Mr. Black’s Tournament Logs: Judging Edition
Think judging a tournament is easy? It’s alright, I envy your blissful ignorance…
Dear readers, Mr. Black here, and I just wanted to share with you my personal log from the tournament I ran two Sundays ago. No fancy intros here, no explanations, just a run-through of my thoughts and feelings as I gradually spiral into a pit of frustration and despair… I only wish I could say it wasn’t the same spiral I’ve delved into countless times in countless other tournaments in countless other gaming systems, but alas, no… So come on down, let’s see how it plays out.
2:00 am (Previous Night): Going to sleep now. Must wake up in six hours to prepare for event. *Note: get at least 8-10 hours of sleep the night before a tournament, whether you’re running it or playing in it. *Personal Note: Remember to feel bad tomorrow evening for taking out your lack of sleep on the players, hopefully that will keep karma in check.
8:00 am: Early stop at Quick Trip to pick up supply of Monster Mixxd Energy Drinks- hope to get sponsership from Monster for mentioning name on internet… Chances look slim of this. Still hopeful about the day! Hope things will go smoothly and the event will be a blast!
10:00 am: Roughly ten players still “on the way”, not off to a good start. Anger rising.
10:30 am: Tournament officially starts despite only eighteen out of twenty-six entries being present. Seeing as this is a win-an-army, that’s $150 from prize support not available, second and third place prizes cut, probably have to cut Painting prize as well. Working on how to break this to players, as well as a Kill List as I type.
Reasons People Had For Not Showing up:
-Hung over -It’s cold -Girlfriend Aggro -There’s a spider near the door.
11:30 am: One hour in, two rules questions thus far, one clarification on the scenario (forgot to post that it’s six turns, not random length- good thing this was caught early!). *Personal Note: Wish I had gotten more sleep… One moment, rules question about Mishap just came up… Ok, handled, first player now upset that his units mishap if they land on his own models. Hate is directed towards me regardless of the actual rules… Hour and a half until lunch break…
12:30 pm: Half an hour left, made mistake on battle point modifiers by saying “highest scoring unit” instead of “highest costed unit”, despite this not making a difference in any games the torches and pitchforks have been raised and my competence as a Tournament Organizer is in question: commencing quelling of peasants.
2:00 pm: Returned from lunch at Arby’s, received a flat drink and a chicken sandwich that had crunchy bits inside… I… Don’t think that’s normal. Snowing outside now and due to this being Georgia no one is used to it. Coincidentally found out I apparently can’t end a tournament without refund “just because” it’s cold out. Round two beginning now, fruitless anger turning into mild depression.
2:05 pm: Four players have already asked about the scenario special rules regarding being able to deploy an HQ and Troop 24 inches out, despite answering this same question three times when I gathered everyone to go over the scenario and then asking if everyone understood it.
2:06 pm: Make that five players…
4:15 pm: Fifteen minutes left in the round, I’m not sure where the time went as I don’t remember the round, Store Employee says I was just staring off into space with a look of pain, seems the snow outside is picking up though, so that’s a change of pace.
4:20 pm: Threatened the players that if we got snowed in then the tournament would become an “Iron Man Infinite Round” event until we could leave. They countered with if that did happen I would be the first to be eaten, despite the event being hosted in a cafe.
5:00 pm: Round three has begun, players in Punishment Room come up to alert me that the previous round player has frozen to death in corner- Missing score-sheet from Round 2 recovered.
6:30 pm: Game deciding first place is done, rendering all other games useless, snow picking up more, considering running out with the tourney entries and leaving them to fend for themselves.
6:53 pm: Player whom has no chance of placing now raging due to not reading scenario and losing… Apparently not winning due to killing more guys in an objective based game is grounds for furious anger. All recommendations to preserve his body heat for the oncoming freeze is ignored.
7:15 pm: Player still raging about scenario, complaining about losing and how poorly worded it was, as well as my capabilities to write scenarios… Don’t have the heart to tell him they are coped exactly from the 2008 Ard Boyz Semi-Finals.
7:40 pm: still
