nevermind

wrong thread

I'm not saying every tournament is or has been determined by collusion. I'm saying that there is the potential for serious abuse when so many people think there's nothing wrong with it. I'm using such a drastic example so that people see why there is a problem. My example is not likely to happen, but it is realistically possible and has happened in many other types of competitions in the past and will happen in the future.

Stasis said:

There is the potential in NFL football for a 14-1 team to bench its starters during the last week of the season because it already has a playoff seed locked up.

There is the potential in MLB baseball for a horrible team to call up a bunch of rookies in the last month of the year and play them instead of better rookies.

There is the potential in NBA basketball for a team to intentionally tank games at the end of the season to try and increase their odds at a better lottery pick in the draft.

In each of these cases a team is not playing to the best of their capability, and essentially giving their opponent an advantage that a previous opponents (earlier in the season) did not have.

The fact is, potential exists for any number of aspects that some people might find less "sportsmanly" in all competitive venues. And people will make subjective decisions all the time.

In all of your examples the party is doing something out of self-interest. They're not doing something because it benefits their opponent or screws over a rival.

Stasis said:

One could definitely make a philosophical argument that screwing over a rival or helping a friend also falls into the realm of "self interest".

But regardless of the reasons, isn't the true reason for your dissent the fact that it assaults your personal sense of honest and fair competition? So it doesn't matter why someone would play below their available capacity for winning, the simple fact that it happens (for any reason) will skew the results of any venue.

~I always play below my available capacity of winning. Especially against Dobbler and Erick...

Sorry, moving on...

One could make the philosophical argument that "self-interest" is really the interest of the entire planet - including all the flora and fauna and other humans. Since, without their help and support the self cannot survive. That would be a needless semantic goose-chase. It's pretty obvious that in any case it's not what I meant by the term and not the common usage.

Stasis said:

Stasis, you have just won the award for being the first person to use "flora and fauna" on the message boards! For your prize , I'm sending you Kennon's mom.

On a more serious note, I think it is important to understand that while most people enter tournaments to enjoy the competitive nature of the event, their methods of enjoying the experience are varied and diverse. Over the years, I have come to realize that the relationships I have built are much more important than winning or losing. One day I will stop playing this game, but I hope I never lose the friends I've made. And I've made great friends on the west coast, great friends on the east coast, great friends all over. At Gencon, I look forward to hanging out at the restaurants in downtown Indy with all the other players sharing food, drinks, and life just as much as I look forward to playing in the tourneys.

So while I have never conceded a game to someone else in a tourney, or taken an intentional tie, I don't take it personally if someone else does. It simply is not the most important thing to me. It is also one of the reasons I have come to love AGoT LCG. There is simply a less intense atmosphere, and with the presence of less douchebags who are so rudely competitive during a tourney we also get the fact that people will approach the dead-serious nature of competition with a much less dead-seriousness. Clearly it results in players choosing to grant full wins where a partial win or tie would have resulted.

Stasis, if you have a background in M:TG, you will find the tournament scene in Thrones much different. Its still competitive, but I have more fun knowing I can go out for drinks with my opponent after the game because the atmosphere is just less intense. I understand your concerns for a loss of competitive fairness, but I really think it is much less prevalent then you currently believe.

Dobbler said:

Actually if we wanted to be technical in academic economic Game Theory this would not be "self-interest" (or more specifically rational self-interest).

What it would be is that said individual's expected utility value from an outcome is adjusted based on individual preferences (valuing a friend advancing and a rival not) which differ from an individual whose expected utility is based solely on the textbook economic definition of 'rational self-interest'.

A tournament being competitive and determined completely by merit and a fun and friendly atmosphere are not mutually exclusive.

I said earlier that conceding a win when you know you're going to lose, rather than letting it to to time limit, is good sportsmanship. I think that behavior in that vein should be strongly encouraged. There's no reason why a tournament can't be competitive without people being rude and obnoxious.

LaughingTree said:

Hah! Thanks Jim. You are too smart for me. I don't think I understand what you just said

Look forward to meeting you in a few weeks!

Stasis said:

Then I believe you will find the tournament scene in Thrones enjoyable!

