Tournament Rules?

[paradox22]

We have a pretty healthy heroscape community here in the Kansas City area. The guys from Nebraska usually attend our tourneys as well...we've had tourneys that had 50+ participants...Whats the point you say? Well I'd like to get those "participants" all addicted to Summoner Wars and then start holding SW tourneys in our area.

Are there any rules for tournament play avliable yet? Such as rules for declaring a winner even when both summoners are still alive at the end of a timed round?

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

I would hazard a suggestion that if both summoners are alive at the end of time (provided those playing are allowed to finish their current turns), I'd say it should end in a draw.

[paradox22]

I would hazard a suggestion that if both summoners are alive at the end of time (provided those playing are allowed to finish their current turns), I'd say it should end in a draw.

I don't think that would really work in a tournament senario... There would be too many "ties" to detemine a clear winner.

[mrbistro]

Hmm. Draws could be problematic. Perhaps base it on the number of your opponent's cards in your Magic and Discard piles?

[Onacara]

Hmm. Draws could be problematic. Perhaps base it on the number of your opponent's cards in your Magic and Discard piles?


Or perhaps assign points for units to be used to decide winner...Say Commons destroyed count as 1 point..Champions count as 2

Going further on that point there should be scoring similar to the NHL involved...

W=2 Points
L=0 Points
T=1 Point...1 point would be given to the person who ended a game with both Summoners still alive but lost the game due to the "Overtime/Shootout" scoring above. The winner would be awarded 2 points.

[Truth]

What do you guys think of the player with the most life points remaining on their unit cards when time is called wins the game? If even that is tied then it is a draw.

I do plan on writing up competitive play rules.

[Onacara]

What do you guys think of the player with the most life points remaining on their unit cards when time is called wins the game? If even that is tied then it is a draw.

I do plan on writing up competitive play rules.

My issue with that would be that someone could summon 5 2 life commons on their last move (as time expires) to "buy the victory" even if their opponent has taken out more points then them during the course of the game.

[Hogg]

I don't think many games will time out. SW plays pretty quick compared to HS.

[Truth]

My issue with that would be that someone could summon 5 2 life commons on their last move (as time expires) to "buy the victory" even if their opponent has taken out more points then them during the course of the game.

But that player will have had to hold onto those rather than have those units on the field helping them, and will have had to collected the magic to pay for them.

[mrbistro]

I don't think many games will time out. SW plays pretty quick compared to HS.
Sadly there are always those cheeseballs who wouldn't mind timing out a game for a cheap win.

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

Or perhaps assign points for units to be used to decide winner...Say Commons destroyed count as 1 point..Champions count as 2

Going further on that point there should be scoring similar to the NHL involved...

W=2 Points
L=0 Points
T=1 Point...1 point would be given to the person who ended a game with both Summoners still alive but lost the game due to the "Overtime/Shootout" scoring above. The winner would be awarded 2 points.

Only possible issue I see here is if your playing with (or against) cards that sit on top of a "stack". If you control the monster but your opponent captures the card, do you not count those cards at the end? If that card is still in play at the end, would you count those cards?

I think finding an adequate time for a game would be a good start first. As for the "tie" bit, I was just basing that off my experience with MTG tournaments. Seemed to work ok for that format but their games tend to go a tad faster so I can see that being an issue here.

I am starting to kidn of like Bistro's idea with "captured" cards, persay. That should show who was controlling the card advantage during the game.

I'm not a fan with the life total on the board. Someone could cast like reinforcements or something and toss out some high life commons to swing the results.

[Creationist]

Maybe there could be a sudden death-ish thingy. Maybe have a set number of turns after and then its decided by something. And I think maybe that decider could be total life of the summoner. The summoner makes the player able to play.

[mrkurtb]

A couple things to consider:

1) Have a 5 minute (10 minute?) warning.
2) To reward aggressiveness and to punish cheesy tournament play, consider rewarding each surviving unit. Weight the points received by the number of rows away from ones own starting row (1-8). For example, all units in the row closest to that player receives 1 point per surviving unit. This progresses all the way up to rewarding all units in the opponent's back row, 8 points per unit.

Ties would be very infrequent and I have a feeling this would finish games quickly/make for some crazy finishes.

[SupaGerm]

What about number of wounds inflicted on the opposing summoner? I figure this would work because:

1. It's already the main goal of the game
2. It would inspire an aggressive rush/desperate defense as time is running out
3. Burn/greater burn only hits commons or champions (no advantage for the elves)
4. No complex math or counting of cards

Note that I'm not talking about wounds remaining, as that would make for an uneven situation between factions.

