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Epita Smash Arena 2 - Results and shoutouts

Ryuker

Smash Lord
Joined
Sep 16, 2003
Messages
1,520
Location
The Hague , Netherlands
This discussion is turning more childish per post. Don't turn to name calling to prove your point it doesn't work.

@ Amsah: My guess is multiple people did by just flushing the toilet and using too much toilet paper or something. After that no one took the liberty to clean that up so it just got worser and worse. Now this is just a guess but that thing was filled till it's peak when I got to JD's place so something blocked the toilet.

What I'm most upset about with JD is how he handled this though and his lack of communication. I was happy he wanted to house us and it's generous that he allows so many people in his house but he really didn't handle the housing well. If you get this amount of people in your house the normal route to take is:
make a list of who's coming, when are they coming and plan ahead were they will sleep ( Just an estimate. ) The more people you get in your house the more you need to structurise it. There wasn't any list about the rules of his house. There was no note on the door saying don't use the toilet it's ****ed up!
And half of the living room wasn't used properly which meant everyone had to sit in a really cramped room. The other half had 2 small tv's and 1 big screen that should have been moved to the side. This half was also really messy with a lot of magazines on the floor and such.
Now I saw he did buy plastic plates to prevent doing the dishes but he never stated this anywere cause there was no list to refer to for rules so we didn't really use them much. He also didn't seem to have a backup plan when the toilet was ****ed ( but people still gotta pee) so we had to improvise and use his washingroom.

Now when I arrived at the station normally I get picked up by the one housing me or I get directions to his place. When jeffzor and I arrived at the station we didn't get any from JD's side. We waited for an hour at the station. When we called jd's place we talked to baxon and then zgetto but they couldn't help us ( can't blame zgetto since it was the first time he got there). We got called by Slhoka who gave us directions in the end ( really gratefull for that.)
When we got to JD's place he was there and I asked him why he didn't pick us up ( eventhough he said jeffzor he would) and he said no time had to bring japanese to poilon. Now this would have been fine with me if he had contacted us about this sooner. I would even accept this crap if the moment he got home he would approach me and appologize for not picking me and jeffzor up. Instead I have to ask him...

I understood he had a hard time during the night with multiple calls and threats of police coming in cause of the disturbence. I already said in the other epita thread that I found this very immature of certain dutchies and I hope they think twice before they do this again ( I know they ain't doing it at my place). But he cut the power though and everyone went to sleep ( not the best way to handle this but atleast it worked). I don't have much to complain about how he handled this night though although he should have reorganized the living room so more people could sleep there.
Then next day he kicked the Swedes out so on. I didn't really get that although he must have felt it was necessary since it was too noisy and the more people there the harder to coordinate everything. After this he went on demanding the dutchies cleaned his place and use his famous seriously line to state it seriousness. Debates after debates most people started cleaning ( I started voluntarily moving the chair to one side of the living room for the vacuum cleaner but wasn't allowed to vaccuum anything cause he said Adam had to do that. I did the dishes with jeffzor ( broke one dish accidentaly so sorry for that JD:(). Hard to do the dishes though since I couldn't use hot water ( WTF!)
After that I had to get going to the Louvre. Since I heard all this debate about the toilet and so on I asked JD what was gonna happen. He said that we were gonna get cleaning stuff. Hour later he didn't get any yet and I was getting pissed off... In the end I cleaned it with multiple handkerchiefs (people make a huge deal about me doing this but I don't really get it we could have done this in an hour and have the hall way cleaned as well). I told JD I couldn't do the reall serious stuff though ( unplugging or whatever you call it) cause he needed special stuff for that. He said he would get it.

I laughed my *** of when I finally got out of there though. I saw that like 3 meters away from his house there was a sanitair store ( or what you call this?) with all the stuff he needed. He could have gotten it in the morning and have his house cleaned by 13.00... . At that point I just though meh whatever I'm going.

( You think I reach the end by now don't you?)
After a great day at the louvre I went back to his place. Pretty late but still. When I got of at Plaisaince I got a call from jeffzor saying we all had to go to the venue and our stuff was being moved over there. ( I guess this was a smart way to handle the problems we were having) I was literally in front of JD's house and he never phoned me or jeffzor about this again ( I forgot were jeffzor got this from I just remember him being pissed off about it ). We could have been standing at his place until the next morning waiting...

Then when I finally got to the venue ( already pretty annoyed since I never did anything remotely close to this when housing him in Holland) he was playing smash and looked pretty shocked ( I guess it was hard to handle). I approached him with a question why he didn't call me and he simply said:" no time..." ( I could have screamed...) So no direction or anything about were my stuff was. No appology for the sudden shift to the venue. Hell he didn't approach me at all when I got there... No I had to approach him about this.

Just for comparison this is how you would do it:
Make a list of everyone there ( if you hadn't already) and all the stuff they are taking or that you found since you are packing other people's stuff withouth them knowing. Try to contact them or instruct someone else to contact who is staying at your place so they know what's up. At the venue aproach everyone you housed with your list and check off if you took everything ( apologize in advance) and if you did forget plan when you will get it or kindly come up with a different plan to get there stuff by the next morning.

