It's time to ditch the ITC missions. Trust in CA.

[Marshal Rohr]

Amateur, unregulated competitions with cash prizes are always scams. Sorry to hear they were sleezy, MC. Edited January 28, 2020 by Marshal Rohr

[Closet Skeleton]

After attending the LVO, I have come to the conclusion that the whole ITC championship is a sham. Reece and everyone involved should be ashamed of themselves. They manipulated the pairings to avoid certain players from meeting each other day 1. Not only was this an insult to everyone else that attended (and paid good money to do so), but that's a huge advantage to have.

 

That's called Seeding, lots of professional sports do it.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seed_(sports)

Sounds like they screwed up in implementing it and you're free to think its innappropriate for a warhammer tournament but its unfair to criticise people without acknowledging the precedent for it.

[Rik Lightstar]

Seeding is only appropriate for Knock Out and Group Stage events, not Swiss style pairings. It sounds pretty indefensible tbh.

 

Rik

[Ishagu]

Seeding is only appropriate for Knock Out and Group Stage events, not Swiss style pairings. It sounds pretty indefensible tbh.

 

Rik

This is the main point. You see it in knockout contests like the Champions League, but not in events the style of a 40k tournament.

[toaae]

I don't think there was any seeding going on. Strength of schedule breaks ties in BCP, but the primary metrics used for pairings is # of wins and total points. I looked at previous tournaments in my BCP, and the score of the losing player never seemed to matter for the winning player's next pairing.

 

I know that at LVO, I played someone in round 2 that had the same result as me in round 1, and every player I've checked did as well. Nothing looks fishy.

[Ishagu]

Did you have a lot of fun playing the same mission for 5 rounds?

[Brother Tyler]

So are we finished discussing the merits of CA missions versus ITC missions?

[Cruor Vault]

After attending the LVO, I have come to the conclusion that the whole ITC championship is a sham. Reece and everyone involved should be ashamed of themselves. They manipulated the pairings to avoid certain players from meeting each other day 1. Not only was this an insult to everyone else that attended (and paid good money to do so), but that's a huge advantage to have. On top of that, their "hand picking" of pairings took so long that round 2 and 3 were delayed hours, round 3 started when it was suppose to be ending. Reece was acting all upset with the delay, which I had to laugh at as it was his fault. Every other ITC event I have attended randomly pairs you round 1 and then goes off strength of schedule after that. But because he didn't want to follow that format, the system crashed.

I had a good time playing against some great players, but had I known ahead of time that 7/8 of the participants were going to be playing at a disadvantage, I would not have wasted my time nor money. I will still attend other ITC events where I know the pairings will be consistent for everyone. I would like to see tournaments using other formats, more specifically Maelstrom missions.

 

That's a LOT of rampant speculation and accusation.

 

Reece and Frankie and the BCP guys were not as you say "cherry picking parings" and it certainly was NOT the reason for the delay each round.  A LOT of major players got knocked out in the early rounds.  If pairings were being manipulated as you're accusing them of being do you think former champs like Brandon Grant would have lost as early as he did?

 

The reason the app crashed was issues with the cloud servers its hosted on couldn't support the unprecedented traffic the app was generating.  The cost to boost them for the weekend to support the traffic that was occurring was in the ~$5-10K range.  I don't have the whole story, but I spent a good portion of the weekend talking to the BCP guys and as they described it to me.

 

"Imagine your office printer breaks, but you and your co-workers don't realize it.  So you all keep trying to print documents.  All those print orders pile up on top of themselves, but the printer is still broken.  Even after the printer is fixed, those jobs are still trying to get through.  So even after the printer guy fixes the hardware problem, the backlog makes it impossible for anyone to get their new documents until the old queue is cleared."

