Fight Club: Lessons Learned & The Future

[Cheekie Monkie]

First of all, thanks to everyone who participated in the event on Sunday, it was a real pleasure to see some 1v1 lobbies in action and see play from different skill brackets. As always, it's a privilege to see some Forest rage. Especially big thanks to the streamers and referees to help keep order, there was some real good commentary which really helps liven the game up a bit.

I'd like to get some feedback for the future. I'll discuss some points which I found personally noteworthy and would like some sort of general agreement on, but please feel free to bring up your own points on how we can improve the Club for the future.

Format
What are your thoughts about the king of the hill style format? Did enough people get enough games in?

Skill brackets
What are your thoughts on the division of brackets? Is it fair to have these divisions in the first place?

As someone pointed out on the night, apart from a few players there seemed to be a lot of skill similarity between the intermediate and advanced bracket. I think this is where the King of the Hill format comes in handy in the advanced bracket, since it rewards kings who do well and allows challengers to test their skills (Yes, I'm aware I didn't enforce the rules that well, I wanted things to be a bit more informal, but I learned that it helps if people actually know what's actually going to happen).

Most importantly - The Future
We can capitalise on the more relaxed structure of the Club by dividing events into 'formal' and 'informal' ones.

Formal events would be like the ones we had yesterday, we'd get it advertised in advance in which we'll try to get as many signups and streamers as possible to host the different brackets and lobbies. We can set up a date and time at regular intervals, e.g the first Saturday of every month. The reason why I suggested these events on a monthly basis is that it makes the event more 'special' and to ease the burden on streamers.

Informal events on the other hand, can be up to the discretion and convenience of the individual/dual streamer. They simply post an announcement, create a lobby of their own and start inviting people. Due to the smaller nature of these events, they may amalgamate different skill brackets e.g. beginners/intermediate, intermediate/advanced or a simple free for all. This has the advantage of accommodating for different time zones, as well as us not having to worry about streamers dropping out at the last moment for whatever reason.

Again, feedback is much appreciated.

If you'd like a hand in organising/streaming future events, please message me or Windu, so we can give you moderator access.

[Forestradio]

As always, it's a privilege to see some Forest rage.

[Atlas]

Forest put out some amazing tape during Fight Club, which I will be going over if I manage to get the vods for them. That game vs Dark Riku was pretty inspirational for poor little newbie GK players like me

Anyway, I think the real strength of the Fight Club format is that it can be done informally. I believe I mentioned it slightly during stream, but with the lack of seeding and appointment you can just put up a lobby whenever and work with whoever's online. Remember, we were anticipating the need for 2 lobbies when we started, and I think we pumped out 4 at one point and held stable at 3 lobbies for literally the same amount of time the monthly tournaments go for. That's a lot of games.

The real crux of this is going to be on streamers imo. To make this into an actual "event", however frequently we decide, we'll need them to put out the casts. I think the evidence points to playing bodies not being a problem here.

As for my individual viewpoint, I think we should do these kinds of events more regularly, but in shorter durations. The format is fine and if there's issues with player skill I think the streamers can work as refs. What is a problem is it running for 6 hours each go. Putting them on a weekend is great for this, but not everyone has that kind of time to dedicate to it. Putting them weekly or biweekly lasting ~2-3 hours should be great.

[Swift]

Whilst I had a great time, there needs to be more in the way of skill division. I originally wanted to play in the intermediate lobby but after restarting my game briefly due to disconnecting my headset the lobby was gone, so I joined the beginners lobby in which I declared myself king and handly (there isn't too much denying that even if I lost my Banshees first engagement in the first game) beat all three challengers. Clearly that lobby was not for me so I joined the intermediates when I could and got matched up against Ser Topi first game. This is my issue, I was clearly not belonging in the beginner lobby but I don't believe that someone as strong as Ser Topi really belonged in the intermediate lobby, ok part of that might be me saying "Not fair Topi QQ" but there is some merit, I have 750 hours and he has 3000+. The lobbies need more encouragement, it felt like a lot of people who should have been in the Elite lobby just played it safe and went intermediate, so in the end half the games they played were against someone they would have faced in the elite lobby anyway.

As for the format of games I felt KotH was a very effective way at providing entertainment (who doesn't like the idea of the tyrant and the upstart?) and judging skill within that bracket. In the end it got a lot looser and was more a case of "who wants to fight who?"

I'd love some mod rights too I'll probably end up cocasting with someone at a later date and being able to make my own lobbies would be great.

[Vapor]

Yeah the next event should not be as long, I'm going to have to take a bit of a break from DoW to let that part of my brain recharge.

I also agree that there could be another skill division or two. There might not be enough streamers for that, but I don't think people would mind and I'm sure streamers could bounce between lobbies if needed.

-Beginner
-Intermediate
-Veteran (or Aspiring Champions ) <- people who get knocked out of ELITE could come here too but they should try to judge the situation and maybe let others play if they're winning too easily
-ELITE

[Swift]

I also agree that there could be another skill division or two. There might not be enough streamers for that, but I don't think people would mind and I'm sure streamers could bounce between lobbies if needed.

-Beginner
-Intermediate
-Veteran (or Aspiring Champions ) <- people who get knocked out of ELITE could come here too but they should try to judge the situation and maybe let others play if they're winning too easily
-ELITE

I wasn't actually suggesting a new bracket, I mean't just get the message in people's heads "YOU DON'T BELONG HERE!" But not this sounds less offensive and more useful, maybe for the larger events.

Also I'm pretty sure my comments on the Fight Club group were deleted so I'll reiterate here: What are the points of mods, we can't make events.

[Crewfinity]

Yeah I had a good time, was a fun event. Looking into possibly streaming some in the future, would be happy to host some fight clubs if that works out.

[Ghorm]

I missed all the fun

I usually play during the midnight hours (pacific time) and there aren't a lot of games going on (if any). Sucks for a newbie but thems the breaks.

I have faith i'll join you guys during an event one day!

For the Craftworld.