I am tired of favouritism & lack of respect for tournament rules

[dave_hun]

TL;DR at the bottom.

Originally I was not sure if I should post this because I was quite pissed off when it happened and I don't like to make public posts in an emotional state. I'd also like to clarify, this post is not meant as a green light to harrass anyone involved, my goal is to raise a discussion, and I'm only judging the decisions made, not the person. All the info I'm sharing is also publicly available, I'm not disclosing confidential information.

Context:
History Hit Open tournament launched not too long ago, and I figured I won't sign up since I expected more top players to attend, however towards the final days of signup phase I noticed that I can still probably get in. Seeding is based on rating (the cutoff for top60 as well), I didn't have tons of time to play but I could have squeezed in a couple games to raise my rating if needed. Paying close attention to the signups it seemed like that was not necessary, and the signups were officially closed on Friday evening. At this point I was surely getting in based on the signups.

It is important to mention that players needed to sign up using both a google form and posting in the official discord. Obviously the players can only see the discord sign-ups, not having access to the google form results.

On Saturday 1 PM CET FlyLikeDjango made this announcement:

I might have just left it alone if it weren't for the specific wording of this sentence. How is it a show of good-will to let players in that failed to understand the 5-sentence registration process written in the handbook, when there is a cutoff for the top60 players, meaning there WILL be players getting left out from the tournament as a result? Players that have completed the registration process fully and on time, and would 100% deserve to get a spot in the seeding.

I still had a saving grace, meaning I can still up my rating until midnight of Saturday - or so I thought.

So the players that were slighted by the previous decision, don't even get the opportunity to increase their rating and their chances to make the cutoff. This makes no sense to me.

The combination of these 2 decisions,and the fact that I didn't increase my rating due to thinking I am in after the signups are officially closed, resulted in me being the 61st rated player, being 0,5 weighted ELO behind the 60th player. It really is comical how it ended up this way.

Why did I get so pissed off about this? Because this is a symptom of a larger illness at this point. I see too many instances of players & admins not giving enough respect to the rules.
-When I have to explain the whole drafting system to my apparently top50 opponent who couldn't bother reading it and wastes my time doing it wrongly.
-When I see top players queueing for a ranked game 5 minutes before the scheduled time. Assuming their opponent will just wait for them. And they do, because no one gets any punishment for being late.
-When some big names are added into a tournament seeding after the brackets are already released.
-When admins actually enforce rules and the affected players act all offended because they haven't read the rulebook prior to signing up.

The list goes on and on. I want to see a change in the general attitude towards rules, because they exist for a reason, and players not caring about them, or admins not enforcing their own rules will usually end up hurting someone else.

Some possible counterarguments to my statement:
-Q: You, dave, are a pleb and would have been eliminated first round against Viper / Yo / Villese / etc. You likely make no difference in the outcome of the tournament, why do you care?
-A: You are right, I would be eliminated first round and it probably wouldn't be close. I still enjoy taking parts in tournaments like this when I can, because playing against a top player in a tournament setting is not an opportunity I get every day. It would be good to just learn a thing or two.
-Q: If all the players signed up properly, you'd have missed out on the tournament anyway, or if simply more top players signed up you wouldn't even have the chance to get in, why u mad bro?
-A: I could have increased my rating to get in despite a couple more sign ups, and if I saw an abundance of top players signing up I wouldn't have bothered with trying.
-Q: In the grand scheme of things, some 19xx players missing out on a high level tournament is no big loss and no one will care, why do you make this post?
-A: That is not the point. I want to see that all players are treated equally, and no one gets hurt because of other people's carelessness.

TL;DR: Badly done signups were accepted after official closing of registration and I among some other players ended up not making the cutoff. Despite the extra day allowed for signups, the already signed up players were not allowed to increase their seeding spot via rating on the extra day. I see a trend of people being careless and I want to see a change in attitude.

 

[RyanKMFDM]

Some possible counterarguments to my statement:
-Q: You, dave, are a pleb and would have been eliminated first round against Viper / Yo / Villese / etc. You likely make no difference in the outcome of the tournament, why do you care?