 

BCP is run by 3 guys with barely any funding, and frankly we should all be grateful that they are willing to put up with the whiny community and support the game as it grows.  Have you ever run a large event before?  With 300+ or more players?  I have, and I can tell you that not having a functional app makes it damn near impossible to do pairings quickly.  With ~800 players in just the Championships and an OPTIMAL rate of 1 table's scores entered every 20 seconds, you're looking at around 2.5 man hours of data entry PER ROUND to do pairings.

 

 

As to Reece being upset...

 

OF COURSE HE WAS!!  

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Lol don’t flip out. And btw it’s Vult. Edited January 28, 2020 by Black Blow Fly

[jaxom]

 

I acknowledge that it may be wishful thinking.  Tournaments are the big communal events (and it would near guarantee an audience if they switched formats rather than trying to establish a new event with a different format). Even those "hobby influencers" that are more narrative-based, like The Battlehosts or Independent Characters, will have episodes on "So you want to prepare for a tournament." Yet, the tournament scene didn't start as the beast it is now. The current tournament scene is the result of people wanting something and taking a risk to see "if you build it will they come" to paraphrase. Other subcultures of the community would need to take a similar leap of faith. However, looked at from a market share perspective, the established "hobby influencer" websites skew towards the tournament/ITC scene. An attempt to promote a greater variety of subculture events would greatly benefit from the explicit backing and promotion by such websites, podcasts, Youtube channels, etc.

 

I wanted to follow up on this. The LVO has narrative events and a more casual tournament in addition to the ITC tournament. Does anyone know if there was any coverage of these events anywhere?

[Claws and Effect]

Like I've previously stated, ITC has it's place. So do the CA missions.

 

I've had a lot of fun with the build your own deck of objectives aspect of the CA missions.

 

The main thing the ITC format has going for it is consistency. If you know what the missions will be ahead of time and have a rough idea of what the terrain is going to be like, you can practice for it. Sure, it's essentially a form of house rules. But it's house rules that a lot of people have agreed upon.

 

Bottom line for me is if you enter an ITC tournament, you know what you're getting yourself into. You can build your list and practice with it because you know everyone else is practicing the same scenarios with it as well.

 

Personally, I think it's going to be an uphill battle to get the tournament scene to adopt anything else at this point.

 

However, I do agree that GW making changes to rules and points costs based on ITC is a bad idea. I don't play competitively very often, but I do play by the matched play rules almost exclusively. Changing a unit I like because someone found a loophole that made it really strong in a very specific format that I rarely play in would be annoying.

[Happy-inquisitor]

 

The main thing the ITC format has going for it is consistency. If you know what the missions will be ahead of time and have a rough idea of what the terrain is going to be like, you can practice for it. Sure, it's essentially a form of house rules. But it's house rules that a lot of people have agreed upon.

 

 

 

Well we have gone round the discussion a few times but I agree that this is a key point. If you want consistency in all its forms then the ITC format is designed to achieve that. Perhaps the high level of consistency of meta - the ability of some lists to consistently dominate - was not an intentional part of the design but it would appear to be what happens.

 

If that is what you want and enjoy, then great. 

 

Where we do seem to have a disconnect is with people complaining about those consistent results - i.e. consistent winning from certain lists - and somehow thinking that the ITC missions mitigate this and achieve "greater balance". There is zero evidence that this is the case and a growing body of evidence to the contrary. 

[Ishagu]

Taken from KDash on Dakka who commented on the same topic I made there:

 

"People enjoy ITC because they know what is going to happen and know what their list can do even in hard counter situations. They might not be able to win, but, they’ll know how to score points to aid their overall placing.

People are scared to move away from this, because the vast majority of people aren’t skilled enough to adapt mid game to score points if something throws a spanner into the works. We’d all rather blame bad dice or “imbalance” for our losses, rather than the idea that our list couldn’t handle a small bit of randomness. Which is also why I personally think some level of randomness SHOULD be strived for in the competitive scene. Independent and quick thinking should be way more valuable than netlisting and practicing with the list a dozen times.

 

For me, you should win the battle on the day on the tabletop due to skill and decision making, regardless of what random things happen in the game, not 4 weeks beforehand when you build your list.

