This was derived from the retirement announcement thread, but I didn't want to derail that thread any more lthan it already was.

For the most part I don't think the comments are about "competitive players" but as DarkRevenant put it "ubercompetitive players."

These aren't the players out there that try to build the best armies and test their skills against the best. These are the players that come to the venues and seem not interested in having fun. There are a few types, with some overlap.

One type is the "beat everyone as horribly as possible." You can separate this guy from the back when he plays a beginning player, or a poor player. He will be focusing his abiliites on wiping out his opponent as fast and impressive as he can. When this opponent makes a mistake, he'll go in to take advantage of it, even though his opponent had not only no chance of beating him, but no chance of even wounding him.

Another type is the "prize hunter." These are the players that show up with the sole purpose to win the prize. Fun? The only fun these guys have is winning the prize. They'll play in whatever way gets it. Often these guys are poor sportsman, and will openly brag about how this is the 15th of these prizes he recieved and its going on eBay when he gets home.

The third is the "cheese player." I don't want to get into discussions about what "cheese" is, because there isn't any one definition. This player, however, will usually go online, find out what is considered "broken" and build their army with as much of that as he can fit.

If he succeeds with the army, he'll bring it every single time. You won't find him tweaking his army or experimenting. That's foreign to this guy. The only time he changes his army is when an FAQ makes his army less effective (in fact, he won't even try to see if it's still effective, just drop it completely), when an army appears that is considered more broken, or when the local players start regularly beating him (not too hard to do when he's so predictable if you have any skilled players).

The fourth is the "evil rules lawyer." There are many types of rules lawyer. Some are good (the rules arbitrators always fall here), some may be annoying to some players. This player always tries to twist the rules in his favor. He only seems to remember a rule that works to his benefit. He'll "forget" a rule in game when it's to his advantage to do so, but remember the same rule when it's to his advantage.

Another thing you'll find is that he often quotes rules that really don't exist. Some of lthem it's clear they know they are making the rule up. He might even quote the rules arbitrator making the ruling on the forum. "Sure, SP13 ruled that Bannson's Raiders work exactly like mercenary units and can be recruted to any faction."

Yes, sometimes when people complain about "competitive players" they feel that anyone who beats them is playing the game wrong. However, most times they are talking about the person who has taken it to a different level and aren't concerned with whether other people have fun at the event.

Just what is the point of this Thread, DBlizzard? It looks merely to be a prelude to a flame war...

Well, what DBlizzard wrote seems to be an interesting list of certain player types. It should be possible to have a civilized conversation about this matter, right?

In that thread of few of the competitive players here were feeling they were being targeted. I wanted to point out that when most players are complaining about competitive players, they are really complaining about the "uber competitive players."

I'm not sure "Uber Competitive" is the right term. My first thought on seeing that was the sort of person for whom the competition is the most important thing. They were "very" competitive.

You're still treading a fine line. I know a lot of fine players who have been called those categories in the past and the opinion of where they sit varies according to the attitude of the defeated...

I always maintained i play for the challenge and I ten to win my matches with small differences as winning for me is enough I never take the trouble to beat some up on the game.

But am I called very/uber competitive sure many times. I try to built the best army and to play flawless. But there are people who maintain that you must play faction pure or not use some pieces.

Which is hard, all I do is look at the rules. Not as a lawyer btw as I am very bad at rules. But for building purposes.

Take the twins, I consirdered them broken but I would not make a fuzz about them I just played them.

I dont like this house rules business as it will be unclear what you can play where, oh local BM's will love it no doubt. I think you will find less players willing to travel to play.

I dont know if the games devolops into what I think it will I might quit myself.

For now wait and see. Different player types you will allways have. the debate on competitive and casual players will always be there and I think it comes down to individuals, there are ar s e ho les on both sides and no doubt they gravitate towards being competitve players.

I think it is the individual like that guy who is now ranting WK is bad and evil and MW is not a good supported game and we should not spent money on WK products. just an Individual who lets hope unwillingly tries to spoil it for other people.

Doesnt matter what system is in effect and what game for that matter they will be around.

Some thoughts.
E130

@Dblizzard,
Its hard to be polite when casual players get almost everything they want eventually regardless of whether or not its good for the game.

1. BMs have to much power with not enough enforcement now. Tailoring events can be abused which we really didn't have under the old (better) system. At least if you saw a venue do something wrong you could address it, now it doesn't matter what they do.

2. Mechs are coming back as prizes. While this is something players wanted, its bad for the game. "Prize Hawks" will be coming back out because these will be sought after to a greater degree than other prizes, especially the cards, which virtually no one wanted. With a greater number of pieces out there that are more rare than others, Ebay's stock price will be going up again shortly for all the extra auctions they will be getting. This secondary market will hurt WK because people can simply go online and get the prize as opposed to going to the venue and trying to win it, or going to multiple venues and winning all the prizes and insuring that other casual players won't ever win them.

3. There isn't any reason to buy boosters anymore. There isn't any way for WK to spure people on to buy boosters. People would be better off with identifying the pieces they desire and going to the internet or ebay to purchase them and get the number they want and EXACTLY what they want as opposed to dropping 15 dollars a booster to maybe get something decent.

4. This will cause WK to lose players, I know a couple of people who buy cases that are dropping out because they feel WK jerked the rug out from under them. It won't spur new players to begin playing the game because as far as they know they aren't missing anything and aren't able to buy the old boosters from WK because they are sold out.

5. Competitive play is essentially dead in any meaningful sense. there isn't a "standard" type game any longer. A venue in California could run a regular game in July and a venue in Austrailia could run the same game the venue signed up for, but have a huge Banned List and the game might be completely different.

So how does rescinding retirement benefit WK? I don't see a way how it does.

