ROM 5 - Mew2King vs Unknown522

[Deleted member]

Even if it's not, even if you're in a real casual mindset that day, it's what the spectators are looking for. And regardless of what umbreon says (I'd like to take this opportunity to share with you an opinion near to my heart, namely, that Umbreon is what happens when rectal polyps gain sentience) you do have an obligation to the guys driving out there and throwing twenty bucks in the pot so that they can be there in person when the legendary matches go down.

Once upon a time in melee, you could enter a tournament with items on low, and only some items like beamswords or shells were allowed. You could play on more stages like jungle japes or corneria, but some of the stages were banned.

The MBR spent a good amount of its energy deciding which items were unfit for competitive play. Eventually, the items were removed a few at a time, until we got rid of them completely. Then, the stages were narrowed down too, from 15, to 13 ("7 golden neutrals" and 6 counterpicks), to 9, to the 6 we have now.

We decided that these things were too obstructive to competitive play. They had the potential to influence the purity of tournament results.

Now, our community has decided that the stream carries more weight than our players do. Our players are not allowed to forfeit or play fun characters because it's not as exciting to stream viewers. In other words, our players are not 100% responsible for their own tournament results.

I would argue that this type of interference is more disruptive to tournament results because at least the items and stages are announced in the rule set prior to the tournament. The influence of the community is never addressed in our tournament rule sets prior to the tournament. Splitting, forfeiting, and playing non-primary characters are never addressed by our rule sets, so our players have no reason to think that there are any outside influences on their tournament results.

This is the problem we are facing after RoM 5. I agree with David that I do not like where the community is heading, because it is easier to resolve a victory through a pokeball on the stage than it is through someone on a stream from a different part of the continent. I understand why he opposes this type of stupidity, and I agree with him fully.

To be clear, I don't necessarily directly support splitting. Rather, I think it is unfeasible to ban it. Even if it is banned, it should be explicitly stated in our rule sets. Even if splitting is banned, let's say you catch a player doing it. How do you punish this player? Prior to the tournament completion, you can seize their winnings. Let's say they're smart and they split after the tournament, what do you do, ban them? I would argue that banning our top players is more disruptive to our tournament results and community than splitting is. I'm more interested in protecting our players from public scrutiny than I am in the witch-hunts that naturally occur after these issues arise. I'm more interested in protecting the players than I am with either allowing or disallowing splitting, it's just that one of these options is much easier than the other.

Regardless of how we approach the problem, we need to explicitly state how the problem should be handled. Things like "soft bans" actually mean "isn't truly banned" when the social stigmas are ignored for whatever reason. To do this, we need to decide who takes priority when we have a conflict between the players and the community. I would prefer the players to have the rights, as they have earned their positions at the top TVs, but apparently I'm in the minority.

edit:

Euphoria, I read your long post twice. You are a better human being than I am. You have earned my total respect for your clarity and sincerity.

 

[S l o X]

i took a game off kk

i am da bess

 

[Lukahn]

1 ] Wtf is wrong with people. Since when does the "community" make the skiill and will to play of a player ?
I mean, ok it's frustrating but let them do whatever the **** they want to do. Be it Kirby vs Pichu...
I seriously do think of melee as an sport. And I think that a sportive is a sportive for himself. Because he want to be the best/ win money / etc. For ****ing himself.
It just happens that some are playing for the people. (and i think that's pretty cool btw) But that doesn't mean all players should play for the audience.

Seriously, **** audience entertainement. I think that is what is killing sportive spirit.

2] As for the split (i'm against it actually), once again... Who are you people to **** on players because of what they do with their OWN money ? It's their ****ing right to do so...
"but it kills stream !" "**** you because 1]"

3] Well, when a bracket seeding sucks. Let it be. What the **** is wrong with Alukard (no offense, I don't know you, you actually may be a cool guy) to change a bracket this late into the tourney ? If the bracket was different from the beginning, resulst would possibly not have been the same ?
"but it the sucks for people that two canadians are playing each other" "**** you because 1]"

 

[Pink Reaper]

I still think the dumbest thing about this entire tournament was not allowing someone to forfeit. If they want to quit, let them quit. You cannot force someone who doesnt want to play. If you do you end up with watching some whack *** matches where people dont try because THEY DONT WANT TO BE PLAYING!