[Truth]

What about number of wounds inflicted on the opposing summoner? I figure this would work because:

1. It's already the main goal of the game
2. It would inspire an aggressive rush/desperate defense as time is running out
3. Burn/greater burn only hits commons or champions (no advantage for the elves)
4. No complex math or counting of cards

Note that I'm not talking about wounds remaining, as that would make for an uneven situation between factions.

I think it would still be rather easy to have a tie with this.

[SupaGerm]

I dunno. I find it hard to believe that each summoner would have taken the exact same number of hits during a game. Unless the players were passive and the summoners weren't wounded at all, I don't think there'd be a real issue. Anyone feel like counting wounds during their next game or two? Maybe at 30 mins and every 15 after that? I'd be curious to see the results.

The main thing is that a tie breaker should reward the player who is closest to achieving the main goal of the game. Some of the other suggestions were number of units in play, number of cards in magic pile, etc. And these all lend themselves to the sort of "cheeseball" strategies that mrbistro mentioned. I'd hate to play my way through a tourney, almost kill the other guy's summoner, but lose because he dumped five zero-point goblins on the table at the end of the game, or hid his summoner in the corner and ditched his entire hand into the magic pile each of the last few turns.

[Hogg]

The game is so swingy it’s hard to determine who is winning at any given time. The "For the Puppies" write-up is a great example of this. One summoner killed the other one personally, even when things looked bad for him.

I think the life counting method is bad for high life summoners. Who cares if someone lands a hit on Grognak? But on Elian one hit is significant.

[SupaGerm]

Well, the only other thing I can think of at the moment that is even between factions is event cards. Based on the deck construction rules, each faction will always have the same number of events available.

A potential tie-breaker could be the number of unplayed event cards. I'm not crazy about this idea, but you could argue that both players fought to a tie, but one of them got there by using less of their special strategies.

On the downside, events are meant to be played, not sat on. I'm also not sure if you would count events burned for magic as unplayed or not. I would guess they count as played.

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

I believe Mr Bistro suggested counting "enemy" cards in your magic/discard pile. This would show who attacked and was more aggresive since that player would have more of his enemies cards in his piles. Can't get those by cheeseballing on the last few turns. You have to earn those cards :p

[SupaGerm]

I believe Mr Bistro suggested counting "enemy" cards in your magic/discard pile. This would show who attacked and was more aggresive since that player would have more of his enemies cards in his piles. Can't get those by cheeseballing on the last few turns. You have to earn those cards :p

Definitely not cheeseballing, no. But horde armies would be at a disadvantage in a straight kill count. It's *typically* easier to bump off a goblin than an orc, isn't it? And you yourself pointed out what happens if the goblin is Blarf and he comes stacked with 4 other cards. Tiebreaking pinata, anyone?

I think if you wanted to do it by captured cards and keep it as fair as possible for all factions, you'd have to count costs on the defeated enemies, and figure out what to do with those pesky 0 point ones. Of course... that sounds like a royal pain.

I think I'm leaning towards Onacara's idea, but where commons = 1 point, champions = 3 (better reward for taking out the more important characters, helps leverage easy-to-kill commons). Thing is, under that plan Krung (cost 8) is equally as valuable as Baldar (cost 4). Maybe that's good though, as you should be protecting your better champions anyway, and it should take them more effort to defeat the tougher ones. It definitely keeps things quick and simple, since you're already going to be sifting through your piles to return your opponent's cards, and can count then.

As far as non-unit cards you may get... Count them as commons?

Could have a fun scenario with Magic Drain in play, if someone kills their own champion, and you steal it from the pile.

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

Good points, Germ. Never really thought about it from that angle. Could always end a tie in a good ol' fashion session of wrist wrasslin'!

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

So I thought about this some more last night. I'm starting to think that there really isn't a valid solution to tie breaking. I'm going to base that off 2 other systems I've played in tournaments in.

First is Warhammer. Rules for Warhammer clearly state that in order to win, you have to achieve "X" amount of victory points more than your opponent which vary depending on the point size of the armies participating. They include a cross referencing chart to further determine whether that equates to a minor victory, major victory, massacre, and even a draw if the differential is marginal at best. So their rules clearly state that a draw (and will occasionally) happen and have built their victory conditions around it. Granted, some Warhammer tournament organizers have taken steps to streamline the victory process by pushing scoring to a Win/Loss/Draw point scale and introduce scenarios that will grant a certain amount of bonus victory points for achieving but in the end, it's all about the VP's and the associated chart.

Second is Magic: The Gathering. Their rules clearly state that the only way to achieve victory is to reduce your opponent's life total to 0. If you are unable to do so in the time allotted, the game is considered a draw because there are no alternatives in the rules to allow for any other type of victory. The ONLY way to win is to kill your opponent. Plain and simple.