It doesn't spur growth, and the people who didn't sell their collections will have to come back and learn all the new rules and see that their old mechs are no match for a post AoD mech. It will be a slaughter when those old player realize they are playing with outdated pieces.

Some players might come back for a month or so, but there won't be any long term growth out of this.

What does this have to do with this thread? It's about the player complaining about competitive players and how "they are ruining the game" and what they are talking about.

It's my guess that Tamias desperately wants to be heard. It's true, he doesn't talk about the horrible defeater, cheese player and evil rules lawyer at all. However, he does talk a little about the prize hunter. But that's more of a coincidence, since he's mainly busy trying to make his point... just like he does in several other threads.

I'll admit, I do aim to beat my opponent as quickly as possible. Not for showing off purposes, or to try and be nasty, but mainly because when I play, I on average spend about 4 hours travelling to and from said venues. I just want to play the game have some fun, if I win I win, so be it, if I lose so be it. Also there tends to be little gap between rounds so extra time means I can go grab something to eat or drink between rounds.

I do believe what DB was referring to were people who are basically unsportsman like when playing. And thats the difference. I make sure when ever I finish a game and if I win, I give the opponent some pointers on what they may have done differently which could have altered the out come or if they were not sure on how some of their units were used most effectively, I'd give them some pointers.

How you actually play the game actually makes a lot of difference.

Yeah, but we've got a player at our venue who does all five of those things. It's really bad.

Nanhold is right,
I do want to be heard. I am a competitive player, but contrary to popular belief competitive players where I play don't go around beating kids and acting like jerks.

Generally they're the ones doing the teaching and making sure everyone is playing fair.

Blizzard has once again missed the point entirely. Its obvious that some players don't like retirement or the ratings/rankings system. And once again, WK is listening to only one side of the player community and giving them what they want AGAIN.

Casual Players have gotten everything they have ever wanted in this game and the stuff the didn't like really never affected them in any meaningful way. They didn't like artillery, so artillery was changed repeatedly and eventually phased out. They didn't like ATVS, the counter to artillery, so the initial set up system was changed to appease them.

They didnt' like retirement so that went away.

It would appear that we are close to a reset or a complete drop of the ratings system, something that has no effect on casual players at all.

@Blizzard,
I am just tired of people compiaining about competitive players like they are the bane of everything for this game when in fact they do most of the buying, teaching, and running of this game.

As compared to them listening to your side and only giving your side what they want (I'm not going to say it's the competitive side, because I know for a fact that some competitive players are fine with the end of retirement, and with the control being given to Battlemasters/Venues).

I'll disagree with this. I know a lot of opinions of major groups of casual players who haven't gotten what they want. I know a lot of the things they didn't like did affect them in a meaningful way. Retirement is top of the list (in fact, enough felt it affected them in such a meaningful way that large numbers of people stopped playing the game).

Interesting. Some of the most passionate anti-artillery arguments I've read and heard came from competitive players.

Nope, that wasn't the reason it was changed. First strike units are why it was changed (from a balance perspective, it was the right choice).

After a year and a half (longer if you count the Mage Knight retirement, that most consider to be the thing that killed the game). Perhaps it went away because WizKids evaluated it and decided the benefits weren't worth the downside?

Heh well I play heroclix and I personally haven't bought any new ones just the promos I got from our venue closing. I like mechs being prizes again (even though I probably won't win any) because it gives me something to fight for not just cause I wanna kill stuff!!

I gots to say, both Tamias and Dblizzard have their points.

D is certainly more calm and collected, infusing his points with the semblance of logic. And for the most part, I dont see anything wrong with his counter. I think he sees the issue from a perspective inside the company walls... and Tamias, sees the issue from a perspective outside... as a player.

Which is why I think Tamias is closer to the actual central problem-point. This is probably because I am a player, too.

The problem is, I think tamias is saying, that the powers that be (ptb) have never really had a solid grasp on how the game is played, and have thus shifted and changed rules in what seems like knee-jerk reaction.

Starting with the hoverbike swarm, which was really an imaginary problem, the PTB flinched and changed the core rules of the game.

Now, say what you will about why and how... but the unchangable facts are 1) the rules changed and 2) the playerbase saw that by making a big stink, the rules could change. Its all downhill from there. We still suffer from players who believe if they yell loud enough, things will change. And, we still suffer, because things do.

When, in fact, a competitive playtester base-- not forumites-- should be the arbitars of such a shift, if any, and only rarely.

Problem again; if the PTB dont know who their playtester base should be, who their best players really are, they dont know who to listen to.

So, you need two playtesting groups... a competitive one, (based on top players at nats/worlds) and a random hodge-podge playtester group, to get a feel for the everyman take on the game.

One tells you balance, the other tells you fun/experience. Dont mix them.

Neither of those will work though, unless the power that be also understand, relate and listen...

And really, you need a head designer that knows the game. Any game you play for prizes/money will be too competitive to pretend it is just a casual game, with casual rules... and flavio units.

After the first change of hoverbikes, they tried to back peddle and not change things that seriously needed changing... for the true betterment of the game against min/maxers.

Ie, first strike armies. Artillery armies. Mechless armies.

In first strike, you could literraly win a game before your opponent had a turn, and you had to bring this army, in case the enemy brought his. It was a fairly stu-pid game until AoD finally fixed it, nearly 100 game weeks later.

Other things have needed fast rapid changes... arty and twins... yet the slowness of the change, even the twins, is extremely harmful. In a perfect world, nothing would have to be changed. Having to change anything once it is out, is really, really bad.

The Faq is a bad crutch for game designers...
/stop

I think tamias has a strong point in that the ptb need to know what they are doing and stop flinching every 4 months. As players, it just makes us feel jerked around. Changing set retirement is just another change in a long list of changes that arent necessary and/or improperly timed.

-MR