I would never call you a pleb, Dave. <3

 

[Degaussed]

I would definitely call you a pleb, Dave <3

 

[Helichaos]

I agree and see the same trend, one discord I am in someone posted this thread and then multiple people responded with their own similar stories, so it's not an isolated incident. I feel like the best way to combat this is to immediately contact the admin/players involved, while they still have the possibility to back track, and let them know how/why the decision is unfair and ask for them to change their mind.

If I was Django and someone immediately replied to that message with something like, "Hey this is really screwing over players who signed up correctly and on time, can you please at least give us the chance to increase our rating?" then I would change my mind. But if noone replies, then I just assume that people accept my decision and they don't have a problem with it.

I don't mean to say at all that you are at fault here, but the challenge with this thread now is that the signup's are finalised, the tournament is underway and even if he wanted to, there's probably not much Django can do.

Thoughts?

 

[timydamonkey]

"I feel like the best way to combat this is to immediately contact the admin/players involved, while they still have the possibility to back track, and let them know how/why the decision is unfair and ask for them to change their mind."

I fundamentally disagree with this.

The problem is, in theory your message there is fine. But let's be honest: if people are messaging admins over decisions that they're upset with, they're not going to be sending something polite or reasoned. In all likelihood, they'll send something abusive, because they're sending it when their emotions are heightened or because somebody else has complained about it and whipped people up into a friendly. I disagree with anything that might lead to people haranguing admins about decisions - it's not the answer. In all honesty, I think this is half the problem, though I can't say for sure - admin concern about being attacked if x player can't participate because of an admin decision on what players view as a technicality. And there's too many armchair viewers - I'd be one of those, I don't sign up to tournaments - who might have a view on admin decisions, but seem to think they have a right to pester admins about things. (Obviously, in the case of this thread, it's about somebody else who is signed up.)

I don't think messaging admins is the answer because it potentially ignores a root cause of the issue.

I don't see anything wrong with a thread such as this where it's actually addressing the topic and while the OP is clearly mad, they're clearly willing to engage in a debate.

I realise people may disagree with this, especially anybody more involved in the AOE scene than me, but I do think it's important to consider.

 

[dave_hun]

I agree and see the same trend, one discord I am in someone posted this thread and then multiple people responded with their own similar stories, so it's not an isolated incident. I feel like the best way to combat this is to immediately contact the admin/players involved, while they still have the possibility to back track, and let them know how/why the decision is unfair and ask for them to change their mind.

If I was Django and someone immediately replied to that message with something like, "Hey this is really screwing over players who signed up correctly and on time, can you please at least give us the chance to increase our rating?" then I would change my mind. But if noone replies, then I just assume that people accept my decision and they don't have a problem with it.

I don't mean to say at all that you are at fault here, but the challenge with this thread now is that the signup's are finalised, the tournament is underway and even if he wanted to, there's probably not much Django can do.

Thoughts?

My goal with this thread was not to get into a tournament that already started, that would be flying in the face of my own message (admins announcing one thing then changing their mind).

Your idea of messaging Django when there was still time until the extended signup finalization is good, it's something I could have done, but decided not to out of principle. I fundamentally disagreed with the extension of the deadline (especially when there's already been an announcement that SIGNUPS ARE CLOSED). Also, in theory I could have increased my rating on saturday, yes, but I'm not the only one affected by the decision.

-What if someone already in the top60 does not see the announcement that the ratings of Saturday evening will be used instead of Friday's and ends up missing out on the tournament because players outside the top60 surpass them?
-What if someone outside the top60 does not have the opportunity to play rated games on Saturday because they are away from home?
What you are providing is something that could have solved my problem and mine only. But this issue is not about me. It's about everyone that's been negatively affected in the history of aoe tournaments by such decisions.

There is also the fact that I am directly affected by the decision, which means I am biased, and me sending my opinion to the admin might not be the right thing to do, especially in an emotional state which I was in.

