Editorial: Top Player Privilege Has To Stop

[Freezie KO]

Welcome to the real world. Big time athletes get away with murder because they bring in the ratings. What's being late compared to that? These pro players are the ones that bring in the viewers. They ARE more important. Nobody is watching the stream to pay attention to Random Average Gamer #477.

Yeah, it sucks if 477 has to play Mango in their first round of Losers, but (a) that person got sent to Loser's in the first place and (b) they weren't going to win anyway.

The point of a tournament is not just to please the local average gamer. It's to find out the best player on that day while entertaining the fans and viewers. Full DQ's do neither of those things.

 

[ph00tbag]

Some people think they should have been fully DQ'd like from losers as well.

But that has nothing to do with "top player privilege" (whatever the hell that is). That's a matter of determining the best balance of consequence with the severity of the transgression. If a bottom seed was late for their match-up against a top seed, is DQ'd, and wins their LB1 match, then the results are not realistically skewed, because they probably would have lost their WB1 match anyway, but they are still punished for tardiness. On th other hand, if they are double DQ'd, then the results are skewed, and the bottom seed player gets screwed. This is the scenario that countervails the single DQ'd top player scenario. If you really give a damn about lower seeds, then you'll consider the impact of a rule equally applied on any player.

In addition, the main impetus for forfeiture being a consequence of tardiness is simple pragmatism. If the DQ occurs after around ten minutes, it's highly likely that time will, in fact, be saved, and the LB match can be played ahead of schedule. It doesn't need to be skipped because on balance no time has been lost.

The only downside I see here is abuse for collusion purposes. But you'd have to be an idiot to intentionally deprive yourself of a WB run just for the easier run through the first few LB rounds.

Double DQ is unnecessary, unjust, and frankly irrational. I'm baffled I need to spell this out. I sense that most of the backlash here is from people who have simply never been involved in running an actual bracket.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

But that has nothing to do with "top player privilege" (whatever the hell that is). That's a matter of determining the best balance of consequence with the severity of the transgression. If a bottom seed was late for their match-up against a top seed, is DQ'd, and wins their LB1 match, then the results are not realistically skewed, because they probably would have lost their WB1 match anyway, but they are still punished for tardiness. On th other hand, if they are double DQ'd, then the results are skewed, and the bottom seed player gets screwed. This is the scenario that countervails the single DQ'd top player scenario. If you really give a damn about lower seeds, then you'll consider the impact of a rule equally applied on any player.

In addition, the main impetus for forfeiture being a consequence of tardiness is simple pragmatism. If the DQ occurs after around ten minutes, it's highly likely that time will, in fact, be saved, and the LB match can be played ahead of schedule. It doesn't need to be skipped because on balance no time has been lost.

The only downside I see here is abuse for collusion purposes. But you'd have to be an idiot to intentionally deprive yourself of a WB run just for the easier run through the first few LB rounds.

Double DQ is unnecessary, unjust, and frankly irrational. I'm baffled I need to spell this out. I sense that most of the backlash here is from people who have simply never been involved in running an actual bracket.

People think because they were top players they only got DQ'd to losers where as others might have been DQ'd entirely if not a pro player, just something people think about this.

 

[-LzR-]

The point of a tournament is not just to please the local average gamer. It's to find out the best player on that day while entertaining the fans and viewers. Full DQ's do neither of those things.

No, the point of a tournament is competition and having fun playing Smash. Twitch has ruined competitive gaming, now it's all about whoring views instead of being just Smash tournaments. Having a stream is always a great addition to a tournament but it should never take priority over anything else.

 

[SpandexBullets]

Man we've had some serious discrimination going on in the community as of late. First that, which I'm going to assume all of us remember, and now this.

What's next? The smashers with autism and severe social disabilities get discriminated against when just trying to play Smash? Yeah, why not just make it high school all over again? (sacasitally speaking, and I know that's not going to happen)

I do agree with this. I shouldn't care who you are, you're too late, you f**ked up. that's all.

Nah, its unfortunately just women.
Like, go on vgbootcamp and look up any video that features a female smasher, then look at the comments. UUUURGGHHH-

I've seen a lot of children on the autism spectrum really enjoy Smash games at local cons, and I'm really glad the much of the community totally accepts them without making unnecessary references to their condition.

