@Tricksy - O.o.  Okay, maybe Gerrak didn't have the greatest choice of words for you, but are you really going to let the words of one *or even a few* dictate your attitude towards a community?  The community aspect is what keeps me playing the game in the first place, and i've lost track of the amount of awesome people i've met because of dancing games.

No one is saying that you or anyone else being unable to do 12s = don't show up, Gerrak included.  Hell if you didn't play at all, no one would say don't show up.  People are confusing elitism with differentiated opinions due to varying skill levels.

Nonetheless, you're a busy girl with your own machine.  You could always like..host your OWN tournament during your own time with your own ruleset that no one could debate or argue with.  Regardless of how 'biased' it was or wasn't, people would still show up, because this game is still fun.

One of my first steps in integrating myself in the seattle dancy game community will be figuring out what the best options are for even bimonthly tourneys/meetups/hangouts.  Skill level aside, the game is all about us all enjoying it to some degree.

@Neko - I just have a lot of stuff going on right now and making time for this tournament became a less and less attractive option.  For now, I just don't want to plan for it at all.

And I'm definitely going to plan some sort of event at my house with my own rules as the summer gets closer.  And I'm all about more community events.  There's just been so much frustration surrounding this whole thing that I can't spend the energy on it anymore.

I appreciate you trying to speak well on Allan's behalf, and while he's a dick on the forums, he is a pretty nice guy in person.  I just don't want to tolerate being talked to like that by anyone; on the internet or otherwise.  I am more than happy to participate in future events, but I'll just sit this one out.

@Neko:

RE: Looking forward to meeting me more after tournament debates, me too, actually.  I always like to meet people who aren't afraid to go head to head with a crazed, loudmouthed girl.

RE: Physical limitations, I'm not even saying that they will keep me from EVER being able to play stamina songs should I want to.  I fully well acknowledge that I am currently in an awkward place because I'm trying to get perfect dosages in place for the wide variety of meds I take, *and* I just had surgery last month.  Maybe in a year, I will be in some condition to improve faster.

RE: Can't do 12s, don't show up - Gerrak actually did say, in another thread, that if you can't *** 9s or pass 11s you don't deserve to be in the tournament.  He later amended that, I believe, but I'm pretty sure that's what Tricksy is referring to.

@Everyone:

What has always bothered me is just the idea that everybody is the same, improves the same, functions the same, and should strive for the same thing when playing this game.  That kind of competition leads to the downfall of a community and, ultimately, the destruction of a fanbase.  Put another way: I'm cool with rules that force me into last place if they are for the good of the community; that's a simple case of majority rules.  I'm not cool with taking that further and saying that because the majority voted one way, the minority are fags or whatever other troll bullshit has been happening.  Treat me with respect and I'll go along with you.

This is pretty long, skip down to the blue text for the most important parts.

Regarding PADMISS specifically, setting the caps is, as Gerrak notes, an extremely sensitive issue since Acme hasn't been the site of that many tournaments and have been generally reluctant. Neko hit on a point I've stated as well: if we can maximize turnout at our occasional tournaments, we increase the likelihood of getting more frequent events approved.  There's no official promise to that effect (as far as I know), but a concretely larger set of competitors able and willing to compete regularly would generally be assumed to mean more income for the arcade as people practice and possibly more incidental income, if, for instance, you buy food at Acme, so it's a fairly natural assumption that a larger event is more likely to attract than a smaller event.  Neko also pointed out something that we have generally not done - because other Seattle-area locations have been extremely generous over the years - and that is giving them a cut of the fees so that it is directly a gain for them; this is again bolstered by better turnout.

------

We have people on one side saying "I won't come if..." and people on the other saying "I want ...".  Assuming nobody is exaggerating, that lends credence to the pragmatic approach being the lower cap, because then we can go ahead and, as Gerrak noted, do "tournaments of all kinds all the time" as Acme warms up to us.  Thus far, the arguments about the cap needing to be above 11 come from no source but opinion, numbers given are clearly noted to be assumptions, but arguments from the opposite end are similarly based in opinion and preference.  Whatever ruels we end up with, everyone needs to understand that this has been extremely subjective - even Rainault's point about warming up, which is well justified, does not give evidence that the cap should be 11, it solely gives evidence that it would be reasonable to lower the cap from somewhere to somewhere else for the first few rounds.

------

If we want to argue fairness, then level caps, being arbitrarily set (even if determined by majority vote) limits, are inherently unfair.  For anyone arguing for a fair tournament, that means ReaF in the first round is equally as valid as Not Worth the Paper on Beginner, because the better player overall will win more songs overall.  Taken to the extreme, this logic would hold for tiebreakers as well, but we've agreed (arbitrarily again) on using certain methods of limiting the possible set of charts used as tiebreakers.

Now that we've all hopefully accepted that maybe absolute fairness can be compromised for the sake of having a little more fun, let's talk about limits.  Answer the blue questions:

If player A picks an 8 then wins and player B picks a 12 and wins, who is better?

If your answer is anything but "they are currently tied and need to play more to find out", then you are letting your opinion influence you.  I don't care which you value more, if a tournament allowed both charts, then they are equally valued when ranking those players.  Furthermore, one or both wins could have been flukes and B is normally the timing player whereas A is the stamina player, who knows.  If you cannot accept that they are currently tied, please stop posting about the rules.


