Well just to post everything from my personal point of view:
I'll start off replying to Gary's post.
1)Regarding scheduling. One of the worst things I know is poor scheduling, and we have indeed, as I've admitted multiple times before, had a horrible scheduling process this tournament. We, as most other teams, want to be competetive when we play, and unfortunately the working situation of a few of our better players have not been optimal, causing our schedule a lot of problems, especially over bigger differences in timezones. Sure we could probably have managed to play most games at time, but we're not a big nation in terms of AOC players, we don't have a good amount of high level players that could help us stay competetive, so we've been primarily trying to schedule games with our top 5-6 players, which has been hard. I'm sure more teams have been and still are in this situation. I'm also thinking back to last year when Argentina A had a match and Nicov wasn't available, and you guys attempted to avoid the match taking place without Nicov, as probably anyone else would have. Everyone wants to field their strongest team, it's logical.
We did not know that Taff's message was "false". We were told Sunday evening that we were allowed one more day to try and play the games if we were able to finish them, as they always want to see games played instead of awarding admin wins, and of course we were going to try to do that. And I also disagree with the statement of us delibarately forcing people to play at hurried times or forcing 3v3. We spent 7 hours over two days playing vs China B 2 weeks ago, and we managed to finish one game. It was simply unplayable. Today we managed to finish the games and the remaining games were two home maps and losing team choosing 3v3 or 4v4 for the map pack. Both home map picks were 3v3 and they chose 3v3 for the map pack, when they could have chosen 4v4. Regarding Brazil C, we asked their players online wheter they would be able to play today, because we obviously wanted to finish the games in order to try and finish 1st in the group, and fortunately they found players to play. They sent 3 of their players, and we sent 3 of ours. They missed magnata, sure, but we played without sletten and mbl who are two of our strongest players as well, so it's not only a disadvantage to them.
2/3) To be honest I doubt any of our team has watched even one recorded game of an opponent team this tournament. We've not really had ambitions, and I think we're pretty surprised with how well we've performed too the last couple of days, and therefore obviously our competetive spirit has raised significantly, which is why our effort to play all the games increased as well. But I do understand and agree with your point on this one.
We also started the games vs you at a late time for Norway, and played past midnight, so everything has been far from perfect for us as well.
4) The restart was indeed a big mistake by us. But when we wrote and asked you guys wheter we were allowed to re, we honestly thought you guys were just joking when you said no, following there was a quick resign from our side after calling a restart. I personally know most of you and consider ourselves friends(still do), and didn't see that one coming. Indeed we should have waited and asked Taff for a decision in game instead of resigning, but as I said, we never saw this one coming. We had multiple people pause at 3:59, which caused it to unpause again and lead to a re called at 4:01. I personally expected none of you to want to take advantage of such an obvious, silly mistake, especially since it was quite obvious why we tried to pause before 4 minutes, but of course I understand it as well in retrospect given your situation and how it turned out decisive. But I still didn't find it sportsmanlike at all.
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We've always followed the admins decisions, and they have indeed turned out favorable for us. But I still think most of Taff's, if not all, have been spot on according to my personal belief and how I think I would have acted in his position. You can argue I am saying this just because it went in our favor, but I'm pretty sure I would be defending the decisions if I was in another team. Taff gave us a lot of trouble today, we were expecting to receive and AW from Brazil C, given how they had lost to every other team, and they even offered us an Admin Win via private messages, but Taff refused them, which was obviously the right decision, which we accepted. We were forced to make a big effort to try and get the games played, and fortunately for us we managed to play them in the end.
I think rules are rules, indeed, and they should be followed. But in a game like Age of Empires II, with all the issues that can arise compared to other games, if we leave no room for the administration to adapt and bend the rules slightly where they feel that it is fair, then every single tournament would be way worse off. Sometimes it favors someone more than others, which it obviously has here, but I still feel they haven't been directly unfair to anyone. Argentina A blatantly ignored and refused an Admin Decision that was made on the spot, and that would be something that deserves a penalty as well if we were to argument like that and try to bring penalties into the picture. You did not follow the rules there either.
I am sorry that it turned out like this, and I hope this won't be sticking around and causing a bad relationship between us or the adminstration, as I think both sides makes good points and the administration is in an extremely tough position in such cases. Hope the rest of the tournament goes well for you guys.
I also want say that me and Taff do indeed have a very good relationship, and speak frequently, but I have never felt in any way that he has done any decision favorably just because of our relationship. In fact, sometimes I feel he gives my team more trouble than we deserve, but usually I still agree with him. He always treats both teams with utmost respect and makes his decision totally unbiased as far as I have seen.
I also want to end by saying I find mbl's reaction is disgraceful.