That's a great thing, having grown up with such a condition, I think it's kind of amazing. But we need to stomp the sexism out, it's totally dormant and almost totally unquestioned. Shouldn't exist in any form.

To be fair, D1 and especially Prog are some of the higher-ups trying to make everyone aware of it.
But it takes just a few assholes at local cons to ruin everything.

 

[the muted smasher]

Why was this made news, sounds like the TO handled it well maybe sent them to losers after 30 minutes instead but I don't think they said it run unreasonably late or anything.

Making things fair for fairness sake isn't fair. XD bro these band wagons are non sense

 

[Staticky]

Wow, people don't understand this situation at all. The "all players should be equal" thing is really dumb. These players are the players put on the posters for these tournaments, it's not a local tournament, its an event. The TO's want hype and a big audience, not slightly larger version of a regular local. Without these players, there's no icing on the cake whatsover. You don't buy a Pay-Per-View to watch the lesser boxers box, you buy it for the damn Mayweather fight.

 

[Bismo Funyuns]

@ LiteralGrill you provide absolutely no evidence that a lower leveled player would have been fully DQed, while many people with expertise in a tournament setting provide evidence that they would NOT have been DQed. That alone makes this whole article a load of major BS, since there was NO TOP PLAYER PRIVILEGE. A moderator (Strong Bad) and a top player (ESAM) already struck down your argument, making it entirely null and void.

 

[LiteralGrill]

I think it's time for the longest post I've ever made, woohoo lets go! CRTL + F your name if you need to.

Can't tell you how many tournaments I've been to where I had to wait up to an hour for "special" players to show up before the tournament could begin, even with 100+ waiting in bracket. It's disgusting.

You aren't the only person I've heard these kind of things from, kind of the reason I wrote this article. I also saw a lot of people unhappy with how the event turned out for similar reasons, which is another big reason for writing this. Over 100 likes, this is probably the most popular thing I've ever written too so this must be bothering people. But now to the tougher stuff.

@Johnknight1 knows his ****.
The rule of thumb for double elimination tournaments is if an opponent does not show up, they are sent to the loser's bracket. If they do not show up for losers, they are eliminated.
45 minutes is a bit much, but the TOs did the right thing. You want to see a player abusing his status, look at Wolfkrone at Final Round 15.

This article makes me question if SmashCapps attends the tournaments he writes about.

Not only have I attended many events, I've TOd many events even outside of the Smash community. I get how tournaments run I promise. The real issue is 45 minutes IS a bit much. Yes it didn't hold up the bracket at that time, but no other player up to that point in bracket would have gotten 45 minutes to get to a match in winners bracket, with 45 minutes it's very likely other players would have just kept losing/been eliminated.

My apologies, I was under the impression that there was preferential treatment in this regard considering the article. I had no idea that DQ to loser's was the standard

Depends on the tournament, Apex as an example ran a rull DQ after being 5 minutes late. Scary strict right?

Wait... I'm really confused. A TO single DQs highly seeded players for showing up late to their WB matches, which is a move he would make for any player in such a situation. Thus, he showed that absolutely no one is above the consequences of tardiness.

And this is a display of favoritism? Can someone please explain the logic of this to me?

I'll just copy/paste it: The real issue is 45 minutes IS a bit much. Yes it didn't hold up the bracket at that time, but no other player up to that point in bracket would have gotten 45 minutes to get to a match in winners bracket, with 45 minutes it's very likely other players would have just kept losing/been eliminated. I really wrote on this because I was seeing some players expressing how they found that to be crappy, and I didn't much care for it either.

Wow, people don't understand this situation at all. The "all players should be equal" thing is really dumb. These players are the players put on the posters for these tournaments, it's not a local tournament, its an event. The TO's want hype and a big audience, not slightly larger version of a regular local. Without these players, there's no icing on the cake whatsover. You don't buy a Pay-Per-View to watch the lesser boxers box, you buy it for the damn Mayweather fight.

Why was this made news, sounds like the TO handled it well maybe sent them to losers after 30 minutes instead but I don't think they said it run unreasonably late or anything.

