Who are you, or anyone, to say who should or should not be playing in tournaments?

If I'm the one playing then I should have a say in how much time the other person spends. Why they're taking so long isn't really important.

If I'm playing a 4 ship list, and have to wait around for 10 minutes for the other guy to just set his dials every round, I don't care why it's taking so long. I'm going to call the TO over and ask them to do something about it.

If there's a time limit on the game, then everyone owes it to everyone else to respect that and play in a way that accounts for that. If someone is brand new to the game, trying to stall for time or just not that bright doesn't matter. If they can't complete their turn in an appropriate amount of time they shouldn't be playing in a timed tournament.

Not really sure what's controversial about that... Who I am, is the person being harmed by someone else taking too long to play the game.

But what is the TO that you call over supposed to do about it, and why is there an expectation that they should cater to your wants? There are rules against intentionally slowing down play - there are not rules that say you must play at a certain pace. This is the crux of the problem; any enforcement of the slow rolling rules becomes arbitrary, and are much more likely to be tuned to the bias of the referee than a consistent rules set.

And you can say, "Well, I'm fine with that," but I think we both know that you'll not be so cool with it if/when you're the one eating a penalty or DQ for 'slow play' just because the referee decided they didn't like you or decided that this part of the tournament was the Power Trip Afternoon.

Who are you, or anyone, to say who should or should not be playing in tournaments?

If I'm the one playing then I should have a say in how much time the other person spends.

But you're not the only one playing, or the only one with "rights". The other player could equally well make the case that you should be banned from playing because you are rushing your opponents. It cuts both ways. Slow play is against the rules but so is rushing. However neither is defined, and neither are the underlying issue.

@Majorjuggler

Ok this is a time issue, it doesn't need partial point agenda jerked into it. I respect your work but please stop with jabbing your partial point cause in every thread. People can slow play even with partial point system. They are slow playing with fat ships now, they will slow pkay with small ships later.

It's not a "partial point cause", it is a statement of reality. For example:

1. 2 + 2 = 4
2. An apple will fall when dropped.
3. Ships with higher jousting efficiency are more cost effective and (all else being equal) more competitive.
4. The optimal strategy in timed games with zero partial points is frequently to get ahead on points and then slow play.

These are all statements of fact with a mathematical basis, and they are all true regardless if people decide to agree with them or not. The last one is the fundamental reason that this thread even exists. Don't shoot the messenger!

You are certainly right in that people can and will still slow play for an advantage even without having a Fat Ship. This is because of #4 above. However slow playing with partial points provides no significant benefit like it does right now.

Partial points, or time limits, or round caps are just going to make the game too difficult for a TO to manage a tournament. How would you keep accurate track of rounds played? If two players disagree on how many rounds have been played how can that argument be correctly resolved? No one else was there watching, so there is no neutral 3rd party to correctly make a ruling. How are you going to enforce a 2 minute time limit during activation? You can't, so that's not a real solution. Partial points just makes things very difficult to manage. And people will just start to game that system. Do you get points for shields destroyed, or just Hull? If you take a Hull upgrade, does that mean that each hull on a 12 point tie fighter is now worth 3 points instead of 4? Way too complicated. I can't wait for the pairings to go up, only for someone to complain that the TO miscalculated an MOV due to a Hull upgrade, or some strange partial points MOV scoring rule, only to have the pairings redone and have everyone move around to a new table. I really don't want to have 30 minutes between rounds while all the truly minute scoring differences for each match are figured out, checked, and then redone due to an error.

I'm not sure big ships with 1 hull point left surviving is as big a problem as some think. Yes, it's infuriating when you can't kill a nearly dead ship. And yes it can cost you a game that you may have otherwise won, if you had landed 1 more damage. 2 ship lists with a big fat ship are dominating now because the Phantom had killed off the natural enemy of those types of lists. With the new FAQ and the Phantom change, I expect that we will see the 2 ship lists start to become less common.

Enforcing 75 minute games instead of 60 minute games will go a long way toward curtailing slowplaying and big fat ship survival.

Slowplaying is like porn, you know it when you see it. Trying to define parameters that explicitly call out what slowplaying is will not end well. Those that want to slowplay will find holes that whatever complicated system is devised to define it and just legally game it that way. Allow the TOs to handle the tournaments and pass judgement on and suspicious behavior. I was at the same Regional event that the OP mentioned with the slow player. I played the slow player and he was obnoxious. We got 4 rounds in. But, let's not create a giant rule book to solve every possible permutation of questionable behavior.

Keep it simple. We all know bad behavior when we see it. If you smell something fishy, as the TO for help. That's why they are there.

