Tournament Discussion - Game Creation

[Bones2484]

We had some good ideas in the other thread and it's time to split that discussion off into a new thread to get it better focused.

There is some concern about "flooding" the Create/Join forum with numerous tournaments which makes it harder for players to find tournaments they want to play in, and harder for new organizers to have their tournaments found.

Some of the options that were thrown out to help combat this include:
- Limiting the amount of new tournaments that can be made by one organizer (yet they can run as many as they want, provided all are being statused)
- Creating sub-forums based on the type of tournament (ie: 1v1, Free-for-all, Team, Other)
- Using "tags" in tournament names to distinguish what type of tournament is being created

I've been asked to make sure that this discussion stays on topic and focused. Let's please refrain from trolling or flaming. Remember, this discussion is to help the tournament community as a whole. So please let us know your thoughts in a civil and coherent manner.

[Bones2484]

Personally, I am in favor of the sub-forum idea.

While I do think limiting the amount of tournaments a TO can have waiting for players is a good idea, it's obvious that many people have a concern about placing limitations on people who want to have fun serving the community... which is a perfectly reasonable concern. I only would hope that TO's refrain from making more and more tournaments if they are responsible themselves for delaying the progress of a tournament that they are already running.

As for the sub-forums, I think it would help organize the forum into areas that would make it very easy to locate a tournament that sounds good to each and every user. It would be best to keep it as simple as possible so we don't have a forum entitled "3v3-Manual-No Cards-Foggy-Sequential".

Someone suggested just having tags for "1v1", "Free-for-all", "Team", and "Other". Which I think would be perfect.

Usually when I head to the Create/Join forum I have something in mind that I want to look for. If I'm in the mood for a quick 1v1 tournament I'd know exactly where to go in this case.

If the sub-forum can be used in conjunction with title tags, then I'd be even more in favor. But obviously that would come down to whether people use them or not. It would make it easy on tournament players to go into the "Team" forum and see something like this in the title: "Tournament Super Fun! (3v3, Foggy)"... and you wouldn't be surprised to see a 3v3 foggy style tournament inside.

[Dako]

Seems like there are not much of FFA tourney - why not merge them with Other?

I like an idea if sub-forums that will be a great addition to CC.
Singles
Team
Other


We can always change it later if we see some problems separating them or handling them.

[mgconstruction]

I agree with this as a said in the other thread. Sub forums would be a great idea.

[Night Strike]

Where would you put them? You could structure them as sub-forums of the Create/Join A Tournament Forum, but then you'd be using sub-forums of sub-forums as main forums, which just gets confusing.

[denominator]

Okay, lots going on here. Keep in mind that I am a tourney player only, and have never actually organized a tournament.

First of all, I think that organizers should only be allowed to have one tournament in the Create/Join a tournament forum at a time (special exceptions detailed below). This ensures that there won't be a flood of "the same" type of tournaments at the same time, as well as guaranteeing that all tournament organizers will be more committed to each tournament.

*Special exceptions being for franchises where there are multiple tournaments feeding into a larger one. This must be given out by TDs.

Secondly, I am not in favour of sub forums. For people like me, who join tournaments of all kinds, this just gets awkward and I fear tourneys will get lost in some forums without as much traffic (teams will get far less traffic than singles, for example). I would rather see some sort of format put in place for the title, just to the extent that you have to have one of a selection of tags in [] brackets (1v1, quads, singles, etc...) and the number of entrants in () brackets (19/25, etc....).

This would also be a good time to implement a "form" for tournaments, but again I am not in favour. I think the rules should say "you must have the following info in your first post: XXX, YYY, ZZZ, etc." Leave it up to the TO how to organize it.

That's my thoughts. It was hard to keep it neutral and not bring in examples.

[SuicidalSnowman]

I think we, as TO's, should start titling our topics in a sort of standard way.

For example, we could say "Taking Signs Ups! 5man/auto/seq/chain/fog/ass/esc" and give people a better idea.

But I do sort of like the idea of better organizing, or having a better way to set them off. When you open the forum, just seeing "Snowman's Crazy Madness Tournament!" you have no idea what you are getting.

As for one tournament at a time, I think, at least for new TO's, this should be mandatory. You should have to successfully finish one before starting more.

But as I have said in some other threads, I also worry about bending the rules for some well established TOs, because then who keeps this in check. Right now the tournament rules are easy to understand and non-discriminatory in any way.

