TGM Online Tournaments

Thread in 'Discussion' started by FreakyByte, 9 Sep 2016.

  1. I've started a conversation about doing online TGM tournaments yesterday, and there is a interesting discussion going on right now, so I've decided to summarize it into a thread.
    I'm with Enchantress on this one. Commentary is hard enough when two players play at the same time already. Additionaly, I would choose a format which also has a loosers bracket, so you dont get instantly eliminated when you loose your first match.

    tl;dr
    We think a TGM1 tournament would be pretty cool, but whe don't know if whe should do a "The Masters" or a single elimination format. Also, if we do a single elimination format, we have to decide if we want to have matches go on at the same time or not.

    And as the internet taught me: long posts need potatoes, so here you go.
    [​IMG]
     
    Tomek and EnchantressOfNumbers like this.
  2. Personally I think a Masters style tournament would be massively ambitious and not as fun to play as it is in person. In particular if you couldn't see how everyone else is doing in real time it would kind of nuke a lot of the fun (and strategy) of participation imo. The Eindhoven ones run OK, but it's still a fair bit of faff getting things organised and you've already got everyone in the same physical location there.

    The exception would be maybe if you had a 1v1 sort of thing as two players in the same game, but still did a TGM race and with Masters-style handicaps, and then an elimination format. I think that would work without being difficult as hell to get working, and solves a lot of the technical challenges about how you sync a whole bunch of things up and get it into a viewable format. The caveat is it needs a platform that allows good TGM multiplayer over the internet, but that's kind of a prerequisite for any other format that isn't just a simultaneous race.

    And personally I'm not a fan of double elimination brackets unless there's either a huge amount of prize money, or you're not planning on doing it more than once or twice a year. Would rather have regular single-elimination tournaments that finish fairly quickly (see: Nullpomino Weeklies), than have double elimination ones that end up being so much of a hassle that they hardly ever happen. In particular TGM races take a while (15-20 mins/round if you include setup), and double elimination brackets, while in theory only being one extra round, have a lot of scheduling interdependencies that mean that even a 16-player bracket could easily take a few hours.
     
    Tomek and FreakyByte like this.
  3. As for keeping the streams in sync, I know other online tournaments will use Livestreamer and capture the video from there for the restream so they can easily pause the streams to get them sync'd up.

    My thoughts for the tournament are largely based on other video game tournaments that I've seen which have just been a simultaneous race format. I agree that with the stream delay it's not the best for being able to keep tabs on what your opponent is doing and react to that, but that's really a limitation for any of these tournaments unless you're playing together in person or have some kind of online multiplayer client/functionality.

    If we do try to put on a tournament, we won't be able to satisfy what everyone wants out of the tournament, but I think we can do something that would be fun to participate in and fun to watch. I just don't want us as a community to not try to put on a tournament simply because it can't be perfect.
     
    Tomek and FreakyByte like this.
  4. Than lets do it as simple as possible. Make restreaming optional. Propose a lot of different times, were players can take part so everyone can make it. Set up some rules how to determine a ranking. Putting it into a video with commentary can be done later.

    Maybe like that: over one weekend (Fri-Sun) you set up a lot of timeslots for the different regions. Everyone joins whenever he wants (possible multiple tries) and just posts somewhere that he participates? Maybe "you have to stream live around that time" has to be a rule to verify scores. In the end apply whatever kind of handicaps you like and make a ranking from it.
     
  5. Sound pretty much like what I had in mind. Define a period of time (a weekend, or maybe even a week) in which the tournament takes place. Define deadlines, for example after the first day the first bracket has to be completed (maybe use different deadlines for different timezones). Then let the competitors organize the rest for themselves. Though I wouldn't do it that for the (semi)finals, which should have live commentary for extra HYPE in my oppinion. A tournament like this could easily be held every first weekend of the month for example.

    Also, I think forcing the games to be streamed live to verify scores is something that should be done. Maybe the two opponents even have to organize themselves a referee that watches the match live to assure everything is fine, but I don't know if that's necessary.
     
  6. I would also remove brackets etc. It requires people to register first and play in a specific order multiple times. I think it is a huge difference if you just can show up at one of some random timeslots and play your game without dependence to anyone else.

    So if I would say "Lets play next sunday at 3, 8 and 11" - what would be a good way to show everyones game? Just open a thread were you can post "I play now at twitch/blabla" and later "I did a 13:27, here is the recording/highlight/screenshot". I possibly could also do a script and schow all channels on a single webpage.
     