 

[Machiavelli]

This seems pretty simple, it's wrong to suggest that two people should be forced to enjoy doing something they don't want to do simply to entertain a large group of people. I assume that isn't why any of these players got into smash in the first place.

At the same time everyone (especially top players) should understand that if you don't make a set hype whenever there are 3000+ people staying up late to watch you on a stream, there are going to be consequences. I'm sure everyone can relate to this, no one likes to be disappointed so this is understandable.

Therefore, it was probably in all 3 players best interests to at least give the appearance of caring whether or not they actually did. However, it would seem that the community is going in the wrong direction if people actually feel we must force people into preferred behaviors. Although if players have the wisdom in the future to do this themselves, then they'll avoid this sort of backlash.

 

[Isatis]

now, our community has decided that the stream carries more weight than our players do. our players are not allowed to forfeit or play fun characters because it's not as exciting to stream viewers. in other words, our players are not 100% responsible for their own tournament results.

gimr asked twitch to put the tournament up on their front page to showcase the best matches melee has to offer, and in turn appeal to newcomers, get sponsors, and grow the scene. what happened sunday night made our stream look like an absolute joke in front of 4,000 people and did the exact opposite. I don't even need to quote the posts nor post the messages from new smashers that were disappointed and discouraged.

so, you think there should not be any streams anymore right? no more chance at getting sponsors onboard? because this is what I'm getting from reading that. I can't name any big FGC events where people in finals did this ****, because nobody does this. (if anyone wants to correct me, feel free to do so!)

 

[Mahie]

If I may, I think this case is similar and the way they handled was much better : http://wiki.teamliquid.net/starcraft2/NaNiwa's_Blizzard_Cup_Controversy

 

[Wake]

I don't understand how it's really possible to force someone not to forfeit lol. What are they going to do? The TOs might ask you to play harshly, but aside from that, how can they tell you not to forfeit if that's what you want to do?

 

[Deleted member]

gimr asked twitch to put the tournament up on their front page to showcase the best matches melee has to offer, and in turn appeal to newcomers, get sponsors, and grow the scene. what happened sunday night made our stream look like an absolute joke in front of 4,000 people and did the exact opposite. I don't even need to quote the posts nor post the messages from new smashers that were disappointed and discouraged.

so, you think there should not be any streams anymore right? no more chance at getting sponsors onboard? because this is what I'm getting from reading that. I can't name any big FGC events where people in finals did this ****, because nobody does this. (if anyone wants to correct me, feel free to do so!)

i didn't say that there should be no streams, simply that they should have no influence on the players. we absolutely cannot put tertiary parties over our own players, it is much more damaging to the community.

if you think that an 11 year old game with difficult tournament logistics on an outdated platform is going to gain sponsorship on a public internet stream, you need a reality check. there are proper ways to go about sponsorships from a business standpoint, putting it on the front page of another website is not it.

 

[Isatis]

if you think that an 11 year old game with difficult tournament logistics on an outdated platform is going to gain sponsorship on a public internet stream, you need a reality check. there are proper ways to go about sponsorships from a business standpoint, putting it on the front page of another website is not it.

k, like what?

 

[M@v]

from a business standpoint;
-newer is better
-ease of operation
-has proven to have a large enough fanbase(new games tend to have large fanbases; hookem before they leave).

Most important of all, the game/sponsorship must be profitable for the sponsors. All about the money. More viewers=more adverstising=more money. Effeciently ran streams with exciting matches of a game, usually new, keep the customers ( yes sponsors view you as customers) in, and therefore more money for them.

 

[King Funk]

Players aren't forced to behave a specific way when they're being streamed but they should at least have some kind of decency and sportsmanship.

 

[Metakill]

And this is what happens when PP, hbox or Mango doesn't go to a national.... I thought this only happens on Brawl

 

[Deleted member]

k, like what?

Go to a company and say "I'll advertise for your business by wearing your shirts and advocating your products if you sponsor me traveling to these events" like Team Ben did.

