the painting in lieu of the theme of the army?
Are the squads clearly distinguished and labeled?
Are all the models based?
Are all the bases uniform?
Do the bases have multiple types of flock/paint?
Are there conversions/unique(FW) pieces in the army?
Are there broken models?
Is there a display to go along with the army?
Is this display in theme with the army?
Do the HQ/Character models stand out from the rest of the army?

any additions would help. The idea is to make it less subjective.

Yep, the plan is to return to this kind of checklist. All shall be revealed in January.

But as a Sneak Peek I can let you know that Appearance scores will still be included in the Overall scoring

Cheers
Dave

Hey Dave - Thanks for the input. Oh and don't mind Steve's (Green Blowfly) post. I can also claim confusion.

I do care about sportsmanship.

I've given just about everyone of my opponents a max score. Them being poor sports is no reason not to be the bigger man about things.

I do care about painting.

I was insulted when a shoddily painted Eldar army crushed my rather clever paint job into the dirt with a an industrial insulating foam "case" spray painted 10 different colors.

See, if I didn't care I wouldn't post. That's how this whole internet thing works.

davetaylor wrote:

paidinfull wrote:
If we make the guidelines clearer, as sportsmanship and general are, this would kill this issue dead.

Hi Chris

Here, here! I agree 100%. Clarity where ever possible. Honesty from all parties in everything, and setting aside egos that may be bruised in the honesty.

The following is NOT directed at you Chris, or anyone else who has posted in this thread, but is a general philosophy I've always followed.

In my humble opinion, the most important element that goes hand-in-hand with clarity from tournament organizers is honesty from players with themselves. Before a player drops cash on the ticket and perhaps airfare and hotel, they should take a good look at the tournament rules and determine whether or not they actually will have fun (and will their opponents have fun) at that event. If the answer is yes, then by all means attend. if the answer is no, then do not attend. Look for events in your area (or further afield) where you and your opponents will have fun. If no such event exists, then create it. If the answer is maybe, be prepared for disappointment.

Why do I like going to Adepticon? Because I can see dozens upon dozens of great looking armies with angles that I've never thought of. Will I play in the Gladiator? No, because I wouldn't enjoy being beaten into the ground the whole day, and my opponents wouldn't feel challenged by the Nerf bat armies I like putting together and fielding. I will, however, play in the 40K Team Tournament because my team is more about the fun chatter before the event and the deadline it provides. We don't really have any plan going into each game, and it is fun to see how our armies can be beaten next. The best teams we've played against were The Untouchables and Kryptman's Gamble, fun guys with cool armies and a great approach to the hobby.

I know what I want from an event, and if the organizer tells me they're going to provide something other than what I'm looking for I'll leave the gaming to those that are looking for their kind of thing.

In the future we'll be much clearer with what kind of event we are going to run, and expect that kind of thing from any event organizer.
Please be honest with yourself, so that you and those around you can get the most out of the experience.

Clarity and Honesty.

Cheers
Dave

Thanks for the reply
Is it safe to assume that this means you (GW) are considering a change to this portion of the format to alleviate any whining or complaining after all is said and done?
Also to be clear I had a wonderful time at the event, I will be attending again, and will continue to support the hobby, as well as met new gamers in my area to play competitively with. I would however prefer to absolve this particular issue so that I know what to expect next year. Are the standards/expectations for painting scoring anywhere on the GW website? I'm afraid I don't know(clearly this indicates I was not aware of what to expect this year).

I said previously that the reason why i was disappointed and upset, was not because I lost, but a statement was made that caused me to agree that this particular portion of the competition, because the army had not been painted or built by the individual, GW was in a sense rewarding someone as a more dedicated Overall 40k hobbyist. I simply felt that this wasn't what I had expected.

My personal philosophy, as we are sharing them (hehe), is that this is just a game. Hence my sportsmanship scores. No need to argue, no need to get upset or frustrated, we are here to have fun, enjoy the fluff, think strategically and play a fantastic game. I entered the competition because i was awarded the ticket for winning a local RTT almost two years ago and this was my first time attending. If I won the Baltimore tournament great, if not oh well, there is always next time. I prefer to have things spelled out for me so as I know what to expect, and while I expect the scoring to be subjective, i do not expect to be held to different standard than other players. I say that because I don't believe you can compare Player A's painting, to Player B's painting, when Player B's army was painted by Player C. You are in a sense comparing Player A to Player C and the effort should be rewarded, in honesty, to Player C not Player B.

Dave,

I hope it's a non-subjective checklist.

I remember when some checklists had 1/2/3 next to them to "rate" them, which was really a 0/1/2/3 since you could not have the check in the first place.

Removing the graded slope and reducing it to "yes.no" would certainly be an improvement over the current system.

Thanks again.

davetaylor wrote:

Yep, the plan is to return to this kind of checklist. All shall be revealed in January.

