Suggested Rule change for cons

[ringkichard]

Yeah, Magic was an excellent example of what a bad concession rule can do to your game:  Last I knew, (5 years ago, maybe it's better now) I was allowed to negotiate prize splits with my opponents, and I was also allowed to concede. I was even allowed to concede to someone with whom I've negotiated a prize split. But I was not allowed to *explicitly* make a exchange of my concession for a prize split, because that (and that alone) would be bribery, and unsportsmanlike.
Of course once you were on the gravy train you know how the system worked and if you're a professional card player, you've got no difficulty sending or receiving subtle signals. So the reality was that people got bought off all the time.
Very much not af fan.

Concession for anything but time saving, or atonement for accidental errors in sportsmanship, is morally fraught.

re: bullying. I've seen it. Gamers can be awesome, but we can also be awful. Famously, the DCI bans tournament Magic players for assault, and I remember at least one semi-pro who is probably still out of the game for hitting someone in the head.

[Speedbump858]

Hi all,

I have been following this thread hoping that a determination for tiebreakers would have been made and Arcane Wonders would have put its stamp of approval on it by now.  Over the years, I have run hundreds of tournaments via the swiss system using various companies' versions of tie breakers.  My conclusion is that tiebreakers in most card games will typically be a disadvantage to a particular deck type. 

Having also played in many tournament environments, I tend to agree with Ringkichard in regards to concession.  I don't believe its good for the game in a tournament environment.  While I understand that some people may think his unwillingness to concede is unsportsmanlike, I would have to say that most tournaments don't bring out sportsmanlike qualities in players.  Each player has a different motivation for playing in a tournament.  Its not always about prizes or having your hand raised and declared to be the "best" player of the day.

For this game, I have only run swiss pairings with strength of schedule as a 1st tiebreaker(and a coin flip or d6 roll as a 2nd).   Its not perfect but it works.

With the year closing out and a new convention season around the corner, I would hope that AW will soon decide on a clear method to use for tiebreakers so there is consistency in tournaments from place to place.

[Shad0w]

Yeah, Magic was an excellent example of what a bad concession rule can do to your game:  Last I knew, (5 years ago, maybe it's better now) I was allowed to negotiate prize splits with my opponents, and I was also allowed to concede. I was even allowed to concede to someone with whom I've negotiated a prize split. But I was not allowed to *explicitly* make a exchange of my concession for a prize split, because that (and that alone) would be bribery, and unsportsmanlike.
Of course once you were on the gravy train you know how the system worked and if you're a professional card player, you've got no difficulty sending or receiving subtle signals. So the reality was that people got bought off all the time.
Very much not af fan.

Concession for anything but time saving, or atonement for accidental errors in sportsmanship, is morally fraught.

re: bullying. I've seen it. Gamers can be awesome, but we can also be awful. Famously, the DCI bans tournament Magic players for assault, and I remember at least one semi-pro who is probably still out of the game for hitting someone in the head.

Bullying is a rarity but yes is does happen

[Shad0w]

Hi all,

I have been following this thread hoping that a determination for tiebreakers would have been made and Arcane Wonders would have put its stamp of approval on it by now.  Over the years, I have run hundreds of tournaments via the swiss system using various companies' versions of tie breakers.  My conclusion is that tiebreakers in most card games will typically be a disadvantage to a particular deck type. 

Having also played in many tournament environments, I tend to agree with Ringkichard in regards to concession.  I don't believe its good for the game in a tournament environment.  While I understand that some people may think his unwillingness to concede is unsportsmanlike, I would have to say that most tournaments don't bring out sportsmanlike qualities in players.  Each player has a different motivation for playing in a tournament.  Its not always about prizes or having your hand raised and declared to be the "best" player of the day.

For this game, I have only run swiss pairings with strength of schedule as a 1st tiebreaker(and a coin flip or d6 roll as a 2nd).   Its not perfect but it works.

With the year closing out and a new convention season around the corner, I would hope that AW will soon decide on a clear method to use for tiebreakers so there is consistency in tournaments from place to place.