Summoner Wars is the same way. It's listed in the rules that the ONLY way to win is to kill your opponent's summoner. To try and come up with a way to tie-break will basically re-write that rule. It will also add a new element on how to win the game thus adding a secondary strategy. So one could play not to kill the other summoner any more but to achieve the tie-breaking factor so that when time is called, they have the win. It introduces 2 victory conditions over the currently printed 1.

That being said, the only option I can come up with to aleviate any sort of influx of ties in a tournament setting (although with the speed at which this game is played, I wouldn't really think there would be that many ties) is to steal a bit from games like Space Hulk and Blood Bowl and have timed turns. This will force the players to think fast and think actively. That and you'll know exactly when everyone will be finished, lol :o

[Truth]

You may be right. I don't think we can expect all tourney runners to have separate timing devices for each table though... that might be asking too much.

Even though the game plays quickly, I think 1 hr. time allotments will still see some players unfinished. Some people will think long and hard when making their moves in a tournament situation.

The best one offered thus far may be wounds on opponent's Summoner... but even that has flaws, because wounds are a bigger deal on some Summoners than they are on others. So back to my original suggestion of life points remaining on a Summoner. But that has its own flaws of certain Summoners starting at a disadvantage.

Maybe Tournament rules could detail how many points a wound on each Summoner is worth. Maybe there is a formula for figuring it out. Take a possible 10 points for killing an opponent's Summoner and divide that 10 points by the number of life points that Summoner starts with. That is the number of points each wound on that Summoner is worth. The player with the most points at the end wins. There is some room for ties, but less than if we don't have some sort of point system.

For example a wound on Prince Elien would be worth: 2.5 points
Whereas a wound on Grognack would only be worth: 1.4 points

Thoughts?

[SupaGerm]

To simplify your points concept, Truth, How about a straight percentage of wounds?

If I do 2 wounds on Elien, I am 50% of the way to killing him (2/4), but if I do 2 wounds on Grognack, I am only 33% percent of the way to killing him (2/6).

50 beats 33.

Here is how it breaks down (# wounds, then percent to death):

Elien
1 25%
2 50%
3 75%
4 dead

Grognack/Oldin
1 17%
2 33%
3 50%
4 67%
5 83%
6 dead

Sneeks
1 14%
2 29%
3 43%
4 57%
5 71%
6 86%
7 dead

The only overlaps are 50% to death, and Oldin vs. Grognack

[Goblin King]

Personally, I think that a good idea is to keep track of the points that you kill. If you kill a berserker, you get 2 points, or kill Krung you get 8. There has been raised the problem with the Goblin's Fighters and Slingers, however, I think that we can classify them as 1/2 points (They do get things done, but are less useful than say an orc fighter).

This would have the players have a total at time out, and the one who has more points is the victor.

If there is still a tie, have a next kill wins scenario, or use super germ's idea and see how many wounds each person has given to the summoner (33%, 50% etc.)

Goblin King

[rickert]

I think what to do with ties depends on the tournament structure. If you are playing round-robin and giving points, then ties aren't such a bad thing. I would favor something like four points for a win and one point for a loss and for a tie. I just like the idea that the person losing has nothing to gain from playing for a tie other than if they really want to mess up the other person's chances to win.

Then after a certain number of rounds if you cut to a final 2 or final 4, but at that point some type of tide-breaker would probably be necessary. But if you don't want that drama you could end the tournament after the rounds and then you wouldn't need a game tie-breaker but you would need a tournament tie-breaker, like perhaps the strength of the opponents the players defeated.

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

I'm still just wary of things that alter the win objective. By providing an alternate win objective (the tie-breaker), it could lead to players playing certain armies that play to that sole strength. For example, if you scored points for kills, one would tend to stray away from Goblins and probably more towards Dwarfs. Then they could work soley on a defensive strategy and eek out the win via kill points.

There has to be an alternative way that doesn't endanger the current game mechanics. Of the solutions present, I would put my vote with the Summoner wounds left percentage. It's a little wonky at first glance (seems daunting with all those numbers) but it's probably the best representation.

[rickert]

I'm still just wary of things that alter the win objective. By providing an alternate win objective (the tie-breaker), it could lead to players playing certain armies that play to that sole strength. For example, if you scored points for kills, one would tend to stray away from Goblins and probably more towards Dwarfs. Then they could work soley on a defensive strategy and eek out the win via kill points.

There has to be an alternative way that doesn't endanger the current game mechanics. Of the solutions present, I would put my vote with the Summoner wounds left percentage. It's a little wonky at first glance (seems daunting with all those numbers) but it's probably the best representation.

I admire your optimism but I don't think it's safe to assume there has to be a better tie-break system. Warlord has been around for years and years and there's still not a good tie-break that doesn't give an advantage to one faction over another or one playstyle over another.