 

For those wanting some data on competitive CA19 events, we are unfortunately lacking right now, simply because most stats collators blank any event not on BCP, or not running 2000 points (which includes the GW heats and finals). I get that it can be hard to collect the data, and specifically the lists, but, even when that is known some events just get instantly dismissed because they are run at 1750 points or simply “aren’t ITC”. This isn’t going to change imo.

With that in mind, below is some of the info from the Caledonian event and the GW finals.

Caledonian Uprising –

Top 10

Thousand Sons & un-aligned Daemons soup.

Forces of the Hive Mind.

CSM & Nurgle soup.

Imperial Fists.

Raven Guard & Imperial Fists.

Iron Hands (Astraeus & Repulsors).

GSC.

Blood Angels.

Iron Hands.

Orks.

Full lists can be found here - https://tabletop.to/caledonian-uprising-2020

 

GW Finals –

Top 10

Iron Hands.

T’au.

Grey Knights & Guard & BA.

Imperial Fists.

Drukhari.

Blood Angels.

Iron Hands.

Orks.

Chaos Soup.

Harlequins.

It is worth noting here, that outside of the 2 placings I’ve listed as soup, I am unable to confirm if the other lists souped or not.

Final standings can be found as pictures on the Warhammer World Events Facebook page.

 

Now, if we count the GK/Guard/BA list as Marines, we see that over the 2 events, 50% of the top 10’s were Space Marine lists. Whilst this is still higher than we’d all like to see, we can already see the difference between “competitive” diversity between this format and the ITC format. We 100% need more data, but, as both of these events were attended by a lot of the best players in the country, inc some that performed very well at the LVO this year, we can potentially start to draw a bit of information from the results and at least begin to wonder what the possibilities could be."

[Snazzy]

I just want to say this is a great thread, personal snipes aside. 

[Claws and Effect]

The problem with random mission draws is you will run into games that you mathematically cannot win. No one can build a list that is equally capable at every possible variation of mission parameters. Sometimes you'll get a mission that you score points for destroying units with a particular battlefield role. If your opponent didn't bring any of them that's points you cannot score no matter what you do.

 

A lot more variety in list building in the ITC format is possible. Except a lot of people are afraid to think outside the box. I've been paying attention to Spikey Bits' "Lists that shocked the meta" series and have seen wins and high placings from factions that most people think are hot garbage.

 

Problem is a lot (maybe even the majority) of people will take the path of least resistance and just copy and paste a list that did well in previous tournaments because they think it gives them some sort of advantage. It really doesn't, though, because they aren't the person who built the list and player skill matters.

 

I'd be willing to bet that if you looked at past years you will find that it isn't so much the same factions doing well year after year, but rather the same players. Marines are stupidly good right now. But how did they do at last year's LVO? But I'm pretty sure you'll see a lot of the same names in the top 100 playing different factions from year to year.

 

TL;DR version: The ITC format is not causing the issue of the same things showing up at top tables. It's lack of imagination among the players. No one wants to take a chance on a new idea not working out.

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

I think it is okay if you encounter the no win scenario. What I would find very interesting is how the waac itc tourney players would try to game CA missions.

[Ishagu]

The problem with random mission draws is you will run into games that you mathematically cannot win. No one can build a list that is equally capable at every possible variation of mission parameters. Sometimes you'll get a mission that you score points for destroying units with a particular battlefield role. If your opponent didn't bring any of them that's points you cannot score no matter what you do.

 

It will certainly make tournament runs without losses a lot less likely. If everyone is in this boat it ultimately isn't an issue, and in effect this actually balances the game.

 

For example a pure Astartes army will never be as capable at playing an MSU list as Dark Eldar, or control the board the same as as other armies in the early turns. This is perhaps why Astartes aren't dominating tournaments using CA missions to the same extent as they do in ITC events.

