Chess clock in tournament

hongkongwargamer

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Off topic: this is not about new players at all.
New players will attend a tourney with the strong desire to learn the game with more experienced players.
They are at the opposite of the very slow player who doesn't care if he bogs down the whole tourney and if he bugs all his opponents by depriving them of a satisfying outcome of the played games.
A newbie cares a lot and their mind is set on adapting.


I think that most people, when engaging in a competitive contest, are eager to understand the requirements and to respect them.
How would a Marathon contest director manage someone who decides to walk the 42 km in three days?
Would he have all his staff wait for the deliberate straggler?

I have attended some ASL meetings - including a tourney (which is complicated in relation with my job.
I never felt offended when I was told the rules.
I strived to finish the games within reasonable time.
I tried to take my opponent's needs into account and adapt so they spent a pleasing time.

About all the veterans here are bent into helping the newcomers grasp the system.
I think I have personally introduced past twenty of them to the hobby. And I go on doing it on a regular basis.
Many experienced players do it too.
And newbies don't find the experience traumatizing, it seems...
I don't see how an accusation of agressivity or discrimination can hold water here.
On the contrary, our community is very welcoming.

Now, if the constraints of a tourney are too hard for a newbie - too narrow time limits, exotic rules, etc. - there always will be a place to play the game without entering the competition ring.
Especially as many players will progressively be shoved out of the tourney because they lost.
Where is the problem here?
Read the thread again. And remember when you are new to the community. Try to have a bit more empathy and try not to make blanket proclamations as if it’s the judgement of God.


So like I said. Have private tourneys where only qualified players are invited.

But wait, the finance don’t work does it? We do want their money don’t we?

Secondly - am I correct in thinking:
You dont want people who are experienced but not DELIBERATELY slow
You dont want people who are experienced but just naturally slow.
You WANT new folks who are slow.

How do you work this in when you don’t want them all BUT you still want their money?
 
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Martin Mayers

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You seem to be under the mistaken assumption that the matter of slow play is tied in to new/inexperienced players?

As it happens the issue I've had with chronic slow play has never been caused by new or "unqualified" players. The worst of the slow players in the UK are very experienced ASL players.

And the two gents who, at the last tournament I ran, were expected to wait for Mr Speedy and Mr Gonzales for 1hour+ past start time, were both new players to the scene (one of them, literally their first tournament. The other, their second. And both had finished their previous scenario bang on time. Go figure.
 

Vinnie

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I don't know, but there are people who seem to think the current formats are absolute rubbish for the attendees (who have paid, in advance, to play).
It seems like you have a bunch of people who are good enough to pay, but not to play. This sounds like an injustice of some sort.
It's not the format that is a problem. Some people need to decide I it's for them. The last scenario can take as long as you wish but when your behaviour negatively affects others...
 

von Marwitz

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Really harsh. Tournament Directors asking players to finish a 4 hour scenario within a 6 hour maximum time frame so that they can keep the tournament they spent weeks organising on some kind of track. What utter scum we are <shrug>
Martin, lest we forget, you are worse than scum. Remember - you are the only and singular Gulagwanker around here... ;)

Besides that @hongkongwargamer has a point. This endless slow-player bashing is simply annoying, and indulding in fantasies how to 'penalize' them I find rather embarrassing and unfitting to how I have come to know the normal ASL community.

Strangely, no tournament I have attended was blown to pieces because people were still playing when the time was up. In all cases, it was possible to make a decision - by far the most cases by the two players involved, else by adjucation.

Most tournaments have something in between 20 to 40 players I guess, maybe even less. Makes for 10 to 20 games. Maybe 25% don't finish on time. Of these, maybe in one of four cases the players can't agree among themselves who should be the winner. I think that a TD needs less than 5 minutes to adjucate a game by looking at the map.

Doable without bringing the TD to the brink of exhaustion and heart attack or turning weeks of preparation into a shambles.

von Marwitz
 

von Marwitz

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It's funny...but come back and tell me it's still funny when you're Tournament Directing and a former friend literally puffs his chest out and squares up to you when you ask him to call time on his 5 hour scenario after 10 hours. Not so funny then mate. And I'm six foot three and 27 stones in weight and can handle myself.
Martin, with all respect, that type of guy will be puffing his chest out and squaring up to you in the same manner if he doesn't like a chess clock adjucation. Still not funny then mate.

von Marwitz
 

trailrunner

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I've only been to a few tournaments, and I've only attended because I wanted to play some games. I had zero interest in the competitive aspect. I understood that these were tournaments, implying a competition, but I never had a problem finding an opponent to just play a game on our schedule.