[Retlaw]

How about: rock paper scissors lizard spock?


No points to count or keep track of
Doesn't change the stategy of the game
Doesn't favor one faction over another
Doesn't favor one type of game play over another
Quickly breaks ties
And is completely unrelated to the status of the game when time runs out ;)

[Truth]

I don't think percentage of wounds on the Summoner offers an alternative win scenario. I think it is still the most accurate tracking of how close you came to achieving the games only win scenario.

[KCU Master 2007]

I don't think percentage of wounds on the Summoner offers and alternative win scenario. I think it is still the most accurate tracking of how close you came to achieving the games only win scenario.

I'm going to have to agree with you and this was the first thing that came to my mind.

There is clearly one objective: Kill you opponents summoner (unlike some games that introduce points and round limits, etc). If you fail to do this you loose. If both players fail to do this, then they should both loose. However, one player is bound to have an advantage at the end of the game. Therefore go with the % of the Summoner's life you killed.

However, any TD must ensure that each player has an equal amount of turns simply because of how swingy the game can be from one turn to the next (which I love about this game).

[Aldin]

I have an idea that might do a good job of reflecting who is winning when time is called. Let the player taking their turn finish, then allow their opponent to Draw, Summon and play Event cards (essentially the reverse of a first turn). After the half-turn, both sides count the summoning cost of the units they've summoned which are on the battlefield (so Blazing Conscription won't give you any points). You carry the differential as a +/- through the tournament.

EXAMPLE:
I'm playing Elves vs. Orcs. Time is called during my turn and I finish out the turn with 2xWarriors, 2xArchers and the Fire Drake. The Drake just polished off a nice line of Orc Fighters leaving just two Shamans and the Summoner. Now the Orc player gets to draw, summon and play event cards. He summons Blagog and then plays Reinforcements to bring in two Smashers then we count points:

Elf
2xWarrior=2
2xArcher=2
Fire Drake=7
Total=11

Orc
2xShaman=2
2xSmashers=4
Blagog=6
Total=12

The Orcs win with a +1 differential and I lose with a -1 differential. If he hadn't had six Magic stored up he couldn't summon Blagog and I win with a +5 point differential (less any other commons he might summon). If I've blocked two of his available wall slots, he summons Blagog and reinforces with only one Smasher and I win with a +1 differential.

I think it does a good job of awarding the player that's winning without being too complicated. Does anyone else think this might work?

[KCU Master 2007]

Aldin do you have a thing for point differentials don't you ;)

But that does make as much sense as anything else, however the primary objective of the game is to kill the summoner. So, as much as I like the idea I don't think it gets the job done. (But it may...what do I know)

[XCoconutMonkey06x]

I don't think percentage of wounds on the Summoner offers ad alternative win scenario. I think it is still the most accurate tracking of how close you came to achieving the games only win scenario.

Sorry if I wasn't clear. I was mostly referring to the kill point tracking. Wound percentage seem like the most logical non-game changing method for breaking ties. Maybe we can try it out in some of our games and see how it plays out?

[Aldin]

Aldin do you have a thing for point differentials don't you ;)

Well sure, but a big part of that is the ease with which point differentials can be used in a tournament setting.


But that does make as much sense as anything else, however the primary objective of the game is to kill the summoner. So, as much as I like the idea I don't think it gets the job done. (But it may...what do I know)

My argument here would be that I think it gives a better idea of who is closer to killing the opposing summoner because the winner should be the one who has the better tactical position - the one most likely to succeed if the game was played out.

I'm a big fan of actively using both Sneeks and Blagog and will often have some wounds on them in a game I'm winning. Elien, though... if he has a wound I'm either losing badly or have at least been caught badly out of position at some point. Oldin is harder to wound than any of the others and has Defenders preventing access to him which means you pretty regularly need to grind through all the other Dwarves to lay hands on him.

The worst off with my idea would be the zero summoning cost Goblins, with the caveats that I suspect both that Goblin games tend to be the quickest and that they have more Magic available for summoning heroes than the other factions.

[Truth]

Yeah in the couple of games I played today I kept an eye on summoner damage percentage and how the correlated to who had the actual advantage in the game. It just doesn't always line up. We need a better method.

I think I'm going to pick up a 1 minute sand timer and play around with timed turns.

[Creationist]

Maybe you could use one of those chess timers. It would be easier to keep track of than a sand hourglass.

[paradox22]

For Monsterpocalypse we use digital kitchen timers.

[paradox22]

Yeah in the couple of games I played today I kept an eye on summoner damage percentage and how the correlated to who had the actual advantage in the game. It just doesn't always line up. We need a better method.

I think I'm going to pick up a 1 minute sand timer and play around with timed turns.