@Speed
You have to allow for concession. When playing I may have to go in the middle of a game for any number of reasons. I play in events even when I am on call for work. I have been doing it for years. When I get a call it is $50 - $150/hr so if I know the call is going to be longer than 2 minute I leave the match and give the other player the win. Another example is one of the guys I play card with is a certified rescue diver, he has gotten calls at 11:15 pm during an event to drive downtown and get a tow motor out of the lake. It becomes hard to find a balance between what is inviting to new players but still closes as many loophole as possible when making rules

[ringkichard]

EDIT --- This is a response to a proposed tiebreaker by Zuberi that has gone missing in the time it took me to reply.
Come back!
--

Interesting!
Definitely simpler to explain, and maybe simpler to play. Probably feels less intrusive, too. When I tried the three round method I was very aware that I was in overtime and had to score the round, which was a weakness because it was a distortion of how Mage Wars is usually played.

The reason I capped the game at three rounds, and scored each round separately, is that I wanted to somewhat limit the power of spike damage to sway the total outcome. Getting pushed through a Wall of Thorns or hit with double Hurl Boulder doesn't actually mean you are losing the game, it's just spike damage. In my system you would lose the round, but maybe not the match if you could win the other two rounds because your opponent's spike was unsustainable.  It's a bit like the difference between median and mean, if you follow my meaning. Your any-round system takes the mean value, and three-round takes the median.

Still, the any-round method is simpler to explain and probably comes to the same outcome in 95% of cases. And when they disagree it's debatable which outcome is genuinely preferable. It also has the advantage of avoiding the situation where I take the first round and you take the second round and then time is called and it's a draw.

I like it and will think on it!

[Zuberi]

I was a bit nervous about my proposal, Ringkichard, and having 2nd thoughts. I hoped I deleted it before anyone had seen it while I debated whether or not I truly wanted to post it. Luckily, I had saved it to Notepad while I debated with myself, so here it is again just as you saw it:

I've been thinking about things, and I would like to post a suggestion of my own for tie-breaking. Firstly, Ringkichards idea of using tie-breaking rounds seems to me to be the best suggestion thus far. At it's core, it is still basing things off of damage dealt. The key difference being when you start tracking the damage. It is at the end of the game, "crunch time", when damage potential should be at its highest and best indicates who is running the show. To simplify Ringkichard's system, I have eliminated the number of rounds requirement.

The last 10 minutes of play shall be considered "overtime". A judge will announce the beginning of overtime, at which point players will finish playing their current round. If there is no winner at the end of that round, they shall begin tracking total damage dealt to the opposing mage for the remainder of the game.

At the end of overtime, they again finish the round they're in. If there is still no winner, then whomever dealt the most total damage to their opponent during overtime is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever had the most life remaining is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever had the most cards in play (Creatures, Conjurations, Equipment, and Enchantments are all counted) is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever had the most mana remaining is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever would have had initiative in the next round is declared the winner.

[Sailor Vulcan]

I was a bit nervous about my proposal, Ringkichard, and having 2nd thoughts. I hoped I deleted it before anyone had seen it while I debated whether or not I truly wanted to post it. Luckily, I had saved it to Notepad while I debated with myself, so here it is again just as you saw it:

I've been thinking about things, and I would like to post a suggestion of my own for tie-breaking. Firstly, Ringkichards idea of using tie-breaking rounds seems to me to be the best suggestion thus far. At it's core, it is still basing things off of damage dealt. The key difference being when you start tracking the damage. It is at the end of the game, "crunch time", when damage potential should be at its highest and best indicates who is running the show. To simplify Ringkichard's system, I have eliminated the number of rounds requirement.

The last 10 minutes of play shall be considered "overtime". A judge will announce the beginning of overtime, at which point players will finish playing their current round. If there is no winner at the end of that round, they shall begin tracking total damage dealt to the opposing mage for the remainder of the game.

At the end of overtime, they again finish the round they're in. If there is still no winner, then whomever dealt the most total damage to their opponent during overtime is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever had the most life remaining is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever had the most cards in play (Creatures, Conjurations, Equipment, and Enchantments are all counted) is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever had the most mana remaining is declared the winner. If they are still tied, then whomever would have had initiative in the next round is declared the winner.

There are two things I don't like about Zuberi's edits.

First is the resources counting at the end. Zuberi, have you read the article on resources by Deckbuilder? The game is so complex that it would be pretty much impossible to break ties based on number of resources other than damage and things about to turn into damage. If you want to calculate and predict the sequences of conversions of resources in order to figure out who would win, you would also need to figure out what decisions each player was going to make. Anyone want to build a portable super advanced MRI machine just for scanning the brains of mage wars players?

Otherwise I'm pretty sure it would be nearly impossible to predict the outcome of a game from so many resources more than one conversion away from damage.

