I'm listening to Yet Another Podcast in which people are railing about using "intent" in deciding punishments for game infractions. The thing is, like nearly every other podcast, they don't know what "intent" means .

"Intent" only means "you did this thing on purpose."

"Intent," alone, says absolutely nothing about why you did it. It says nothing about your state of mind while doing it ... except that you did it on purpose.

It's not only stupid to exclude intent when talking about gaming infractions, it's actually vital to take it into consideration, because there is no such thing as cheating absent intent . Rule-breaking without the intent to break rules is "accidental rule-breaking."

The idea that the punishment for rule-breaking that is intentional should not be harsher than rule-breaking that is accidental is just prima facie absurd.

This isn't a difficult concept, and it is slowly driving me insane listening to self-righteous jackasses opine vociferously and at length about the role of intent when they don't f****n' know what intent even means.

Ugh.

13 minutes ago, Jeff Wilder said:

I'm listening to Yet Another podcast in which people are railing about using "intent" in deciding punishments for game infractions. The thing is, like nearly every other podcast, they don't know what "intent" means .

"Intent" only means "you did this thing on purpose."

"Intent," alone, says absolutely nothing about why you did it. It says nothing about your state of mind while doing it ... except that you did it on purpose.

It's not only stupid to exclude intent when talking about gaming infractions, it's actually vital to take it into consideration, because there is no such thing as cheating absent intent . Rule-breaking without the intent to break rules is "accidental rule-breaking."

The idea that the punishment for rule-breaking that is intentional should not be harsher than rule-breaking that is accidental is just prima facie absurd.

This isn't a difficult concept, and it is slowly driving me insane listening to self-righteous jackasses opine vociferously and at length about the role of intent when they don't f****n' know what intent even means.

Ugh.

Products of our new, improved public school educational programs?

56 minutes ago, Stoneface said:

Products of our new, improved public school educational programs?

No child left behind.

24 minutes ago, Rakaydos said:

No child left behind.

Which turned into Common Core which has now turned into "states do as you wish!" As it should be!

1 hour ago, Jeff Wilder said:

The idea that the punishment for rule-breaking that is intentional should not be harsher than rule-breaking that is accidental is just prima facie absurd.

This isn't a difficult concept, and it is slowly driving me insane listening to self-righteous jackasses opine vociferously and at length about the role of intent when they don't f****n' know what intent even means.

Ugh.

1. Latin. Lost the crowd.

2. Hard word. Lost the crowd.

3. Polysyllabic word. Lost the crowd.

4. NOW, yer communicatin'!

1 minute ago, Plainsman said:

Which turned into Common Core which has now turned into "states do as you wish!" As it should be!

Except most states go "Whatever's cheapest" and 90% of the country ends up with Texas textbooks.

3 minutes ago, Plainsman said:

Which turned into Common Core which has now turned into "states do as you wish!" As it should be!

NO.

... because it DOES have meaning as to why?

"What was your intent when you decided to jump off the bridge?": Were you committing suicide, or just having a dive?

Intent is far more than just "Was it done on purpose?"

13 minutes ago, Eisai said:

... because it DOES have meaning as to why?

"What was your intent when you decided to jump off the bridge?": Were you committing suicide, or just having a dive?

Intent is far more than just "Was it done on purpose?"

Yeah. Seems to me like the OP is confusing intent with intentional.

Average rant. Might consider listening again.

3/5

RoV

intent as an adjective is more like stating the action. Hence the dial was changed intentionally.

intent as a noun is the purpose. Hence no malicious intent.

However if I were to point at a word it would not be intent it would be tolerated. A previous FAQ (before they started separating them into general, tournament, escalation, epic) had that dials changed in the activation phase would not be tolerated. Fast-forward to the most recent tournament FAQ and there literally is nothing mentioned about dials, nothing. (Even the past FAQ talked about dials in the faction mirror to avoid players accidentally picking up their opponent's dial).

Anyways the TO's can only use the latest FAQ as guidance, I strongly believe that the tournament part should be reviewed and have some omissions added back in along with maybe more general explanations on offenses in tournaments with the fundamental event document.

The podcasts are saying "intent doesn't matter; it should be the same punishment whether you do it accidentally or not." That's what I'm ******* about. It absolutely matters if rule-breaking was done with intent or not.

Stop saying it doesn't. It's stupid.

3 hours ago, Jeff Wilder said:

... R ule-breaking without the intent to break rules is "accidental rule-breaking."

I'd say it's closer to "negligence".