Who are you, or anyone, to say who should or should not be playing in tournaments?

If I'm the one playing then I should have a say in how much time the other person spends.

But you're not the only one playing, or the only one with "rights". The other player could equally well make the case that you should be banned from playing because you are rushing your opponents. It cuts both ways. Slow play is against the rules but so is rushing. However neither is defined, and neither are the underlying issue.

@Majorjuggler

Ok this is a time issue, it doesn't need partial point agenda jerked into it. I respect your work but please stop with jabbing your partial point cause in every thread. People can slow play even with partial point system. They are slow playing with fat ships now, they will slow pkay with small ships later.

It's not a "partial point cause", it is a statement of reality. For example:

1. 2 + 2 = 4
2. An apple will fall when dropped.
3. Ships with higher jousting efficiency are more cost effective and (all else being equal) more competitive.
4. The optimal strategy in timed games with zero partial points is frequently to get ahead on points and then slow play.

These are all statements of fact with a mathematical basis, and they are all true regardless if people decide to agree with them or not. The last one is the fundamental reason that this thread even exists. Don't shoot the messenger!

You are certainly right in that people can and will still slow play for an advantage even without having a Fat Ship. This is because of #4 above. However slow playing with partial points provides no significant benefit like it does right now.

I think everyone that reads these forums is acutely aware of two things. MajorJuggler is a total advocate for partial points, and ficklegreendice HATES turrets.

Partial points just makes things very difficult to manage. And people will just start to game that system.

Agreed that it is difficult to manage, but that is an entirely different discussion.

Let them. They'll get an advantage of around 1-4 points compared to the 40-60 points that they are getting now.

I think everyone that reads these forums is acutely aware of two things. MajorJuggler is a total advocate for partial points

Even more basically: I am pro-MATH!

Don't they use timers in chess to do this kinda thing? Either you play until someone is check mated or someone runs out of time on their clock? maybe we should implement that =D

I dont hate the idea of partial points. Just call it repair cost. To simplify it, just call every hull/shield removed is a loss of 2 points. So han survives with 1 hull left, it counts as 24 points lost...

*Also, i think complaining about players being more thorough than yourself is pretty weak. I dont want to think things through so no one else should either!

Don't they use timers in chess to do this kinda thing? Either you play until someone is check mated or someone runs out of time on their clock? maybe we should implement that =D

Yes, and in online implementations of Magic: the Gathering as well.

A problem, as Audio Weasel noted, is that a singular timer setting would penalize larger lists; even the quickest player is still going to chew through more time moving a swarm than they would moving ChewBo around.

it's not an insurmountable problem - you could simply modify the amount of time a player has according to the number of ships in their list - but it does complicate the implementation.

I dont hate the idea of partial points. Just call it repair cost. To simplify it, just call every hull/shield removed is a loss of 2 points. So han survives with 1 hull left, it counts as 24 points lost...

*Also, i think complaining about players being more thorough than yourself is pretty weak. I dont want to think things through so no one else should either!

the problem with this system is that your nearly equal cost whisper with only one hull left is -6 of whatever point cost it started with. you'd have to scale the partial points for each ship.

and frankly, thats a very stupid idea.

Don't they use timers in chess to do this kinda thing? Either you play until someone is check mated or someone runs out of time on their clock? maybe we should implement that =D

Yes, and in online implementations of Magic: the Gathering as well.

A problem, as Audio Weasel noted, is that a singular timer setting would penalize larger lists; even the quickest player is still going to chew through more time moving a swarm than they would moving ChewBo around.

it's not an insurmountable problem - you could simply modify the amount of time a player has according to the number of ships in their list - but it does complicate the implementation.

How would that work? If you start with 8 ships, you get more time than someone that starts with 2 ships? As your ships die, does you time also decrease? And why should someone with more ships get more time? Both players had 100 points to spend, if you "reward" players with more ships more time, you may end up encouraging more swarms. And then who's in charge of the clock? Does each player bring a stopwatch with them? Who starts and stops the time? What if there is a disagreement as to when the clock should stop or start? Frankly, the game wasn't desinged with a clock in mind, to try and shoehorn one in will just create a miserable experience.

Don't they use timers in chess to do this kinda thing? Either you play until someone is check mated or someone runs out of time on their clock? maybe we should implement that =D

There is one massive, key difference between X-wing and Chess that makes using clocks in X-wing absolutely impossible.

Chess has defined turns. One player makes his move, then the other player, then back to the first player. Adding a clock button press at the end of each turn is uncomplicated and relatively unobtrusive.