 

[Qulala]

Why did I get so pissed off about this? Because this is a symptom of a larger illness at this point. I see too many instances of players & admins not giving enough respect to the rules.
-When I have to explain the whole drafting system to my apparently top50 opponent who couldn't bother reading it and wastes my time doing it wrongly.
-When I see top players queueing for a ranked game 5 minutes before the scheduled time. Assuming their opponent will just wait for them. And they do, because no one gets any punishment for being late.
-When some big names are added into a tournament seeding after the brackets are already released.
-When admins actually enforce rules and the affected players act all offended because they haven't read the rulebook prior to signing up.

For me its mostly these points above that bother me sometimes,

Extending deadlines or giving people the change to fix their signups i can understand in some way.
admins messaging a player or players with something like: did you know you made a mistake in your signup can you please fix it, is in my opinion just nice of them. However it would have been better 1 day before the deadline and not after.

Same as extending a deadling because you want some more higher players in.
Sometimes your tournament gets a bit lost during a week because another anouncement takes the attention away or forum is flooded with scheduling topics and people dont see your tournament anymore or forget it. From the organisers perspective i understand to extend the signup a bit and wait for a better timing to highlight your tournament again to the players.

But messaging players or extending dealines should always be in a reasonable time before the deadline closes and not after

i think it would also be better if people singup on one place to avoid thsese mistakes in general. (yes its up to the players to read only 2 lines about how to signup, and its their fault if they dont, but in general its better to keep it as easy as possible)

 

[Helichaos]

My goal with this thread was not to get into a tournament that already started, that would be flying in the face of my own message (admins announcing one thing then changing their mind).

Your idea of messaging Django when there was still time until the extended signup finalization is good, it's something I could have done, but decided not to out of principle. I fundamentally disagreed with the extension of the deadline (especially when there's already been an announcement that SIGNUPS ARE CLOSED). Also, in theory I could have increased my rating on saturday, yes, but I'm not the only one affected by the decision.

-What if someone already in the top60 does not see the announcement that the ratings of Saturday evening will be used instead of Friday's and ends up missing out on the tournament because players outside the top60 surpass them?
-What if someone outside the top60 does not have the opportunity to play rated games on Saturday because they are away from home?
What you are providing is something that could have solved my problem and mine only. But this issue is not about me. It's about everyone that's been negatively affected in the history of aoe tournaments by such decisions.

There is also the fact that I am directly affected by the decision, which means I am biased, and me sending my opinion to the admin might not be the right thing to do, especially in an emotional state which I was in.

Yeah that's fair enough. I guess I'm assuming that organizers are generally going to make the decisions that are best for them (which involves favouring the pros usually), but if every time they try a sneaky they get called out on it, maybe we can change the culture.

I totally get why you didn't in this case, and apart from making threads either before or after this happens I don't really know how we can change this culture

 

[Memeluke]

1. why would you ever require players to sign up in more than one place
2. if somebody is too stupid to sign up correctly, just don't let them in the tournament, simple as that

 

[DracKeN]

I think this decision was fine and it would be also fine if admins were more strict and would just accept correct signups and not the ones having only 1/2 done. The few spots around the cut for the signups is never really fair and clean competition in the last days anyways, as some people have smurf accs, some dodge, some avoid queuing when they know they'd likely get matched against better players etc. I'm not trying to move the point of the topic elsewhere, but I think there are bigger issues regarding this than when admins allow 1 extra day for people to finish their signups.
I agree with your point generally, that some people are sometimes treated differently than others would be in their spot and they're gaining unfair advantages that way. Also the fact that some people just show little effort for the tournaments, not trying to be on time, not checking the rules before the event etc. annoys me as well.

 

[Philippe le Bon]

sign up to budget tournaments, get budget admins​

… simple as that



thankfully exceptions to the rules exist!