  7. If I understand you correctly, you would let the competitors play their games alone and compare them afterwards. I don't think that's a good idea. I think that would remove a lot of fun from the tournament. Also, it could kind of be unfair for one player to already know what his opponents score was before he starts his own game.
     
    EnchantressOfNumbers likes this.
  8. I deliberately proposed a tournament which is not perfect but has the biggest chance of happening.
     
  9. I think we have to choose something between "most likely to happen" and "most fun to play".
    We have already shared our opinions. What do other people think about this?
     
  10. I think there's a difference between proposing a tournament format that's not perfect and one that's not appealing. For one, "biggest chance of happening" doesn't really mean much if you're only going to get a handful of people to actually participate. In particular creating a relatively high barrier to entry (have to stream live and within certain time slots) for a format that doesn't really feel much like an actual competition seems like a poor balance. Not allowing multiple tries opens up potential for cheating if things aren't being properly tracked. Allowing multiple tries just essentially makes it like a one-day Carnival of Death, except it's TGM1 (which people don't like as much), isn't part of a bigger thing on the site, and your score has to be streamed to count.

    As I said before, the Masters format works for a couple of reasons. A big one of those is that there's a huge trade-off in TGM1 between playing for time and playing for completion, and a lot of the strategy (and therefore interest) feeds off of that - how much you feel you have to push and take risks is entirely dependent on your live time gaps to everyone else. Another is that (at least in theory) you end up with a decent climax and players finishing close together, which makes it exciting both as a participant and a spectator. Having players do their runs in isolation hurts the first one (at the very least you need to pre-select your strategy) and removes the second for players if not spectators. Having players do their runs at different times destroys the second aspect, and for the first aspect, depending on whether you can only do one run or several, it either biases it in favour of later participants, or removes it entirely.

    Rather than just splooging out vague concepts and ideas, maybe a few questions to answer and focus what you're actually trying to do and why:

    1. Is the priority of the tournament to provide entertainment for the people participating, or for people who might want to watch it? A lot of issues can disappear if you stop giving a shit about spectators. On the other hand, if you don't give a shit about your players and make a fun tournament, nobody will bother to play and there'll be nothing to watch anyway.
    2. Is the intent of the tournament to have some high level competition to find out the "best" on the day, or is it to just create close/fun games where mediocre players can beat good players if they do well? (i.e. are there handicaps?)
    3. Given that TGM has no in-built online play, how does the format play out in reality? Is it better to try and find some 3rd party software that creates online play and just deal with the lag (or try and revive Blockbox somehow), or are there tournament formats that can still work well despite players being split from each other. Are there other ways to mitigate dissonance of playing separately and still provide some mid-competition feedback (for example both players hearing live commentary updates on how their opponent is doing)?
    4. Which game/mode actually provides the best spectacle, in particular with regards to points 1 and 2, and how reliably participants can complete it. What do people find fun?
    5. What does this tournament actually offer to the community/players that the existing leaderboards and things like the Carnival of Death don't already provide?
    6. Are there ways that the format can add to the experience of playing or spectating the tournament, rather than just providing a means to selecting a winner?

    If you want something to happen, make it interesting and appealing, make it easy for people to participate in, and it will happen if you want it to. "Build it, and they will come" works, but it only works if the tournament is relatively low hassle for players and actually entertaining for them (or has big $$$ for the prize pool). In terms of the stream or organisation it can be as much hassle as you want it to be, because as the organiser it's then in your hands entirely whether you put in the effort and get it off the ground. But you can't outsource it to the players or massively compromise on the entertainment value and expect many people to still be interested.
     
    Last edited: 13 Sep 2016
    FreakyByte likes this.
  11. I think we should focus on making it a fun tournament for the players, but still stream it live for score verification and for possible spectators. Finals should definitely be streamed with live commentary to also get some people outside of the TGM community in.
    I like the idea of making it a fun tournament for all kinds of players much more, although finding the right handicaps could be challenging.
    Pretty much the same as the SRL races did. The methods for using exact starting times have already been discussed.
    That's a hard one. I like Death mode the most, but there are also enough people which enjoy the master modes more. Also, the mode doesn't have to be completable since we could just let the player with the better score in terms of leaderboard ranking win. Although the modes which can't be completed consistently most by people (pretty much everything except TGM1 lol) may not be the best for a tournament.
    It is streamed live, and there is direct contact and competition between the players (which proved to be much fun during the SRL races).
    Being in a skype call with your opponents and discussing the match afterwards should be able to do that I think.

    I've already posted too much in this thread, now I want to hear the opinion of others about these questions (and also about my own opinion ^^).
     

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