Should player A have chosen an 8 against player B? should player B have chosen a 12 against player A?

Assuming no flukes, the answer to both is yes.  They both won their own picks, which would mean they were good picks.  If you believe A was wrong to pick what is clearly a Hard chart, then you are projecting your own preferences onto the question.  Let's assume now that A can barely pass 11's and hasn't even tried a 12; B ultimately won, so the 12 is justified to that extent - A forfeited and did not have any fun as a result, and B didn't actually compete on the 12 as a result, but there was nothing inherently wrong with the decision.  Again, any belief in the wrongness of the decision is tinted by personal preference.

Are you going to a tournament purely to have fun, purely to win, or a combination of the two?

Now we're getting to the heart of the matter.  Some players have stated that they play what they play because nothing else is fun, some say they play a wide range, but have preferences, some are working their way into higher difficulties because that's what they want to do, some are working on honing their timing, because that's what they want to do.  They have all voiced interest in this event for one of those three options; I'm assuming there are not too many who are playing purely to win with a complete disregard for fun (please correct me if I am wrong), so it follows naturally that all entrants are competing because the game is fun, and some are more competitive than others.  This means, regardless of chart preferences, you can probably relate to other players - don't want to play an 8 under any circumstances, but love 12's?  There's somebody who is the exact opposite of you, and there is somebody who plays both equally; all three of you are playing for fun, and would like to avoid having the tournament not be fun.

Why has this discussion been so charged?

We just nailed it, both sides are being told that the way they play is not the way somebody else wants to play, and they are taking it personally.  Moreover, many of them are not compromising in any way.  For players asserting the the cutoff needs to be somewhere, think about what it means to the players who get screwed out of their fun by it.  Alright, if you've made it this far, you're a little less of a self-centered asshole.

Fun vs. winning - which matters more?

I stated this at one point before: DMN used to throw in a clever rule - "If both players agree and no extra time is taken, then it's okay."  The intent was to allow whatever craziness two players thought was fair between them without mucking up anything for everyone else - this traditionally referred moreso to using mods or playing on Beginner or whatever, but would it be so bad to say the cap is 11, but that you can ask your opponent if a 12 or 13 is okay with them?  The same can apply for lower caps - set it at 9, let players who agree go lower.  Hell, make them contingent on one another, if player B asks to break the 11 cap, then player A is now allowed to pick charts on both sides of the capped range; if A wants an 8, then B is allowed a 12 and if A wants a 7, then B is allowed a 13, even though A may have to bow out of the harder charts.  Yes, there's a risk of introducing a little bias toward players who specialize in the core range (9-11 in this example), but, by current PNW standards, that's an arguably (and I know everyone is going to argue about it) good spread between tech and stamina for general play, but anyone who doesn't have a crippling overspecialization way outside that range should be able to compete over a good portion of it, then two players who want to break out of the core can go ahead and do so - with the caps being mutually dependent asking to break either cap opens up preferable options to like-minded players and exploitable weaknesses to your polar opposite.  For fairness, this would probably best be achieved by having you state your maximum range when you enter and holding to it for the whole tournament - that is, when you put your money down, you say if you are playing 9-11, 8-12, or 7-13 - and then each match is determined by the player with the narrowest range.  If needed, later rounds can lift the ranges to allow less restricted competition among top players, but again, the goal is to open things up to encourage generalist skills - if the finalists both want to 7's after playing 13's in every round before that, then who has the right to tell them not to?

Back to the question - if winning is the most important thing to you, then this system is biased toward the arbitrarily defined core and taking the core range means screwing over players who would otherwise play outside it.  If fun matters to you more, this system encourages balanced play across a wider range than the caps explicitly set (since picking a wide range requires you to handle both easier and harder charts).  Most importantly, it makes this whole stamina vs. tech battle into something a lot more cooperative - players who are that put off by easy/hard charts don't have to put up with them, but players who don't care don't have to care.  Sara and Suko can enter and not have to play a single 12 in the first few rounds (provided they're fine with the lower bound being 9), but NIMM, Gerrak, and every other stamina player can whore out 13's are day long against one another; strategy-oriented players like me get to decide ahead of time if the risk is worth it - I can do some very mean things to both tech and stamina players if I am allowed 8's, but that means potentially exposing my bad knee to 12's (or just forfeiting the song if one is chosen) in earlier rounds.

Arguments about coddling or whatever other flamebait people have posted still apply, sure, but with a little compromise ON BOTH SIDES, we can actually have a reasonably balanced, open competition that doesn't scare anyone away.  The core of the matter all along has been that both sides think only about making the rules suit their own habits and preferences, when the truth is that we are all in this to have fun and being so self-centered is damaging to the group.  The same concept of compromise applies for the question of fairness - this is not an irreconcilably unfair format, but is hardly perfectly balanced, but if everyone can agree to a little compromise for the greater good, then it doesn't matter quite so much, does it?

If you couldn't tell yet, we're all just a bunch of ass holes.

Word.

