Tournament Bounties

By Yoritomo Zenko, in Legend of the Five Rings: The Card Game

Good Afternoon,

for anyone who played the AEG game you know all about tournament bounties. I found myself wondering today if Fantasy Flight will allow such practices to continue with the new game. Does anyone know if it's been discussed?

Thanks

Mike

I don't really know if they can stop it.

As long as players are not colluding to get certain results, I see no problems with players offering and collecting bounties.

It might depend on who FFG actually allow to make story choices.

Gencon was a vote by the Hatamotos. Could be expensive trying to 'persuade' a group. ;)

What's a bounty?

2 minutes ago, CitizenKeen said:

What's a bounty?

The thing I use to wipe up spilled drinks

Image result for bounty towel

Edited by Cambeul no Oni
1 minute ago, Cambeul no Oni said:

The thing I use to wipe up spilled drinks

Image result for bounty towel

Its the quilted quicker-picker-upper

NOT HELPFUL.

7 minutes ago, CitizenKeen said:

What's a bounty?

In the CCG, players had a lot more 'power' when making choices for story prizes.

One example is, "if you win, name any character from your clan to do X", where X is whatever story AEG put forward.

Hundreds, if not thousands, of dollars could change hands.
Pre-tournaments, there were threads of "I'll give the winner $200 if they pick the character I like".

Not strictly bribery.

Not until you make it to the final, and offer your opponent a cut of the bounty to let you win. ;)

So, bounties were just money being put on the table to make certain story choices if available.
If chosen, the bounties could be collected. (More in theme with Doomtown, but the premise is still the same)

Edited by Bayushi Shunsuke

They also had Bounties where Clans, or members of a Clan, would put up money to have the best players play their Clan for a Season, or a Tourney etc...

15 hours ago, CitizenKeen said:

NOT HELPFUL.

While entertaining, you are correct.

It involves offering a reward for picking a particular story choice or achieving a particular goal, usually involving playing as a particular clan, since in the CCG you could only pick certain story choices for your clan. They could range from "Buy you a beer" to a large stack of cash.

It is in a weird gray area, where I'm guessing FFG would probably want to discourage it, but would be impossible to enforce.

I would think that as long as the bounty only applies to the story picks , it may be discouraged but probably still allowed.

If the bounty starts affecting the games (e.g. "I'll give you $100 if you make sure your Lion opponent wins your match"), that would probably flat-out invalidate the results.

I'd be tempted to say that general bounties issued before the tournament starts are fair game. Things like "An original artwork to the top of Crane" or "$100 between the Phoenix Hatamotos for picking Keeper of Void" or even "A set of core box Dragon to the bottom Dragon player". I suppose I'd even be happy with "$10 to everyone who beats a Unicorn Hatamoto." But I think it starts getting dodgy if they're being issuedfor specific games.

29 minutes ago, JJ48 said:

I would think that as long as the bounty only applies to the story picks , it may be discouraged but probably still allowed.

If the bounty starts affecting the games (e.g. "I'll give you $100 if you make sure your Lion opponent wins your match"), that would probably flat-out invalidate the results.

Actually something like that happened, albeit not with cash. During the Race for the Throne there were contests in a number of spheres (military, political, economic, spirit, and knowledge) and one of the regular economic contests was over which clan could redeem the most koku - the reward points that came on card packs. IIRC, at one point the Spider Clan players bought the Tao of Fu Leng - a prize with a fantastic prop from the previous World Championship - from the Crab for several thousand koku. The Crab then immediately turned around and used those koku to bribe the Mantis to throw the Emerald Championship at Gen Con.

So bribery definitely happened but this was in-character bribery so the story team allowed it.

I seem to recall that during AEGs reign, there was a floor rule for bribery: all bribery had to be notified to the tournament judges, as it may have an effect on the story prizes.

Bounties get close to the standard FFG unsportsmanlike conduct, which is a bit vague in parts. Depends on whether a judge will allow it, or if the players decide to report it.