X-wing does not have defined turns, which makes using individual clocks impossible. During a single attack, the "active" player changes six or more times. If we assume 8 ships, with one dying each round until the game ends, then we end up with around 210 clock changes just for the combat phase. By comparison, the longest recorded Chess match in history lasted 269 moves; most games last around 40. There are also numerous times during a X-wing game where both players are doing things at the same time; which clock runs during these sections of play?

Chess-style clocks are never, ever going to happen, people. Move on.

EDIT: Changed my assumed game a little.

How would that work? If you start with 8 ships, you get more time than someone that starts with 2 ships? As your ships die, does you time also decrease? And why should someone with more ships get more time? Both players had 100 points to spend, if you "reward" players with more ships more time, you may end up encouraging more swarms. And then who's in charge of the clock? Does each player bring a stopwatch with them? Who starts and stops the time? What if there is a disagreement as to when the clock should stop or start? Frankly, the game wasn't desinged with a clock in mind, to try and shoehorn one in will just create a miserable experience.

Here is my issue with this sort of response: you're not actually asking a question even though it's phrased as a question. You're just positing that clocks are impossible without even trying to implement a model where clocks are used and seeing what the pros or cons are (presumably you just don't like the idea and so reject out it out of hand, in which case fine - but you could at least be honest about it and say, "I don't like clocks and don't want clocks in the game," rather than asking a rhetorical question to 'explain' why clocks are impossible)

The time is not being offered as a 'reward' in the given example, as I explained - it would be a mechanism to even-out the natural advantage that a clock would otherwise give to smaller lists. Traditionally, you are in charge of stopping and starting your own timer, with a player's remaining time being open information. You start the clock when you are doing something and stop it when you are finished; games with more complex interactions where players simultaneously act have traditionally solved what would otherwise be a complicated exchange of timer stop-and-starts by either having all player timers running while simultaneous actions are ongoing or all player timers stopped. And yes, there are plenty of games, from Puerto Rico to Warhammer Epic to certain variants of ASL that have even more complex structures than X Wing that have very popular clock-driven tournament formats.

It isn't a matter of possibility - it's a matter of finding an ideal means of implementation.

And it does not matter that the game wasn't designed for clocks. The game wasn't originally designed for a big tournament scene with WAACs crawling all over it and interfacing point systems to manage it all, but such things were plugged into it anyway because where there is a will, it turns out, there's usually a way.

There is one massive, key difference between X-wing and Chess that makes using clocks in X-wing absolutely impossible.

Chess has defined turns. One player makes his move, then the other player, then back to the first player. Adding a clock button press at the end of each turn is uncomplicated and relatively unobtrusive.

X-wing does not have defined turns, which makes using individual clocks impossible. During a single attack, the "active" player changes six or more times. Times that by, say, 8 ships on the board and then 6 rounds of play and you get 288 clock switches just for the combat phase. The longest recorded Chess match in history lasted 269 moves. There are also numerous times during a game where both players are doing things at the same time; which clock runs during these sections of play?

Chess-style clocks are never, ever going to happen, people. Move on.

Chess is not the only game that uses a timer as a resource (at least in certain formats), and it's rather fallacious to claim that because the traditional chess implementation would not work, no implementation could ever possibly work. Again, you're not even trying to think of a way to make it work - you just want to claim it's impossible because you do not like it.

EDIT: As an example, I could use your same straw man to claim that One Night Ultimate Werewolf is actually an impossible game to play because it hinges on a timer, and since the chess model is the only model I will consider, the game must involve dozens if not hundreds of tedious clock slaps as players accuse / negotiate / lie / beguile one another. So much attention must be paid to the timers, then, that the fundamental elements of the game must fall apart.

Gee whiz, I don't know how those poor souls stuck with that broken game ever have any fun.

Have a clock you can hit any time you are waiting on your opponent to make a decision. If one player ever reaches, say, 15 minutes > than the other player, they lose.

You could add other rules, such as:

You are responsible for stopping the clock when you are done.

Time can only be recorded in the planning phase (or others, as the designers see fit)

Your time is on your side of the table (to discourage your opponent from just arbitrarily pressing it at every opportunity), and to not allow them to sneakily run up your time.

Or the first 30 seconds of each press go "uncounted" so there is no benefit to hitting it at every little juncture.

Just stay away from tournaments and play for fun My games typically take 2 hours plus... I would hate having to 'play fast' and run lists purely designed to kill fast or survive an hour.

If you think your opponent is slow playing, then just remind them there is a time limit and tell them they need to play faster. If they have a problem with that or don't listen, get the TO, tell them the problem and get them to MAKE your opponent play faster and give you a time extension.