@ancsik
I like your new method of highlighting your main points in blue. Now I don't have to skip your posts due to their length. =D

@Suko: Yeah, I've been tending toward more detail than less when justifying my claims, in contract to most posters' approach of "We should do X because we should" (or the more common "We should to do X and everything else is wrong")", but that's been keeping people from reading them.  The blue was less to show people to concise points than to get people to read the Q/A section, but I should probably start doing blue tinted cliffnotes for everyone's benefit.  Or something like that.

Tricksy:
     Not to be mean, but you hooked up and live with a guy who OWNS a machine, and I have testimony that says that you don't play as much as you could, and I have trouble believing you "only have 5 hours a week to play" because of a "full schedule". In addition, if you played 5 hours a week, that would be more than most of the current 'regulars' at Acme anyway, and I have first hand observation of your skill that tells me that you CAN pass 12s if you committed to doing so. I've seen you knock out Basshunter songs when you're practiced up, with a pretty decent score I might add.
     I of course want you to be in the tournament, and as we've said a thousand times, timing is still a way better asset than stamina because you'll win your pick, they win their pick and then you got about a 80% chance of randoming a 9 or 10 for the third song, which you SHOULD win if you have better timing.

My point was 12s should be allowed because most of the tournament entrants, most of whom again for the thousandth time don't post on the forums, and hence I am speaking for, DO play these songs. I'm not even in the standard division. So why do I even give a shit? Because I care about making it fair to the rest of the guys who play, i.e. I care about the community as a whole! Not just making the few veterans who post here happy.

And yes
Unless you have a real physical condition, essentially you CAN do it if you actually work hard at it. Again, it's nothing personal, but if you DO have a condition, or don't have the time or whatever, then don't play competitively! Tournaments are fun but theyre also serious sometimes and mean proving that all your hard work has paid off. Or enter competitions that are more lax, such as the many many DDR tournaments we have. ITG tournaments come once in a long while because Acme doesn't like them, and they should be done right! That means catering to all the entrants, not just the ones on these forums. I am trying to speak for those other entrants. This is by no means any sort of bias, hell if anything I'm probably making it harder for my dear girlfriend to win by vying for 12s. This is not a mean intent here.


I also wanted to address this:      Never once did I say that you aren't welcome if you 'cant pass 12s'. Not once. In fact, I really want all of you here because your venerable history with dance games makes it all the more important that you support such an event. Furthermore, as I've already stated above and a thousand times prior, your having better timing will be a far better asset than these rising players who must rely on stamina to win their pick. Because the last song will PROBABLY favor you. So why is this so offensive to at least ALLOW for these players who are putting in a lot of dedication to get better at the game to play the songs they regularly play? I truly don't understand how these points are so misconstrued as to have people think that their play styles are being 'attacked'. Just understand that I am trying to work for a ruleset that is most representative of the people who play currently in the area and will be participating in the tournament.
     Hell, Suko, Laura, etc. I don't even think you guys are particularly lazy in your inability to pass these songs. It probably is just a product of physical limitations. But we all have to deal with physical limitations. I play almost every day and Keby still can do harder stuff than me. Does that make me lazy? No. Does that mean these hard songs should be disallowed because I can't do them because I'm naturally too short/fat/asthmatic? Also no. Because that wouldnt be fair to cater the rules to my personal limitations.

As the "dear girlfriend," I say bring it anyway. I'll be MORE than happy to win over some guys on stamina songs.

And honey, didn't you say you were going to stay off the forums while you're at work : p

I know God I gotta get back to this BORING SHIT. UGH

See, THIS is the competitiveness I like to see.  Stick it to a 'stamina player' by beating them at what they think they do best, and vice versa. 

This has been at the core of the debate in more ways than one - players who are really having trouble with the 11/12 barrier (*see below), don't necessarily want to tell stamina players that they can't play X or that there's no need to be competitive on X, but it really sucks to have someone pick something that you know firmly from experience that you don't have reason to even try at that point in time.

Stamina players should be proud that they can casually play through 12's, but non-stamina players get kind of resentful that they feel forced to sit out a song (as much as you can try, if you can't pass a 12, a serious attempt at competing on one will mess you up when the tiebreaker shows up).  Things are greatly, greatly exacerbated when certain players respond to non-stamina players' concerns by saying that there's only one way to play the game and tech players are doing it wrong and they just need to do what everyone else does.  The song pack Keby and I added for Sakuracon last year was, by agreement, meant to emphasize the 8-9 range; there are a couple 12's in there - I chose all of them - not one was Keby's - because I thought they were good contributions to the pack that stamina players might appreciate; Keby has a reputation as a stamina player and chose to emphasize easier charts, because he thought our machine catered too much to stamina players.  This was all out of respect for other players' habits, neither of us were trying to say anyone played the "wrong" way and were trying to round out the machine for everyone.