Some of this discussion reminds me of bike races vs bike events. When I used to race, I have gotten pulled (removed) from the race because I was too far back, with no hope of catching the leaders. If I remained on the course, I would get lapped, which created a dangerous situation, and made it harder for the officials scoring the race. I was momentarily upset, but it was a competition, and those are the rules and the official made the right call. I also participated in other rides (such as centuries), where people ride the same course at their own speed. These are not supposed to be races, but just fun events. There are rest stops with food and music, and I even took a short nap at a rest stop once.

Marathons and running races are similar. Some running races have generous cutoff times and will let you remain on the course after the volunteers and officials have left. These races are well known to the walkers and slower runners. Some races have stricter cutoffs that are enforced. One time I was doing a long race. My stomach was upset that day and I was going slow, and I was in danger of not making the cutoff and being listed as a DNF (did not finish). I had flown across country for that race and a DNF would have sucked, but that's the rules.

ASL is different than these examples in several ways, and I'm not suggesting the rules of bike or running races be applied to gaming tournaments. The point is is that there are different types of events - competitive and social. For competitive events, the rules could be applied a bit firmer. But with that comes some negatives - hurt feelings, gatekeeping newer players, tough adjudication decisions, not letting known slow players enter, or being selective on who can participate.

I have played slow people. They ponder the odds to eight significant digits, or try to map out every option and subsequent consequence. If they are a friend, I tolerate it because overall I like their company, and I realize that they are doing their best in their own way. I'm sure I've slowed somebody down before, or done something annoying to a friend.

When I play one of my friends, we like to play a bit on the faster side to inject a bit of realism. In a real battle, decisions would have to be made quickly, with imperfect knowledge and without a full consideration of all possible options. We don't play recklessly, but perhaps 20 percent faster, and sometimes we'll blunder and make a dumb mistake. It's sort of the opposite of that old playing style going way back to the old Avalon Hill days where you try to get every last attack factor gathered to get exactly 3:1 odds in game of Afrika Korps.
 

Robin Reeve

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Secondly - am I correct in thinking:
You dont want people who are experienced but not DELIBERATELY slow
You dont want people who are experienced but just naturally slow.
You WANT new folks who are slow.

How do you work this in when you don’t want them all BUT you still want their money?
You got me wrong.
For a competitive tourney, one needs people who have minimal knowledge of the rules.
A tourney is not the place to learn from scrap.
Newbies are welcome to a tourney - I just evoked some tourneys which involve exotic rules that a newbie would possibly not want to try before he gets used to the bases of the system.

I am evoking extremely slow players.
And I am not blaming them for their way of playing.
I simply underline that, if someone knows they will bog down a tournament and thus not adapt to its frame, it is better to go for games not placed in that frame.
Hey, if I attended a tourney, I wouldn't mind not being part of the more stressing tourney and I would readily go for casual gaming, with beer and social talk.
I even could take the opportunity to introduce a newbie or two to the system, by targeting scenarios well adapted to learning the game.
Use your common sense rather than your anger to read me.

Your remark about "wanting their money" is outright insulting.
Please provide proofs that any tourney organizer is trying to make money of the events they try to set up.
Or if you are accusing me personally, tell me how on Earth I made a single buck through my gaming activities, while being totally ignorant about it.

Your statements are nearing slander.

I thought that you were a rather congenial, educated person.
Up to now.
Now, you are stooping down to direct statements that what I wrote was rooted in greed.
I suggest that you cooled down and try to interact in a more civilised way.
 

hongkongwargamer

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Your statements are nearing slander.

I thought that you were a rather congenial, educated person.
Up to now.
Now, you are stooping down to direct statements that what I wrote was rooted in greed.
I suggest that you cooled down and try to interact in a more civilised way.
This is slander.

And personal. I suggest you cool down and try to interact in a more civilized way.

For an example of a civilized discourse. Take a look at how Martin and I are interacting.
 

von Marwitz

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Exactly.

The few tourneys we ran in Asia preCovid - Hong Kong, Singapore, Manila and Siem Reap were joyous affairs back then (tons of sponsors - thx again). These tourneys nowadays doesn’t look that much fun to be at right now!

If this is what it comes to at tourneys these days, you gotta ask yourselves: Why do it? Why do it to yourself?
Well, despite all this chess-clocking, slow-bashing, penalty-fantasizing, and fast-self-praising here, you've got to see what's happening on the ground.

If you and our opponent at a tournament are ok with it, what or who can keep you from playing the IIFT, not using precision dice, tap a chess clock once for two hours each, and decide who is the winner if you cannot finish in time - regardless of what the 'rules' mandate?
In most cases, you can check these points with your opponent within 2 minutes after being matched and in most cases you will be able to resolve them without ever involving the TD. And why would the TD be bothered by this if the players are happy and he has no fuss with it?

That might leave you with 20% of the cases, in which one of the players might not be mutually happy to begin with. All right. Your opponent wants/does not want to use precision dice and the tournament mandates their use? Maybe you want to play the IIFT while the tournament mandates the IFT. Well, possibly a case of tit for tat?