Making things fair for fairness sake isn't fair. XD bro these band wagons are non sense

Without all of the players in the middle, these guys don't GET to have a reason to travel. These guys make the prize pools exist, make it so sponsors WANT to give money to events, and a bunch more. Tournaments should be made for the player, not for the viewers. Though usually if it IS for the player the viewers come in naturally.

I get the idea, but I disagree. If you aren't present for a match, you should get dq'd from that match, whether you are top level, mid level, low level, or a casual. But if you are there for the loser's match, then you've already suffered the punishment you deserve, you should get to play. If the bracket has moved on, and you not being there is preventing other matches from being played, of course dq them. But mango showed up during the first round of losers,so its not like there were other matches being held up.

If they hadn't waited the 45, there is a really solid chance they WOULD have held up loser's bracket. This is the issue, no other player during the event would have been waited on THAT long without any contact for being late, yet these guys were. Yes they were sent to loser's bracket which is at least admirable over staying in winners, but they probably shouldn't have been able to get there in the first place.

@ LiteralGrill you provide absolutely no evidence that a lower leveled player would have been fully DQed, while many people with expertise in a tournament setting provide evidence that they would NOT have been DQed. That alone makes this whole article a load of major BS, since there was NO TOP PLAYER PRIVILEGE. A moderator (Strong Bad) and a top player (ESAM) already struck down your argument, making it entirely null and void.

I'll be fair and say I missed ESAM's response somehow, not sure how but still I can respond to that in a minute. But I think I still raised fair points with Strong Bad. It seems there was no solid rules for how DQs worked at the tournament, and from reading this thread it seems like people don't know of even a semi standard ruling on this. Without any kind of rule to work with that's equal across the board its going to severely increase the chances of bias in rulings. While it may not seem like much, I doubt any of the players before the pro brackets would have gotten 45 minutes before they were sent to losers at all, if these three guys had done this during day 1 brackets people being strapped for time would have had to throw em out of winners AND losers more than likely.

I just hope specifically that the end of your response wasn't saying "because a moderator and top players said you're wrong you're wrong for sure". That'd just show the issue exists moreso. Heck, ESAM's version of how players get DQd vs Strong Bad's was different even, just again highlighting some of these issues.

But....most TOs won't fully DQ people who made it into the pro bracket. People typically are given 20-25 minutes each unless they are like REALLY HOLDING UP THE BRACKET (which wasn't happening in this case becasue everything was BO5). I know when I run tournaments I never double DQ anyone unless they specifically tell me "I'm leaving" or "DQ me i don't want to play"

From what I've seen here, it seems like TOs all have totally different rules and nobody really agrees how it's done.
That's an issue in and of itself, but another issue comes in when you specifically mention a "pro bracket." But I'll get there in a second.

If it were anyone else at the TOP 32 of a NATIONAL, even if it were more unknown players like Matt or Rookie, MacD would've done the SAME THING because they deserved it. This wasn't Day 1 Pools, this wasn't Round 1 Doubles. It was the Top 32 bracket.

At least get upset about things that actually deserve to get upset about...

One of the reasons I wrote this is because I saw plenty of people upset about the situation and from the response this article has gotten it seems plenty enough people have had experiences where top players have gotten special treatment and it bothers them.

But beyond the players being better, why is it the Top 32 players of a national get to have more time to get to their matches than all of the other players who had been playing since day 1? Most of what I have seen basically involved viewership and such prioritizing it over the people playing at the event. I get that we want to see top players, and that even higher up players want a chance to play the pros to test their own skill or maybe be involved in the epic upset, but it's still showing average folks that once you hit a certain point of skill level you'll get different or special treatment than others.

This tournament is only one example of MANY however, and made it quite the topical time to address the topic. There are probably much worse moments where top players really did get some unfair special treatment, I know MacD once gave a player special seeding when they promised to use secondary characters, and then they didn't and nothing happened. That kind of seeding never should have happened in the first place... In fact that whole story is just plain yuck. Maybe MVG where Axe and M2K were able to enter more events than they should have, though maybe even then it was also sponsor privilege too? These are more recent, but there's plenty to find and I even linked another in the article. This IS a probloem that needs to be adressed, as it seems obvious enough that these little things are getting under some players skins.