I stopped arguing to block 12's a while ago, but what's coming up now is that players feel like, if allowed, they are guaranteed to be picked against them (and in my experience, they will be), and as much as it is more fair to allow them, it is less fun - for both players - when one player forces the other to sit out; some players are very respectful of this and would actually hold back against non-stamina players - they'd still pick something intense for the other player and that they are sure they will win, but it would be a hard 10 or easy 11, rather than going straight for a 12 - in the spirit of lighthearted competition and sportsmanlike conduct.  However, it has been shown that some players will not hold back, and, as I had noted, one player even admitted his strategy was to cause me injury so that I either couldn't play the rest of the round or, if I tried, then he would be guaranteed a win. That's simply not fun, and that's what I've been speaking out against; it's what Sara was referring to when she said that she wants fun tournaments. We don't want to hang out all day with a bunch of people who seem like they'd happily take a crowbar to your shins if they could get away with it, since it makes a win more likely; we want to hang out with people who want everyone to enjoy themselves.  We don't want to event to be any less competitive as a result, but unfortunately, a balance must be found.

An important concept that keeps getting glazed over is that "sticking it to an X player" goes both ways.  Our last Acme tournament failed miserably in this regard - expert only meant that I had to play on stamina player's terms (11's and 12's were picked against me frequently), but when my knee was starting to give out, I couldn't drop down to an 8 that I knew I'd 99 and that Stamina McDragonforce would likely 96 when his feet kept getting to the arrows half a beat too soon.

To go right to the core of the issue, I am bitter because, last time around, I did hold my own on 11's as 12's as best I could (and did damn well considering how badly I was hurt by the end of the day).  Thankfully Gerrak had brought a friend of his who has sports medicine training - I didn't want to back out, but didn't think I could safely keep playing, and she offered to massage my knee during the break between every single song - so I did keep coming back for more against every player who picked stamina charts against me - sometimes I had to forfeit and make it up in the tiebreaker, sometimes I finished the song, always I tried.  I did what you and Gerrak keep asking, but when I wanted to pick something I knew I would win, I was barred from it.  I wasn't trying to pick a gimmicky custom edit no one had seen, or force crazy mods, or pick a beginner chart - hell, the first round where I knew I needed to be careful picking songs, I wanted to pick a song that was a 9 on Hard, and therefore no easier than the easiest allowable charts, but because it wasn't expert, it wasn't allowed.

I left that tournament feeling extremely bitter because picking a Hard chart in the first round where my knee was acting up would have let me win the round, let me stay in the winner's bracket, skip past the douchebag who wanted to make me hurt myself, and generally have a much more pleasant time.  I made no effort to stop stamina players from being stamina players, but was not allowed to play to my own strengths.  A few other players had wanted to play Hard charts as well (and one did when the organizers weren't looking), and in general, I don't think there would have been any hard feelings on the part of stamina players if I had answered their 12's with an 8.  In general, I don't think for than a couple Hard charts would have been chosen all day, but that was not reason enough to ban them.

I will say, the highlight of the tournament was my round with Mykl; I'll admit, he was pretty out of practice (he had barely played in almost 2 years), but I believe he still holds some of the Acme machine records (including some 12's).  Instead of using a 12 that he still had the record on, he picked a 10 against me: one that I hadn't seen and that I wouldn't have been great at had I practiced it.  Mykl has always been fun to compete with - I walked up there knowing that, even though he knew full well my knee was messed up and I was struggling, he would account for that, pick something that I might actually be able to land a respectable score on and we would both walk away having enjoyed ourselves.  The score was still not close, because he knows how to size up an opponent and pick songs against them, and I had no doubt going in that I was going to lose, but was happy to be given a chance to finish 3% behind him rather than having to walk off half way through.  Even if I wasn't hurt, he would have stomped me on a 12, but he had the respect to aim for both of us having fun than to aim for the most crushing defeat possible.

Middle and high school sports leagues often include a rule that ends the game if one team gets far enough ahead, because it is plainly demoralizing for the losing team to have to keep going when they've fallen that far behind; there was a case about a year ago where a middle school girls' basketball game ended with a score of around 130 to 12; normally, such a game is called with a 40 or 50 point lead, because it's just too one sided, and the winning team felt so bad as to issue a public apology and retroactively forfeit the game; currently tech players feel like stamina players would not only have not called the game early, or apologized afterward for being too caught up in competition, but that they would gloat about it afterward, since stamina is the one true ITG. What possible reason is there to spend time with a person like that?  It's not fun, it's not worth the entry fee, and I almost didn't enter that horrible Acme tournament because I thought it was going to happen to me (and, oh wait, it did in at least one round). Given precedent, banning 12's comes off to many as the only way to ensure good sportsmanship.

The stamina players currently posting give an impression that they would never do such a thing; if they knew they could beat you 90 to 97 on one chart and that you'd forfeit if they picked a different one, they would happily make you forfeit and tell you that you practice the wrong stuff and need to get better and that tech is for fags.  Again, worrying about a crowbar to the shins makes a tournament damn unpleasant.  I don't want to take away stamina players' fun, but I want to protect my own potential for having fun, since, as far as I can tell from the last couple tournaments, I actually need to put effort into enjoying myself around stamina players.  It goes back to the Usain Bolt analogy - I don't think he'd be racing any of us because he felt a need to crush our hopes and dreams; it would be insulting for him to throw the match and I'd be shocked to see that, but I'd be equally shocked to see it end with him taunting his opponent.  Maybe he'd even offer a head start so that he can still run without holding himself back in the slightest but his clearly outclassed opponent gets a chance to see something other than horrific defeat; personally, I'd have a lot more respect for seeing how quickly he caught up to me and then continued past me if I had a slight head start than to have a few of his back for the whole race - hell, I'd keep track of how long it take for him to catch me and see if I could do better in subsequent races. Coddling is insulting, throwing matches is insulting, but neither are necessary for us to have a tournament that doesn't alienate different groups of players.