Any headway on these rules?

[TheLion]

Ugh... talk about a thread that will suck the life out of a game... :rolleyes: :)

I love the game, but I'm not going to waste valuable time playing againt "too intense" players in a tournament situation. There are reasons why games like Chess and Backgammon (and card games like Cribbage) work in tournament settings, and reasons why CCG's and CMG's have hard times building a stable, fair tournament scene.

I'd rather see energy put into getting some kind of league up and running for the game. That way, timed games do not matter, it's just a matter of playing the game. Arrange opponents, for say a month's worth of games, and let them play, and record results. No arguing over victory conditions, no worries about timing mechanisms (not everyone has chess clocks, I have one, but I'm not going to lend it to a tournament), and no sweating over time limits in an intense game (let them players finish the game naturally).

[Truth]

No real headway on this yet.

Leagues sound like a cool idea.

[RoninValentina]

I've got to agree with the sole win condition idea. You win by killing the opponent's summoner. Either you succeed, or you fail. Precisely because Summoner Wars is so volatile from turn to turn, I don't think you can devise a reasonable system of judging board position as a means to determine a winner in timed out game. Counting points on the board doesn't reflect cards in hand or still undealt- randomized to the bottom of the deck. So you win, lose or draw. So the issue with this in a tournament setting is frequent draws dilute/diminish the ability to determine a winner. So what if draws had worth on a sliding scale?

Say a Win is worth 3 pts. A loss is worth 0 pts. A player's first draw is worth 2 pts. Their second draw in a tourney is then worth 1 pt. Any further draws are then worth nothing, as the player has repeated failed to secure the sole winning objective. As the tourney progresses, this process will weed out players who may not be losing, but are clearly not winners. Accordingly, the Draw result will not outright eliminate good players from competition, and indeed should also help rank players who over the course of the event have won some games, but not all. Of course, any undefeated players are clear champions. And because each Draw result has a diminishing return, it forces players to act and should help conclude games before a Draw result can occur.

Just a thought I had. It sounds pretty solid to me, but it came to me about 5 minutes after reading this thread and there may be implications as to why it may not work I haven't thought of yet.

Edit: I suppose a real ass of a player could attempt forcing a Draw result to devalue an opponent's score post match, but that's akin to having 30pts more than opponent in Heroscape and running away till time is called.

[Jexik]

I don't think there should be any other win condition. Kill the other Summoner. I've seen so many games that come down to a final die roll one way or the other, that I think it'd be really hard to pin down any one factor for the final outcome of a game.

The only thing I might suggest is the ability to offer a draw if both players are out of their draw pile, and are down to just their summoner and some Walls left. If you give up your turn (to simply say "I offer a draw"), and the other guy fails to kill your Summoner during his next turn and turned down the draw, then it's a draw. But even with that I could see some potential annoyances. (Say I have a 1 life Elien who will eventually be cornered, and they've got a full health Grognack somewhere... he'd be annoyed).

So I don't really like that either. I don't like fractional life.

[pixlepix]

I think that games should be played to the end. When two games are over, the winners face eachother, and so do the losers.

[Mr Migraine]

I don't think there should be any other win condition. Kill the other Summoner. I've seen so many games that come down to a final die roll one way or the other, that I think it'd be really hard to pin down any one factor for the final outcome of a game.

The only thing I might suggest is the ability to offer a draw if both players are out of their draw pile, and are down to just their summoner and some Walls left. If you give up your turn (to simply say "I offer a draw"), and the other guy fails to kill your Summoner during his next turn and turned down the draw, then it's a draw. But even with that I could see some potential annoyances. (Say I have a 1 life Elien who will eventually be cornered, and they've got a full health Grognack somewhere... he'd be annoyed).

So I don't really like that either. I don't like fractional life.

That ability is pretty common in chess leagues.

[Truth]

Some guy on BGG said it took him 3 hours to play through a game. Its crazy, but some how possible, so it is hard to just let players play out a game in a tournament setting where others are ready to start the next round. I think that if I were to run a tournament today, a new round would start when all of the players from the previous round were finished. If a game goes longer than 60 minutes its a draw.

That isn't perfect though. A really slow mover could really hamper a player from getting the points they need from a win, thus being quite frustrating for that player. Keep the thoughts brewing on this. We'll work it out.

[manick74]

Simple answer for the timed tournament win decisions.

Count the cards on your side of the table. Winner is the player with the most.

Since you put your opponent's cards in your magic pile when you destroy them, and then into your discard pile, at the end of the game depending on how many exchanges you were successful in you should either have more or less than your opponent. Just total up the card you control in play, in hand, in deck and in magic and discard piles for your end score.