Aside from having upkeep direct damage effects in play or a creature about to attack a mage for the win when time is called, we simply don't have the brain power to consistently and  successfully determine who would win based on counting ALL the resources in play, although some people could make a good guess.

Not to mention the second thing I don't like; I think Zuberi's edits underestimate the influence spike damage could have for players new to organized play who WILL play slower than more experienced players. In Zuberi's version of your tiebreaker plan, a spike towards the end of overtime could make a much bigger difference to the outcome then one at the beginning. If you cap it at about 4.08333... rounds (remainder of current round, 3 more rounds and upkeep of a 4th round), a damage spike at the beginning of overtime is far more likely to be equal in significance to a damage spike towards the end (or any damage spike during overtime, for that matter).

I made some edits to my last post on this thread addressing the question of how to determine a "real" draw in MW; I proposed to include the upkeep of a 4th round as part of Kichard's tiebreaker plan, so that it could be determined if both players' Mages would die at the same time or not as a result of direct damage.

[Zuberi]

I'm not sure where your first argument is coming from, Imaginator. I never suggested that we try to figure out who would have won or the value of resources. All of my criteria for breaking ties is very easily calculated and purely looks at the state of the game when it ended.

Criteria
1) Total Damage Dealt during Overtime: Whoever has the higher number for damage dealt, wins. Very simple.
2) Most Life Remaining: Take your Total Life and subtract your Current Damage. Whoever has the higher result wins.
3) Most Number of Cards in Play: I think this is the one where you thought I was calculating resources. Nope. Just simply counting cards. I know some cards are more powerful than others, but I admit that is too difficult to quantify at the table. So, we simplify things. Whoever has the most cards in play, wins. I have 12 cards in play, you have 9, I win. It wouldn't matter if 4 of my cards were Decoys.
4) Most Mana Remaining: Again, just looking at where things were at when the game ended. Whoever has the higher amount of Mana left in their Mana Supply wins.
5) Whoever would start the next round with Initiative: This is admittedly little more than a coin toss should everything else be equal. A very unlikely scenario, but one to be planned for just in case.

None of these actually predict who would have won. Neither does counting up the number of tie-breaker round victories from Ringkichard's original proposal. Instead, they are more of an indicator for who was the stronger player at the end. You look at each criteria in sequence starting with the first, and you stop looking as soon as one of them is unequal and determines a winner. They are currently listed in an order that I believe ranks them from most to least significant. I shall gladly admit that the further down the list, the less accurate and significant my criteria are, but I believe we need to use as many options at our disposal as possible as well as that these options need to be simple and easy to quantify.

A Closer Look
Damage Done (only counting the damage during the last 10 minutes) is obviously the best criteria of the list. It measures your ability to continue applying pressure and laying down the hurt. It is vulnerable to spike damage, as was the round wins measured by Ringkichard. Comparing the two is very much like comparing Mean to Median as he said. Which is better is debatable, but my way is simpler which is the whole reason I cut out the round wins. Not because it was bad, I very much like the idea and it's exclusion was part of the reason I was hesitant to post my idea. If people want them to be included, we can certainly put them back in, but they essentially measure the same thing so I believe they are redundant and needlessly complicate the system.

Life Remaining then measure's ones ability to sustain all the hurt coming your way. If you are both dishing out equal amounts of pain, which person has the most cushion to absorb that pain has the clear advantage.

Most Cards in Play is probably the most controversial of the criteria. At it's heart it is about board presence. If you both are dishing out the same and can take the same amount of damage, then who has the greatest presence on the board is probably a decent indicator of who is in the stronger position. Board Presence or Board Control is a very difficult thing to accurately measure though, so I opted again for the simplest method I could think of.

Mana Remaining is the only criteria I have listed that gives a nod to the future state of the game, as it is essentially measuring your potential to change the game by bringing out cards. It is again a very simple thing to look at and calculate though, even if it is not the most accurate way of determining a player's potential.

Who would next have Initiative is the final straw. Initiative does have an impact on game play and I've found generally favors the person who has it. Thus, the next person with that teeny tiny little advantage edges out their opponent. As unlikely as it is for the tie to ever reach this point, it would not continue past here. A winner would be declared.

Spike Damage
I'm not sure I understand how a spike at the end of overtime would be more significant than a spike at the beginning. I would appreciate you illustrating that point for me. Overtime would be the time to bring out the big guns, but I believe 10 minutes is enough time for damage to average out and us get the idea of who could maintain the bigger onslaught.