I went to eat after this and then too poilon's were I met JD again who I later heard was gonna sleep there. I asked him were my laptop was and he gave me a name ( not on paper and if it wasn't for Slhoka I wouldn't have found him). When I got back at the venue I couldn't find my stuff anywhere. I got my laptop back but I couldn't find my bag. I asked slhoka but since JD didn't have a cellphone we couldn't get in touch with him. After Slhoka was so nice to try figuring this out I later heard JD was at poilon's sleeping. When it was about 3.00 I went to poilon's since I just had to know what was up and Poilon asked JD( It's frigging hard to wake up JD when he sleeps he basically seems dead..) I got told he forgot it and poilon offered me to sleep at his place on the floor. I went ahead and did that and the next morning remen woke me up and I caught JD ( Once again he didn't approach me about the trouble with my stuff but I had to approach him.) I asked him how he was gonna fix this and he said I can not get it until sunday evening or monday morning. The he told me he went to the venue and I accepted that for some strange reason. After thinking again I ran after him since I was basically fed up with this. I got frigging angry at him and managed to convince him to give me his key's to his place and get it my self.. So I did. When I got there at the same spot I left it was the nasty stuff I took out of the toilet room. None of it cleaned up or anything just like I left it 1 day ago....

So besides Slhoka's and poilon's help I had to fix every **** problem I had my self...
You would think that he had a lot on his mind so on and you could say I'm excpecting to much service but if you realise I managed to persuade my parent to allow him to come to my place for 2 months to find a job ( Smoke weed...) and basically sit in his own room( own bed so on) the majority of the time keeping him to the rules and sort of being a policemen by watching if he didn't violate the rules we had, convincing my parents that he was a good guy and would stick to the rules...
you might understand I feel screwed and dissapointed.

I didn't talk to him much during the rest of the tournament although I tried to help with the tournament when I could. I heard he's off to poland now so I wish him luck and hope he get's his life back on track. I posted my opinion and comments on the tournament itself in the other epita thread. I don't wanna connect the crap that happened with JD to this tournament specifically.
 

ajp_anton

Smash Lord
Joined
Jan 9, 2006
Messages
1,462
Location
Stockholm
From what little experience I have with drunk people, Kurre was the only swedish who had gone a bit too far. Not saying he didn't do anything, but every time I saw him "like that" he was asleep, blocking the door from inside the "swedish room".
All (?) of the swedes then went to sleep in this small room to avoid the noise from the dutchies who kept opening the door and flashing with the lights for no good reason except that they claimed the bed in our room was theirs. Eventually they got it (JD: "don't argue with drunk people"), making it even more cramped for us on the floor (I had a 30cm wide spot I spent the night on).
I can't remember there being silence outside the door before I fell asleep.

Just saying that IMO, it's more likely the dutchies messed up the place than us. Nothing you say can change the memories I have from there, so don't bother =)
Flooding the toilet however could've been anyone. First time I saw it it was already flooded, so it happened very early.
 

Helios

BRoomer
BRoomer
Joined
Jul 12, 2004
Messages
4,090
Location
Gothenburg, Sweden
Wow, Ryuker, I'm really sorry you had to go through all that, especially after treating JD so well at your place in Holland FOR TWO MONTHS! :S

*sad panda*
 

Samochan

Smash Master
Joined
Jun 2, 2006
Messages
3,450
Location
I'm in your house, dsmashing your tv
Sooo.... what did we learn from this?

INFORM EVERYONE BOUT THE HOUSE RULES AND MAKE SURE EVERYONE FOLLOWS EM!

I did do the same mistake on my tournament cause I simply forgot and everyone had already set up, but yea, the more people, the more prone they are to do things you wouldn't like to be done on your house or venue. Make list of things, otherwise you forget.

Edit: Smasher, I don't copy armada, I copy everyone lol. And then make up my own stuff at the same time. But I admit I idolise armada, but I could never truly copy his playstyle cause I play very differently from him. ^^
 

