Scheduling Thread for the IRON DM 2020 Tournament!

[FitzTheRuke]

I'm sure I could have tweaked a few things here and there still, but I've got to get some things done at home, so I've posted my Final Round Entry!

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I'm embarrassed that I messed up on my cut-and-paste. It's not a big deal, I suppose, which I why I'm a little annoyed at myself for the mistake. At least the whole thing is there!

 

[Wicht]

My final judgment is posted. We need to wait on Rune to finalize the judgments but I want to take a moment and thank all the participants this year (last year). Thanks!


I look forward to the next tournament. I'm kinda getting the itch to enter again as a contestant.

 

[Rune]

@FitzTheRuke and @humble minion, a new IRON DM has been determined.

Congratulations and/or condolences.

 

[Gradine]

I look forward to the next tournament. I'm kinda getting the itch to enter again as a contestant.

As am I!

Congratulations go out to all our contestants! We how to see you all next year (this year)!

 

[FitzTheRuke]

When do you think the next one will be? I'm not in a hurry - that was hard work, but I think I'd be ready again in much shorter than a year.

 

[Rune]

Now that we’re already looking toward the next tourney, I’d like to get a head start on recruitment.

No, really! If anyone would like for me to give them a notification when the next tournament is recruiting later this year, just send me a private message to that effect. I’ll be happy to send you a heads up. Of course, you’ll have to make sure that you check EN Worlds regularly or have your email notification turned on in your settings.

Similarly, if anyone would like to be considered as a judge for future tournaments, I encourage you to send me a private message for that, too. Please include a link to any IRON DM Tournaments that you’ve participated in (the OP has links to all of the surviving EN World tournaments).

Finally, I believe @el-remmen mentioned in one of these threads that he is hoping to take on the task of archiving these tournaments off-site. Anyone who’d like to assist in that project should probably let him know.

I personally am interested in such a project and would like to hear more about it, although I don’t know if I actually have any usefully applicable skills.

 

[Rune]

When do you think the next one will be? I'm not in a hurry - that was hard work, but I think I'd be ready again in much shorter than a year.

We usually aim to start recruiting around September (after the major conventions and before the major holidays). But, you know, sometimes life supersedes.

However, you should definitely read my post directly before this one.

 

[el-remmen]

@Rune have you considered announcing dates for a future IRON DM tournament, like for example: Recruitment for IRON DM 2021 will begin Monday August 16 for a first round starting the week of September 20th.

Obviously, these specific dates would change - but it would allow for some anticipation, build up, reminder bumps of a thread, and for people to block out some days ahead of time on their calendars (or in the case of a returning champion, request a change of starting date).

 

[Rune]

@Rune have you considered announcing dates for a future IRON DM tournament, like for example: Recruitment for IRON DM 2021 will begin Monday August 16 for a first round starting the week of September 20th.

Obviously, these specific dates would change - but it would allow for some anticipation, build up, reminder bumps of a thread, and for people to block out some days ahead of time on their calendars (or in the case of a returning champion, request a change of starting date).

I tend to shy away from setting things in stone so far in advance because it’s hard to know if schedules will be accommodating so far out. That’s okay for most; both contestant-rosters and even judge-rosters can be flexible.

But I much prefer a tournament with a defending champion, unless that is for some reason absolutely impossible. The way I figure it, they’ve earned that extra bit of accommodation.

Of course, I’m just one guy. I prefer to have these types of discussions with a multitude of judges. That was easier when the RBDM club was still a viable place for discussion. These days, we kind of have to settle for conversations with recently active judges.

As I said, I’m just one guy. I might not always be the one who kicks things off, anyway. It has tended to work out that way for most of this past decade, I guess, but that may just be habitual.

For instance, @Gradine did an excellent job of organizing and running point for the 2019 tourney (as far as I could tell from my outside perspective – especially impressive as it was also a debut as judge) as soon as I had bowed out to compete. @Wicht, @Radiating Gnome, and @Nifft have done likewise.

And @CleverNickName organized and MCed the 2010 (or 2009?) tournament without even being a judge, which must have been an extra challenge.

 

[Gradine]

If there does happen to interest in more than one Iron DM a year, I would be happy to run a Summer spinoff.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

I'd probably be ready by Summer to give it another go.