What remains are the few inevitable cases of games which you might not exactly enjoy.
The good thing is that they are over in 4 hours or maybe less if you opt for audacious tactics.

von Marwitz
 
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Robin Reeve

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This is slander.

And personal. I suggest you cool down and try to interact in a more civilized way.

For an example of a civilized discourse. Take a look at how Martin and I are interacting.
No slander. Just facts : you accuse tourney ditectors (or is it me in person?) of trying to reap money from people.
That is absolutely offending and dead wrong.
Proove your case or come back to reasonable discussion.
 

hongkongwargamer

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Well, despite all this chess-clocking, slow-bashing, penalty-fantasizing, and fast-self-praising here, you've got to see what's happening on the ground.

If you and our opponent at a tournament are ok with it, what or who can keep you from playing the IIFT, not using precision dice, tap a chess clock once for two hours each, and decide who is the winner if you cannot finish in time - regardless of what the 'rules' mandate?
In most cases, you can check these points with your opponent within 2 minutes after being matched and in most cases you will be able to resolve them without ever involving the TD. And why would the TD be bothered by this if the players are happy and he has no fuss with it?

That might leave you with 20% of the cases, in which one of the players might not be mutually happy to begin with. All right. Your opponent wants does not want to use precision dice and the tournament mandates their use? Maybe you want to play the IIFT while the tournament mandates the IFT. Well, possibly a case of tit for tat?

What remains are the few inevitable cases of games which you might not exactly enjoy.
The good thing is that they are over in 4 hours or maybe less if you opt for audacious tactics.

von Marwitz
I am sure DELIBERATELY slow players are a blight to the tournament scene. We can’t get rid of them - ie I ran more than a few tournaments before, the money don’t work when you limit players. I know it. How do you solve the equation without applying a layer of procedures (chess clock) on everyone?

Plus can we be more focused here - and perhaps focus all the bashing to the DELIBERATE/ TACTICALLY slow?
 

hongkongwargamer

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No slander. Just facts : you accuse tourney ditectors (or is it me in person?) of trying to reap money from people.
That is absolutely offending and dead wrong.
Proove your case or come back to reasonable discussion.
What exactly is wrong with getting money from people so that the tournament finances work?

I have been there myself more than a few times.

But if we can’t ban them, we have to accommodate them dont we?

Calm down. Take a deep breath. You are fighting your own demons here.
 

Robin Reeve

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What exactly is wrong with getting money from people so that the tournament finances work?
Your previous question wasn't that one.
How do you work this in when you don’t want them all BUT you still want their money?
"Still want their money" is a clear statement that money is more the reason of organizing a tourney than accepting people.

It is not about "my demons".
It is about introducing a sly remark through an element (money making) that has strictly nothimg to do with the topic (the rules of a tournament and the decision to adapt to them or not).
 

von Marwitz

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You seem to be under the mistaken assumption that the matter of slow play is tied in to new/inexperienced players?

As it happens the issue I've had with chronic slow play has never been caused by new or "unqualified" players. The worst of the slow players in the UK are very experienced ASL players.

And the two gents who, at the last tournament I ran, were expected to wait for Mr Speedy and Mr Gonzales for 1hour+ past start time, were both new players to the scene (one of them, literally their first tournament. The other, their second. And both had finished their previous scenario bang on time. Go figure.
I believe that all of us agree on one vital point:

Scenarios unfinished when the time is up cannot hold up the entire tournament.
This just will not do, everybody sees that.

If a participant in a tournament has not yet realized it, then it should not take long to provide the explanation.

If the player is aware of the fact, that he is holding up the entire tournament, then he cannot expect everyone else to wait for him. He must see, that a decision must be reached.

Depending on the situation, it might be ok to let the game continue for a couple of minutes - or not. Usually, it is the 'morning rounds' in which this matters, as the afternoon-rounds often have larger scenarios and are more 'open end'.

The players have to be told that a decision must be reached and should be advised to find one amongst themselves. If they can't do so, the TD - as the name implies - will direct and make that decision. At the start of the tournament, he will likely have explained how 'his mechanism' will work in such cases, and it should be clear that this 'mechanism' is not open to debate. At that point, the TD will likely have pointed out, that no TD likes to adjucate games, because under the circumstances it will not always be possible to make the best decision and as such drive home to point to the players, that they are expected to make that decision themselves when the time is up and only call on the TD if they can't. It should also be clear that there is no appeal against the decision of the TD when he is called upon to make a decision.

Should a player really protest, that he cannot finish his game and expects all others to wait on him, it is obvious that this won't do and that his wish will not be fulfilled. If he cannot accept that, I am convinced that the problem is not primarily one of slow play but rather of attitude...

Up to this point, I do believe that the vast majority of us is in consensus.

What not all of us agree on are the factors on which the TD's decision shall be based:

Merely on slow play some have proposed.