All that said, the current standard bracket rules are still disrespectful - early rounds bar stamina players from playing on their own terms; later rounds cut out the low range as they open up stamina charts.  I proposed the pick-your-range system to resolve this issue, it basically takes the stories about Stamina McDragonforce preying on a non-stamina player and lets the concerned players protect themselves.  It says explicitly that to compete on higher or lower difficulties, you accept that other players get to do so as well.  It doesn't coddle players by allowing 7's without allowing 12's, but it formalizes the idea that some players will be very put off by really easy or really hard selections and requires players to respect that concern for the players who would be concerned about it.  It also doesn't coddle the stamina players by immunizing them to lower ranking charts - if I allow you a 12, you allow me an 8.  If you truly can't beat a player without leaving the 9-11 range (that almost everyone seems able to agree is valid, the debate has been over what else should be valid), you are not the better player in general - if a hard 11 vs. a 12 will turn the tables that much, you need practice.  I hate that I have to suggest this rule set, because it means that players can't be respectful of one another without the rules forcing them to do so, but it does offer the compromise everyone has been looking for, at least philosophically.

The two bracket system was meant to alleviate the tension , but all it actually does is pull the top players (who are normally competent at both timing and stamina) out and separate the two camps further, because the remaining stamina players in the standard bracket are more often proud of not playing anything "too easy" and the non-stamina players are bitter, since the split was meant to better accommodate them after the last couple ITG tournaments threw them aside.  Having the DDR event is cool and all, but the debate at hand was over holding an ITG event that wasn't so damn elitist, and immediately, Gerrak in particular latched onto the idea that a DDR event means we don't have to worry about about the players excluded by such elitism.  Elitist exclusionism clearly isn't a problem if just we tell the "non-elite" to exclude themselves.  At one point Gerrak had explicitly said that players like Laura, who had been abstaining from ITG events because stamina players were being unnecessarily cutthroat, were meant to be served by the bracket division, and now such players are being told the standard division is not for them, because they aren't good enough to handle cutthroat stamina players.

Entirely separate point: Gerrak, Acme players who do not post here do not factor into this discussion.  If you think they'd be interested in entering, tell them to come here and voice their own opinion.  You do not speak on their behalf.  They may be stamina players, but we have stamina players saying they'd be willing to compromise if it led to better turnout in addition to those who insist on 12's.  Regardless of that, they also plainly have not voiced interest in entering either.  If you cannot accept this, then I will speak on behalf of other potential entrants, including, but not limited to all past entrants of Jerrad's ITG tournaments, which were not as open regarding 12's and received no complaints about this fact.  With that, I now speak on behalf of at least the sum of the people who have voiced interest plus your Acme contingent, and therefore, the fact that tech players will likely side with me means we have majority in all decision making; you can't prove that I don't have this support, just as I can't prove you don't have these silent players' support.  Get them to speak for themselves, or treat them as abstaining, do not make assumptions about what they would want or that they would even enter.

*TANGENT: Admittedly, some of the harder 11's in ITG and a lot of ITG3/Rebirth have helped blur the line, but there is a major break in the style of chart and song when you cross the 11/12 line on the core packs (ITG 1-3 + Rebirth) - think about how Max300 compared to the rest of DDR at that point, there were some charts almost as hard by numbers and style, but the extra 70 steps over the next hardest chart and the ominous nature of the song made it a whole separate challenge.

If nobody enters the tournament under this name, I'M going to do it.

I believe I said this pages ago. If they care so much, have them get their asses in here. The president doesn't win the election because "all those guys who didn't vote really liked him". It's bullshit. It they care, get them to participate, otherwise, they have no right to complain. PERIOD.

Keby should totally do this. While wearing his handlebar mustache.

I looked at most of the 12's on itg1-rebirth and, I don't think I could find a song that didn't have a lot of stream... I couldn't really find any 12's that were easy like !; ! is more technical than stamina.

I was thinking if we could find more songs like this to put on a list to choose from, maybe it would be more fair in the final rounds, except I couldn't find any 12's with more tech than stamina. Then again, 11's are almost just as bad. For example, The Beginning(11), Xuxa(11) , Infection(11), Destiny(11) are almost as tiring as songs like, Dead Souls(12), Disconnected -Delight Mix-(12), and Me and My Lover(12). You might as well put the cap at 12 since most 11's are just as hard. And plus, its in the final round anyways.

I like the "you have to agree on a song" rule since it eliminates players from having to play a song they have little or no chance in passing. It also lets player know and understand not to be a major douche and pick something that' even harder.

Side tangent - The funny thing about level caps to me *and a good amount of players i've discussed this with agree* is that the whole point of the cap isn't just 'How hard is it to pass this?'  But 'How hard is it to 100% this?'  On that line, once stamina stops being a factor, you step difficuties start to change in your mind.