Or, if you want a proper full game sponsorship from a company like MLG, you contact those companies and makes your best sales pitch.

Either way, it's better than hoping a faceless executive is watching this stream with a kid's game and likes making uninformed business decisions. If you want to waste your time/money/effort go play the lottery and stop pushing your moral agenda onto other people.

 

[tarheeljks]

good luck making a pitch to a real business without being able to present some sort of product (e.g. a successfully run stream with large viewership)

edit: you also appear to be ignoring the benefits streaming has among the existing player base

 

[Jolteon]

I still think the dumbest thing about this entire tournament was not allowing someone to forfeit. If they want to quit, let them quit. You cannot force someone who doesnt want to play. If you do you end up with watching some whack *** matches where people dont try because THEY DONT WANT TO BE PLAYING!

/Thread .

 

[KrazyKnux]

Yeah, I agree with your point that the rule needs to be enforced, I just don't think it needs to be enforced by the TO. It should be enforced socially, because it's really a rule about social conduct (since there's nothing inherently "cheating" about splitting a pot or "bracket manipulation"). "Good old fashioned shame," as Ferrish put it.

Yeah, and from what it seems like it's working already with how this blew out of proportion. I'm thinking it won't happen (at least as badly) in the future.

 

[Revven]

The best thing to do is to ignore what outsiders think and move on. Don't highlight the drama, don't talk about it outside the community, just act like it didn't happen if it's brought up outside of here, learn from it, and improve to make sure it doesn't happen ever again.

The FGC has had its fair share of ups and downs. They're definitely not perfect. Anyone remember the Cross Assault "scandal"? Well, if not, Aris (a really well known Tekken player) was sexually harrassing one of the competitors on the show, on the live stream (even though he was joking, the female took it offensively). Long story short, "gaming journalists" quickly picked up on the story and ran with it everywhere, putting the FGC in a bad light. What did they do? They looked at it, talked about it as a community, learned from it, and moved on. Now it's a common joke stream monsters make at times (well it was earlier this year).

There's also definitely been some fallouts for tournaments for the FGC in the past. I can't recall the specifics (it's been awhile) but generally speaking, not every tourney goes swimmingly there either.

The FGC aren't perfect beings, they just have much better connections to the companies that make the games and also have sponsors, thus bigger tournaments/better venues etc. But that doesn't mean we can't do the same thing! The best thing to do is not to play the blame game. What should be done is talking about how to avoid the issue in the future and where to go from here as far as getting Melee out there goes. I'd say just continue to do what we've been doing: VGBC streaming the big Melee events and hyping it up, with good TOs and great matches being displayed. Oh and of course, get a whole bunch of Smashers out to NEC.

 

[KrIsP!]

Real talk, Nintendo doesn't care about us : c

 

[KishPrime]

Long Post

Realize I'm late to the party. Oh well.

I agree with some of what you're saying, but the consequences of this are essentially to make your competitive community into a second-tier social-competitive community. If we aren't aspiring to and pursuing elite competition, then we're just enjoying the view and the company. Spectators and eliminated participants own this community and have an opinion on what they want it to be as well, and what happens at the top goes a long way towards defining what the community will be. We are all investors in this place, the players, the forum-only posters, the streamers, the TOs - all of us have invested time, energy, and labor into the process of crafting a place for competitive play. An ending like this is a poor return on that investment, and it's completely fair to put that on the top players.

Furthermore, fair or not, new players and spectators will watch people screwing around in Grand Finals and think, oh these guys are just a bunch of friends having fun. As an undecided competitive player, why would you want to join a community where its own top players aren't taking competition seriously? You're killing future growth. May not matter as much for an 11-year-old game...I think we've done a fairly good job burying it...but the point remains.

We did, in fact, list provisions against this type of behavior in our rulesets, so it's not like no one does. Difficult to enforce, sure. But a lack of trying to do is a statement about who we are as well.

 

[Coffeeblack]

Hype finals would've been awesome but you can't force someone to try. I think given the situation with sponsors watching its ****ty but at the end of the day the players didn't want to play so too ****ing bad. Move on already

Europhoria and pink reaper for ****ing president(s)

 

[Divinokage]

Realize I'm late to the party. Oh well.