Jeffz0r

Smash Champion
Joined
Jan 20, 2005
Messages
2,702
Location
the Netherlands
( You think I reach the end by now don't you?)
After a great day at the louvre I went back to his place. Pretty late but still. When I got of at Plaisaince I got a call from jeffzor saying we all had to go to the venue and our stuff was being moved over there. ( I guess this was a smart way to handle the problems we were having) I was literally in front of JD's house and he never phoned me or jeffzor about this again ( I forgot were jeffzor got this from I just remember him being pissed off about it ). We could have been standing at his place until the next morning waiting...
I'll tell you what happened before I called you >_>
I got off at plaissance by myself (I was with 5 other Dutchies, but they went back to their hotel (Dave, Marc, etc.)). I still remembered the way to JD's appartment, so I went there. Someone just left the building, so the door was open and I could get in. When I was in front of his appartmentdoor, I rang the bell and that's when it happened... nothing!! **** I was in shock, there was no-one there (I left in the morning, so I only knew the Swedes were kicked out, but nothing from what happened after it). I called some people and found out the Dutchies were also kicked out and apparantly no-one knew where JD was. I also called Shloka (didn't know what he would be able to do to help, but I was desperate and he also helped me when we were stuck at the station (see Ryuker's post)), he didn't pick up unfortunately. I managed to get Poilon's number from someone luckily. Too bad, he also didn't pick up. Then a bit later he called me back while I was calling someone else, so I called him back right away afterwards. This time he did pick up and told me JD was at the venue. So he told me to call him back in 10 minutes, while he would hurry to the venue and give the phone to JD. So I did and finally I got JD on the line. That's when I found out he went to the venue and took all of our stuff. See if I had known this, I would've gone to the venue right away instead of to JD's appartment, then it wouldn't have been a problem. But since he didn't let me know ****, I was ****ing stressed and already worried I wouldn't even have a place to sleep. Which was also ****ed up, because I had to sleep at the venue instead of at Shloka's where I would go to, after getting back to JD's place. So I couldn't even take a shower.
Anyway, so I finally went to the venue and got in contact with Ryuker along the way.

When I finally got to the venue, I confronted JD about this, about why he didn't contact us. He said he was busy... HE WAS ****ING PLAYING SMASH FOR GOD SAKE!
Really I could barely stop myself from hitting him in the ****ing face, I don't think I've ever been this angry with another smasher.

So just for the record, if you ever come to Holland JD, don't bother asking me for housing. And if I ever hold a big tourney again (who knows, I might someday), don't ever bother registering, cause I won't let you enter anyway.

I'm not gonna post all the other stuff that was ****ed up about the housing and the tourney itself, cause I think other people already said all that I could think off anyway.
 

A-D

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Oct 2, 2006
Messages
456
Location
Netherlands
hahaah jeffz0r you punching someone in teh face xD

just thinking about it Makes me *Rofl
:D
but yes.. I understand you
 

Nihonjin

Striving 4 Perfection
BRoomer
Joined
Feb 1, 2005
Messages
2,867
Location
Amsterdam, Holland
best post of the whole thread.. also RtB2 > all =P

anyway I wonder if after this mess the european community will find its way to get back together..
Im sure we will, I've had a great time in france before, during and after the tournament. :)
A couple of knockbacks definitely won't keep me from traveling. (Im sure most people feel the same, save for Euan :( )

and btw screw it! everyone says the best thing of ESA2 was being able to visit the city, we Italians didn't really have any time to do so =P
Seems I missed out on that as well :(
Made up for it by playing Masashi though :o
 

Jeffz0r

Smash Champion
Joined
Jan 20, 2005
Messages
2,702
Location
the Netherlands
You're still lucky, I only played Masashi 1 match, in which he went Marth vs my Peach and he chose Yoshi's Story...:urg:
 

Poilon

Smash Cadet
Joined
Dec 3, 2005
Messages
40
the two videos on ajp's random videos which are tagged "Poilon", it's my nickname but it's not me.
 

Remen

Smash Apprentice
Joined
Sep 14, 2002
Messages
135
Marc's experiencing some trouble accessing Smashboards right now, so I'll be relaying a message from him:

Marc said:
In the end the hosting never gave a proper response to the many questions and complaints that were posted about this tournament, which is a huge disappointment to me. JD and Slhoka seem to have vanished into thin air. I hate to think they chickened out, but I think at least JD did. The discussion in this topic kinda got out of hand at times, and I blame most of that on the people who should have responded, but didn’t. Another entry on this tournament’s list of failures. If you can’t or won’t take responsibility for your actions, you shouldn’t host big tournaments. Although it wasn’t all bad, it’s highly unlikely I’ll go to France for a smash tournament again in the near future.
:D
 

Slhoka

Smash Lord
Joined
Dec 21, 2005
Messages
1,710
Location
Kourou, French Guiana
Marc said:
In the end the hosting never gave a proper response to the many questions and complaints that were posted about this tournament, which is a huge disappointment to me. JD and Slhoka seem to have vanished into thin air. I hate to think they chickened out, but I think at least JD did. The discussion in this topic kinda got out of hand at times, and I blame most of that on the people who should have responded, but didn’t. Another entry on this tournament’s list of failures. If you can’t or won’t take responsibility for your actions, you shouldn’t host big tournaments. Although it wasn’t all bad, it’s highly unlikely I’ll go to France for a smash tournament again in the near future.
We do not chicken out. I'm not stupid enough not to respond to what happened during this tournament. I know that we lost most european smashers' confidence with ESA2, and that we won't win it back if we keep silent. I started writing an post in which I try to explain what went wrong and why, and what we learned from this tournament. But I'm currently too busy with some others unexpected problems as well as work for my studies in order to finish it.
I wanted to post it as soon as possible, but I wasn't able to do so.
As for what happened in this topic, I was away from home during these days, and I didn't have any access to the internet.
Anyway, my post will come for sure, I guess I should be done in a week or so.
It's true that I should have announced I wanted to respond. It might have helped avoiding problems in this topic, but I also didn't want to say it because I'm pretty sure some people would have kept asking for it.
I'll try to finish it as soon as possible, that's all I can say.