Example - Monolith (11), is harder than Vertex (12).  One False Move (10), is harder than July (11).  Euphoria (12) is harder than Summer (13).

To be fair, Euphoria was a 13 for the first month or two after it went onto the beta machine in 2004, then it was bumped down a notch, because it wasn't as hard as Pandemonium and there was a reference pool of four 12's and a single 13 to compare it against.  10+ ratings were hardly a science back then, and there are still errors, at least around here, the day Monolith Ex was unlocked was the day people starting arguing whether it should be a 12.  The rating system has it's minor issues, but I can't think of any charts that are off by 2 or more, so it contributes some inaccuracy to level caps, but does not completely undermine them or anything like that.

Next time I see Foy, I'll have to ask him if ratings were meant to capture passing difficulty, scoring difficulty, or both - I think I've asked him before, but I just don't remember what he said.  If it so happens that ratings were meant to generally only apply to passing, not to scoring, then any debate about the ratings no longer working after sufficient skill is pointless, because the rating system isn't actually supposed to keep working at that level.

Also, the point of level caps, as they sit in local discussion is a matter of how hard it is to pass a song.  There's no debating that point; somebody said "let's set level caps to keep people who have trouble passing sufficiently hard charts from feeling left out" and then rules were added as a result.  In other situations, there may be other intent, but in this case, the fundamental reason for doing it is exactly what it was constructed to be, so there's no alternate interpretation.  Proof by construction is fun that way.

I see my observations and opinions are not being given any weight here at all, dispite how much I play with these guys and talk and DO try to get them on the forums. I've endlessly encouraged people and been supportive of the community as a whole, but we need to have a reason to get on the forums, and a good tournament provides that reason more than any other source. I had hoped that we could organize a tournament with a very appealing ruleset (and separate divisions) in order to get more people to actually post here and participate in the 'community' as we know it here. Face it, there are like 5 of us arguing here, a small subset of the players as a whole, and for all you all know, there's 3 people who post here who won't play in a 12-cap, but there's 5 people who don't post here who won't play an 11-cap because they feel they'll get dominated by more experienced timing players, and those players may never lend their time to posting on these forums because they weren't ever given a good reason to by means of a tournament that suits their play. This might not be a huge likelihood, but one conveniently overlooked by this "Gerrak doesn't speak for the people, just ignore his opinion" attitude.

Frankly at this point, I've made the statements I needed to make, and you all are now tunnel vision in your opinions. If I am not seen, dispite my extensive credibility on the subject, as attempting to represent the rest of the players that don't post here, then I'm obviously wasting my time. As I said, I'm not even in the standard division, so do whatever you want with the rules and I don't care anymore. I've done nothing but aim for good and fairness and been totally incriminated for it. So thanks

I would really like to see a vote. I know it's hard to track down people who don't post on the forums, but I'd like to know who will be entering and who will NOT enter if the cap is 12 or if the cap is 11. Speculation only does so much. I'm genuinely worried that we're risking cutting the amount of players entering in half, something that would make the tournament much, much more lame. I'm tired of tournaments with only 6 people in them!

I think a vote is well in line with ancsik's post, which is essentially just that without raw numbers, my guess is as good as yours.  Maybe we could set up a poll with three options:

1. I would not enter a tournament with level caps over 11
2. I would not enter a tournament with level caps under 12
3. I would enter either tournament regardless of preference

and then have people vote.  I'm sure some of these new ACME players will create an account in order to vote - the tournament rules are on here and ACME tends to tear down flyers we put up, so if they're going to enter they have to show up here anyway.

Edit: Post 666... apparently this poll is the devil.
Edit 2: I made this poll.

The intent is admirable and I believe we all share it - we all want an appealing tournament, and different things appeal to different people.  I tried to get quantifiable information in the main tournament thread about what would make people enter or not; ideally the rules should be set in a way that attracts as many players as possible (or scares away as few as possible - pick your interpretation, but, semantics aside, the intent is the same). The fact of the matter is that it is unfair to those players that we structure tournaments without their input, but we are not willfully excluding them; if they need incentive, tell them that there's a tournament in the works, and that their input will be gladly accepted regarding levels caps.
 They can have a tournament suited to them if they want it; I will support the majority if no compromise can be reached, though I do want to mention, yet again, that the pick-your-range option exists as a potential compromise which nobody seems to be acknowledging.  Compromise between the two factions will do more for turnout than allowing the majority to do as it pleases.

If the specifics of the tournament are sufficiently important to these players such that they would refuse to enter over the 11/12 capping debate, they need to be accounted for. This tournament can easily suit their play style if it's so important to them, this debate is reason for them to post.  Once the rules are set, they are set and there's no reason for them to post, even if the tournament only allows 12's, because there's no potential for things to be changed.  We can easily set up a poll with 5 options for caps (11 or I won't come, 12 or I won't come, prefer 11, prefer 12, do not have a strong preference) and make it simple and straightforward for them to voice their opinion, completely separated from any of the detailed back and forth arguments in here that might scare them away.