[Overwhelming Odds]

I saw "Grey Knights and Blood Angels".  That is amazing.   Oh, and the posts about randomness, unwinnable games, and net-listing are spot on.  Excellent thread.  There is no right answer.  You have to take into account the "meta", which is a far greater problem set than just the format or competitiveness. It includes:

 

Player skill

Player experience (as a whole and with the list itself)

Player base (how good are the other players)

Diversity (in lists and experience)

WAAC mentalities

Terrain type, density, and placement

Mission tailoring (ITC) vs. Meta tailoring

Rogue aspects (Lists no one is prepared for/expects, wild strategies, weird combos/interactions)

Amount of disruption effects (Can the player/list handle that "wrench in the works", "anti-" lists)

 

Until a methodology exists to take into consideration these aspects, there will not be "fairness".  The sad part is it is achievable with very little effort.  Balance is created on a whole by balancing the independent factors as a whole. If certain "aspects" create "no-win" scenarios, correct those first.  Adjust or remove.  Easy.

 

 

Last but not least, I seriously want to address negative overall bias.  I have seen SAVANTS utilize "sub-standard" <perception> lists and crush opponents.  But what is not okay, is the incredible negativity of the player base saying "That list is garbage."  "Why did you bring X unit?, Y is better"  or the comment I despise most, "Why are you playing that?"  Those comments cut deep when the player brought what he brought for a reason.  There is too much negativity in the way people lead off and interact in the first place.  There needs to be a much more positive spin on every interaction.  "That is a unique list!  Can you explain how it works, I am intrigued".  Or, "I see you are using X unit, how are you utilizing them?".  These encounters make people feel included rather than excluded.  It is as simple as that.  This is an unfortunate byproduct of the environment that competitive tournament create by virtue of the desire to compete and win.  It is an environment that breeds attitudes of superiority and dominance.  I doubt many people go to tournaments and help their opponents to have every advantage to beat them.  Counter-productive.  But it is exactly that positive attitude that grows the hobby and makes people really enjoy the experience.  

 

I have competed in numerous competitions, from X-wing, to MTG, to Warhammer 30K/40K, and I have absolutely helped my opponents correct mistakes, catch errors, and have ended up losing because of it. You know what feels amazing? Having them thank you profusely for sportsmanship.  Besides, I don't EVER want to win on a technicality, oversight, or because I did not do the right thing.  That is a worthless and hollow victory at someone else's expense. No thank you, I would rather lose fair and square.  

 

V/r,

 

Dan

Edited January 29, 2020 by Overwhelming Odds

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Gotchas are not cool.

[MegaVolt87]

SNIP

 

I have competed in numerous competitions, from X-wing, to MTG, to Warhammer 30K/40K, and I have absolutely helped my opponents correct mistakes, catch errors, and have ended up losing because of it. You know what feels amazing? Having them thank you profusely for sportsmanship.  Besides, I don't EVER want to win on a technicality, oversight, or because I did not do the right thing.  That is a worthless and hollow victory at someone else's expense. No thank you, I would rather lose fair and square.  

 

V/r,

 

Dan

Agreed, though knowing better than an opponent is still a particular of player skills. It's something that you should be leveraging at that kind of competitive level. I am not the best at 40k admittedly, though for a few other systems there I definitely leverage having a greater knowledge there to the fullest for sure.

[Overwhelming Odds]

MegaVolt87,

 

I agree and also disagree.  Let me give an example.  I used to play with "top tier" judges that knew the game (MTG) in and out.  They could absolutely crush you if they chose to.  But, I learned a very valuable lesson from them (there were 7 in my gaming group in Rapid City, South Dakota in 2008).  

 

I asked why they always helped the new players in every way they could, helping them to play to their maximum ability.  Their reply changed the way I approach all "competitive" games and also casual gaming. 

 

"I want and need the absolute best opponents". So simple, yet profound.