I agree with some of what you're saying, but the consequences of this are essentially to make your competitive community into a second-tier social-competitive community. If we aren't aspiring to and pursuing elite competition, then we're just enjoying the view and the company. Spectators and eliminated participants own this community and have an opinion on what they want it to be as well, and what happens at the top goes a long way towards defining what the community will be. We are all investors in this place, the players, the forum-only posters, the streamers, the TOs - all of us have invested time, energy, and labor into the process of crafting a place for competitive play. An ending like this is a poor return on that investment, and it's completely fair to put that on the top players.

Furthermore, fair or not, new players and spectators will watch people screwing around in Grand Finals and think, oh these guys are just a bunch of friends having fun. As an undecided competitive player, why would you want to join a community where its own top players aren't taking competition seriously? You're killing future growth. May not matter as much for an 11-year-old game...I think we've done a fairly good job burying it...but the point remains.

We did, in fact, list provisions against this type of behavior in our rulesets, so it's not like no one does. Difficult to enforce, sure. But a lack of trying to do is a statement about who we are as well.

That's exactly how I feel about it, I could not have said better myself. Instead I raged on through my conviction about how top players should be like.. Perhaps it was wrong to some extent but I'm still passionate about the game and I could not really control how I should present my arguments when I see players not taking it seriously. Sorry for that guys.. I hope you understand this kind of feeling.

 

[prog]

That's exactly how I feel about it, I could not have said better myself. Instead I raged on through my conviction about how top players should be like.. Perhaps it was wrong to some extent but I'm still passionate about the game and I could not really control how I should present my arguments when I see players not taking it seriously. Sorry for that guys.. I hope you understand this kind of feeling.

You're dumb.

 

[ph00tbag]

i would argue GIMR definitely overstepped his boundaries by "forcing" them to take WF "seriously" after neither of them wanted to play. i understand wanting to produce good content for the stream, but it's pretty clear imo WHY that backfired.

one competitior wanted to exit the set in WF and the powers at be held him back. let him live with his own decision and get on with the ****ing show. 2 sets of m2k vs. KK sheik dittos.......call me a melee FANBOY but that sounds dope as heck

It's also on Unknown for having a bad attitude.

And before you jump on me about that, if Dr. Peepee can go from losing to Mango 3-0 at Kings of Cali while sick, to beating Mango 3-1 in two sets, then Unknown can buck up and get over a disappointing experience in Winners Semis to try to win a tournament. Having a bad attitude is just a john. Honestly, it's not even about what Unknown owes the stream. It's what he owes himself, the people he's playing and the people he beat. Dropping out has the same impact on those people as underplaying.

GimR did technically overstep his bounds, yes. Unknown ought to have been allowed to forfeit. But when you make it entirely about that, and defend or diminish the impact of Unknown being a poor sport, you perpetuate the culture that tolerates that kind of behavior.

 

[Lovage]

ur mom perpetuates these nuts calm down my little pony

 

[GimR]

I'm sorry Umbreon but you know nothing of the state of competitive gaming if you think stream numbers have nothing to do with getting sponsors, etc. seriously, Marvel tournaments do not have as many entrants as people think. The reason it gets the sponsors is because of how many people watch it.

This is all silly TBH. This community has a group that's willing to go out and stream events to thousands of viewers in order to get people interested, grow the community, and get sponsors interested. Are you guys really saying that it's so important that players act any way they want that you're willing to throw the opportunity away that we're giving?

And yes I overstepped my boundaries. But you gotta understand, I've been dealing with this stuff in the Brawl community for a long time (Public splitting) and I thought the Melee scene would be different(It is for the most part). I'd just finished coming back from Cali. I'd gotten almost no sleep and I did this for free for Alukard making me lose $300. So I got pissed. We had 4,000 people watching and the finals were ruined. I should've let Unknown forfeit so that finals would've been a serious set between Kaze and M2K. I didn't realize me yelling at 'em for being soft would cause them to super sand bag through finals.I do now looking back obviously

 

[Scar]

Hey guys, I'm going to talk about this on stream tonight with Cactuar, Sheridan, Prog, and King Funk from Denmark. Please tune in, not only to support us but also to participate in this discussion through another medium.

