Fall '03 Iron DM Tournament -- Wulf Ratbane is Iron DM!

[Pielorinho]

Here's where the tournament itself will be; I'll be editing this post as time goes on. The initial signup thread (with questions about the tournament) is here.


The rules:

Simple. We get 8 people willing to play (and 3 alternates). I pair people off as competitors and give them a set of 6 "ingredients".

The ingredients are elements that must be used in the designing of a scenario/adventure - which should be written up in overview form - players can be as specific as they like - but detailed stat-blocks and the like are not weighed as heavily as uniqueness and playability of the ideas.

The results are then judged by me and the winner moves on to the next round. . .

So, once we have the 8 players (and alternates), I will pair people up based on availability. Players will have 24 hours from the posting of the ingredients to post their entry, which should give plenty of time for someone who is not immediately around when the ingredients are posted to get their entry done. Once you have posted an entry, YOU MAY NOT EDIT YOUR POST. Doing so will cause you to automatically forfeit the round, no matter how excellent your entry was.

Obviously, if your opponent posts an entry before you do, you are on your honor not to peek.

There is no limit on the length of a scenario, but keep in mind that giving too much information is almost as dangerous as giving too little. If you bore me, I'll give the round to your opponent.

As usual, we ask that those not involved in a round not post any suggestions or ideas about the posted ingredients.

The Iron DM is a grueling competition, with hard as nails judges (expect to have your scenario picked apart).

The contestants:
Nemmerle
Dave Turner
Nifft
Wicht
Macbeth
Rune
Mythago
Cool Hand Luke

The alternates:
Lightful
Wulf Ratbane
humble minion
Berandor

Matches so far:
Dave Turner vs. Nemmerle -- Nemmerle wins!
Wicht vs. Nifft -- Wicht wins!
Rune vs. Macbeth -- Rune wins!
Mythago vs. Cool Hand Luke -- Cool Hand Luke screws up the deadline and forfeits, and is replaced by Wulf Ratbane -- Wulf Ratbane wins!
Wulf Ratbane is the Champion!
Daniel

 

[el-remmen]

Come on, Come on

I have a boring corporate meeting at 1 - and I need something to do to diminish the desire to kill my boss with a stapler.

 

[Pielorinho]

First round: Dave Turner vs. Nemmerle!

Your ingredients are:
Funeral
Insane Unicorn
Shadow Mastiff
Broken Teeth
Slow transformation
Betrayal

You have 24 hours from the time-stamp on this post to turn in your entry. Remember, editing after you've posted results in disqualification -- do your spellchecking first, and use the preview button.

Good luck!
Daniel

 

[Dave Turner]

Very groovy ingredients! Best of luck, nemmerle!

 

[Pielorinho]

Okay, a couple more questions.

First, would a mod (Nem, maybe?) be willing to go back to the last thread and correct my link to this thread? It went all funky, and now that the thread is closed, I can't fix it.

Second, Wulf requested a field of sixteen instead of eight. I can handle that, but I'll only do it if I get unanimous consent from all current players.

What say you guys?
Daniel

 

[el-remmen]

Okay, a couple more questions.

First, would a mod (Nem, maybe?) be willing to go back to the last thread and correct my link to this thread? It went all funky, and now that the thread is closed, I can't fix it.

Second, Wulf requested a field of sixteen instead of eight. I can handle that, but I'll only do it if I get unanimous consent from all current players.

What say you guys?
Daniel

I can take care of the link.

My concern with 16 is that it would take too long to finish - and while I may have time to compete for the next week or so. . . the further it goes the more likely that work will begin to pile up again and scheduling rounds will be increasingly more difficult.

 

[Rune]

Okay, a couple more questions.

First, would a mod (Nem, maybe?) be willing to go back to the last thread and correct my link to this thread? It went all funky, and now that the thread is closed, I can't fix it.

Second, Wulf requested a field of sixteen instead of eight. I can handle that, but I'll only do it if I get unanimous consent from all current players.

What say you guys?
Daniel

The tournament will drag on for much longer, if you do that. Your call though, as far as I'm concerned. I'd only do it if I knew I had the alternates already. On the other hand, I've never had a chance to test my mettle against Wulf... (Nor, Nemm, for that matter, but he's already in.)

By the way, if you want to do a second one today, I'm good to go.

 

[Wicht]

I don’t care if there is 16. And I also can go now if you want to do 2 at a time.

 

[Dave Turner]

My concern with 16 is that it would take too long to finish - and while I may have time to compete for the next week or so. . . the further it goes the more likely that work will begin to pile up again and scheduling rounds will be increasingly more difficult.