One of my greatest concerns is that, even though you've stressed to these players that there's a discussion which may be the sole deciding factor in whether they enter or not, they are not motivated enough to actually come here and say it.  It honestly leaves me worried that they might not be motivated enough to actually show up to the tournament; they may be willing to say that an 11 cap means they won't enter, but do they promise a 12 cap will ensure they do enter?  Obviously, the scheduling doesn't always work out for everyone and people can't enter as a result, but the players currently arguing for the 11 cap are saying "as long as it is possible for me to be at Acme on the day of the event, I will enter if the cap is 11 and I will refuse to enter regardless if it is a 12" - are the players who can't be convinced to post once on this forum in support of a 12 cap as committed to entering if the rules suit them?  I hate to exclude anyone's opinion, but I do see posting here, even once, as a form of pre-registering for the tournament, given that it is being planned and coordinated in one place and one place only (that place being here).

We could easily post a flier on the machine saying "tournament rules, including level cap, are being discussed and we want input from all interested players, please go to the forums" and see if they respond in the few days before Acme takes it down.


I never said to ignore you - I said that your opinion, like mine, is that of one person and should be treated as such.  Despite the tension, I don't think anyone actually advocates ignoring you, it's just not fair to let you claim that you are more important than any other player because you've assumed the voices of a handful of silent players.  Sara, Laura, and Suko are vocal players and each of them have one opinion as well; they have been expressing theirs and I have been advocating that the stamina players not ignore them, but instead try to accommodate them.  You, Neko, and NIMM are also three players, and I have not been advocating that you three be ignored.  Neko and Laura have been IMing eachother constantly, because they get along fairly well - they just happen to disagree about the level caps, but neither is taking it personally.  Most of the remaining posters have said that it's not so big a deal in the end or that we should do what will be the most inclusive, and, honestly, they are the majority.


The issue with representing someone, is that they should actively choose their representative.  If they explicitly told you to go post on their behalf, so be it, but it still concerns me that they'd have a strong enough opinion to want it expressed, yet not be willing to express it themselves (yes, this sets up a bit of a catch-22 around representing them, it sucks, but it's how I feel and Suko has posted in agreement).

People's opinions exhibit a whole lot of inertia and are essentially locked, and generally have been from the beginning.  I don't expect you to stop wanting the cap to be 12 or for tech players to stop wanting it to be 11; these are personal preferences that would potentially influence enjoyment of the event, and nobody should be that easily convinced of what they like the most.  I encourage both sides to evaluate how much it matters to them that the event fall perfectly in line with their opinion.  Unfortunately, enjoyment is impossible to meaningfully quantify, but the debate is not an attempt to make anyone think that playing a certain way is more fun, but to ask if a rule which would reduce your enjoyment but increase that of others if a justifiable one.  The issue I'm currently trying to resolve is that most discussion have treated wants as necessary, and therefore conflicting wants as irreconcilable unless someone is alienated.  This is not the case.

I'll use a 0 to 10 scale of fun points (FP) - FP are measuring predicted enjoyment solely as a function of the rules - as a really hollow abstraction, since quantifying enjoyment makes little sense:
- If setting the cap at X will cause 3 players to drop from 10 FP to 8, but 3 others to increase from 4 FP to 9, that's justifiable.
- If setting the cap at X will cause 2 players to drop from 9 FP to 2, but 4 other players to increase from 7 FP to 8, that's not jusifiable.
- If setting the cap at X will cause 10 players to drop from 10 FP to 9, but 2 to increase from 3 FP to 10, things are tricky, because you can either alienate two people or tailor the rules to those two.

As it sits now, a few people from each faction are giving the impression the cap would be the difference between 0 and 10 FP for them and would be a singular deciding factor in whether they come or not.  Some people have stood back and said, it'll be at least 8 FP to have this thing in the first place, so do whatever you want".  The third example is tricky, because FP were (intentionally) defined as limited to predictions based on the rules alone; in general we agree than a larger event is inherently more fun, so the players who don't agree with the rule change may enjoy the event equally (or even more) by allowing it, or maybe they would enjoy it a little less, as predicted by FP, but on average across all applicable players, things would probably be better off for it even in that worst case.  

I'm not trying to tell anyone how they should play or what they should advocate in terms of rules, but I am asking people to think of more than themselves when factoring their preferences against the rules.  If setting the cap at 11 is such a big deal that it would completely ruin the tournament for someone, they deserve the same consideration that Sara, Suko, and Laura deserve when they say the same about setting it at 12.  And I will stress yet again, that there is such a thing as compromise, the cap does not have to be a binary debate between 11 and 12.

Oh, Gerrak, I have one final point to hopefully aid in you understanding the general feelings everyone has had.  Those Acme players who are worried about how badly they would do without 12's?  I could easily say that the game ranks by timing, and therefore they should just go learn to play better and train on the 9-11 range if they want to have a chance; I could say it just as easily as you tell tech players to train some stamina.  Instead, I am advocating that we listen to them if they tell us it's that big of an issue.  I would be appalled if Sara, Suko, or Laura said that we should just ignore their opinions, if these players were to post them; I would tackle such posts just as hard as I've tackled yours.  We all play this game and we all want to enjoy the tournament - none of us are out to ruin it for anyone else and differing opinions should never be taken personally.