 

[Muster]

If they hadn't waited the 45, there is a really solid chance they WOULD have held up loser's bracket. This is the issue, no other player during the event would have been waited on THAT long without any contact for being late, yet these guys were. Yes they were sent to loser's bracket which is at least admirable over staying in winners, but they probably shouldn't have been able to get there in the first place.

Just read through the thread again and this was posted page 2

Additionally the 3 DQ'd players (S2J, HAx, and Mango) didn't hold up loser's when they were sent to loser's bracket. Winner's bracket had so many matches and so many BO5's that them not showing up wasn't a problem at all. Loser's bracket was still running faster than winner's bracket without them being there.

And on the Apex ruleset with punishing tardiness, this is a vastly different setting and intensity of tournament, taking place, again, on MOTHERS DAY.

 

[futilejoyrider]

Nobody got any special privileges that anyone else got in regards to DQ's at Press Start. Everyone was treated fairly in regards to DQ'ing.

And they were treated equally at Press Start.

MacD never fully disqualifies people on the first DQ from winner's bracket. He only does that when they hold up losers' bracket, which neither Hax, Mango, or S2J did.

They weren't late for their Loser's Bracket matches, so that wasn't an issue. If they were, MacD would have DQ'd them again, this time from the entire tournament.

Neither Mango, S2J, or Hax$ were late enough to hold up the Loser's Bracket. They were on time or early for those matches.

There was ZERO top player privilege here, unless MacD also granting this sort of DQ policy privilege to everyone else is "top player privilege."

Mango (as well as Hax and S2J, all of whom were DQ'd from Winner's Bracket Round 1 to Loser's Bracket) did not hold up Loser's Bracket, so they weren't DQ'd from Loser's. There was no privilege shown there, and it was consistent with the way MacD always DQ.

Thanks for really clearing this up for the people, man. Even though you said the same thing in this post multiple times, it was nice to specifically address everyone's comment on the issue. And for the issue itself, I really don't think that there is really much of an issue... just hysteria. MacD seems to have done the right thing as a TO with respect to everyone, including the players and the viewers.

 

[Dylan_Tnga]

Another good thing about the "average player", is that, nobody is born an immediate pro, you have to get there, which means that even the likes of Mew2King/Zer0 started off as average players. It is through practice, patience, endurance, and determination that you become a "top player" (and this applies to everything, not just Smash).

I wouldn't call Zero a TOP level player dude. Sorry to nitpick but he is not among the great smash players. He is highly above average, but nowhere near the level of m2k or even someone lower on the national PR like Wessballz or Axe.
Back on topic :

Nobody deserves special privilege, however I think if the person is late and winners bracket already started... it's fair to give them a chance in losers bracket (as long as they're not WAY too late)

All the Drama over this is stupid, everyone is stating the obvious.

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

I wouldn't call Zero a TOP level player dude. Sorry to nitpick but he is not among the great smash players. He is highly above average, but nowhere near the level of m2k or even someone lower on the national PR like Wessballz or Axe.
Back on topic :

Nobody deserves special privilege, however I think if the person is late and winners bracket already started... it's fair to give them a chance in losers bracket (as long as they're not WAY too late)

All the Drama over this is stupid, everyone is stating the obvious.

Considering how he wins pretty much every thing in Smash 4, did almost the same in Brawl and was pretty well off in PM I would call him a top level player.

Melee is the ? for him there, idk how well he does in that.

 

[ph00tbag]

I'll just copy/paste it: The real issue is 45 minutes IS a bit much. Yes it didn't hold up the bracket at that time, but no other player up to that point in bracket would have gotten 45 minutes to get to a match in winners bracket, with 45 minutes it's very likely other players would have just kept losing/been eliminated. I really wrote on this because I was seeing some players expressing how they found that to be crappy, and I didn't much care for it either.

Again. Pragmatism. I've done the same thing at locals with more players, for tags I've never seen before. Reprioritize the matches that are being played on the available set-ups. After a point, it makes more sense to DQ someone, sure. But until it's a problem, you're not late. It's as simple as that.

You made some kind of positively worded comment elsewhere in this post about Apex being really strict, and I'm going to stop you right there: Apex is not widely considered a well-run tournament series, by any stretch. Looking to them as a paragon of organization is dubious.