This is my fear as well.

 

[Pielorinho]

Thanks for fixing the link. And that takes care of the "unanimous consent" thing -- sorry, Wulf! If anyone has other ideas for alternate activities, I'm open to hearing them.

I'd like to not do rounds simultaneously: when reading the tournaments, I find it confusing to read simultaneous rounds. So there's always going to be only one round happening. As much as possible, I'd like it to be about one round per day. I'll post a space-saver post after both round entries appear, and slot my judgement into that post later, so that readers can follow along more easily; once I've made a judgement, I'll post again telling folks to go back and find the judgement. (Hope that makes sense -- when it happens, it should be pretty clear).

Daniel

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Sixteen could drag, but the folks here seem pretty motivated. It is up to the judge to keep things moving. The danger with sixteen would be moving it so fast that some of the sixteen can't keep up, flake out, and then there are no alternates.

But assuming all goes well, it's only one extra match for the people at the top of the bracket. (That's you, isn't it, nemm?)

There isn't really any more waiting around involved provided the judge can process the entries. It's invisible to the folks in bracket A what the folks in bracket B are doing, if they are run concurrently.

Two big benefits: (1) twice as many adventures in this thread when it's all done (for the loyal readers), and (2) I get to play.


Wulf

 

[Nifft]

16's fine with me, but could be a logistical issue for you, Pie.

-- N, ready to go now if someone else is up for it

 

[Pielorinho]

If we end up doing sixteen contestants, I'll do simultaneous rounds, even though I don't like them as a reader. Otherwise, I think it's handleable to do one round per day: it's easier on the reader, and still enables us to finish the tournament in as little as one week, if schedules work out.

edit: just so it's clear, it seems very unlikely to me we'll do sixteen contestants, given that several current contestants have said they want it to be limited to eight, and I'll only do it if I get unanimous consent from those eight to make a change.

Daniel

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

Ok, no problem.

I guess my thought with 16 was that, with so many folks ready to go right now, you could process the first round pretty fast and whittle back down to 8 in a jiffy.

As it turns out, Daniel is not the Iron Ref I was looking for-- in fact, at one entry a day, he's running slower than most.

But it's no big deal, I've fought for the integrity of the setup before. Eight is fine-- keeps it special. As much as I want to play I wouldn't recommend an alternate bracket/thread or anything like that.

I can wait a few months for another. Gotta set my computer clock forward 4 minutes, apparently...

Wulf

 

[el-remmen]

If we do 16 and simultaneous rounds - why not ask contenders to pre-create posts for their entries and then email you their entries before editing the post to add the entry - thus you know when it was really completed by and the thread is still neat. . . and/or stagger them so entries will tend to come in 6 hours after each other.

 

[Pielorinho]

As it turns out, Daniel is not the Iron Ref I was looking for-- in fact, at one entry a day, he's running slower than most.

Hey, I look out for my readers. Ideally, I'd like to see the contest thread have the following posts in sequence:
* Judge gives out ingredients
* Entry #1
* Entry #2
* Judgement

with nothing in between. The only way I can see doing that, however, would be to set up another thread in which I reposted everything and nobody else posted anything; if I did that, then I could do simultaneous rounds. The pace isn't my limitation -- it's my confusion as a reader.

Daniel

 

[cool hand luke]

I can't go today, but any day after this should be fine.

I would like to see a 12 person tourny, with the previous 4 winners getting byes.

16 is fine with me, I need the practice.

 

[Pielorinho]

Nem, that's an intriguing suggestion. It does open up the whole editing can of worms, though.

Staggering entries could also work. If we do that, I'd need to ask people not to post their entry too early, though: if I schedule a simultaneous round to begin at 5 pm EDT tonight, for example, the folks in that round would just need to make sure not to post their entry before 12:28 pm EDT tomorrow, so as not to have their entries interspersed with y'all's.

Daniel

 

[Wulf Ratbane]

The only way I can see doing that, however, would be to set up another thread in which I reposted everything and nobody else posted anything.

The moderatus emeritus can always delete intervening posts and tidy up the thread.

As for timing the entries, some entrants are faster than others, some like to post right at the wire. I don't see that "All entries should be posted by 12:00 PM EST" is all that different than "All entries must be posted between 6:00 and 12:00 PM EST."

It may make scheduling a bit trickier for some folks, if they only have computer access during a certain timeframe.


Wulf

 

[Macbeth]

Wow, go to Chem class for an hour and suddenly the old thread has two more pages, and this new thread is open. Just finished getting up to speed, glad to see I'm in, and I'm ready for a matchup.