Either negligent with regard to ignorance of the rule broken, or with regard to a behaviour that led to (or with reasonable foresight, would be expected to lead to) a rule being broken.

- - - - -

I do agree, however, that intent and/or degree of negligence should definitely be considered when inflicting punishment for an infraction.

Most difficultly comes in proving 'intent' in the absence of corroborating evidence, or what a 'reasonable person' would do or foresee in a given situation.

(Disclaimer: this opinion is expressed "in principle", without reference to any particular prior event)

Too much Glitterstem..........

Let me see if I understand and could maybe even translate.

Violating the rules = someone being killed.
Planning on intentionally violating the rules for personal benefit = 1st degree murder
Intentionally violating the rules for personal benefit = 2nd degree murder

I'm sure someone else could go on with the comparisons. The idea that intent matters is somewhat important but there are also levels where how it is done over rides any ignorance of the act.

3 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

No child left behind.

That brings everyone down to the lowest common denominator. Or as the ad for K/12 goes, "All students are uniquely brilliant".

3 hours ago, Darth Meanie said:

1. Latin. Lost the crowd.

2. Hard word. Lost the crowd.

3. Polysyllabic word. Lost the crowd.

4. NOW, yer communicatin'!

Reminds me of a joke. A student was going through a picture book of zoo animals in class and calling out their names. He gets to "E" and says, "A fricken Elephant" . The teacher pales and looks at the picture. The caption read, "African Elephant". There ends the tale of Hooked on Phonix.

4 hours ago, StevenO said:

Let me see if I understand and could maybe even translate.

Violating the rules = someone being killed.
Planning on intentionally violating the rules for personal benefit = 1st degree murder
Intentionally violating the rules for personal benefit = 2nd degree murder

I'm sure someone else could go on with the comparisons. The idea that intent matters is somewhat important but there are also levels where how it is done over rides any ignorance of the act.

Sure, but I think what the OP is saying is that the WHY someone cheated doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is if they cheated on purpose or not.

It's the difference between murder and manslaughter.

In other scenarios intent does matter (the bridge example above is a good one) but I'm with the OP as far as this case goes. Intent defines cheating or not in this case. If it was intentional, it's cheating, regardless of the specifics of the intent. It doesn't matter if it was because you'd accidentally set it wrong in the planning phase or if you're changing it to react to your opponent's revealed moves. Changing your dial intentionally is cheating and should be dealt with appropriately.

Unintentional moving of the dial is not cheating.

This isn't rocket science. Intent matters and, to make things even easier, intentionally changing a dial is always cheating.

Actually, for most laws outside of murder, intent isn't particularly meaningful.

Further, for rules for a game , intent absolutely isn't meaningful in almost any situation. Whether I am breaking the rules or cheating on purpose, or by accident, isn't particularly relevant to the fact I'm breaking the rules and causing harm to others in the game. That's why they are rules.

Separately, just from a logistics standpoint, it's incredibly difficult to police intent from a judge/OP perspective. It's cleaner, from an enforcement perspective, to remove the issue of intent and focus on rules that are verifiable and enforceable.

So, to be completely blunt - a philosophical treatise is functionally irrelevant here. What matters is what is actually doable within the confines of the game and organized play.

8 minutes ago, Tlfj200 said:

Whether I am breaking the rules or cheating on purpose, or by accident, isn't particularly relevant to the fact I'm breaking the rules and causing harm to others in the game.

But it does matter, in how you address the situation.

Someone doing something that breaks the rules out of ignorance or more likely a misunderstanding of the rules is a completely different thing then someone understanding the rules and breaking them intentionally.

That's why intent in the sense of 'they intended to cheat' matters because there really is a difference between cheating and a honest mistake. There are cases where there can be no such thing as an honest mistake, such as changing the maneuver on a dial after people start moving ships, but there's plenty of cases where someone broke the rules, without intending to.

26 minutes ago, VanorDM said:

But it does matter, in how you address the situation.

Someone doing something that breaks the rules out of ignorance or more likely a misunderstanding of the rules is a completely different thing then someone understanding the rules and breaking them intentionally.

That's why intent in the sense of 'they intended to cheat' matters because there really is a difference between cheating and a honest mistake. There are cases where there can be no such thing as an honest mistake, such as changing the maneuver on a dial after people start moving ships, but there's plenty of cases where someone broke the rules, without intending to.

Does it though, at high level events?

Let's say I look at someone's dial at nationals or worlds - what is the proposed solution? How do you assess my intent, and does that change the outcome?