 

[Wicht]

After 20 years, we are probably ripe for a spin-off series or something.

The primary problem with doing Iron DM twice a year is scheduling judges and finding enough competitors. I seem to recall that doing it twice a year made that somewhat harder, though I may be misremembering. A competition which was not elimination, and could be done with only one or two judges would help with that.

I was thinking this morning of trying a summer competition of Iron Ninja DM (name is a work in progress), where contestants were provided ingredients, but then they had to craft a specific sort of thing such as a magic item, an NPC, monster, scenario, that sort of thing, sometimes genre specific, sometimes not. Instead of elimination, assign points and then the one with the most points at the end would be the winner. I can't remember if something like that was already tried a few years ago, but it might be fun to give a go this summer if there is interest.

 

[el-remmen]

I am starting to give some thought about an IRON DM archive site project. Maybe those of us who are interested in contributing to the project can use discord or slack or something to discuss. I am open to suggestions. Maybe ENWorld has its own group messaging system that could work?

I think the first step would be grabbing every existing IRON DM and create clean versions of the text (just ingredients/entries/judgements) that can then be formatted for a simple free website using wordpress or weebly (unless we want to approach Morrus about potentially hosting pages for us, since it has its start on here).

I imagine each tournament page will have bracket with clickable names for each rounds head to head installments and the judgement. Furthermore there will (eventually) be pages for each individual competitor with their record and links to their entries, a master ingredients list (which would be helpful for judges coming up with ingredients in the future - either to avoid repeats or riff on a past theme), and "LOST TOURNAMENTS" page where we just do our best to list the past "lost" tournament, despite an incomplete record.

Anyway, once a format is established, we can figure out how to assign permissions and sub-projects. We also need to discuss an "editorial style." That is, while I would want to clean up typos and clarify and provide formatting to some of the messier (and older) entries, I think it is important to establish a consistent format and a limit to what will be revised.

I guess, for the sake of fairness, we should also reach out to every past competitor to let them know their work is being posted on the site (and to give them a chance to withdraw it, I guess)

DM me if you're interested.

 

[Neurotic]

(unless we want to approach Morrus about potentially hosting pages for us, since it has its start on here).

This would have additional advantage that those badges and whatnots could be added to the profile (or at least referenced - i.e. Activity or some other tab could show participation and / or status

 

[Gradine]

After 20 years, we are probably ripe for a spin-off series or something.

The primary problem with doing Iron DM twice a year is scheduling judges and finding enough competitors. I seem to recall that doing it twice a year made that somewhat harder, though I may be misremembering. A competition which was not elimination, and could be done with only one or two judges would help with that.

I was thinking this morning of trying a summer competition of Iron Ninja DM (name is a work in progress), where contestants were provided ingredients, but then they had to craft a specific sort of thing such as a magic item, an NPC, monster, scenario, that sort of thing, sometimes genre specific, sometimes not. Instead of elimination, assign points and then the one with the most points at the end would be the winner. I can't remember if something like that was already tried a few years ago, but it might be fun to give a go this summer if there is interest.

Yes, I was thinking of something in a similar vein. Different rounds could have different challenges. Short time limits would help with the timing issue as well.

 

[el-remmen]

I was even thinking of starting an "Iron DM webpage" with the records of all the past competitions and the future ones. . .

So it looks like I have been saying I was gonna do this for at least 18 years - found this post in IRON DM 2002 thread as I started grabbing the entries for it.

I started a google drive folder I can share with others who want to help once I get the first one done, we can use that as a template for others to follow as we archive, but also allows us to use it as a model to tweak, if we want to make changes.

My hope is once we have done the work of cleaning up the docs we can think about site structure.

 

[Gradine]

Yes, I was thinking of something in a similar vein. Different rounds could have different challenges. Short time limits would help with the timing issue as well.

Had the thought of a Project Runway-style competition (because that's a reference a lot of people here will get, right? ). Every week a new themed design challenge. Maybe we eliminate a contestant each round. Grab a random open source creature picture off of GIS - Design this monster. Design this race.

 

[FitzTheRuke]

Sounds fun.

 

[Gradine]

I'll workshop it for a while; we've got at least a good five months before summer officially hits. If anyone is interested in helping me with the design of it, hit me up through DM