Help with first tourney

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Joaco
Posts: 48
Joined: Mon Aug 24, 2015 7:44 pm
Location: Uruguay

Help with first tourney

#1 Post by Joaco »

Hi nice community of elves. Me and some friends are trying to organize the first tourney in our city and probably in our country.
We are having some troubles on finding the balance on the points system. We want to give points for painting and list composition but dont make them as big as battle points. So maybe you know a system from we can start with or some recomendations woul be nice, since probably some of you have played im some good tourneys.

Thanks in advance!
SpellArcher
Green Istari
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Location: Otherworld

Re: Help with first tourney

#2 Post by SpellArcher »

Hi Joaco
Joaco wrote:We want to give points for painting and list composition but dont make them as big as battle points.
My general advice, having played under multiple tournament systems for some years, would be to give points for painting. Somewhere between 10% and 30% of total score, according to taste. This encourages everyone to make what effort they can, without turning the tournament into a painting contest. Conversely, I wouldn't give points for composition. This is inherantly subjective and while most players can live with others sometimes having a stronger army, they don't like such players getting bonus points for it. There are various options for both factors of course, I'll discuss a few but these are not exhaustive. Another thing to consider is whether to allow 25% for Lords and Heroes or 50%. Plus whether End Times rules are being used. I'm kind of assuming the points total will be somewhere between 2000 and 2500.


Comp

Uncomped

This would be my suggestion, unless you expect a huge difference in the attitudes of your players to the game. 8th edition is not horrifically unbalanced out of the box. It greatly simplifies your (very demanding) job as Tournament Organiser. You can always ask players not to bring anything too extreme in your tournament pack.

Timmy Comp

The organisers vet the lists and reject any that they consider too hard. This is of course subjective and depends on the TO's having a good understanding of power levels.

Hard Restrictions

Before the event, you list various limits on each army. For example, Daemons might only be allowed a single Skillcannon in addition to certain other limits. You can also include limits that apply to all armies, for example a cap of 50 or 60 shots. The advantage is that everyone knows the restrictions before the event. They can be hard to get exactly in balance but we could help with that.

Tally Comp

This is a bit like Hard Restrictions but instead of outright limits, the player starts with a 0 score which is increased for each 'soft' pick he takes and decreased for each hard one. The final score can then be applied to his tournament result.


Painting

Best Painted

This can always be awarded but some tournaments give prize(s) for this without it affecting tournament points as such, a separate event if you will. Can be TO (I recommend at least 2 people) or player judged.

Checklist

Tournament points are awarded for each criterion an army meets. For example, is it fully painted? Is it highlighted/shaded? Are the bases textured? This is less subjective but can sometimes fail to differentiate between quality levels of painting.

Assessment

TO's (2+ please) or possibly players, give each army a general score on it's appearance. This is subjective but then so are aesthetics in general! You can also specify levels, for example, an army not fully painted, based etc. will score less.
Joaco
Posts: 48
Joined: Mon Aug 24, 2015 7:44 pm
Location: Uruguay

Re: Help with first tourney

#3 Post by Joaco »

Thank you very mutch Spell, thats quite handy!

By giving points for composition, I was trying to prize those generals who dont seek to make the most over powerful list by chosing only the strongest things in their army.Like taking all the maximun points on heroes, max points on rare and special units, and I repeat the strongest units, like taking 2 frosthearts or something like that. I was thinking on some kind of reward, that wont make a big difference, but more like a tie breaker.
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Prince of Spires
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Re: Help with first tourney

#4 Post by Prince of Spires »

Since it's the first tournament I would keep it as simple as possible. Both because it makes the rest of the job of running the tournament easier and because choices can have unforeseen consequences. Especially with comp rules. My personal view is that after AoS dropped, the 8th edition scene became less competitive and more aimed at (reasonably) fair and fun lists. So comp is less needed.

So with that in mind I would use 8th edition rules out of the book, with one exception. I would not use the different scenario's. They are not completely balanced in all situations and games like watchtower can be frustrating for some armies.

As for painting I would use the Checklist system SA mentions. Depending on how you score the tournament I would award points for painted (3 colours per model minimum), based etc. For at most 25% of the total score. Painting is not the focus point of the hobby for everyone. And not everyone is a master painter. So I would not differentiate between levels of painting. As long as someone made an effort then it should be good.

I would stick to this and evaluate afterwards how it went. If you are afraid of the power level of the lists people will bring then explain in the player pack what you are aiming for with the tournament. You can then still get jerks who bring over the top power lists but most people will follow your aim that way.

If you are very familiar with all army books then you could consider vetting all lists. It's a lot of work and you really need to understand what strong lists and units are for each book. But it's an option (though not what I would do, as mentioned).

Rod
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SpellArcher
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Re: Help with first tourney

#5 Post by SpellArcher »

Joaco wrote:Like taking all the maximun points on heroes, max points on rare and special units
The problem is Joaco that in some armies Specials are bad and Rares are great. In others it's the opposite. Some armies want to max out Lord choices, others don't want any. So you need different criteria for each army and that can get complex. Then it would be a question of which comp system you want to apply.
Prince of Spires wrote:I would not use the different scenario's. They are not completely balanced in all situations and games like watchtower can be frustrating for some armies.
For your first tournament I agree with this.
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