Hey everyone! Adam, from TFG Radio, back again to discuss all things 40K with you, the masses!
I attend and help run a lot of tournaments. They have varied in size to small six man events, to the largest tournament in the world. A lot of factors go into the attendance of an event. Advertising, or lack there of, other tournaments in the area, time of the year, and, if its close to a larger grand tournament, are just some of the reasons that help determine the size of a tournament. There is no guarantee that your event will attract a lot of players, and that’s ok. No matter the event, there is always room for improvement. What you shouldn’t be doing is what may have happened recently.
If you have been following the Competitive 40K Facebook page, it has recently been mentioned that an event appears to have inflated their numbers. As of this writing, it has yet to be determined if this actually happened. I am NOT part of the people looking into it, but I do have a Best Coast Pairings subscription, and I once stayed at a Holiday Inn. From looking at the most recent event, and looking at a previous event, there seems to an inordinate amount of drops after the first round, and a lot of the same people, from the same team, dropping in both games. The people that dropped helped to get each event to a major, as even without those players it was already at GT level. If proven to be true, that they padded their numbers, this will, unfortunately, affect the validity of the event, and bring down sanctions to the tournament organizer. So, the question is, “Is the risk of getting caught worth it?” Short answer is “NO!”
I don’t understand why someone would do this. The risk far outweighs the reward. It is even in the ITC rules about one of the possibilities that would happen if you got caught:
Haven’t we learned the folly of trying to make your event larger too fast from the London Grand Tournament? Do you really need to boost your ego in the world of tiny army men by, allegedly, padding the attendance of your event? Why aren’t you satisfied with having a large, well run event? I have run plenty of events that came close to either grand tournament or major status, and it never occurred to me to add “shadow” players to bring me up to that threshold. Instead of finding way a way to bend, or outright cheat, the system, you should be working on ways to increase attendance to your event. If you focus more on that, than of cheating, you will garner a better reputation both in the ITC and in your local community. So resist the temptation of padding your event, as nothing good will come of it. It also saves a lot of people a lot of extra paperwork 😉
That’s all for this week, I hope you enjoyed the read. Let me know your thoughts, and any similar tournament stories, in the comments section. Don’t forget to visit our Facebook, Twitch, and Patreon pages to stay up to date on what we’re up to and when episodes drop!
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