 

[Dylan_Tnga]

I would agree with you were he winning PM tournaments. Winning smash 4 / Brawl doesn't make you a top player IMO..

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

I would agree with you were he winning PM tournaments. Winning smash 4 / Brawl doesn't make you a top player IMO..

He was when he was focused on it.

And Yes it does. Otherwise you're really just showing your bias for other games in the series.

You not liking them =/= players aren't top level players in other series.

Zero is a top level player, period.

 

[LiteralGrill]

Again. Pragmatism. I've done the same thing at locals with more players, for tags I've never seen before. Reprioritize the matches that are being played on the available set-ups. After a point, it makes more sense to DQ someone, sure. But until it's a problem, you're not late. It's as simple as that.

Not all TOs share the same feelings I guess, this thread alone has shown lots of people and places do things very dirrerently. The tournament here didn't even list what its rules were involving tardiness unless they intended to use the Apex rule for it too which does seem unlikely.

You made some kind of positively worded comment elsewhere in this post about Apex being really strict, and I'm going to stop you right there: Apex is not widely considered a well-run tournament series, by any stretch. Looking to them as a paragon of organization is dubious.[/quote]

What I said about Apex is that their rule is 5 minutes and total DQ, yes I know I have heard many things about how that series has been run over the years. The reason I mentioned them was that the rules linked to the tournament with the Apex rules, though it seems likely they only did this for the Melee portion of things, it's the only other place you could even try to find a DQ rule for the tournament.

 

[PurpleDolphin]

People dont seem to realize putting a top player in losers completely messes up the results and is an overall negative thing. If a player is late, no matter what, a TO should be professional and completely DQ them. If not, you are basically telling top player who could make it back through losers that it is ok to be late because they can win anyways. If you look at the people who normally would have lost because of the top players in winners that move on, results get skewered and people aren't getting payouts they might have normally get and rankings also get messed up. Look at the Grand Finals for Press Start. Fly Amanita was absolutely destroyed by Mango, and I think that Mango, Hax$, and S2J's DQ to losers was a part of that.

 

[ssknight7]

Losers implied they lost, which they didn't, they actually failed to attend.

Losers implied they failed to win, which they did. Society is starting to implode with the everyone is equal bs.

 

[Dylan_Tnga]

Losers implied they failed to win, which they did. Society is starting to implode with the everyone is equal bs.

"All Animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others..."

- Animal Farm

The problem isn't the "everyone is equal" mentality...

The problem is people seem to think that it matters if they are offended by something, and that they have the right to gang up and witchhunt the party that offended them.

By not allowing people to express their opinions that you DON'T like, and yes this includes hateful opinions, you are killing free thought and helping humanity move towards more of a "hive mind" which if you browse reddit, is a very scary reality of modern society in the internet age.

 

[Effay]

Yeah, no.
First, I'd like to say that I spend five days a week in a public school and that my opinion should largely be ignored because I am a minor.
Second, wouldn't any lower-level player still have to beat everyone else in the bracket to even get to the final rounds?
Third, when you spend a lot of time in a public school and, like me, are near the bottom in social status, you tend to be able to notice things while people don't know you are there. Everyone tends to favor the popular kids, who are mostly jocks (that is, people who are better at a game than others). The jocks at my school actually have a running joke where, at the end of the year, they pretend to be friends with a "bottom feeder" like me and laugh about it with each other. There is no way that teachers didn't notice this, students treating each other as less than human, playing with their "inferiors'" emotions.
Oh, wait I forgot: this is the Internet and nobody cares.
The point is that I heard those jocks in that comment. What is wrong with treating everyone equally? Giving someone priviliges--because they're really good at a game?
With what I've experienced, I would be more than happy to see "equal" for a change.

*Uses self-inferiority in school as argument in comparison to a Smash tourney*

 

[ph00tbag]

What I said about Apex is that their rule is 5 minutes and total DQ, yes I know I have heard many things about how that series has been run over the years. The reason I mentioned them was that the rules linked to the tournament with the Apex rules, though it seems likely they only did this for the Melee portion of things, it's the only other place you could even try to find a DQ rule for the tournament.

So then is the problem lack of clarity? I mean, it's a problem, but that's not the impression I got from the title of the op-ed. I assumed we were arguing about top player privilege. If it's lack of clarity we're talking about, then an opinion piece is hardly worth the keystrokes. No one would disagree with that.