[Kinnison]

Subforums would be a bit of a problem, as NightStrike noted. But it might be tolerable. What do you do to organizers who create threads in the main area? or the wrong area?
(oh, and I'd have broken it down into: 1v1, Singles, Teams, Other/Combinations ... most leagues and ladders would belong in the last category, even though many are 1v1 based)

Tags would be nice, but I don't see making the hurdle any higher for first-time tournament organizers, making them figure out what mandatory label their tournament falls into.

And one tournament in signups at a time seems harsh to those who DO run the short quick-fill tournaments.


The event that precipitated this was an unusual concentration of threads by 2 TOs... even though they've been making them for a while, for THAT MANY to congregate at once seems to have been unprecedented. So thinking about ways to deal with it is fine, in case it should happen again. But I'm not sure any drastic action needs to be taken at this time.

Some TOs can run a bunch of tourneys at once and never drop a game... some can't finish one. That's why we have the warning system now in place. The real concern is having first-time TOs get lost in the shuffle, or LARGE tournaments have difficulty filling for the same reason.


How about combining the solutions: have 2 sub-forums in the Create/Join Area. Don't let threads be created there, some mod or TD would need to move them there.

One for people who have NEVER organized a tournament before. Not 'tried and abandonded', or 'first one is still running'... One for genuine new Tourney Organizers. It should be fairly simple to generate a list of who has had Tournament Privileges before...

One other for tournaments that some difficulty is expected in getting them to fill. Probably large tournaments... or maybe just the complex/longer ones. I'm not sure WHAT should go in there right now, honestly...

This could be a way to flag the two tourney types that there seems to be the most concern over having them 'get lost'.


Opinions?

[denominator]

Subforums would be a bit of a problem, as NightStrike noted. But it might be tolerable. What do you do to organizers who create threads in the main area? or the wrong area?
(oh, and I'd have broken it down into: 1v1, Singles, Teams, Other/Combinations ... most leagues and ladders would belong in the last category, even though many are 1v1 based)

Agreed. That would be a moderating nightmare, and we'd end up with ghost threads all over the place in all the subforums as tournaments move to their proper place.

The other way to avoid that is to make it so that threads have to be approved by a moderator before being posted. This should be possible as this is a phpBB based site.

And one tournament in signups at a time seems harsh to those who DO run the short quick-fill tournaments.

In theory, they should fill even faster than they currently do. There will still be no limit on the number of tournaments anyone can have ongoing, just how many can be started at once (I agree 1 is fairly harsh, 2 is certainly doable).

How about combining the solutions: have 2 sub-forums in the Create/Join Area. Don't let threads be created there, some mod or TD would need to move them there.

One for people who have NEVER organized a tournament before. Not 'tried and abandonded', or 'first one is still running'... One for genuine new Tourney Organizers. It should be fairly simple to generate a list of who has had Tournament Privileges before...

I'm not a fan of this. I suspect that it will make it very, very difficult to fill tournaments run by new organizers. Why would I want to join a tourney from an untried individual when I could easily just join one from someone who's proven themselves? This already exists, but segregating the two simply compounds the problem.

[Kinnison]

How about combining the solutions: have 2 sub-forums in the Create/Join Area. Don't let threads be created there, some mod or TD would need to move them there.

One for people who have NEVER organized a tournament before. Not 'tried and abandonded', or 'first one is still running'... One for genuine new Tourney Organizers. It should be fairly simple to generate a list of who has had Tournament Privileges before...

I'm not a fan of this. I suspect that it will make it very, very difficult to fill tournaments run by new organizers. Why would I want to join a tourney from an untried individual when I could easily just join one from someone who's proven themselves? This already exists, but segregating the two simply compounds the problem.

Hmmm. I hadn't thought of it that way. I was thinking the TOs would play in the new folks tournaments... both from a mentor standpoint, and for ideas... you never know what a new viewpoint will bring.

But you have a point.

[Dako]

Where would you put them? You could structure them as sub-forums of the Create/Join A Tournament Forum, but then you'd be using sub-forums of sub-forums as main forums, which just gets confusing.

Don't list them on the front page - only have them as sub-forums of Join/Create. And also, as people said, create mod policy that only approved thread are visible - move them to proper forums and see how nice and shine new layout will be.

Also, this might require more people to handle - but it just means one more guy in the gold ranks to help you out .