And also, if I'm always offline on MSN, it's because I blocked almost everyone in my contact list. I was just fed up with all those who were constantly asking me for explanations (even if it's nicely done, it becomes really annoying when it's the 20th person to ask you), those who were thanking me and asking random stuff (same comment as before) or those who insulted me.

By the way Marc, you're really clever (that wasn't irony or sarcasm, just what I think, and I'm almost sure you'll understand why I'm saying such a thing :p)
 

Samochan

Smash Master
Joined
Jun 2, 2006
Messages
3,450
Location
I'm in your house, dsmashing your tv
Doesn't mean they can't get their passports now :p
Yea, but why get expensive passport now when there is no guarantee that the tourney is even held? Even a relative date and confirmation of the tourney would be sweet.

And shyne, they didn't look up the tourney until like, 1 or 1 and half month before it was held. And I've yet to ask if they have their passports now.
 

Slhoka

Smash Lord
Joined
Dec 21, 2005
Messages
1,710
Location
Kourou, French Guiana
It's funny how this tournament got more Japanese players than OC3 did, funny indeed.

Actually, it's not that surprising, because Captain Jack lived in France during 1 year, and the bonds between him and French smashers are quite strong. Many Japanese people can't speak English or French, and having someone like CJ coming with them to translate was a big advantage for them. =)

Ok, now for the big post.

Since ESA2 was quite a big failure, I (and most people) think that a post is necessary in order to explain what went wrong and why. I know it’s pretty late (more than 2 months after the tournament), but during the first few weeks after the tournament, I was really tired and depressed. Then I was really busy. And in the last few weeks, I have to admit that I was able to do it, but I didn’t because I’m so ashamed of this tournament that it was quite hard to face it. Well, anyway, here it is, and while this post isn’t meant to be an excuse, I hope it will help you understand what happened. Again, I’m sorry for the delay.

I’ll try to look at every aspect of a tournament like this one, say what we did and whether it turned out to be good or not, and then what could have been done to make it better.

Housing :

Let’s begin with what was (according to me), the worst thing we did.

What did we want to do ?
Finding housing for everyone, either at a smasher’s place, or in a hotel.

What happened
We couldn’t find enough places for everyone, and many people were homeless on Sunday evening. And it would have been the same if on Friday, we couldn’t find an agreement with Cycom to have people sleep at the venue.

Why was it so bad ?
We wanted to handle more people than we could (we had to find housing for like 120 people, including Frenchies coming from far) and also, we’ve been unlucky.
I’ve read on someone’s post (can’t remember who) that there was a rumor saying we didn’t search any hotel. First, I’d like to say -quite obviously- that this is wrong. We did search for housing. But we had many difficulties finding something, because most hotels which weren’t expensive or too far from Paris were full. I guess it was because of the holidays in France (ESA2’s week end was the one where everyone in France was on holidays). I had to find a room in a hotel for the mother of a smasher who wasn’t allowed to travel alone (because of the Ryanair rules), and I spent like hours to find one available room for 40€. So, I guess you’ve got the idea, finding rooms for more people and cheaper than that was impossible at best. We called quite a few hotels, too, and every single answer was negative.
But it wasn’t that much of a problem, because we had free places at some smashers’ places. Doraki’s parents and mine were supposed to leave for the week end, so both of us could house like 20 smashers. In the end, and due to unrelated events, they had to stay, so I could only house 7 guys, and Doraki 6. Add JD who couldn’t house anyone anymore, and we had 52 free places which just disappeared in a few days.
In the end, I understood that the only remaining thing I could do was leaving the venue during the tournament and search for a hotel in the neighborhood. But I had no time.
Plus, on sunday night, some people who were supposed to house smashers left without the ones they were supposed to house.
So yeah, we sucked about housing =/

How to solve this problem ?

Either renting a place if enough people need housing, or asking people to search themselves. This is too much work for a host, at least when so much people need housing. This doesn’t mean we can’t help, but wanting to do everything isn’t possible.


Venue :

I personnally think that the venue is good. We didn’t manage to make a good use of the diffierent rooms, but I think it’s better to have many rooms than a big one. It allows a better flexibility on the use of the rooms.
The only real problem of this venue is that there are no showers. I searched for public baths or a pool in the neighborhood, but I couldn’t find any. In the end, I think that having no shower is bearable only if we stay two days at the venue (although this is something I really don’t like, don’t get me wrong), but for 3 days like here at ESA2... this is a real problem, which was not supposed to happen because we weren’t supposed to be at the venue on Friday evening.
This shower problem is actually the only one I can’t solve right now.