[Sailor Vulcan]

A damage spike at the end of the ten minutes is more valuable because your opponent either doesn't have or has less time to react unless they predicted the damage spike. In order to predict a damage spike late in the tiebreaker I think you would probably have to be watching the clock in relation to your opponent's behavior. However, a damage spike of the same size at the start of the tiebreaker gives a lot more time to break even again. If the tiebreaker is divided into rounds in the way that Kichard described, then a single damage spike won't win the tiebreaker on its own, since each successful spike can only earn a max of one tiebreaker point. I think damage spikes tend to cost more resources in the short term then playing normally would. Therefore mages will probably be less likely to spend their ten minutes building up to an anticlimactic finisher that normally wouldn't win the game, and will try to get ahead the way the normally would if the game weren't about to be cut off.

Now that I think about it, there could be exceptions:

Say player 1 deals 3 damage in both the first tiebreaker round and second, while player 2 deals 0 in both. Then on the third round, player 2 deals 7 damage.

And now I think perhaps they should use both the total damage dealt during the tiebreaker and the 2/3 pts system. Technically mode and range represent this better for an individual game, but regardless, different stats are sometimes more reliable to use than others depending on the circumstance. I would say that both should be used, then figure out which tiebreaker measurement has the most approximate reliability based on the damage potential of objects that are in play, and focus on that one.

For example:

Player 1 deals 3 damage in both the first tiebreaker round and second, while player 2 deals 0 in both. Then on the third round, Player 2 deals 7 damage. Player 1 has taken 7 during the tiebreaker and player 2 has taken 6. However, player 2 is walled in with 2 iron golems, and player 1 has destroyed the wall of thorns he was just pushed through and put on a hidden nullify. There is no object on the field that can get player 2 out of that situation (like teleport-Thoughtspore or Huginn or divine intervention).

In this situation, the mode (Kichard's original plan) is more reliable.

The idea is that the arena configuration--the present state of the game at the single moment in time where the tiebreaker ends, provides great insight into who has the advantage/disadvantage, and how stable that advantage/disadvantage is. You can approximate that advantage/disadvantage by looking at the total combined mage-damage potentials of objects in the arena controlled by each player. (This takes position into account, since if the mage isn't in range of an object's attack then that object's mage-damage potential is 0.) for cards like Poison Gas cloud, their mage-damage potential is only applied to a mage that is in range of its damage effect, regardless of who controls it. In the case of poison gas cloud, that range is 0-0.

You can approximate the stability of the advantage/disadvantage by looking at the objects most likely to be able to change the situation and make their own controller's total mage-damage potential greater than their opponent's, in a shorter period of time and using fewer resources. The more different cards and actions that a strategy to reverse the state of the game is, the less likely it is to happen before the player who already has the advantage can pull out a win.


It's just a theory of course, but I think it could have a lot of merit. I'm not sure if the amount of focus it has on current total mage-damage potential and possible ways it can change for future total mage damage potential (that stability I described) underestimates the influence complexities of the social interactions and mental processes of the players can have on the state of the game. But if they were even enough to get that far in the tiebreaker process in the first place that their "mode" and "range" disagreed, then it's possible that their strategic intellects in regards to Mage Wars are relatively close to each other too. How relative that is, however is up for debate.

So that's what I think we should do when the "mode" and "range" disagree, in order to evaluate which one is more likely to predict who would win if the game continued to the end. Even though it can't perfectly predict who would win, technically speaking no tiebreaker can do that in this game because of dice rolls. However, it looks like we can get EXTREMELY close.






So to recap.
When deciding which tiebreaker more accurately evaluates the outcome of a game, ask these two questions:

1. Which mage is in more immediate danger of receiving the most damage?
2. What are the easiest/most likely/least resource-consuming ways the answer to the question above can be reversed?



What do you think?

[Zuberi]

I haven't looked at all the resources provided by Shad0w on how tie breakers work and are designed. I've never run or participated in a tournament at all to be honest. So, with the disclosure that I am a simple commoner addressing the Senate, I hope you'll excuse my simple ways.

The way I see it, we have 3 different approaches for determining the tie-break.
1) Looking at what all has happened in the game thus far.
2) Taking a snap shot of the state of the game and examining that.
3) Trying to predict where the game was going.

All three approaches have merit. If we apply them to a foot race with both a finish line and a time limit, we could imagine the following scenarios should time be called before anyone crossed the finish line:
1) Awarding the win to whomever performed the best. This could be judged by number of people passed or amount of time spent in first place.
2) Awarding the win to whomever was closest to the finish line when time was called.
3) Awarding the win to whomever was most likely to cross the finish line first. To calculate this, you'd need to figure out each runner's position and calculate their average speed they could be expected to maintain.