 

[LiteralGrill]

So then is the problem lack of clarity? I mean, it's a problem, but that's not the impression I got from the title of the op-ed. I assumed we were arguing about top player privilege. If it's lack of clarity we're talking about, then an opinion piece is hardly worth the keystrokes. No one would disagree with that.

Well the lack of clarity probably helped lead up to the problem, but it's not the only issue. Again, the fact that mid bracket 45 minutes is unlikely to be waited on for the average player but is allowed for the top players. This was just one instance recently I saw people rumbling about, I did include a reference to another event as well and these sorts of small things happen in various events often enough for the general populace to notice. This just seemed like a good topical time to bring it up.

 

[ssknight7]

"All Animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others..."

- Animal Farm

The problem isn't the "everyone is equal" mentality...

The problem is people seem to think that it matters if they are offended by something, and that they have the right to gang up and witchhunt the party that offended them.

By not allowing people to express their opinions that you DON'T like, and yes this includes hateful opinions, you are killing free thought and helping humanity move towards more of a "hive mind" which if you browse reddit, is a very scary reality of modern society in the internet age.

Not everyone is equal, therefore the "everyone is equal" mentality is a problem.

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

One of the reasons I wrote this is because I saw plenty of people upset about the situation and from the response this article has gotten it seems plenty enough people have had experiences where top players have gotten special treatment and it bothers them.

Right, but it happening in the past is not equivalent to it happening recently. It really hasn't. MacD did the CORRECT thing and you are blasting him for it and essentially slandering his name and his tournaments because...other people got upset at DIFFERENT scenarios where top player privilege was a thing (Which it has been historically)

But beyond the players being better, why is it the Top 32 players of a national get to have more time to get to their matches than all of the other players who had been playing since day 1? Most of what I have seen basically involved viewership and such prioritizing it over the people playing at the event. I get that we want to see top players, and that even higher up players want a chance to play the pros to test their own skill or maybe be involved in the epic upset, but it's still showing average folks that once you hit a certain point of skill level you'll get different or special treatment than others.

Why do people that place top 3 get paid? Why not pay everyone? Why are the people that make it far treated better?

Oh wait, it's because the earned it. Again, they literally held nothing up for the tournament. If they did and they weren't DQ'd, THAT would be pro player privilege, not what happened, which is GET ****ING PUNISHED FOR BEING LATE! We didn't even see hax/s2j on stream and Mango was literally on stream only from Leffen's match on (which was a 9th place battle). They weren't prioritized because the stream wanted to happen, it was already PLANNED to happen this way and have a bunch of time. Spoilers: There was good TOing at foot. I typically am not a fan of prioritizing stream over the tournament, but this was done in a way where both the tournament and the viewers had maximum efficiency and the tournament ended at something like 9PM-10PM PST, which is pretty damn early for a tournament that started at ~noon PST, streamed most of winner's bracket, most of doubles top 16, and ALL of singles top 8 in one day.

You are literally complaining about MacD planning so far ahead in advance that he gave his players time, which is a GREAT asset to a tournament, by the way. It's actually really irritating being so stressed for time at a tournament you feel like you can't even walk to the bathroom or get a snack from a vending machine without missing your matches. He did an AWESOME job TOing and you aren't giving him ANY credit.

This tournament is only one example of MANY however, and made it quite the topical time to address the topic. There are probably much worse moments where top players really did get some unfair special treatment, I know MacD once gave a player special seeding when they promised to use secondary characters, and then they didn't and nothing happened. That kind of seeding never should have happened in the first place... In fact that whole story is just plain yuck. Maybe MVG where Axe and M2K were able to enter more events than they should have, though maybe even then it was also sponsor privilege too? These are more recent, but there's plenty to find and I even linked another in the article. This IS a probloem that needs to be adressed, as it seems obvious enough that these little things are getting under some players skins.

But there wasn't even anything that was privileged here. THEY GOT IN TROUBLE BY BEING DQ'D FROM WINNERS BRACKET!!! There are NO TOURNAMENTS ANYWHERE that straight up DQ people from entire brackets besides like super early R1 pools because getting thrown off-schedule there ****s up the ENTIRE REST OF THE TOURNAMENT. It's like you aren't getting that point.