Hardware and equipment :

What was planned ?
70 TVs, 40 being rented like last time. It’s expensive, but we know it is a good choice.
1 mic, 2 projectors
Pens

What happened?
- 40 laggy TVs >_>
The first thing we wanted to do was renting the TVs from the same company as last time. Everything was ok, nothing to worry about, we already did it last time, we knew what to do ^^
But about 10 days before the tournament, they called us to say that in fact, they wouldn’t have enough TVs for us (and not 1 or two..., they only had 10 TVs left >_>). But no problem, they sent us to another company and had arranged everything for us with them. When we arrived there, there were no TVs, only computer screens.
So we had to find something, and we did. We knew that Epita could lend us as many screens as we needed. So after testing the screens to see if there was no lag, we decided to buy 40 VGA Boxes for 3000€. It was really expensive, but Cycom handled most of the cost, because they could use it for future events. I didn’t try it myself, but Poilon did, and there was no problem.
And at the venue, we did not get the screens we were supposed to have. And as you could see, they lagged with the VGA Boxes.

Mic : no mic. And the megaphone we used last year broke before the tournament.
The projectors didn’t work with my computer. We didn’t check them before because I was using the same computer Poilon used last year, on the very same projector.
We made the mistake not to ask Cycom for pens. Since they host lots of tournaments and since we ask them to print sheets that would be filled for the pools, we thought they would bring pens.


How to solve this problem ?

-TVs : Same thing, without getting owned every minute by someone else -_-
But I think that from now on we’ll use CRT screens, because it’s safer.

Mic : making sure we’ll have something (a smasher bringing it ?)
Make sure the projectors work a few days before the tournament.

Food and drink :

What was planned ?

4 “meals”, 2 on saturday and 2 on Sunday.
Vegetarians would have a special thing.

What happened ?
Only 3 meals, which weren’t really meals, pretty frugal and always the same.
Well, I think this is the only point where we had a communication problem due to language differences. When Joanna Dark announced we would have meals, he meant (and thought, just like me) something like a sandwich (a bit more consistant, though), a dessert like a bit of cake, and a bottle of water or a can. Some people appeared to think it would be a full “classical” meal. We’re sorry about that, We thought it was clear =/
We agreed with Cycom that they would be in charge of the food. During the reunion we (Poilon, JD and I) had with Cycom before the tournament in order to set everything, it seemed that we had the same idea about food. They’re used to doing it for other tournaments they organize, so we were pretty confident, especially since our discussion about this topic showed that, in fact, we didn’t know the exact content, we wanted to do the same thing. It happened not to be so. They did the same thing as they usually do, because it pleases those who come to their tournaments. From what I gathered after discussing it with them, it seems that Smashers do not expect the same kind of thing as other gaming communities they are used to.
As for the missing 4th “meal”, I asked and was told that they understood 3 meals only, which pisses me off a bit.
I’m angry at them on 2 others points : first, the fact that the food was always the same. They told me it was too complex to make different things >_>
Also, they didn’t do anything for vegetarians but removing the meat. I had no real answer about that.

How to solve this problem

We’ll take care of the food and won’t leave this issue to Cycom or other guys.

Timetable :

What was planned ?

Singles + Teams + Low Tier + Regionals + N64 + Brawl + freeplay

What happened ?

Only singles + shortened team tournament
Registration took like 3 hours

To be honest, I think that the time table we did for this tournament was good. It was planned for 64 TVs. We would have been able to do everything we planned if we hadn’t had 40 lagging TVs.
As for the registration, the reason is that Cycom is used to do event where everyone pays in advance, which makes things way faster. They told us that it would be done quickly, but didn’t realize that the process is long and would make things last longer.
We were more than 2 hours late, but without the TVs problem, we would have been able to deal with it without any problems.
Also, there was too much time between the end of the first round of pools and the beginning of the second round. It’s mostly my fault. The first explanation is that I forgot to include in the planning the time I needed in order to enter results, and because there were 896 results to enter (a bit less, actually), it was quite long to do. Thanks to Yultan who helped me, I could speed up the process, but still, it took too much time.

How to solve this problem ?

TVs that work, obviously.
And some ideas to make things a bit faster like having one person constantly taking results, or pre paid registration only.
I have also a few more ideas to be more efficient, but I have to test them first.

Bracket issues and communication issues :

What happened ?

During pools, there was a few problems with the seeding and people of the same location in the same pools (especially during the 2nd turn).
And during the bracket, the location problem happened again, as well as some problems with people who didn’t hear that due to the TV problem and time limitations, we had to proceed to more rounds in best of 3 than expected.
Mr P also had a problem since he claims to have won his match against 4ever while the results sheet reads that he lost.