PLZ CHECK OUT THIS THREAD <3

 

[Divinokage]

You're dumb.

Umm.. I'm not sure if you are trolling here or not. =/

 

[GimR]

Umm.. I'm not sure if you are trolling here or not. =/

pretty sure he's trolling

 

[ph00tbag]

ur mom perpetuates these nuts calm down my little pony

If you think I'm not calm, you're probably just projecting.

Calm down, bro.

 

[the_CAM_factor]

good streams are the future of melee.
they can attract new players and get melee better recognition from the fgc.
i really wish we had proved ourselves better at rom, I know we will at apex but thats a long time away and now til then we need to make every tourney matter.

 

[leffen]

I think KK/Unknown johning on the "viewers" having more power than the player is ****ing ridiculous


Our community is built up by people who do never get to WF. If you start neglecting them, then the top players won't get anything either. Good finals = more viewers/better experience for the people at the tournament -> people want to attend tournaments->tournaments can still be hosted


I still want a ban to happen. No excuses Unknown/M2K/KK have changed my mind about the ban, instead made me even more dissappointed at the involved. Unknown and KK are both angry at the community for being angry at them, and constantly try to blame someone else (boy I wish I could quote unknown just blaming EVERYTHING on m2k).

Unless some form of punishment happens, splitting will continue to be a problem. If you look at the example above @the Naniwa situation, that is how it should be handled (He basically didn't get to enter Code S because he threw a POOL match), and because of how it was handled, it pretty much ensured that nothing like it would happen. That is not to mention that this was MUCH worse and boy, did it SEVERELY hurt us as a community, possibly keeping up from being a part of Evo, making the best and biggest tournament organizer quit () and keeping god knows how many sponsors and people from getting into competitive smash

By just "letting this go" we show that as a community, we accept this type of behavior in community, and I feel like doing so will really hurt us in the long run. Much more so than the "hype" the players mentioned attending Apex would do

Oh, and while splitting may not occur at Apex, you all know that if unknown and kirbykaze face eachother in bracket, there is a really high chance of that set going similarly to their RoM set (as shown by all of their previous ones)

 

[KirbyKaze]

ITT leffen still thinks that all this is about the split

Never change lol



edit:

leffen your last comment is dumb, this is literally the first time we've done this at a tournament that wasn't a local (within the last 2 years or so). Even at TBH and HOPE we played the sets out. I began to play the set out at this one but then he forfeited and they made us keep playing. That's basically the only reason we ****ed around.

 

[Espy Rose]

It's not, but a good portion of it is.

 

[leffen]

After I heard Alex Strife say "Pot splitting is the reason I'm done" then yeah, for me that is more important than you feeling "powerless" and that made it okay for you to manipulate the bracket

 

[Zankoku]

I don't think KK split.

 

[Europhoria]

He didn't. Leffen's IQ is just under 80.

 

[GimR]

lol, there's no way Alex Strife is quitting anything over this. He's just upset

 

[Lovage]

and leffen felt a little bit worried about it... (55 IQ BRAIN COULD STILL PROCESS FEAR)

GOSH leave him ALONE guys

 

[Jockmaster]

I still have yet to comprehend how the stream viewers are people who top players shouldn't give a **** about. I don't quite agree with all of Leffen's post, but the statement "most of this community is players who DON'T make it to WFs" is so true.

Scrubs like myself (and many, many others I assume) are not only bad at this game, but don't have too much of an opportunity to get better (transportation johns, school johns, blah blah). So my involvement in the community comes down to casually playing very infrequently and then watching the big tournaments online, in combination with going on smashboards. The stream allows a small amount of...interaction...i guess with the greater community. So when I sit down for a night and watch a tournament, watching the biggest matches of the night get totally blown off is frustrating.

I don't care about splitting as long as I don't know its there

I would rather people forfeit than play half-assedly (it's almost patronizing)

And I want this community to grow, which is tough when the one thing that would REALLY help (streams) has a couple of our most elite players act like they don't give a damn

I'm to the point where I feel Unknown and KK understand where we're coming from, and for that I thank them. M2K is still playing victim like always, but whatever.