Yes, pro-player privilege is a problem in the community in general, but this was an example of "I don't care if you are Mango, you are getting DQ'd because you didn't follow my rules." He did the correct thing in this case and you are ****ting on him for it.

There is nothing privileged about what happened, there is nothing even remotely wrong with what happened. For people complaining that "It messed up the bracket" tough ****, if you make it that far you should be prepared to fight ANYONE and EVERYONE at that tournament, no johns if you lose.

 

[[FBC] ESAM]

People dont seem to realize putting a top player in losers completely messes up the results and is an overall negative thing. If a player is late, no matter what, a TO should be professional and completely DQ them. If not, you are basically telling top player who could make it back through losers that it is ok to be late because they can win anyways. If you look at the people who normally would have lost because of the top players in winners that move on, results get skewered and people aren't getting payouts they might have normally get and rankings also get messed up. Look at the Grand Finals for Press Start. Fly Amanita was absolutely destroyed by Mango, and I think that Mango, Hax$, and S2J's DQ to losers was a part of that.

But this wouldn't happen for people attending their first tournament, why would it happen for established players? You are acting like DQing completely is the standard when it hardly ever ever happens....like ever. I'm not sure if you realize it but Mango had a ****ING RIDICULOUSLY HARD BRACKET and he DESERVES to win after traversing it. HE had to win 10 sets or so while someone like Fly had to win...4-5.

Nobody ever gets DQ'd fully from tournaments, why would pro players be different? I REPEAT: NOBODY EVER GETS DQ'D FULLY FROM TOURNAMENTS FOR BEING AN ACCEPTABLE AMOUNT OF LATE!!!!!! It sounds like you want the opposite of pro-player privilege by DQ'ing them even though no other players would be DQ'd in that circumstance.

 

[Bismo Funyuns]

My philosophy on DQs for time constraints is not that players should be DQed not for not doing exactly what TOs told them, but for disobeying orders and adversely affecting the pace of the tournament. Mango, Hax, and S2J held up winners bracket, thus DQ. If they didn't hold up losers bracket, why the **** should we care that they were allowed to play in it. They didn't negatively affect the pace of the loser's bracket, so they did no harm by playing in it.

 

[Sur Fartsalot]

This reminds me so much of whats happening in Baltimore. Just unfair.

 

[Deleted member]

I wouldn't call Zero a TOP level player dude. Sorry to nitpick but he is not among the great smash players. He is highly above average, but nowhere near the level of m2k or even someone lower on the national PR like Wessballz or Axe.

I don't really pay attention to things of this caliber. I just slap down some well-known names onto a post and call it a day. Although, anyone besides from me who's brave enough to pursuit their opponent offstage with Mewtwo (as opposed to noobguarding) already earns my respect.

 

[Diltune]

Project M at Paragon had to be postponed almost 6 hours because Mew2King was late and I had to play him in Round Robin. :/

 

[Bismo Funyuns]

Project M at Paragon had to be postponed almost 6 hours because Mew2King was late and I had to play him in Round Robin. :/

THAT is top player privilege. What happened at Press Start has precedent in MacD's TOing style and was NOT biased towards top players.

 

[PurpleDolphin]

But this wouldn't happen for people attending their first tournament, why would it happen for established players? You are acting like DQing completely is the standard when it hardly ever ever happens....like ever. I'm not sure if you realize it but Mango had a ****ING RIDICULOUSLY HARD BRACKET and he DESERVES to win after traversing it. HE had to win 10 sets or so while someone like Fly had to win...4-5.

Nobody ever gets DQ'd fully from tournaments, why would pro players be different? I REPEAT: NOBODY EVER GETS DQ'D FULLY FROM TOURNAMENTS FOR BEING AN ACCEPTABLE AMOUNT OF LATE!!!!!! It sounds like you want the opposite of pro-player privilege by DQ'ing them even though no other players would be DQ'd in that circumstance.

Your response makes a whole lot more sense then mine, and looking back at it, what I said was flawed. Thanks for making me realize that, and next time Ill think twice about my argument and what Im posting.

Edited for double quote

 

[SuperAtrain]

People supporting this shows that the Smash Community a strong, developing, and beautiful one. This post is great, and all of its supporters are, too. Smash 4ever!!!