During the first round of pools, there weren’t that much seeding problems, and to be honest, I couldn’t do much about that, since I just used the seeding I was given by those I asked to (that is to say, JD, Doraki, Benoit, Marc, Luma, Tonberry, Helios and Aldwyn). I actually asked to some other people, but I had no answer. So, about the first round, I couldn’t do that much.
During the second round, there were more problems, especially with the locations. Since there was so many people, I couldn’t remember every nickname and location, and I couldn’t make a correction for everybody (Kman and Frosbyte, I’m really sorry, I totally forgot about you).
Then, there were many problems in the bracket too. I tried to solve many of them, especially with the Dutchies (thanks to Tonberry for his help and his patience), and I must admit I regret some changes, because I accepted too much changes for some people who didn’t want to face each other since they came from the same place, and it turned out to be a problem for frenchies (like JD who had to face two good frenchies -Benoit and Aska-, something many people wanted me to change).
Some people were also screwed by weird results brackets (like Luma), but I couldn’t do anything about that.
And 3 matches were done in best of 3 instead of best of 5 because the players didn’t hear we had to change because of time limitation. I’m sorry for all those who were kicked out of the bracket this way.
As for teams, I’m sorry about this shortened bracket, but we had to hurry, so I was the one who had the idea of best of 1 at the beginning of the bracket. While I knew it wasn’t fair at all, I tried to seed the bracket so that good teams wouldn’t face another good team during a best of 1. It worked on the whole, except for a few teams I didn’t spot, like Linkje and Ivo.
Once again, I’m sorry about that.

How to solve this problem

As for the 1st pools seeding, I can’t do much but harassing players so they give me a seeding.
For the 2nd pools and the bracket, I asked Nealdt to add a little feature which will point out tio’s mistakes and thus help in order to create a better seeding.
About those who played in best of 5 instead of best of 3 as well as the best of 1 in teams, I’m really sorry. The TV shortage made us change the rules this way, and it seems that we couldn’t make these rules clear for everybody.
By the way, even though I want to apologize to all of you for the whole tournament, I want to say I’m really pissed off by something : some of you told me that they had difficulties to understand me as I announced things. I asked some other people and they confirmed it was sometimes hard to grasp the meaning of my english due to my lack of good pronunciation. Why did no one tell me about that ? I mean, I know my english isn’t good. I know I had to shout quite often. I know I have a little pronunciation defect, even in French. I can understand if you don’t understand me... but tell me to repeat, or to ask someone like JD to speak for me ! Seriously, I wouldn’t have been hurt or anything, but now that I know some people couldn’t understand what I said (or at least a part of it) during the tournament, but that no one ever bothered to tell me... Well, I’m quite annoyed. It doesn’t apply to smash tournaments only : when you don’t understand someone who’s explaining something, tell him, because if you don’t tell him anything, he’ll just keep speaking in a way you don’t understand, like I did.


Cash prizes :

What was planned ?


Single :
1st : 1500 euros
2nd : 800 euros
3rd : 300 euros
4th : 100 euros
5th : 50 euros
7th : 20 euros

Teams :
1st team : 1500 euros (750 euros x 2)
2nd : 800 euros
3rd : 300 euros
4th : 100 euros
5th : 50 euros
7th : 20 euros

Total = 5540
-_-


What happened ?

Singles :

1st : 1400
2nd : 500
3rd : 300
4th : 100
5th : 50
7th : 20
9th : 10

Doubles :

1st team : 600 (300 x 2)
2nd : 300
3rd : 100
4th : ??

Total : 3680 or more ?


The first reason explaining why the cash prize went this much down, is that TVs turned out to be way more expensive that it should have been (like 3000€ instead of 1400€).
The second is linked to the Wii theft. I know some of you will think it’s unfair for those who expected a higher cash prize, but we really couldn’t let the 3 guys who were stolen go home without anything. They were given 160€ each, in order to buy a second hand Wii. Some of you may think that since it’s our fault as organizers, we should have repaid them ourselves, but we just couldn’t (Poilon and me have lost about 550€ during this tournament, and I don’t know about JD). And I think repaying such people is more important than having high cash prizes, because having people bringing hardware is one of the key aspects of a tournament.
So we were left with about 3700€ for cash prizes, but why were team prizes so low ? It was my idea. Since we had to speed up the team tournament,I thought that the tournament wasn’t completely fair. The top result weren’t changed, though, so I don’t really know if I was right to propose this.
Some of you may also wonder why we kept such a high prize for first place of singles while the second was lowered. This is Poilon’s will. He wanted to keep a really high cash prize for singles first place, no matter what happens. I can’t say I agree with this decision but well, he was the main host.

Also, I’d like to thank some people who weren’t hosts but helped in a way or another. I want everyone to be aware that those people rock.

Giggs : For those who dont know, he’s the one who was on the right of the inscription table, during registration and who was telling you where to go. He wasn’t supposed to help, but he was sooooooo helpful. When I was too busy to do something, he was always here, ready to help, and even if he hadn’t a clue about what I told him to do, in was always done in time and without any problems. This guy may not be a good smasher, but he’s awesome.

Yultan : you probably don’t know him because he’s neither a good player nor someone who like to be the center of attention, but he was really helpuf too. He really helped me in order to enter results faster than expected, and was always ready to help.

Qlex : He didn’t do that much during the tournament, but he was really supportive and did an awesome job for housing.

Tonberry : Man, you rock. No, really. You helped me so much. JD told me that your tournaments are extremely well organized, and now I understand. No matter how many troubles we had, you kept helping us, always being positive. I really hope to see you soon or to be able to attend one of your tournaments, because I really appreciated what you did at ESA2.