Is it 'okay' if I look at my opponent's dial if it's on accident? I suspect the answer is that it still isn't okay - and that's why floor rules can be managed regardless of a person's intent: because they're still breaking the rules.

13 hours ago, Rakaydos said:

Except most states go "Whatever's cheapest" and 90% of the country ends up with Texas textbooks.

Not a bad idea in some states considering they don't even have textbooks.

33 minutes ago, Tlfj200 said:

Does it though, at high level events?

Yes. Intent matters at every level of event, when the level of punishing the infraction is determined.

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Let's say I look at someone's dial at nationals or worlds - what is the proposed solution? How do you assess my intent, and does that change the outcome?

Intent can be assessed in any number of ways. Contrary to what idiot podcasters are saying, it's entirely possible to determine intent without reading someone's mind or having them sign a confession.

PG's intent was completely obvious, for example, in that he was attempting to change the dial subtly, with his thumb, while shielding it from his opponent, while his opponent was busy. He clearly intended to change his dial, and that's why people are so pissed off about the "resolution." Intent matters. Intent doesn't determine if a rule was broken -- broken rules still need a resolution, and I'm not against that -- but it does determine if there was cheating . Cheating is worse than non-cheating, and deserves worse punishment in the context of X-Wing.

If intent can't be determined (which happens), then you just address and remedy the rule-breaking as rule-breaking, not as cheating.

Saying that "intent matters" is not the same thing as saying "lack of intent means no addressing the rule-breaking." I can't believe I actually (apparently) have to spell that out.

Quote

Is it 'okay' if I look at my opponent's dial if it's on accident? I suspect the answer is that it still isn't okay - and that's why floor rules can be managed regardless of a person's intent: because they're still breaking the rules.

It depends on what you mean by "okay." If you did it accidentally, it's "okay" in that you're not a cheater, and you don't deserve DQ or ban. That doesn't mean looking at your dial accidentally doesn't have consequences ... it just means that the consequences for actually cheating should be worse.

How is this even in question?

1 hour ago, Jeff Wilder said:

Yes. Intent matters at every level of event, when the level of punishing the infraction is determined.

Intent can be assessed in any number of ways. Contrary to what idiot podcasters are saying, it's entirely possible to determine intent without reading someone's mind or having them sign a confession.

PG's intent was completely obvious, for example, in that he was attempting to change the dial subtly, with his thumb, while shielding it from his opponent, while his opponent was busy. He clearly intended to change his dial, and that's why people are so pissed off about the "resolution." Intent matters. Intent doesn't determine if a rule was broken -- broken rules still need a resolution, and I'm not against that -- but it does determine if there was cheating . Cheating is worse than non-cheating, and deserves worse punishment in the context of X-Wing.

I, too, can't believe we're having to have this discussion, again.

You're basically calling into the incredibly narrow scenario where the entire x-wing community got to watch someone cheat live, on camera, and therefore witness the intent. Outside of that, other than someone's word , either the accused, or the accuser, how do you police intent?

I mean that literally - walk us through it, lawyer.

1 hour ago, Jeff Wilder said:

Saying that "intent matters" is not the same thing as saying "lack of intent means no addressing the rule-breaking." I can't believe I actually (apparently) have to spell that out.

It depends on what you mean by "okay." If you did it accidentally, it's "okay" in that you're not a cheater, and you don't deserve DQ or ban. That doesn't mean looking at your dial accidentally doesn't have consequences ... it just means that the consequences for actually cheating should be worse.

How is this even in question?

That was never the question? Many of the people that you're vociferously ranting about simply stated that there should be clear, written floor rules for when the game state is broken (which, btw, includes cheating). Judges and TOs shouldn't have to make it up.

Further, because most cheating is NOT witnessed except by the accuser, the rules don't [nor shouldn't ] incorporate intent, because that requires such an extra level of evidence it borders on the hypothetical. The closest we have is collusion, which by definition, has intent in it (which, is fine, but also nearly impossible to actually prove).

As for PG directly - I totally agree he should have been DQed - no one is arguing that. I'm not sure what we're arguing about except some weird hypothetical, because none of us buy FFG's explanation about his intent. You want harsher penalty because you believe he intended to cheat, and we simply want harsher penalties because he demonstrably cheated, REGARDLESS of the fact of whether he meant to or not, because "dems de rulz," as us plebs without a thesaurus are wont to say.

If you want to add "intent" to your rules - walk us through what those look like, because barring direct camera evidence, or the judge staring it down, I don't see why intent even matters as we currently do not even have the framework for structured penalty tiers in tournaments.