I believe this to be a pretty good analogy as Mage Wars is at it's core a Damage Race. So, we first need to decide which one of these approaches we wish to use for Mage Wars, and THEN work out the specifics. They all have Pros and Cons.

Approach One: Looking at what all has happened in the game thus far.
Pros:
1) Awards good performance.

Cons:
1) Requires additional Record Keeping.
2) Player's behavior will change to meet the standards. They shall perform whatever actions are most rewarded.

Approach Two: Examining a snapshot of the state of the game.
Pros:
1) Simple and Easy to measure/quantify

Cons:
1) Does not accurately measure overall performance or chances of eventual success.

Example
Ringkichard's Tie-Breaker Rounds or my Overtime suggestions. Both focus on the end state of the game.

Approach Three: Trying to predict where the game was going.
Pros:
1) Provides the fairest measure of who was most likely to win by the conventional method.

Cons:
1) Most difficult to quantify with any certainty or accuracy.

Example
Several people have discussed a desire for this approach but I can't think of any specific proposals that fall into this category at this time.

Discussion
I believe that Approach #1 would always favor certain spellbook builds too greatly to be a good method of use. It skews the nature of the game. Meanwhile, I believe Approach #3 is too difficult to quantify and measure. I do not believe a fair method could be created that could also be done quickly by hand without subjectivity.

Thus, I am a fan of Approach #2 and believe that's where we should focus our efforts. Into judging which mage is in the best position at the end of the game. Which one is strongest.

[Sailor Vulcan]

I haven't looked at all the resources provided by Shad0w on how tie breakers work and are designed. I've never run or participated in a tournament at all to be honest. So, with the disclosure that I am a simple commoner addressing the Senate, I hope you'll excuse my simple ways.

The way I see it, we have 3 different approaches for determining the tie-break.
1) Looking at what all has happened in the game thus far.
2) Taking a snap shot of the state of the game and examining that.
3) Trying to predict where the game was going.

All three approaches have merit. If we apply them to a foot race with both a finish line and a time limit, we could imagine the following scenarios should time be called before anyone crossed the finish line:
1) Awarding the win to whomever performed the best. This could be judged by number of people passed or amount of time spent in first place.
2) Awarding the win to whomever was closest to the finish line when time was called.
3) Awarding the win to whomever was most likely to cross the finish line first. To calculate this, you'd need to figure out each runner's position and calculate their average speed they could be expected to maintain.

I believe this to be a pretty good analogy as Mage Wars is at it's core a Damage Race. So, we first need to decide which one of these approaches we wish to use for Mage Wars, and THEN work out the specifics. They all have Pros and Cons.

Approach One: Looking at what all has happened in the game thus far.
Pros:
1) Awards good performance.

Cons:
1) Requires additional Record Keeping.
2) Player's behavior will change to meet the standards. They shall perform whatever actions are most rewarded.

Approach Two: Examining a snapshot of the state of the game.
Pros:
1) Simple and Easy to measure/quantify

Cons:
1) Does not accurately measure overall performance or chances of eventual success.

Example
Ringkichard's Tie-Breaker Rounds or my Overtime suggestions. Both focus on the end state of the game.

Approach Three: Trying to predict where the game was going.
Pros:
1) Provides the fairest measure of who was most likely to win by the conventional method.

Cons:
1) Most difficult to quantify with any certainty or accuracy.

Example
Several people have discussed a desire for this approach but I can't think of any specific proposals that fall into this category at this time.

Discussion
I believe that Approach #1 would always favor certain spellbook builds too greatly to be a good method of use. It skews the nature of the game. Meanwhile, I believe Approach #3 is too difficult to quantify and measure. I do not believe a fair method could be created that could also be done quickly by hand without subjectivity.

Thus, I am a fan of Approach #2 and believe that's where we should focus our efforts. Into judging which mage is in the best position at the end of the game. Which one is strongest.

Using the statistics analogy again, whether its best to use mean, median, mode or range to most accurately draw conclusions from a set of data varies.

I think this same logic applies to different tiebreakers. It will probably be fairer and more accurate if a combination of all three of them were used. Personally I like both Kichard's tiebreaker (approach 2) ) and yours, Zuberi (approach 2), and I like mine too (approaches 2 and 3). I think that if your two tiebreakers disagree, mine can break the tie between those tiebreakers. Then if the players are still tied after the third tiebreaker then the game ends in a draw.