I’d also like to thank all of those who were trying to be helpful while we were dealing with the tournament problems. While some people were pointing out flaws and kept making reproaches without trying to help, quite a few others tried to help or simply said something encouraging. It really helped. Thanks to all those who did it.

Ah and I’d like to point out something I really didn’t like. Some Spanish guys made a prank : one of them was lying in a corridor, acting like a junkie having a bad trip, a pen looking like a syringe on the arm. I understand you just saw it as a funny joke, but really, it was a bad idea to do that. Not only do I not really think it’s that funny in normal conditions, but as a tournament host dealing with a ton of problems, it’s just an awful joke. We already had a similar problem during another tournament, and it’s really hard to deal with this situation for the hosts. So yeah, I really didn’t like it, and it wasn’t the right moment at all. Please don’t do this kind of thing again (and I think it should apply to every tournament or event you’ll attend).

About JD’s appartment

I won’t try to search any excuses for JD. He has his part of responsibilities, especially for not giving rules and for his lack of reaction to solve problems. And I won’t say he made good choices. But really, when you’re housed at someone place, especially in a crowded apartment, you just respect the host and his place, even though he didn’t say anything about that. You don’t get drunk enough to barf, or to fight with others and break a bed. You don’t shout at 1am in an apartment.
That’s all I have to say. I hope that at least it will be a lesson for everyone : respect your hosts, and respect your guests by giving them good housing conditions.

I guess that I covered most of the major aspects of this tournament’s organization.
I’d like to add that I’m really sorry for what happened, and I want to apologize to everyone for the disappointment. ESA2 was supposed to be a great tournament, and the European and Japanese communities showed their confidence in what we were doing. And I’m really thankful about that.

About ESA3

ESA3 is really likely to happen. Not before next winter, though, but we’ll probably make it happen. I won’t say many things about it, first because I don’t know yet, but also because I think it’s a bit out of place right now. The only things I can say is that the ESA2 failure learned us many thing allowing a good tournament organisation, and that there’s a high probability that Melee will be the main event. The organisation will be done in a really different way. We’ll give more information around the end of the year. I hope there will be quite a few international tournaments before this day, in order to reunite a bit the european community.
I would be pretty disappointed to see what started as a toilet problem shatter the whole european smash scene ^^’
 

Ryuker

Smash Lord
Joined
Sep 16, 2003
Messages
1,520
Location
The Hague , Netherlands
Thanks for listing your thougts on these matters and telling your part of the story. I read all of it and I'll try to respond to the points a bit later cause it's a lot to respond too. Nice to hear ESA2 hasn't prevented you guys from considering ESA3.
 

peyudosmith

Smash Journeyman
Joined
Aug 27, 2007
Messages
482
Location
Singapore
yeah, it's nice to see a report of all the things that went wrong and why.. but don't be mad at that slhoka. you just did it ok, it wasn't your fault at all.

in my opinion the housing was a bit of a problem but I didn't suffer it because I was housed by Doraki and I left on Sunday evening, so all of it went right.

then, the food thing was also bad, but I don't really mind at all, it was only 2 days, everyone can eat that **** for 2 days without problem

the main problem were those 40 laggy tvs. however, the single and team tournament went good and I just thank you guys we had so many time for freeplays, it was great.

That junkie joke you mentioned slhoka, it was me and some friends and I think you are overrating it like if it was a really big mess while it was only a funny joke (we didn't know you had so much trouble at that time) and all the people around there applaused him ^^
but well, we're sorry for that.

two things left:
- slhoka, you rock
- we will surely attend esa3, because esa2 wasn't a failure for us spanish, we had a great time! thx guys for making it possible.
 

Marc

Relic of the Past
BRoomer
Joined
Sep 14, 2002
Messages
16,284
Location
The Netherlands
I’m glad you took the time to write all that, even if it’s quite overdue. It’s a bit hard for me to give an in-depth response, since I already said everything I wanted to say earlier and it’s been a few months since then. It does make things a bit more clear and provides some closure at least.

One major thing I feel is left unaddressed is regionals. As I see it, the only reason that event didn’t take place properly is because the Frenchies didn’t do anything until like midnight. There was enough time, people were there and no other event was taking place that evening. So, why did we end up playing just one crew battle? I really didn’t get that.

Also, the difference in cash prize between #1 and #2 ended up being ridiculous. First place was supposed to get almost twice as much, not almost three(!) times as much. On a sidenote, according to your table 9th place should have gotten 10 euro’s, I never got that. Paying for the stolen Wii’s with prize money is a pretty bad thing too, though understandable. Solution: Find a way to chain consoles to the tables they’re on and/or buy insurance.

I probably won’t visit a French smash tournament any time soon. This also has to do with me quitting Melee, so don’t think it’s all your fault. As for the general attitude here, most people seem to have had a pretty good experience at ESA2. Some things are still unresolved though, like the problems with JD. That won’t be solved until the parties involved actually speak with each other, but JD basically missed his chance when it was discussed in this thread.
 