[barterer2002]

Seems like there are not much of FFA tourney - why not merge them with Other?

I like an idea if sub-forums that will be a great addition to CC.
Singles
Team
Other


We can always change it later if we see some problems separating them or handling them.

See part of my thing here Dako would be that I think that 1v1 and should be different. There is a plethoria of 1v1 tourneys up consistently and I think they should be split out from the 4 player 5 player etc type of tournaments. Actually what I really want to split out are the 1v1 bracket style tournaments. These are popular and should be continued but they can clearly overwhelm the forum while other 1v1 formats such as Bring it On! or Risk would go over in the singles forum.

[barterer2002]

As far as the tags go there are two ways this could be handled.

1). The TO has to use his description (title) space to make the description which generally means that there won't be as much room for a title. I'm not as in favor of this.

2). new tech created by someone who knows what they're doing (not me) to give TOs a few choices to click on (much like the ratings system) like 1v1, singles, doubles, triples, quads, mixed effort, esc, flat, no card, nuclear, manual, automatic etc and then these tags can display directly below the title page. This would mean we could have fewer tournaments per page but the description on them would be much better.

[HighlanderAttack]

The thing I would like to see is once you have read about a tourney, you have the ability to make it read so you don't have to go back into it.

I know it turns grey after you read it but that is only until someone posts in it again.

That is all I have to say and I am done with this topic.

[Jace22]

I agree that tags seem like a good idea, lets players know the general type of tournament they are getting into without having to read the more specific description. However I don't know how this could be accomplished. Maybe like Bart said and add the tag beneath the tournament, making less tournaments per page. Another suggestion for after privs are given out could be the ability to mass produce games so it is easier and less time-consuming to produce games for the bigger tournaments. This isn't my suggestion, just something I've seen around the forums

[max is gr8]

I'd suggest 3 subforums maximum:

Team Tournaments
Singles Elimination (Elimination meaning it follows a bracket (or could be shown as one) with a double triple etc. elimination)
Other --- (Leagues, Ladders, Building Ones, Tournament Tactics not just win as many games as possible [of course winning is necessary but you know what I mean] and so on.)

There are few tournaments in the Team but if I wanted a team tournament it'd be nice to head to one point to see it.
Singles Elimination are the main group, how many tournaments follow the bracket tradition?
Other --- Again a quiet section but would appease the people who want more complicated tournament or wish to be more committed to a tournament

[JOHNNYROCKET24]

We had some good ideas in the other thread and it's time to split that discussion off into a new thread to get it better focused.

There is some concern about "flooding" the Create/Join forum with numerous tournaments which makes it harder for players to find tournaments they want to play in, and harder for new organizers to have their tournaments found.

Some of the options that were thrown out to help combat this include:
- Limiting the amount of new tournaments that can be made by one organizer (yet they can run as many as they want, provided all are being statused) bad idea
- Creating sub-forums based on the type of tournament (ie: 1v1, Free-for-all, Team, Other) good idea
- Using "tags" in tournament names to distinguish what type of tournament is being created good idea

I've been asked to make sure that this discussion stays on topic and focused. Let's please refrain from trolling or flaming. Remember, this discussion is to help the tournament community as a whole. So please let us know your thoughts in a civil and coherent manner.

[MudPuppy]

I prefer the one Create/Join a Tournament subforum we currently have to the proposals calling for the creation of multiple subforums. I like to play in a variety of tournaments and prefer the convenience of having them all listed in one place. Having to go through 3 or 4 subforums in order to see what's currently being offered will just be more work. It's very rare that more than 10 new tournaments are added on any given day and I can simply scan through the creation dates of the posts to spot the newly created tourneys. There are only 3 pages in that subforum now even with the recent mass tourney creations that sparked these discussions. Typically, it sits at 2 pages at any given time. There really is no need at all, with this level of volume, to splinter the subforum into different categories... whatever those categories may be.

[b00060]

I am sorry, but I still find it hard to believe that sifting through 2 pages of actively recruiting tournaments is a bad thing.

[Bones2484]

I am sorry, but I still find it hard to believe that sifting through 2 pages of actively recruiting tournaments is a bad thing.

And at the very least you don't think putting in very simple tags in the title wouldn't help people find tournaments they are interested in?