 

You want to help the newer players become as skilled as possible. Ideally, even better than you!  Why?  Because then everyone wins.  You play better to compete or "catch up".  You are pushed, challenged, and you improve each other.  Skill begets skill.  That is how you grow and develop.  

 

- or -

 

You can continue to win, at all costs or just because you know the game mechanics better.  You don't help the other people, they don't learn from you, or your experience, they can't "fast track" to success or "even out" the playing field.  Or heaven forbid, achieve greater heights.  They lose interest quickly, because no one likes getting their teeth kicked in constantly.  

 

The moral here is that you can have BOTH competition and winning, but you can simultaneously also teach, mentor, assist, and develop future players at the same time.  I guarantee you will benefit in the short and long term.  There really is no drawback.  The worst excuse I hear is that "no one did that for me".  That is all the more reason to do it! 

 

Now, I understand if there is money invested and on the line, that is different.  All bets are off, for the most part.  But, you can still give critical, constructive feedback after a match and make a friend for life, just by being genuinely helpful.  If you saw mistakes, point them out afterwards.  Give factual advice.  Relay experience in the proper context.  That is how you can grow a player base.

 

The higher the experience level and the competency of the player base, the better the overall gaming experience.  I have experienced this firsthand and it was the greatest year of my gaming experience, in my life, ever (I started at 16 and I am over 40 now, for a reference).  The skill level was astronomically high.  The competitive environment was fierce.  I also increased my play level exponentially. I later moved to Texas and was ranked #1 there, within months.  The disparity in our skill levels, there, was astounding.  So, I, the previous student became the teacher.  Pay it forward!

 

We can have direct influence over increasing other peoples experience levels and competency.  Help people improve and everyone wins.  

 

Just wanted to give my perspective.  I love this game and I want as many people as possible to learn and play it.  There has never been a better time.  Analog hobbies are surging as people are drowned in digital content everyday.

 

I mean no "ill will" towards anyone who has posted previously.  I am not arguing nor being combative.  Please don't take it that way. I am "not on a high horse", preaching or ranting.  I am just relaying personal experiences that I know can have a positive impact.  This is just my perspective. We were all that "new guy" at some point.

 

V/r,

 

Dan

Edited January 29, 2020 by Overwhelming Odds

[Happy-inquisitor]

The problem with random mission draws is you will run into games that you mathematically cannot win. No one can build a list that is equally capable at every possible variation of mission parameters. Sometimes you'll get a mission that you score points for destroying units with a particular battlefield role. If your opponent didn't bring any of them that's points you cannot score no matter what you do.

 

A lot more variety in list building in the ITC format is possible. Except a lot of people are afraid to think outside the box. I've been paying attention to Spikey Bits' "Lists that shocked the meta" series and have seen wins and high placings from factions that most people think are hot garbage.

 

 

 

I am not sure how that relates to the CA missions at all though. None of them have an element where you need to kill specific battlefield role units. One of them has scoring objectives only for Troops units but if you absolutely insist on not bringing troops you can try to win that one on the kill point element. Not that anyone is really suggesting you randomly generate the missions, that is not what is happening at the tournaments I go to - the TO decides the missions.

 

As for more variety in ITC list building I am afraid I just utterly disagree. The secondaries penalise you for taking certain types of units which easily give up those secondaries - if you run those units you are effectively playing at a VP handicap.  It is no good thinking outside the box if your unit choices give your opponent a 6-12 VP headstart on you because of easy secondaries. This totally messes with internal balance and where you come to factions that struggle to avoid fielding those sorts of units (e.g. nids) it messes with external balance.

[Ishagu]

Yes it cannot be understated how the ITC funnels factions into taking specific units. The Tau are a big victim of this.

 

Kroot can be a good screening unit, but you give up Double Victory points when your opponent chooses to score "Ripper" making them un-viable. Same with unit like Piranhas, the VP punishes you for taking them. As a result every ITC Tau list is the same, and ironically the standard ITC Tau list cannot perform well in CA missions due to how static and defensive it is.