Slhoka

Smash Lord
Joined
Dec 21, 2005
Messages
1,710
Location
Kourou, French Guiana
One major thing I feel is left unaddressed is regionals. As I see it, the only reason that event didn’t take place properly is because the Frenchies didn’t do anything until like midnight. There was enough time, people were there and no other event was taking place that evening. So, why did we end up playing just one crew battle? I really didn’t get that.

I'm partly responsible for this. There was a mess after the end of the second round of pools, because many players wanted to rest and postpone the singles bracket to sunday morning, while many others wanted to play it on the evening. After a pretty long debate, we decided to postpone it. Then I and quite a few players said "lets start regionals", but there were no reaction at all. Many people didn't want to play it, and that's why we started it so late.


Also, the difference in cash prize between #1 and #2 ended up being ridiculous. First place was supposed to get almost twice as much, not almost three(!) times as much. On a sidenote, according to your table 9th place should have gotten 10 euro’s, I never got that. Paying for the stolen Wii’s with prize money is a pretty bad thing too, though understandable. Solution: Find a way to chain consoles to the tables they’re on and/or buy insurance.
As for the cash prizes, I already said that Poilon was the one who decided (and I don't want any responsability about this because I wouldn't have made like he did).
And I'm pretty sure the 9th were given their 10€, it's weird that you didn't get them =/

Also, I did thought to a system to chain the Wiis and protect them, and I'm working on it. I'm not sure that a insurance would be advantage for us, but I'll take a look to them for the next tournaments.

By the way, I think I forgot to explain how come the Wiis got stolen.
Before the tournament, I've asked Cycom a few things :
1. Just after the registration, make a list or every player's hardware.
2. Always have someone at the entrance, checking who enters, controlling who's leaving the tournament (and controlling what he's taking).

They didn't do any of these things. And about the theft itself, the thieves did it during the finals, when everyone was watching Amsah's and CJ's awesome Sheik dittos.


That junkie joke you mentioned slhoka, it was me and some friends and I think you are overrating it like if it was a really big mess while it was only a funny joke (we didn't know you had so much trouble at that time) and all the people around there applaused him ^^
but well, we're sorry for that.
I know I'm according to much importance to this, because it didn't happen at the right moment, but still, I don't think you should do this kind of joke at such an event. Especially not with the hosts. Hosting isn't easy, and a junkie in the venue isn't quite the kind of issue you want to deal with =/
 

Marc

Relic of the Past
BRoomer
Joined
Sep 14, 2002
Messages
16,284
Location
The Netherlands

I'm partly responsible for this. There was a mess after the end of the second round of pools, because many players wanted to rest and postpone the singles bracket to sunday morning, while many others wanted to play it on the evening. After a pretty long debate, we decided to postpone it. Then I and quite a few players said "lets start regionals", but there were no reaction at all. Many people didn't want to play it, and that's why we started it so late.
At 9 PM or so everyone was more than willing to play crews, the Frenchies even wanted to bet money against us (The Netherlands). Of course that enthusiasm diminished as the hours passed, playing at 3 AM is just silly. I also recall the debate about postponing the singles bracket being settled before 10 PM. After that, I proposed to use alternates in crews etc and people were enthusiastic and willing to start soon. Then... nothing happened anymore. Of course it got harder to get people to participate, but cause and effect shouldn't be confused here: people didn't want to play anymore because it was getting too late.

As for the cash prizes, I already said that Poilon was the one who decided (and I don't want any responsability about this because I wouldn't have made like he did).
And I'm pretty sure the 9th were given their 10€, it's weird that you didn't get them =/
I can't remember it and it struck me as new to see a cash prize for 9th place, so I think I was left out. Maybe because I left pretty early Sunday evening, although that's not an excuse. People knew I was leaving after all. France owes me.

Also, I did thought to a system to chain the Wiis and protect them, and I'm working on it. I'm not sure that a insurance would be advantage for us, but I'll take a look to them for the next tournaments.
Fair enough, although I think that it's an oversight not to look into insurances when hosting a big tournament like this. It was also pretty easy to get information, FC has been doing things like that for years. Chains are a much simpler solution for theft though.

By the way, I think I forgot to explain how come the Wiis got stolen.
Before the tournament, I've asked Cycom a few things :
1. Just after the registration, make a list or every player's hardware.
2. Always have someone at the entrance, checking who enters, controlling who's leaving the tournament (and controlling what he's taking).

They didn't do any of these things. And about the theft itself, the thieves did it during the finals, when everyone was watching Amsah's and CJ's awesome Sheik dittos.
I think theft can never really be prevented, there's always a way. It's not very realistic to expect Cycom staff to go through everyone's bag and make sure every item inside is theirs, which is exactly what it would take. The list could come in handy, especially when there's suspicion in the air.
 

Mr P

Smash Ace
Joined
Jun 22, 2003
Messages
644
Location
Bawbagistan, Scotland
Sorry for taking soo long to respond but i've been a bit busy with like work and stuff over the last 2 months. But i'd just like to clarify that i most CERTAINLY did beat 4ever 2-0 and the **** lied about what happend. I'd also like to say i wont be going to ESA3
 
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