The question really is if this would have an unintended effect on certain strategies in a timed tournament round, roughly about an hour. Would Champion strategies be the only sensible way to go given this timed win condition? It does give new uses and risks to cards like Mana Drain and Blarf as well.

You would also need an end of game procedure. The game can't be over immediately at time, you should give each player a turn or two to sort position out and see if they can go for a legitimate ending (summoner killed) if they're behind in card count.

A standard CCG style end of game procedure would be something like this:

Swiss Format. 1 Hour rounds. When time is called active player finishes his turn. Then the players complete 3 more total turns. At the end of those 3 turns the player with the only Summoner left standing, or who controls the most cards in the game wins.

Thoughts?

Edit: So this has been brought up once and dismissed. I still think it's the best way to go personally. Even factoring Horde armies into it, while they do die as fast or faster, they also get more attacks in to deal more damage and balance it out. And you're talking about an hour's worth of exchanges, if one player has been playing that slow then he should be handed a game loss for stalling.

[manick74]

That isn't perfect though. A really slow mover could really hamper a player from getting the points they need from a win, thus being quite frustrating for that player.

In response to this in particular, having a judge who is paying attention can help allay any of this. Just be aware of slow play, and give warnings as required. Of course, if it isn't obvious by now that I've played lots of CCG's competitively (or at least tried, lol) then I don't know what to tell you. :)

[TheLion]

I've never seen slow play handled well in tournaments. The stock answer is always "call the judge over for a warning," but most judges have a hard time calling slow play.

The problem is in the way the time keeping is kept. A player should only affect their own time in a game. In chess, I don't care if a player takes 15 minutes on a move, because he is only hurting himself. If his clock runs out, he loses the game, no matter what the board position is. This isn't true with CCG's, and CMG's.

I just don't see how SuW can be a timed game. I think it's a credit to Truth that the game is designed so well, that playing the game to it's logical conclusion is the only fair way to determine a winner.



Edit: In chess, if time runs out for a player, and his opponent doesn't have enough material to checkmate, the game is drawn. I forgot about this, because I have never seen it happen before. The vast majority of the time, if the clock runs out on a player, he will lose.

[Quintaton16]

Would using Chess timers be impractical? I realize it could be a little expensive, but they seem like a fair idea. I doubt anyone participating in a tournament would have to read over the cards enough times to make the game terribly long. I suppose you could offer a disclaimer that participants must be able to play at a certain tempo, but 30 min. per person doesn't sound like too hard a burden.

If not, there's always a rolling rumble-style tourney format. Ollie has lots of good ideas in this vein.

[TheLion]

Chess clocks work in chess because there is no way for a player to affect the time of the opposing player.

Chess clocks don't work when your opponent has actions to do when it's on your clock.

I saw players trying to use chess clocks in Dreamblade, and had to chuckle watching the opposing player eat time on the opposing players clock (taking off the wrong piece, then having to put it back, and putting it back in the wrong cell, having to move it back to the corrct cell, and the player on the clock forgetting what his last move was...). :)



I feel the discussion here is trying to force SuW into a box it won't fit in. The game is an incredibly balanced, well designed, and well play tested. If the game designer is having a hard time figuring out a fair (and balanced) tournament game, then it wasn't meant for tournament play.

I still think leagues are a better idea.

[mrbistro]

Just because the ideas we've looked at in a brainstorming session haven't worked, doesn't mean we should throw our hands up and say it can't be done. So far we've looked at traditional tournament formats and they don't quite fit. I think ultimately we'll have to try something new.

[paradox22]

feel the discussion here is trying to force SuW into a box it won't fit in.

I believe there is room for both formats (regular play and tourney play). If you don't like tourneys.... don't play in them. Pretty Simple. Some people get freaked out by "competition" and the focus on "winning". I have never understood this philsophy when gaming, but to each their own.

I have no doubt that before GenCon Colby and the other great minds here will have an acceptable format for us to play tournaments.

Also,I too think leagues are a good idea...[I]but in addition to tourneys.
:)

[SupaGerm]

Chess clocks work in chess because there is no way for a player to affect the time of the opposing player.

Chess clocks don't work when your opponent has actions to do when it's on your clock.

I saw players trying to use chess clocks in Dreamblade, and had to chuckle watching the opposing player eat time on the opposing players clock (taking off the wrong piece, then having to put it back, and putting it back in the wrong cell, having to move it back to the corrct cell, and the player on the clock forgetting what his last move was...). :)


Aside from that fact that this stall tactic amuses me greatly, I've got to agree with you that it isn't really feasible.

If you wanted to ensure that players weren't stalling just to avoid losing, you'd have to go with a set number of turns, rather than a time limit. The problem with that is that one (legitimately) slow game makes everyone else wait around. Either timing or counting turns would add a new rule that never existed before in the game, and as I've said before, I don't like when that sort of situation happens.