 

 

Adding on to this:

 

Balancing is more difficult than people give it credit for, and the ITC missions do obfuscate things. The mission and terrain have a tangible and significant impact on how effective units are.

 

A classic example:

 

How much are 5 Heavy Bolters worth against an Ork army on an open table?

How much are they worth against an Imperial Knight hidden behind lots of cover?

 

How much is a scoring focused unit with teleportation worth in a mission where every objective is far away from your deployment?

Is it worth the same when all the objectives are in your deployment? Of course not.

 

Because the ITC is so predictable and variation between missions is near non-existent, certain units become overly powerful as a result, whist others end up as completely ineffective.

GW should not balance the game around a meta that uses unofficial rules. Heck, you can go as far as saying that ITC 40k is not real 40k.

Edited January 29, 2020 by Ishagu

[BLACK BLΠFLY]

Secondaries like Recon and Engineers are the worst for the meta encouraging zero interaction.

[chapter master 454]

Secondaries like Recon and Engineers are the worst for the meta encouraging zero interaction.

 

Same time though, the only other option is kill power and well...we are all kind of looking around and asking how to handle that.

 

A measure of expectation is to be had here: this is a discussion aimed at the more competitive high level of the game, not the casual level so all assessments must be made with that in mind. In this instance, those sort of objectives help encourage movement on both sides of the play field to leverage terrain to their advantage or their units movement values, not just their compensator. With those two objectives is can actually cause targeting to change dynamically as now a unit prior may of had no tactical value but now does because he's the poor shod told to sit on that quarter of the board or objective.

 

Again they don't promote Zero Interaction, they actually encourage it funnily enough as now players need to weigh their options on both sides of the table.

"I need a unit to hold that quarter...but I can't just leave a chaff squad there or they will get wiped easily...but if I use my tougher unit they won't be available elsewhere"

"I can deal with those chaff boys he puts in that quarter easily...but if he sticks his big unit there it isn't easy to kill...is it worth the resources I could put elsewhere"

 

What promotes zero-interaction is if the rules favour killing power over staying power too much. In 40k often units lack one to have the other (not tanks though, they lack both) but we can clearly see the zero value in staying power if all we are going for is kills. Imagine if those "non-kill" objectives didn't exist, the whole Grinder style of list that we have seen from Tau and Chaos would not of been a thing as they play for a different objective. They seem uninteractive but they are no different than Captain Smash or a mega elite alpha shooter/charging army, they both do the same thing that all players try to design: least amount of input from the opponent.

That is natural as we don't want our opponents opinion on whether or not we delete their units, we just want ours because ours is "we win". The trick with game design is funnily enough to make it so players HAVE to interact, kind of like trying to make two magnets with the same polarity touch. Designers WANT interaction, Players don't. Designers need to sell awesome virtues of units and weapons as if they don't have interaction, players want to know interaction exists.

A strange paradox of games.

 

There is also a big hang up on the concept that possibly people are getting a bit too "black and white" with things here. There is no 1 size for all, some LOVE ITC and some LOVE CA. Then you have the variants that come with that with those who would like to see more of A and less of B while some thing C should be removed while D is toned up with other communitity members declaring A as Chaos Spawn and E is a far superior idea.

The vast complexity of this game is both its undoing and what brings people in. How can you balance a game that ranges from being played on 4x4 to 4x8 with terrain ranging from dustlands to megacity complexes so tight an armrest is considered a commodity! Not to mention the various units and their interactions.

 

Personally I would only comment that ITC needs to review its terrain rules (in particular having a hard set in stone map) and for tournaments to start considering using CA along with ITC missions to keep things fresh and interesting. ITC missions have a deep level of knowing what secondaries you want but now that you have to factor in some missions may not use that method of scoring, now you need to consider how would you handle those other missions? I would comment that in a tournament, each round would cycle between ITC and CA. Round 1 is ITC, 2 is CA and so on with each format choosing from 3 missions (with 6 total between the two).