NOTE: Laura apparently beat me to the poll idea, but it's important to encourage the silent Acme players to come and vote at a minimum (hopefully, they would be willing to post more detail).  Personally, I'm voting for the prefer 11's option, since, despite my preferences, I would not skip the tournament solely because the level cap was set in the wrong place.  People on both sides have been very resistant to admit that this is a possibility - maybe for some it's not, but I doubt it's that critical to every person who claims that it is.  If there are enough issues with different rules to the point that I thought it wasn't worth my time and effort, that would be different, but this is one rule that may cause me to enjoy the event a little less and nothing more.

Seriously, this is too true. This is what pissed me off so much about Gerrack's post in the tournament thread. I removed my response because the internet doesn't need more idiots flaming each other on forums, but none of the tech players have argued that these ACME players "suck" and that they should just get better at their accuracy. On the contrary, we've been trying to find a balanced medium the both of us can enjoy.

Like Tricksy, I was extremely turned off by Gerrak's defensive and antagonistic attitude during the "discussions". This is what made me decide not to enter. I enjoy playing the game and socializing with the community, but not enough to deal with crap attitudes like the ones he was spewing out. 12's or not, that has ruined my desires to participate in the event.

@Gerrak and any other 'stamina player' - Maybe i'm just more competitive than most, but I stand by the logic of 'Don't like the logic?  Beat them at it.'  Like, as stated i'd personally prefer an open expert only tournament, in that that's generally what I play.  But EVEN IN EXPERT, if I end up playing against someone that is like 'I can't play 12s.  Mind if we keep it to 11s?' ..then that isn't too farfetched for me to agree to.  If i'm the better player that I think I am, i'll beat you on a wide range of 9-11s, rather than you feel you could have beaten me if we'd have stayed in your range.  Whereas, if anyone wants a stamina battle with me, then okay bring on the 12+s and get wrecked.  In addition to being the 'uncontested' winner if you can pull it off, you become a much more well rounded player when you train up to actually be able to pull it off.

If / when the community grows and starts getting better, these are things you'll almost have to accept when competing in expert divisions that aren't just 6 people.  This goes back to ancsik's original getting a 12 picked on them because it was a free win and could hurt him, or Laura getting a 1st round stamina song.'  Viable tactic, yes.  Necessary for the win?  No.  Making yourself any friends along the way?  Definitely not.  I mean, everyone generally loves everyone and not too many enemies are being made, but I don't have much against attempting to beat anyone at their own game within reason....If your own game is 1s on beginner, then this is obviously exempt.

tldr:
There's plenty to gain at going for beating everyone at their own game.

@Neko, that's more or less the goal I've stated in my own posts.  Some players have shown themselves to be quite willing to skip the no-holds-barred beatdown yielded by picking a 12 against those who simply can't handle them, some have gone ahead and done it for the sure thing.  In general, those who choose to do so are not very well balanced players and feel it necessary, but that is not exclusively the case, and it does breed ill will out of an event intended to be enjoyable when done unnecessarily.

I've said time and again, the goal of this tournament should be making people - a lot of them - want to come back and try again, so that we can hopefully get Acme to agree to tournaments more often and maybe revive our tournament scene.  Banning 12's may keep some players from walking away and not looking back and it may cause others to do just that.  I would love to trust in the players to not be unnecessarily cutthroat so that the point could be moot, but I've been let down before and having people say so strongly that I need to focus on stamina and only stamina tells me I can expect to be hit with 12's constantly, since that's the sure thing are players are going to be cutthroat about it, and I am not going to enjoy myself.

I don't want to deny stamina players their half of the game, since then they won't enjoy the tournament as much, but there is a lot of emphasis on how players can't win unless they can pick certain things, which means we're marching onward to a cutthroat tournament.

High entry fee aside (since that's a separate debate), if I qualify for the expert bracket (and let's be honest, it's not that unlikely unless a lot of unexpected people show up), I do plan on entering it rather than dropping down.  I've been looking forward to a rematch with Keby, because our match at Sakuracon was one of the most fun ITG matches I've had, and a rematch with NSX, because, even if he does pick a 12 against me (which I'm not fully sure he'd do), we are way too evenly matched in general (as evidenced by back-to back ties at the Narrows SN tournament), and Neko is steadily sounding like less of a stamina elitist and more like someone I will be hard pressed to net a single win against without watching him closely all day long - tournaments are about strategy as much as skill for me.

However, I don't like that, without revision, I have to leave myself open to stamina charts when I won't be able to pull players down to a low-margin battle on a tricky hard chart.  Additionally, I get the feeling that the remaining two slots will not yield such lighthearted matches, but overall, it will be preferable to whatever the standard bracket ends up being if the two factions don't become more cooperative.

Would it be possible to set the cap at 11 but allow 12's and above if both players mutually agree to it? This would stop the forceful picking of a very hard song on someone who isn't comfortable playing it, but would allow two people to play whatever song they wish if they feel stamina is their specialty.

I'm not running the tournament, but if I was, this rule would be in place.  I think that if two players agree on something that doesn't take extra time/resources, it should be allowed, no questions asked.