Inquisitor Grand Tournament 2013 - 30/03/2013

[MarcoSkoll]

At the gt you should encounter 15 diff people

It's a maximum of twelve. Up to four people for each game, of which you are one, so three others per game times four games.
(You're in every game you play, so you have to count yourself for all of them, not just once.)

But you only score six normally (You score three GMs, and your three players).

However, prior to the lot drawing on player numbers and table assignments, you have the potential to be scoring anyone and be scored by anyone, which isn't changed by increasing a single player pool. Whether we've got six players, sixteen, or sixty, I'd be as likely to be scoring you as I would any other attendee.
That symmetry is changed by introducing a second, mutually exclusive, player pool - after that, you haven't got an equal chance to be scoring any other player.

Whether this is actually a problem or not remains to be seen, but I can certainly see why it could put people off.

[Kaled]

While I appreciate there's a difference in theory, in practice I see no difference between only scoring half of the participants because you weren't drawn to play the other half, and only scoring half of the participants because the other half are playing at a different scale. Add to that an option for those players whose scenario is not dependent on a particular scale to GM for the other group, then I don't see much of an issue.

But I think my views on that are pretty well known already (radical and subversive as they may be!).

[MarcoSkoll]

It's a wasn't vs. couldn't issue. I wasn't drawn to score Gav this year (despite playing with him), but that's quite different to saying that I couldn't have been.

As is, having now seen the average scores, I can see I'm a little more frugal about the points I gave than others - I feel less guilty about that knowing that everyone had an ab initio even chance of being drawn to be scored by me (and equally, by players who might be more generous than average) than knowing that I had unfairly disadvantaged one group from the start simply because the others had no chance of being drawn to play against me.

While I'd like to be able to see a combined GT, we probably want to (and I quote little brother from AB here) "minimise the risk of adversely affecting the IGT, (which is a long established and successful event) and dealing with the fallout of that", so I think we should tend towards a moderate approach and build up to it, rather just praying it's all going to work.

[Kaled]

Pessimist!

Since I've seen no evidence or foundation for the suggestion that there may be an adverse effect on the IGT then I'd be happy to risk it.

Out of curiosity, would people feel differently if there was no entry fee and it really was all just for fun?

[Koval]

You'd have to manage a free tournament pretty carefully else you'll probably end up with some players turning up mostly unannounced. At least with a token entry fee and tickets before entry, you'd have a rough idea of how many people for whom to prepare.

[Kaled]

The other Conclave events are like that and people turn up unannounced and it's never been a problem.  Plus, I only sold a handful of tickets before the IGT both years I ran it - the majority were bought on the day.

Anyway, I wasn't really suggesting Ruaridh do away with the entry fee as it does allow us to get good prizes.  I was just curious how much people's feeling about the level of 'fairness' was influenced by having to pay in order to take part.  I've no idea how 'fair' the other events have been - I've never really thought to ask and it's never been an issue.

[MarcoSkoll]

Since I've seen no evidence or foundation for the suggestion that there may be an adverse effect on the IGT then I'd be happy to risk it.

You said as much about the experience of players (not that I'm sure how you quantified experience) tending to affect their scoring. Taking that, and quoting Molotov, "the INQ28 community (such as it is) is still in its infancy", I can certainly see why the two together might raise concern.

The fee and prizes do have a minor part in it, but I'm more concerned about how "whoops, the 28mm/54mm players are all at the top/bottom of the scoring table" isn't going to foster the desired sense of unity and equality.
I want both sides to be able to walk in and out with neither feeling one-upped by the other. And I can't say with any reliability that would happen if we just winged it.

[krenshar]

I think fairness raises it's head the moment there is a scoring system; even without prizes there is the recognition to compete for.  And while the Inquisitor mindset puts fun above winning, a perceived bias can dampen that fun in the same way that seeing another player lift Artemis from their carry case is prone to do.

That's not me advocating that the scoring system be dropped outright.  If nothing else an Inquisitor grand tournament showing up on the WHW calendar probably draws more attention from the wider GW player-base than 'campaign day' or 'grand conclave' would.  And you can't really have a tournament without a way of keeping score.

[Kaled]

You said as much about the experience of players (not that I'm sure how you quantified experience) tending to affect their scoring...

True, I did say that - and at the time I was going from memory so now I've gone back to have a look at the data.  I'm talking here about the 2011 data (just because I have a better spreadsheet with the breakdown in).  I assigned each player an experience rating of high/medium/low based on my rough assessment from seeing them in action at this and previous events.  As you'd probably expect, I put a higher proportion of players into the 'high' category than either of the other two, but I think that's probably reasonable looking at the list of attendees.  (If you or anyone else wants to have a go at assigning their own experience ratings to the attendees and sending that to me in a PM, then I'm happy to re-crunch the numbers and post the results.)

The average score handed to GMs was 31.8.  The averages were 30, 33.6 & 36.0 for the high, medium & low categories respectively, with standard deviations of 4.9, 2.5 & 3.2.  There were two outliers - one player in the high category handed out an average of 17.7 points and one in the low category handed out an average of 39.3 (these were the two which had sprung to my mind when I made my earlier comment).  With the two outliers removed the averages were 31.4, 33.6 & 34.3 for high, medium & low, with standard deviations of 2.5, 2.5 & 1.9.

For the scores handed to players there was much less difference.  The average score handed out was 32.3.  The averages for each of my categories was 32.4, 32.7 & 31.6 - so actually there was little difference, with the low category handing out less points this time.  The standard deviation of the scores was 2.3 overall; and 2.6, 2.9 and 0.5 for high, medium & low respectively.

Not sure whether that helps or hinders the case I was making...

I think fairness raises it's head the moment there is a scoring system

We've always had a scoring system and something to compete for - scoring has generally been done in terms of resources of one kind or another, then we've (usually) had an overall winner of the campaign.

[krenshar]

My bad, I meant to include a sentence about fairness being a bigger issue as an event gets larger, but I must have imagined typing it.
I could be wrong to think that players would worry over fairness but as Marco has said, if there's a polarisation of the two scales on the scoreboard or among the winners then it might strengthen the perception of differences and even biases between the 'camps' when the idea is to disprove just that.

[Kaled]

and quoting Molotov, "the INQ28 community (such as it is) is still in its infancy", I can certainly see why the two together might raise concern.

Another thought. Molotov is probably right in what he says about the Inq28 community, but I understand that there are some within that community who have a higher level of experience. Plus are there other Inq28 players on here who might enter who have some Inquisitor gaming experience. And also, there have been quite a few experienced Inq54 players who have either taken up, or are considering taking up, Inq28 and may enter at the smaller scale.

(I've certainly considered the idea myself - mostly because I have quite a few good ideas I want to turn into characters and I think I can do that more quickly at 28mm. As it is I have far more ideas than time, and I'm much slower at building & painting 54mm characters than I am 28mm ones.)

[Heroka Vendile]

Out of curiosity, would people feel differently if there was no entry fee and it really was all just for fun?

As it is those such as myself and VanHelser are already paying at least in the region of £100 for the weekend to cover travel, food & accommodation, so paying £0 or £10 for the IGT entry makes no odds.
I do however feel the the entry fee of the IGT is necessary to provide the prize pool, otherwise the day becomes no different than a more strictly run campaign day.

[MarcoSkoll]

Seeing as this is down to only a few months away, any clues on date or when the event pack will be available?

[Necris]

Do we have a date for this event yet?

I might actually be able to plan ahead far enough to attend something Inquisitor related next year

[greenstuff_gav]

i gots my scenario pre-written, started work on the NPC, got group ready for playtesting week after next