But as a Sneak Peek I can let you know that Appearance scores will still be included in the Overall scoring

Cheers
Dave

Thats great. And very encouraging. I look forward to seeing what GW has decided on.

paidinfull wrote:Painting, like all art, is very subjective, which is in part, the reason i suggested a Presentation category instead of the overall Painting scores. One could categorize it in a number of different ways.

Is there a theme to the army?
Is the army uniformly painted?
Is the painting in lieu of the theme of the army?
Are the squads clearly distinguished and labeled?
Are all the models based?
Are all the bases uniform?
Do the bases have multiple types of flock/paint?
Are there conversions/unique(FW) pieces in the army?
Are there broken models?
Is there a display to go along with the army?
Is this display in theme with the army?
Do the HQ/Character models stand out from the rest of the army?

any additions would help. The idea is to make it less subjective.

Something that you need to account for in the list is the differentiation of quality. All of those can be answered 'Yes' whether or not the army is of mediocre or superior quality. This is where the issue arises with a judges opinion and comes down to training. Having a checklist is an excellent idea. However, implementing a proper checklist is the hard part. One of our groups uses a checklist to account for this. See the example questions below:

1. Are the models painted in three colors?
2. Is there a basic level of highlighting (ie: dry brushing one layer)?
3. Is there a medium level of highlighting (ie: dry brushing with a wash and maybe dry brushed again)?
4. Is there an advance level of highlighting (ie: solid blending techniques applied, dry brushing is not noticeable)?

The same breakdown is used for shading, conversions, bases, etc. This allows for differentiation of quality. However, the key to a successful implementation of such a checklist is 'Training'. Judges who are going to use this type of list need to be trained on how to differentiate between the levels of quality.

Inquisitor_Malice wrote:

Something that you need to account for in the list is the differentiation of quality. All of those can be answered 'Yes' whether or not the army is of mediocre or superior quality. This is where the issue arises with a judges opinion and comes down to training. Having a checklist is an excellent idea. However, implementing a proper checklist is the hard part. One of our groups uses a checklist to account for this. See the example questions below:

1. Are the models painted in three colors?
2. Is there a basic level of highlighting (ie: dry brushing one layer)?
3. Is there a medium level of highlighting (ie: dry brushing with a wash and maybe dry brushed again)?
4. Is there an advance level of highlighting (ie: solid blending techniques applied, dry brushing is not noticeable)?

The same breakdown is used for shading, conversions, bases, etc. This allows for differentiation of quality. However, the key to a successful implementation of such a checklist is 'Training'. Judges who are going to use this type of list need to be trained on how to differentiate between the levels of quality.

Those are great additions. B)
I didn't want to go into too much specifics but wanted to give a general idea.
Also if you do it on yes/no and you have around 20 questions it is possible to have a larger variance in scores rather than what appeared to be increments of 5. Maybe that is asking too much though...?

paidinfull wrote: I say that because I don't believe you can compare Player A's painting, to Player B's painting, when Player B's army was painted by Player C. You are in a sense comparing Player A to Player C and the effort should be rewarded, in honesty, to Player C not Player B.

Hey PIF - I completely understand your philosophy and have read the your groups slanted posts about the same subject in the IFL forums. That said however, I do not agree with the resolution of players receiving a zero or a penalty if they did not paint it. The reason being is we have been down this road in GTs before and the only players that are hurt in this (with any sort of penalty) are the honest ones. I believe it has happened in the past with the penalty system and to apply such a system, it will happen again in the future. As alluded to above, you cannot realistically police army painting.

Dave mentioned that it all comes down to honesty. Some people have it and some don't. Why punish the honest ones?

If anything - making painting slightly less in points in the overall scheme of things would be a better approach.

I give the players credit that did mark there sheets that they did not paint their forces. Rick and Pete both marked their sheets appropriately and I applaud them for it.

BTW: Tell your buddy Two Heads Talking form the IFL forums that Pete marked the forms appropriately indicating that he did not paint the army.

paidinfull wrote:
I said previously that the reason why i was disappointed and upset, was not because I lost, but a statement was made that caused me to agree that this particular portion of the competition, because the army had not been painted or built by the individual, GW was in a sense rewarding someone as a more dedicated Overall 40k hobbyist. I simply felt that this wasn't what I had expected.

My personal philosophy, as we are sharing them (hehe), is that this is just a game. Hence my sportsmanship scores. No need to argue, no need to get upset or frustrated, we are here to have fun, enjoy the fluff, think strategically and play a fantastic game. I entered the competition because i was awarded the ticket for winning a local RTT almost two years ago and this was my first time attending. If I won the Baltimore tournament great, if not oh well, there is always next time. I prefer to have things spelled out for me so as I know what to expect, and while I expect the scoring to be subjective, i do not expect to be held to different standard than other players. I say that because I don't believe you can compare Player A's painting, to Player B's painting, when Player B's army was painted by Player C. You are in a sense comparing Player A to Player C and the effort should be rewarded, in honesty, to Player C not Player B.