No matter what rules are decided on, there will always be someone who finds flaws with them. Honestly, though, if everyone is going into a tournament fully aware of (whichever) tiebreaker rules are in effect, it shouldn't matter. If it's a strict time limit, then you should be prepared for the possibility of a slow player (either on purpose or otherwise). Remember, some people are faster players, and playing against one of them could influence your play as well.

[manick74]

Honestly, though, if everyone is going into a tournament fully aware of (whichever) tiebreaker rules are in effect, it shouldn't matter.

What he said.

It seems a lot of you are coming at this with the perspective of having the winner shake out exactly as if there were no time limit. That's just not possible or feasible. Just figure out a clear set of rules and tie breakers, understanding that by imposing those rules you also change the meta game ever so slightly. That is part of playing in a tournament environment.

Not to say that it's better or worse than a casual or league game that is allowed to reach he original design's conclusion. It's just different.

As far as point scoring in a swiss style tournament goes, if draws and going to time are thought to be problem issues, just make them worth less points.

[paradox22]

Not to say that it's better or worse than a casual or league game that is allowed to reach he original design's conclusion. It's just different.


I totally agree.

[killercactus]

FWIW, here's what I like if there's no draws (which I'm actually just fine with, BTW):

Win condition - kill the summoner.

If the time limit expires and both summoners are alive:

1) Count the life remaining on each summoner. The higher number wins.

if that's the same:

2) Count the number of wounds on each summoner. The lower number wins.

if that's the same:

3) Count the number of your opponent's cards in your Magic and Discard piles. The higher number wins.

if that's the same:

4) It's a draw. Deal with it.

Does #1 force Elien to play more aggressively? Sure, but I think the Phoenix Elves have the capability to do that with their auto-wound and movement powers. I think they'd be just fine in tournaments with this rule. Plus, they have #2 to fall back on, meaning they only need to keep the others summoner's life equal to Elien's (not lower) to win, because they'll have always dealt more wounds (unless a 3-life summoner comes out later).

In the same vein, a Grognack player that wants to stall for the time limit doesn't have the benefit of using Grognack as an attacker, which is a big deal for the Orcs. They'd have to play slow, which I think puts them at a disadvantage, as Grognack is made to go out and take less punishment than he deals out.

#'s 1 and 2 focus on how well the other faction did in trying to kill the summoner, which is the primary win condition, so some version of it should break ties IMO. #3 says, since both players did an equal job in trying to kill the summoner, who dominated the other faction more en route to that goal? Yeah, this probably handicaps the Goblins, but they can play with this in mind. Plus it's hardly ever going to be used.

[Quintaton16]

The last game I played, I took down all 7 of Grognack's life in one turn with Sneeks and Blarf. If the game had ended before that turn, I would have lost, but Grognack would have remained cornered against his own walls with no means of escape.

In the game before that, Grognack was leading the charge against a severely depleted Elf-host when he was suddenly trapped between two walls, the Fire Drake and the edge of the board. Up until that point, the Orcs were winning heavily.

I think the game can change too quickly to use any kind of victory points. At the present time, each faction is very balanced, important since they all use vastly different playing styles and appeal to different people. I can't see this being implemented without impacting that in a very negative manner.

Edit: I am also pretty sure that this would make the Dwarves a lot better. Oldin has only one less life than Grognack or Sneeks, and the Dwarves don't lose much by keeping him back. All they need to do is get one wound on the Summoner and then play defense (another thing which the Dwarves excel at).

[LilNewbie]

How about using the amount of wounds inflicted on enemy units over the course of the game as a tie-breaker?

The tournament organizer just has to provide some paper and a writing implement to each player/table side. The papers could even have two charts so each player can track damage done by both of those involved in the game. Or you could use beads or a token that can be taken be each player when they inflict a wound. If the tiebreaker is needed, count up the tokens...BAM! You are finished! ;)

It would award aggresive gameplay but not allow people to win by killing their own units or hurt those with any special abilities (so far).

Determining winner:

1. Enemy summoner killed.
2. Number of wounds inflicted on enemy units.
3. Number of wounds remaining on friendly units on the board (including summoner).

Heck, you could even track the number of wounds caused over the course of tournament and have a special "Slayer" award for the player who caused the most enemy wounds.

EDIT: We tracked wounds during two games tonight and both times the wounds caused were very close. We also ruled that you only track actual wounds caused (not any overkill wounds) and if an ability allows you to destroy an enemy unit, the unit is worth its remaining wounds for the destroying player. It was very easy to track. We used glass beads and a player would take one for each wound caused on an enemy unit.

Newb.