I do not agree with that. Instead, I believe

a) each case is to be individually reviewed
b) a number of factors depending on the case should be the basis of the decision.

This means:

If the position of the slow player in an unfinished game is such, that he would have most likely won, the decision should be that he is the winner of the scenario.
If people return late from lunch, constantly take cigarette breaks, phone calls or meddle with their cellular, it can be one of the factors as can be slow play.
These are just examples.

Furthermore, a TD could elect to defuse a situation before the tournament even begins:

Scenario lists could be published in advance as to allow participants to prepare their setups. Slow players might be especially encouraged to show up with a prepared defensive setup.

Martin has pointed out, that the most difficult challenge he faced were experienced players that were exceedingly slow. It is not unlikely, that their style of play is therefore known already, when they sign up for the tournament. These players, we can assume with reasonable certitude, will be aware that they are very slow players. There won't be many of this type. So, if these few are known to the TD beforehand, he could just frankly send them a short message (maybe drawing on previous experience from a past tournament) and encourage them to bid for the defence and come with a prepared setup to save some time by avoiding to agonize over an offensive setup, which can only be made on site.

If it turns out that players do not take up such advice, then there might be a stronger case to hold their slow play against them, in case the adjucation of the TD is required.

von Marwitz
 

hongkongwargamer

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Your previous question wasn't that one.
"Still want their money" is a clear statement that money is more the reason of organizing a tourney than accepting people.

It is not about "my demons".
It is about introducing a sly remark through an element (money making) that has strictly nothimg to do with the topic (the rules of a tournament and the decision to adapt to them or not).
Come back when you stop foaming.
 
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hongkongwargamer

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I believe that all of us agree on one vital point:

Scenarios unfinished when the time is up cannot hold up the entire tournament.
This just will not do, everybody sees that.

If a participant in a tournament has not yet realized it, then it should not take long to provide the explanation.

If the player is aware of the fact, that he is holding up the entire tournament, then he cannot expect everyone else to wait for him. He must see, that a decision must be reached.

Depending on the situation, it might be ok to let the game continue for a couple of minutes - or not. Usually, it is the 'morning rounds' in which this matters, as the afternoon-rounds often have larger scenarios and are more 'open end'.

The players have to be told that a decision must be reached and should be advised to find one amongst themselves. If they can't do so, the TD - as the name implies - will direct and make that decision. At the start of the tournament, he will likely have explained how 'his mechanism' will work in such cases, and it should be clear that this 'mechanism' is not open to debate. At that point, the TD will likely have pointed out, that no TD likes to adjucate games, because under the circumstances it will not always be possible to make the best decision and as such drive home to point to the players, that they are expected to make that decision themselves when the time is up and only call on the TD if they can't. It should also be clear that there is no appeal against the decision of the TD when he is called upon to make a decision.

Should a player really protest, that he cannot finish his game and expects all others to wait on him, it is obvious that this won't do and that his wish will not be fulfilled. If he cannot accept that, I am convinced that the problem is not primarily one of slow play but rather of attitude...

Up to this point, I do believe that the vast majority of us is in consensus.

What not all of us agree on are the factors on which the TD's decision shall be based:

Merely on slow play some have proposed.

I do not agree with that. Instead, I believe

a) each case is to be individually reviewed
b) a number of factors depending on the case should be the basis of the decision.

This means:

If the position of the slow player in an unfinished game is such, that he would have most likely won, the decision should be that he is the winner of the scenario.
If people return late from lunch, constantly take cigarette breaks, phone calls or meddle with their cellular, it can be one of the factors as can be slow play.
These are just examples.

Furthermore, a TD could elect to defuse a situation before the tournament even begins:

Scenario lists could be published in advance as to allow participants to prepare their setups. Slow players might be especially encouraged to show up with a prepared defensive setup.

Martin has pointed out, that the most difficult challenge he faced were experienced players that were exceedingly slow. It is not unlikely, that their style of play is therefore known already, when they sign up for the tournament. These players, we can assume with reasonable certitude, will be aware that they are very slow players. There won't be many of this type. So, if these few are known to the TD beforehand, he could just frankly send them a short message (maybe drawing on previous experience from a past tournament) and encourage them to bid for the defence and come with a prepared setup to save some time by avoiding to agonize over an offensive setup, which can only be made on site.

If it turns out that players do not take up such advice, then there might be a stronger case to hold their slow play against them, in case the adjucation of the TD is required.

von Marwitz
Whilst we know the effect of people who use slowness as a tactic, that is best defined properly upfront. With a game as interactive as ASL, it’s not the easiest to nail down during tournaments. It’s also important to define upfront so new players are comfortable coming in to meet the community.
 

Robin Reeve

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I may have misunderstood your wording.
Please tell me what your making money argument has to do with the topic.
 
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