Bounties involving story choices are never an issue. If a player wins a personal story decision they are allowed to pick whatever they want. If someone is offering money for the player to pick their character or clan for the choice and the winner chooses that choice, then collects the bounty there is absolutely nothing wrong with that, its the winners right to choose.

Some of the most interesting events in the old game came down to bounties for story prizes.

The idea that bounties break sportsmanship conduct or effect competition in any way are completely wrong, because absolutely no aspect of the gameplay itself is directly effected by this, its an after competition choice or before competition choice. If there was a situation where a player was offering a concession on condition that the winner choose their character, then you are looking at a possible bribery situation, but just a person saying "$500 to the person that chooses X for emerald champion" is a non problem, the winner properly won his competition and can choose whatever story decision he wants for whatever reason.

However, this also depends on how often and what kind of method FFG uses for story decisions. Gencon was all Hatamotos voting, which is difficult to bounty for... not impossible but difficult. If they continue that trend of making them group votes that could make the Bounty tradition rarer then it was in the old game.

51 minutes ago, TheItsyBitsySpider said:

The idea that bounties break sportsmanship conduct or effect competition in any way are completely wrong, because absolutely no aspect of the gameplay itself is directly effected by this, its an after competition choice or before competition choice. If there was a situation where a player was offering a concession on condition that the winner choose their character, then you are looking at a possible bribery situation, but just a person saying "$500 to the person that chooses X for emerald champion" is a non problem, the winner properly won his competition and can choose whatever story decision he wants for whatever reason.

Keep in mind that even this was welcomed in the old CCG. The Dragon-Scorpion alliance came about directly from two players agreeing not to contest the final in a tournament. Shosuro Jimen's corrupt Emerald Championship came from a Crane player conceding a tournament. That said, these were not cash bribes but rather story bribes (i.e. Players: "We both think it's better if I concede rather than fight it out." Storyteam: "Okay, Jimen convinces Noritoshi to concede the match rather than duel.").

I also think that there is also a difference between "Reward for winning" than "Reimbursement for losing". Its one thing to say "Hey, if <Blank clan> wins and chooses <blank> I will give the person who does it <Blank>" But if it is, "If the last game is playing <Blank Clan> I will give <blank> to the opponent to lose." The latter sounds more like bribery than the first.

My openly-biased Opinion on bounties and/or fan-made prizes for what little it's worth:

1. Additional Prizes that don't restrict to one clan/deck/outcome are terrific. The more that get it the merrier. These are usually done story-wise to build community or to reflect well on the clan of the giver. L5R is awesome for this stuff.

2. Bounties or prizes that are more valuable than the overall tournament prize may or may not be bad, but are tasteless. Even if unrestricted, that's more attention given to the bounty than to the actual tournament itself, and I don't think that's a good thing. Bounties should be about encouragement than anything that has the hint of bribery or overshadowing the tournament organizers about it.

3. Bounties or prizes that are created specifically to HURT a certain team or faction in the storyline or, even more so, players playing that faction suck, will always suck, and nothing will convince me otherwise. Cheer for your team...don't try to tear down other players. If the conflict is a Unicorn/Lion war, sure, support the Unicorn! Great! But don't, for example, support Corrupt Lion to try to make the Lion faction do things that will make Lion players unhappy in order to troll them. Trolling is never a good idea.

3. Bounties or prizes limited to a certain clan are generally OK if they are being given to cheer on your own "Team"

4. Bounties or prizes created to limit a certain playstyle is generally OK if it is well-intended, but less good than just celebrating the whole team. Rule #2 and #3 definitely apply.

5. Bounties to make a player choose a specific outcome are pretty poor. If you want a specific outcome, convince the winner of it with your words, rather than a bribe. #2 and #3 DEFINITELY apply.

6. Bounties to make a player choose a specific outcome with the intent of trolling the Card designers/overall storyline and/or another faction are terrible.

7. Bounties to change a specific game, in any direction, by anyone, is bribery. Don't do it.

So: to make the most utterly tasteless thing you can possibly do: Have a large bounty to win a specific outcome designed to troll a certain storyline and FFG and the players a certain way.

And yes, that's happened. I hope it doesn't.