~Except if you are on the east coast and have to play finitesquarewell regularly.

orclrob said:

I just want to say thank you for the well written, thoughtful tourney report. I agree it's too bad that it has been buried by a tangential conversation. At best, this "collusion" topic is a good conversation that the community should have more generally...that is, not targeted at any one player. At worst, it's something we've already beaten to death (as a community) and raised here by a few people who do so to voice their frustration, possibly because they have been in positions where they didn't make the cut simply because someone else did this?

In either case, this particular thread is not really the best place for the discussion, and even if it were, I don't think we should shoot the messenger, especially when he provided such a fantastic write up that many readers will likely glean lots of rich information from. But then, I guess it wouldn't be the Internet if people didn't look for reasons to flame and then pile it on.

In short, thanks again for providing the write up. In a close game, I'm 95% sure I would have done the same thing as your meta-buddy, and I don't think he did anything wrong. But again, that's completely besides the point of this thread, which was to share information with the community. So no matter whether someone agrees or disagrees, seems like this is the wrong place to discuss it. I'm really glad you contributed though, and sorry the direction it turned kind of ruined the initial intent.

I look forward to more tourney reports in the future. You know, you could post this tourney report on CardGameDB.com. I think that would be a FANTASTIC place for it.

Cheers,

Dan

Dobbler said:

~hey now, i think each of my opponents from the last few tournaments would attest that i've been rather friendly and humble while beating the crap out of them

finitesquarewell said:

It all depends on how many crappy cards you tell them to take out of their deck.

We all can learn a lesson from longclaw, he is the master at beating the crap out of you while making you feel like you are the best thing since sliced bread!

for what it's worth, i asked steve this morning before i left for school how he felt about rob and and wade "legally screwing him" out of fourth place -- his response (not verbatim): "meh, that's tournament play, i probably should have won another game"

Dobbler said:

Haha, it was an overly nerdy way of saying that some people value outcomes not based solely on pure self-interest.

Basically just the whole Vince Lombardi "Winning isn't everything its the only thing" perspective versus the "Its not just winning but how you win" or "helping friends" perspective.

And I look forward to meeting you finally as well after gaming online! I hope I am not too drunk to make sense haha (and rings is going to make fun of what I will be drinking

finitesquarewell said:

That's actually quite funny! I don't know Steve that well, but I can totally hear him doing that. I remember you not being overly happy with one of his performances at Gencon, and I could swear he said "meh, that's Erick"

finitesquarewell said:

You're always humble when you beat the crap out of me, even outside of tournaments. In fact, you seem disappointed when we don't beat you. ~It must be lonely at the top.

I'll echo Twn2dn, and say thank you, orclrob for posting your report. To clarify, I am in no way condemning anyone for what took place, and certainly don't think anything was done with malicious intent.

The TO was fine with it. I'm fine with it.

I don't think I've ever missed the cut due to something like this (I can miss the cut on my own easily enough ), but I have turned down friends offering to concede so I can make the cut several times (not that I deserve a gold star, but to clarify where I'm coming from).

I just think you run a 0% chance of having an issue with any of this stuff when games are played out to decide standings. I think the overall community has a better collective experience when things are decided this way.

And Dobbler, regarding the comparison to sports teams resting star players, I think this is much more of an issue in an event where 4-6 matches are played before cutting to a final because strength of schedule means so much more. I'm not saying it can't be an issue in sports, but when you're playing a minimum of 16 games to decide who makes the playoffs, a team has more chances to win that 1 game to avoid the issue.

In the words of Dana White, "Never leave it in the hands of the judges", or in this case, strength of schedule.

Twn2dn said:

Thanks for the note. I don't take anything stated in this thread personally. Good questions were raised. I did my research based on the comments raised and I can still sleep at night. All is good. As far as posting on CardGameDB.com, ~I think one firestorm is enough.. ~If I post there it will be a much edited version I assure you

Good Gaming All

orclrob said:

Well edited or not I'd love for you to post it over there. The Blog section is up and running for just this kind of stuff.

finitesquarewell said:

Ahhhhhhh ha ha ha ha ha ha ha

skeletonator said:

Dude...you've been reading your card too much.

orclrob said:

Good to hear. None of my comments were personal. If you were trying to be sneaky and abuse the rules intentionally, I am sure you wouldn't have called yourself out on it.