[Speedbump858]

@Speed
You have to allow for concession. When playing I may have to go in the middle of a game for any number of reasons. I play in events even when I am on call for work. I have been doing it for years. When I get a call it is $50 - $150/hr so if I know the call is going to be longer than 2 minute I leave the match and give the other player the win. Another example is one of the guys I play card with is a certified rescue diver, he has gotten calls at 11:15 pm during an event to drive downtown and get a tow motor out of the lake. It becomes hard to find a balance between what is inviting to new players but still closes as many loophole as possible when making rules

@Shad0w I understand that people are in a tournament and life happens.  There is no practical way for me as a tournament Judge to prevent a person from leaving or conceding a game.  I think it would be best to minimize the possibility of coercion or collusion.  Given the examples you made, I would have no problems awarding the win the the player that didn't have to leave.  Depending on the size of the player pool, its likely that player would be at a disadvantage as s/he would now have a win but a weaker tiebreaker.   So while I agree there has to be a way to address that life will occasionally interfere in a tournament, it shouldn't be used as a way to position yourself or the other player in the finals.

Out of curiosity what are your thoughts on this: I had a player in one of my tournaments get a phone call from his brother.  His brother was locked out of the house.  Given where he lived, it would take him about 40 minutes to get there and back.  The match he was playing had only been going for 20 mins out of a 60 min round.  He asked me if he could forfeit the match and come back.  This was round 2 of a 5 round tournament.  I said sure.  He started to sweep his cards and his opponent stopped him and asked if I could instead play the rest of the round out as he didn't want to end up with a weaker tiebreaker (card differential).  I decided that if I played out the rest of the round, this was not a forfeit.   So I gave the choice of a forfeit win or a playing it out and standing by the results.  Player A left to help his brother and Player B played me.  I somehow managed to win the match(which led to some grumbling by Player B).  Player A came back as he said more or less(it made the tournament round start about 5 mins late) and the tournament finished without any other issues.

[Zuberi]

I do not think you should have agreed to play for him. Would you have also agreed to let me and a friend tag team throughout the tournament so that we didn't have to both pay the entrance fee (if there was one)? What if that player had gone on to win the tournament? I don't think you would have had a lot of happy players on your hand if one of his wins he wasn't even there for. Seems really unfair to me. Plus, weren't you supposed to be acting as a Judge? Who was covering your spot while you sat down to a game?

Allowing him to leave and come back was okay though, in my opinion.

[Shad0w]

@Speed this has happened in other games when a player has to leave. before the match has been decided (no matter the reason) the other player gets the win. You can play out the match for fun but that is it. Even if the player filling in wins the player that left does not get credit for it. Now on the subject of leaving and coming back I have no issue with it as long as you can get seated and ready before the 10 minutes after round start.

Ok I am calling out the part about filling in. I was online playing a FPS and doing some work for a clan. One of the people I know asks if I can sit in on a game on one of my other accounts. I said no problem I do not have anything to do for about 90minutes. I noticed it was a password  locked room. I entered and they were in the game but it had not started. So I was sitting around talking and the game started a few minutes later. about halfway into the game I wanted to check the scores and I noticed it was almost all clan people. By this point I was up 37 to 0. I ended the match at 65 and 1 when I asked in a private chat I found out it was a official match for the tourney we were playing in. Now if this was to get reported myself and the team I played on all get suspended. This gave them a huge advantage (if I would have known I would have not played) I was if the top 3 in a few weapon classes and top 150 overall in the world. When a player fills in it could unbalance the results.

[Speedbump858]

When I thought about the match, I only considered playing because I thought it was fair for all involved and would not unbalance the results.  I had given the choice for a match win via forfeit.  I took in consideration that I had no knowledge of the deck or strategy I was playing and that I would definitely not be playing it optimally(but I play to win-everyone that was there knows that).  Essentially I was just taking the game where the other guy left off.  It seemed like a fair trade/gamble for Player B or he would have just opted for the forfeit win. 

@Zuberi No one complained.  Another player(who is also a Judge/TD) would make rulings on my game if any had come up.  Multitasking was very common during tournament days.  If I was running more than one tournament, I would definitely not have agreed to play(On some days I would be judging 2 to 3 simultaneous events).

@Shad0w Point taken.  Had this been a qualifier or a regionals I would not have played.   


In regards to some of the tiebreakers that are being discussed, I like the damage dealt during overtime scenario but do not like the extra book keeping.