The reason I haven't answered this particular issue and keep refering to the magical "in January" is that there is a lot of discussion that needs to be done by the team here regarding this particular issue. Surpringsly enough, it's the various shades of grey that really trip us up ; )

A broader discussion will be had by our team here (and yes, our teams do make the decisions based on constructive feedback in tandem with what we (GW) want to see represented at our Grand Tournament), and as there are many angles I don't want to make a call one way or the other on this one right now.

We're glad you had a good time, and we'll be working harder to ensure you and everyone else has more clarity to make those honest decisions.

Cheers
Dave

@ Dave Taylor

When I read the original post it appeared to me the poster was asking you for an explanation how painting scores determined. I think he would appreciate something along the lines of a bulleted response.

- G

I will. Inquistor_Malice
B)
I agree, its great that they were honest and they should not be punished or put at a severe disadvantage than others especially for being honest. It should however make a difference that they did not paint their armies, and it also should not be easier for them to win Best Overall. Doing nothing at this point makes it easier, IMO, as well as discourages other individuals who put the effort into doing it themselves. It does this because it raises the point, why should i compete against someone who is paying someone else to do their work when I could do the same? This is a really big negative, in my opinion, to a business that wants to keep people buying and painting models. If GW was paid to paint models for competitions, there wouldn't be an issue if you asked me, but i think they would want to keep the competition about the customers. Doing it this was raises the cost point for hardcore hobbyists and reduces the overall appeal of the GW hobby. Collect, assemble, paint, play.

I haven't posted much on this forum but a bit about my hobby love is included in my IFL signature.
I have easily over 10k in guard, over 4k in Tau, 6k in Eldar, 3k Orks, 2k in Daemonhunters, and 2k in marines.

What i hope to say by this is, I am not the greatest painter nor am i the worst. I don't win every game nor do I lose every game. I love the hobby, from fluff to table top and agree with Dave that people should attend events, and play games, where one knows they will have fun. Competing against 165 other players is not guaranteeing yourself a win, so if you only have fun if you win, well... i think you see where i am going with this.

When I enter a competition, as do most people, you are entering under very specific guidelines, usually with an intent for personal gain. Be it to see how you match up competitively against others in the 3 categories, or to know you won't win but to have fun playing against the best with the small chance of winning it all, or just pad your ego. If you are competing against other people, in any event, be it 40k, swimming, music, sports, it is my opinion that the expectation is that you do the work yourself. Otherwise, the point of the competition becomes diluted. If you didn't do all the work yourself in this case what are you hoping to achieve? How are you competing? What are you competing for? To increase your chances to win free stuff? These are rhetorical statements by the way, intended to get you to think about the negatives to setting this standard. I know we can apply these to Pete, but please don't. My intent is to move forward to press my point and have an adjustment made so that in the future my colleagues, my friends and my opponents will be able, in the spirit of competition, to have a clear field of "battle".

I feel as a community that if we set a precedent, this is about the hobby and your personal involvement in the hobby, and in turn discourage those that are not honest about having someone else painting their army, cheating in the games, then those incidents will be fewer and farther between. You can't police it, it's like the war on drugs, but you can definitely discourage it.

I also hope that you can understand and agree that there is a large need to address this particular portion of the competition. I apologize if I've reiterated a lot of what I've said before but something should be done to address this.

This is a lot like boxing scoring and i think we all know how awful that is. 2 different judges can see a fight 2 different ways and removing the subjective nature of it to level the playing field would help substantially. GW has released how you get the best General, its clear as day. Sportsmanship is also a no brainer, it's listed on the sheet. The same should be done with the Appearance portion for the Overall scoring.

Green Blow Fly wrote:@ Dave Taylor

When I read the original post it appeared to me the poster was asking you for an explanation how painting scores determined. I think he would appreciate something along the lines of a bulleted response.

- G

Aaaah! I see.

I do not know which particular paint judge judged Andrew's work at the Las Vegas show, and I'm not about to publicly critique his work. I will also not critique his work as judged in Las Vegas in private with Andrew without having the army in front of me and Andrew standing right next to me.

As we all know, the internet and email cannot convey tone properly, regardless of the number of emoticons we use. All I can hope is that at the next GW-run tournament Andrew attends he is able to ask a paint judge about his army and accept praise and constructive criticism with equal measure.

Cheers
Dave

davetaylor wrote:

The reason I haven't answered this particular issue and keep refering to the magical "in January" is that there is a lot of discussion that needs to be done by the team here regarding this particular issue. Surpringsly enough, it's the various shades of grey that really trip us up ; )

A broader discussion will be had by our team here (and yes, our teams do make the decisions based on constructive feedback in tandem with what we (GW) want to see represented at our Grand Tournament), and as there are many angles I don't want to make a call one way or the other on this one right now.

We're glad you had a good time, and we'll be working harder to ensure you and everyone else has more clarity to make those honest decisions.

Cheers
Dave

Thanks, I appreciate you taking the time to respond, and understand it's not a simple process.
I respect and value the fact you are taking the time to address the "various shades of grey"