 

[malamadre]

If we could have the names of the players that didn't signed up correctly the drama level in this post would raise at least 2 points.
6/10 drama

 

[King_Marv]

If we couls have the names of the players that didn't signed up correctly the drama level in this post would raise at least 2 points.
6/10 drama

It’s pretty easy. Go to discord and check the signups after the deadline. It’s 4 players and funny one of them is my opponent O_O

 

[dave_hun]

If we could have the names of the players that didn't signed up correctly the drama level in this post would raise at least 2 points.
6/10 drama

I guess you are trolling, but I'll answer regardless:
Who these players are makes no difference to the point I was addressing, in fact I don't even care.
I'm not looking to put blame on anyone, the goal was to make changes for the future, which may or may not happen (probably not, but it's worth to try I figured).

 

[oozkan]

It is interesting that @FlyLikeDjango is a German. I mean we are talking about a country that you can get a red light ticket as a pedestrian, in the middle of country where only one or two car passes for entire day.

Germany is in trouble, bring back Merkel. *jk*

 

[Tiekel]

Signing up in duplicate, that's like how they used to do things in the stone ages at an office, brings you back in time.
As for the carelessness to not reading tournament rules. Why not make it more anal by having sign ups go through something like google forms, click page by page you've read and accepted it, then at the end fill in your details. I think you can even make results publicly viewable. Now nobody can get offended if they haven't read it

 

[RyanKMFDM]

I would definitely call you a pleb, Dave <3

D:

 

[SuperskinnyBLS]

This community does not deserve any better. A little reminder to everyone that when Chrazini enforced the rules and did not allow Hera to participate, the horde decided to go after the admin and started attacking him all over social media.

 

[HongeyKong]

Signing up in duplicate, that's like how they used to do things in the stone ages at an office, brings you back in time.
As for the carelessness to not reading tournament rules. Why not make it more anal by having sign ups go through something like google forms, click page by page you've read and accepted it, then at the end fill in your details. I think you can even make results publicly viewable. Now nobody can get offended if they haven't read it

Those are even more useless than "Are you 18?" on porn sites

 

[Tree]

I see a trend of people being careless and I want to see a change in attitude.

I think maybe the community could voice out their appreciation more to rule-respecting admins, because usually what they get are salty complains from players who suffer from not following the rules and sometimes that could be discouraging.

Also, that can set a role model to all those who wanna host a tournament out there too

 

[Tuunbaq]

This community does not deserve any better. A little reminder to everyone that when Chrazini enforced the rules and did not allow Hera to participate, the horde decided to go after the admin and started attacking him all over social media.

Indeed, and the worst part is that one of the most toxic member of this community, Roxy, is now "required" to be a mod to every AoE twitch channel there is. One of these streamers told me they didn't appreciate her but didn't want to mess things up so she's a mod there as well. Even on RedBull she's a mod. And yes, she's the one criticizing Chrazini on social medias when her friend wasn't treated as he should in her eyes.

In AoE, it's all about connections.

 

[HongeyKong]

I smell drama

 

[doacid]

In AoE, it's all about connections.

In every place it's all about connections, not just aoe.

If I had a Twitch channel I'd make sure to only give admin to people who (at least initially) don't want the job. And if I had to make exceptions I'd definitely wouldn't give it to people who've devoted their lives to being an admin everywhere. You can still get good people fitting that criteria, meaning it's not necessarily a bad thing per se, but you also have good chances of getting a power hungry dude with his own agenda.

 

[amazing_knight]

In AoE, it's all about connections.

True, but everywhere. I see the same people who are mods on nearly all channels. Most of them are nice, but some use mod privileges to show how they're above the system. People should remember what happened with Chessbae (Read).

 

[amazing_knight]

One of these streamers told me they didn't appreciate her but didn't want to mess things up so she's a mod there as well.

I assume that's the case with most streamers. They just want to be "nice" to all.

Toxic positivity (prevalent amongst aoe2 streamers): "Let's all be nice and respectful to each other, no drama on this channel please. No talk about racism sexism politics please. I don't want to offend anyone. I want to be friends with everyone."

That's all nice and well, but it's unjustified when you use that to shut down any valid criticism when one of your friends messed up something.

This is exactly how Chessbae gained insane power amongst Chess streamers, to the extent that she carried out copyright strikes on some channels. But eventually, people figured it out and she was banned from Twitch.