[PaulusH]

I still see no reason to change the current policy.
Some come with the argument that CC is growing; but at the scoreboard the number of active plays is 80 pages for a long time already. (Sorry, but I check that information simply because I need it at preparing an future tournament).

Since I started with tournaments there have been several times where there is an increase in tournaments while in other periods the number to join is relatively low. Basically nothing special now, except that there are people that would like a change.

It looks like that there are 3 options given, but actually none of them fits with the tournament system. The tag is already recommended in the tournament handbook. Upgrade that from recommended to needed takes out a lot of fun surrounding the tournaments.
-Limiting the amount of tournaments: is already rejected in another discussion.
-Creating subforums or using tags both suffer with the same problem: somebody need to clasify the tournament before it is started and reduces the freedom of the organizers. Using a tag in the title is already recommended, but not directly needed. That gives me the freedom to put in tags that are less common (like "5x5 windmill"), people that don't understand it might still guess a large part of it.
Suppose I put in as tag "5-player games" and mix in some triples or doubles as I sometimes do in my typical 5-player tournaments, then suddenly it is no longer allowed because of the used tag. Suppose you make subforums for "teams", for "free for all" and for "Singles", where should I put my team-tournaments that are free for all and where people enter as singles.
In other words It would take out the fun of creating tournaments.

It would also take out the fun for new people . One of the best replies in the other tread was

Well, this whole thing is a disappointment to me. I'm a new guy to tournament life. I think Bex and I joined one of JR24's dubs awhile back and I had a blast. I've been looking to branch out in my CC experience. So I said "yes" to a clan and "why the heck not" to a bunch of tourneys listed by 3 or 4 different organizers. I was even talking to suicidalsnowman over Christmas break about working together to come up with one of our own.

This thread (and I took the hour to read it all) has left me very disheartened. And a tournament that I was really looking forward to on Route 66 has been ditched (I really hope temporarily). That just sucks. I think I get the idea of the issues at hand. But I would like to say a few things as someone new to the tourney scene:

A. As I scrolled down the list I loved the variety. I absolutely loved it. I literally thought, "dang, this is awesome, look at all the choice."

B. When I saw multiple tourneys being offered by a few players I thought, "man, they are really supportive of this, how fantastic is that!"

C. I feel, as a novice to this aspect of what CC has to offer, that more is better. If there were fewer I would have hesitated in joining the 5 or 6 that I did this week out of concern that I was going to make a fool of myself among elite players who are crammed into far fewer games.

I hope you guys can work this out in an amiable way. I would hate to see this section crash and burn.

Meh. Not sure I added much here, but thanks for letting me share my thoughts.

E.

[Bones2484]

The tag is already recommended in the tournament handbook. Upgrade that from recommended to needed takes out a lot of fun surrounding the tournaments.

What do tags have anything to do with "fun" surrounding tournaments? Is it really less "fun" to give people an easier time of finding tournaments that they might enjoy? This point makes absolutely zero sense.

Suppose I put in as tag "5-player games" and mix in some triples or doubles as I sometimes do in my typical 5-player tournaments, then suddenly it is no longer allowed because of the used tag. Suppose you make subforums for "teams", for "free for all" and for "Singles", where should I put my team-tournaments that are free for all and where people enter as singles.

Huh? Why would you tag your tournament as "5 player games" if the tournament isn't all five player games?

[negoeien]

I thi k teh idea of a filter is also a possibility, the organizers who launch a serie of tournaments put a lot of time in creating them and organizing them and probably won't bother to define the tournaments. It could be something like search a certain game type but then exclusively for tournaments.
Just a thought.

[scottp]

filters is the best idea on this thread
tags is next
sub-forums may be the more effective than tags, but a little more work, so slightly behind or maybe tied with the tags idea

limiting TOs from providing MORE different OPTIONS is the worst idea and seems asinine to me.

[ingrates]I sure wish there were less flavors of beer in the beer aisle at my grocery store! It's such a pain walking all the way down that long row and seeing all those Mexican and German beers when all I really want is a Bud.[/ingrates]

[negoeien]

Filters aren't that hard to implement I think. And for those tournies that simply have a lot of different styles and do not fit a filther just name them other, and the ones searching for a more thoroughfull and difficult tournament should take the time to look in to those.
As I see know the problem is the easy , straightforward franchises which could be easily tagged. Seems they are almost the majority the other tags or filter options or whatever should catch your eye IF you are looking for it.