 

[#HBC | Red Ryu]

Project M at Paragon had to be postponed almost 6 hours because Mew2King was late and I had to play him in Round Robin. :/

Something like this is an example of clear to player privilege.

 

[ph00tbag]

Well the lack of clarity probably helped lead up to the problem, but it's not the only issue. Again, the fact that mid bracket 45 minutes is unlikely to be waited on for the average player but is allowed for the top players. This was just one instance recently I saw people rumbling about, I did include a reference to another event as well and these sorts of small things happen in various events often enough for the general populace to notice. This just seemed like a good topical time to bring it up.

So, it's based on speculation and an anecdote. I'm sorry, were we trying to have a fact-driven discussion here or are we just talking about feelings. I get the sense I may have stepped into the wrong conversation.

 

[Thor]

But this wouldn't happen for people attending their first tournament, why would it happen for established players? You are acting like DQing completely is the standard when it hardly ever ever happens....like ever. I'm not sure if you realize it but Mango had a ****ING RIDICULOUSLY HARD BRACKET and he DESERVES to win after traversing it. HE had to win 10 sets or so while someone like Fly had to win...4-5.

Nobody ever gets DQ'd fully from tournaments, why would pro players be different? I REPEAT: NOBODY EVER GETS DQ'D FULLY FROM TOURNAMENTS FOR BEING AN ACCEPTABLE AMOUNT OF LATE!!!!!! It sounds like you want the opposite of pro-player privilege by DQ'ing them even though no other players would be DQ'd in that circumstance.

Our scene's been getting bigger, and we somewhat recently held a regional, and the policy was, if you're 10 minutes late, you get a text, at 15 minutes late, you forfeit that round.

Not a DQ to nothing. Not an extension for special people. You automatically lose whatever bracket match you're playing, be it a bracket pool match or just a bracket match, and either proceed to losers or are out of the event [no one skipped seeding matches but if you were dumb enough to skip loser's [semi] finals of pools, you were 4th or 3rd seed instead of 3rd or 2nd, top 4 making it out means it didn't matter much].

Issue could be easily cleared by explicitly stating that either a loss or a DQ is awared and defining what that means in the rules. I have full faith that MacD meant a DQ was just losing the set [forfeit], and I don't think he'd have done any differently for Jace or A Rookie or Fly Amanita or Axe or SFAT or Leffen or anyone else in that bracket.

Tl;dr - I'm 100% with ESAM on this one.

 

[bubbyrules1]

I see why people think that they should have been DQ'ed, but at the same time, having them go through losers from the first round (I think?) is most likely nerve-wracking for them. Not only did they lose practice time (Again, I think?), but they also know that they cannot screw up. In this context, I say that was as fair as the Knee (JK). I do agree that 45 minutes late is ridiculous though.

I also agree that Top Player Privileges do need to stop. Just because you are number one doesn't mean that you are more important than everybody else. Heck, I would say that the top players should have to fight each other in the earlier rounds rather than just clobber the new players so the pros can get back to what people like watching. It's really unfair that newbies can't build up any sort up excitement because they see they're up against Mew2King or Mang0. Maybe it's just me, but I'd rather watch newbies play against each other rather than a pro 4-Stock them over and over again.

This is my two-cents on this topic. Argue with it all you want, but keep in mind that the Smash 4 competitive scene is likely laughing at Melee's, something I see every day.

 

[42nd]

I disagree with this. At the end of the day it is the high level gameplay that makes melee the amazing game that it is. That being said, removing top level players entirely would just take away from the excitement of the tournament. I think due to the circumstances they should have been allowed through losers and because of that it was a really fun tournament to watch. Things happen and being a high level player who most people want to see will give you privileged at the end of the day. Hopefully something like this doesn't happen again :l.

 

[K7Sniper]

So a few friends and I talked about this in the latest episode of my web show

 

[SphericalCrusher]

Not going to get into a debate here, but I don't think being late to your winner's bracket match should equal being disqualified from the tournament all-together. They forfeit the set. I understand seeding and it does throw a wrench into loser's... but the purpose of this tournament is for the best man (or woman) to win. There's only going to one winner in singles. This is my opinion.