I'll start off replying to Gary's post.
1)Regarding scheduling. One of the worst things I know is poor scheduling, and we have indeed, as I've admitted multiple times before, had a horrible scheduling process this tournament. We, as most other teams, want to be competetive when we play, and unfortunately the working situation of a few of our better players have not been optimal, causing our schedule a lot of problems, especially over bigger differences in timezones. Sure we could probably have managed to play most games at time, but we're not a big nation in terms of AOC players, we don't have a good amount of high level players that could help us stay competetive, so we've been primarily trying to schedule games with our top 5-6 players, which has been hard. I'm sure more teams have been and still are in this situation. I'm also thinking back to last year when Argentina A had a match and Nicov wasn't available, and you guys attempted to avoid the match taking place without Nicov, as probably anyone else would have. Everyone wants to field their strongest team, it's logical.
We did not know that Taff's message was "false". We were told Sunday evening that we were allowed one more day to try and play the games if we were able to finish them, as they always want to see games played instead of awarding admin wins, and of course we were going to try to do that. And I also disagree with the statement of us delibarately forcing people to play at hurried times or forcing 3v3. We spent 7 hours over two days playing vs China B 2 weeks ago, and we managed to finish one game. It was simply unplayable. Today we managed to finish the games and the remaining games were two home maps and losing team choosing 3v3 or 4v4 for the map pack. Both home map picks were 3v3 and they chose 3v3 for the map pack, when they could have chosen 4v4. Regarding Brazil C, we asked their players online wheter they would be able to play today, because we obviously wanted to finish the games in order to try and finish 1st in the group, and fortunately they found players to play. They sent 3 of their players, and we sent 3 of ours. They missed magnata, sure, but we played without sletten and mbl who are two of our strongest players as well, so it's not only a disadvantage to them.
2/3) To be honest I doubt any of our team has watched even one recorded game of an opponent team this tournament. We've not really had ambitions, and I think we're pretty surprised with how well we've performed too the last couple of days, and therefore obviously our competetive spirit has raised significantly, which is why our effort to play all the games increased as well. But I do understand and agree with your point on this one.
We also started the games vs you at a late time for Norway, and played past midnight, so everything has been far from perfect for us as well.
4) The restart was indeed a big mistake by us. But when we wrote and asked you guys wheter we were allowed to re, we honestly thought you guys were just joking when you said no, following there was a quick resign from our side after calling a restart. I personally know most of you and consider ourselves friends(still do), and didn't see that one coming. Indeed we should have waited and asked Taff for a decision in game instead of resigning, but as I said, we never saw this one coming. We had multiple people pause at 3:59, which caused it to unpause again and lead to a re called at 4:01. I personally expected none of you to want to take advantage of such an obvious, silly mistake, especially since it was quite obvious why we tried to pause before 4 minutes, but of course I understand it as well in retrospect given your situation and how it turned out decisive. But I still didn't find it sportsmanlike at all.
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We've always followed the admins decisions, and they have indeed turned out favorable for us. But I still think most of Taff's, if not all, have been spot on according to my personal belief and how I think I would have acted in his position. You can argue I am saying this just because it went in our favor, but I'm pretty sure I would be defending the decisions if I was in another team. Taff gave us a lot of trouble today, we were expecting to receive and AW from Brazil C, given how they had lost to every other team, and they even offered us an Admin Win via private messages, but Taff refused them, which was obviously the right decision, which we accepted. We were forced to make a big effort to try and get the games played, and fortunately for us we managed to play them in the end.
I think rules are rules, indeed, and they should be followed. But in a game like Age of Empires II, with all the issues that can arise compared to other games, if we leave no room for the administration to adapt and bend the rules slightly where they feel that it is fair, then every single tournament would be way worse off. Sometimes it favors someone more than others, which it obviously has here, but I still feel they haven't been directly unfair to anyone. Argentina A blatantly ignored and refused an Admin Decision that was made on the spot, and that would be something that deserves a penalty as well if we were to argument like that and try to bring penalties into the picture. You did not follow the rules there either.
I am sorry that it turned out like this, and I hope this won't be sticking around and causing a bad relationship between us or the adminstration, as I think both sides makes good points and the administration is in an extremely tough position in such cases. Hope the rest of the tournament goes well for you guys.
I also want say that me and Taff do indeed have a very good relationship, and speak frequently, but I have never felt in any way that he has done any decision favorably just because of our relationship. In fact, sometimes I feel he gives my team more trouble than we deserve, but usually I still agree with him. He always treats both teams with utmost respect and makes his decision totally unbiased as far as I have seen.
I also want to end by saying I find mbl's reaction is disgraceful.