[Ollie]

If not, there's always a rolling rumble-style tourney format. Ollie has lots of good ideas in this vein.

Thanks for the hat-tip! Now that I have two whole games of SW played, I figured I'd start posting about tournament structures. :rolleyes:

I think that the Rolling Rumble format would be perfect for Summoner Wars. It's been successful at a few Heroscape tournaments in a few different areas now. It can be tweaked for increased competitiveness but it's intrinsically more laidback than Swiss or knockout style events.

The basic idea is that all games are played to completion and pairings are made from whoever is not playing (as long as they have not played each other already) and games started as soon as possible. A full set of rules, with some optional tweaks, is here (http://www.heroscapers.com/community/showthread.php?t=24423) on heroscapers. If there is interest I'd be happy to rewrite it and post here with SW in mind, though it's pretty clear how to apply it I think.

If a time limit is necessary, I'm a big fan of draws. I think it adds a lot of interest and chess and cricket, to take two examples, thrive on the existence of this possibility.

[Tidus]

I got one... How about every player counts up their total cost value of all their cards on the battlefield + the Summoners full health.

Step 1

Each player counts up points of all cards they control on the battlefield, as follows:

Commons/Champions - Add X points (X = Summoning Cost)
Wall's - Add 9 points for each wall
Ice Wall's - Add 3 points for each ice wall
Summoner - Add Y points (Y = Full health)
Bonus - If your Summoner has 5 Full health or less, roll a die. On a result of 1-4 add 1 point. On a result of 5-6 add 2 points.


Deck - Add 1 point, for every 3 cards remaining

Step 2

Each player subtracts points from step 1's final score as follows:

1. Count up all wound's on all of your cards on the battlefield (Common/Champions, Walls, Ice Walls, Summoner, etc)
2. Subtract this value from step 1's final value.
3. This is your final score.

The higher your score the better you did.

Whoever gets the highest score comes in 1st.

I am sure their are flaws but it seems okay.

[jsmkd]

i do not think that this well work orcs get more points for ices walls and goblins get screwed becasue they have free units and some teams have higher summoning points all together so they well get more points or have a harder time because they can not get there units out.

[gamjuven]

I think it should probably have to do with summoner's health. The game's all about the summoners anyway. Now of course you'll have players that will get angry if they play PE, but I think that kinda comes with the territory. You better be protecting that prince. Plus, you should be hurting the opponents summoner as well.

You can't do units destroyed since the FK makes it impossible to tell how many you've destroyed. Maybe a combination of magic and summoner life. If someone wants to try to hoard tons of magic let them. I'll either magic drain or kill them because they have no units on the board. I would also have to insist that whoever goes second in the game would get the last turn as well.

[Thing 2]

Warning: wordy message.

Ok, so I might be a little late and you might have worked out a solution by now but I think this is a good idea so I'm going to go ahead and post it. I have to warn you, it's a little bit complicated. So here it is:

Phase 1: The Game
I would recommend making the time limit a little bit on the short side because more will be added. When time runs out, the players are allowed to finish the current round so that each player has had an equal number of turns. Then, they're given a choice. They can either accept a draw or, if they think they can win within two rounds, they can push the game into overtime*. Only one player may push the game. If both try, the first one to decide is consider the one who is pushing the game.

If you push the game it is extended by two rounds and there are three possible results:
-You win. (Recorded as a win)
-You draw (Run out of time). (Recorded as a loss)
-You lose. (Recorded as a loss)

If your opponent pushes the game it is extended by two rounds and there are three possible results:
-You lose. (Recorded as a loss)
-You draw (Run out of time). (Recorded as a draw)
-You win. (Recorded as a win)

Phase 2: The Tournament
Throughout the tournament, each player has two numbers following them. These are an Overall Score (OS) and a Draw Value (DV). They are recorded as follows:

Draw Value:
Your DV is determined by the number of times you have drawn in a tournament. It begins as the same number of points you would receive for a win (probably 2). Every time that a game that you're playing is drawn, this number is decreased by one**. For example, if the DV started as 2 and you'd drawn 2 games up to this point, you now receive 0 points for a draw. This number can be negative.

Overall Score:
Every game has one of three results for each player. Each result yields a different number of points. The player with the highest OS after all games have been played is the winner. This is how points are earned:
-Win: 2 points
-Lose: 0 points
-Draw: You gain a number of points equal to your current draw value**. Note that you can lose points for a draw.

*If a player's DV reaches 0, that player forfeits the right to push a game.

**It is important that, in the case of a draw, the OS is changed before the DV.

Phew! I think that's it. I know that it's really complicated, but I think that it's a good solution because it adds no new objectives, it discourages drawing repeatedly, and it does not punish those who run out of time because of a time consuming opponent (unless it happens several times).