Don't let your opponent dictate the pace of the game, if you don't speak up then you don't get to complain.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

The issue is people are confusing "slow play" with "stalling". Playing slowly may be annoying, but it isn't a problem. Stalling is a problem, and you need to call a judge over, "fly casual" or not.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

We tried that. It got co-opted by the people at the other end of the spectrum and is now used to justify things that should embarrass anyone who plays the game.

you have 20 seconds per ship with (assuming 6 ships at 2 minutes) that's still plenty of time.

Is it? Are we talking about planning phase or activation phase? What if you have 8 ships? Now you're looking at 15 seconds per ship.This is why a simple time limit doesn't work in this game, and why it's left up to the TO to sort out.

Not only this, but with more ships, there are extra blocking possibilities that you need to account for. We all know how much thought sometimes needs to go into the turn after the first engagement. A set time limit per turn only further benefits 2 ship builds.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

And how does this stop people who aren't intentionally stalling but just playing unreasonably slow? If anything this will just make the problem worse.

Player A: "Excuse me, this is a timed match and you've spent 2 minutes on your dials, could you please play a bit faster?'

Player B: "What's your problem, jerk, haven't you ever heard of "Fly Casual"!? I'm not gonna let you bully me, I'll take as long as I **** well please to take my turn because I "Fly Casual".

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

I think this culture is mostly there already, but it's difficult to promote that attitude at the professional-level competitions. Afterall, most competitors at the venue - even the ones very interested in good sportsmanship - are not there just for fun. They are there to win (and also have fun, but that may not be the core of the experience at that level of play - which I think is also fine. Games don't always have to be about pure fun).

'Fly casual' doesn't necessarily apply when I really do want every edge I can get to defeat my opponent.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

The issue is people are confusing "slow play" with "stalling". Playing slowly may be annoying, but it isn't a problem. Stalling is a problem, and you need to call a judge over, "fly casual" or not.

Slow play is in fact a problem, even when it's not intentional stalling, because it can create the same effect as stalling where one player gets an advantage because of the time limit.

Looking through X-Wing tournament rules, there is no rule against slow play, and I agree this needs to be changed, because often times it will impossible to tell if a player is intentionally stalling or just playing slow, so TOs need to be able to enforce a reasonable pace of play regardless.

FFG needs to add rules regarding "slow play" and "reasonable pace of play" to the tournament rules that aren't just about stalling.

I'm a fairly new player, so take this with a grain of spice, but it seems to me that the best remedy for slow-play is to actively cultivate a culture of "fly casual".

The issue is people are confusing "slow play" with "stalling". Playing slowly may be annoying, but it isn't a problem. Stalling is a problem, and you need to call a judge over, "fly casual" or not.

Slow play is in fact a problem, even when it's not intentional stalling, because it can create the same effect as stalling where one player gets an advantage because of the time limit.

Looking through X-Wing tournament rules, there is no rule against slow play, and I agree this needs to be changed, because often times it will impossible to tell if a player is intentionally stalling or just playing slow, so TOs need to be able to enforce a reasonable pace of play regardless.

FFG needs to add rules regarding "slow play" and "reasonable pace of play" to the tournament rules that aren't just about stalling.

It is up to a judges discretion. Putting in hard definitions makes it easier to game the system. Honestly, this is a judge issue. If you are having issue with it, then your judge isn't prompting players to speed up enough.

Who are you, or anyone, to say who should or should not be playing in tournaments?

If I'm the one playing then I should have a say in how much time the other person spends.

But you're not the only one playing, or the only one with "rights". The other player could equally well make the case that you should be banned from playing because you are rushing your opponents. It cuts both ways. Slow play is against the rules but so is rushing. However neither is defined, and neither are the underlying issue.

@Majorjuggler

Ok this is a time issue, it doesn't need partial point agenda jerked into it. I respect your work but please stop with jabbing your partial point cause in every thread. People can slow play even with partial point system. They are slow playing with fat ships now, they will slow pkay with small ships later.

It's not a "partial point cause", it is a statement of reality. For example:

• 2 + 2 = 4
• An apple will fall when dropped.
• Ships with higher jousting efficiency are more cost effective and (all else being equal) more competitive.
• The optimal strategy in timed games with zero partial points is frequently to get ahead on points and then slow play.

These are all statements of fact with a mathematical basis, and they are all true regardless if people decide to agree with them or not. The last one is the fundamental reason that this thread even exists. Don't shoot the messenger!

You are certainly right in that people can and will still slow play for an advantage even without having a Fat Ship. This is because of #4 above. However slow playing with partial points provides no significant benefit like it does right now.

So, a player doesn't get an advantage by slow playing before they run out of shields in your partial point system? Or just before they lose half their HP? (Depending on the partial point system). The same problem exists, just at different point values.