Opinion: Competition at LAN Parties

I'd like to open by saying that this post is posted by myself as a LAN attendee, not staff, and pertains to no specific LAN event, but rather an observation of similar traits between many.

If you don't know me, a large piece of understanding this post is that I am a big proponent of e-sports and competitive gaming. My gateway PC game was Left 4 Dead, and I like to think the rush I felt when I played versus mode all those late nights is a large influence to why I enjoy competitive gaming.

I've never really thought of myself as an extremely competitive individual. I do, however, enjoy working in groups, on a team, striving for a greater goal. Initially, playing against AI is a blast, and I was content comp stomping with friends for quite a while in League of Legends, which is probably the game I put the most time in. But eventually the bots become easy: you know what they're going to do better than the code they're written on. So I took that dive into PvP, and despite the inevitable hate, trolling, however you want to refer to it, I have had some of the greatest gaming experiences of my life. And I've been gaming most of it.

Enough about me. There is a lot fo discussion on many forums regarding tournaments at LAN parties. The taboo in each thread seems to be 'competition'. People refer to it like one should feel ashamed for being competitive, that participants should be chastized for being upset they lost, or staff should rethink how they format the tournament.

This confuses me. I'm not endorsing the pointing of fingers, calling of names, or discouragement of any kind. But tournaments are supposed to be competitive. Someone is going to win, a lot of people are going to lose, and their going to be upset. That means staff did their job! They provided a valuable enough incentive to bring out the competitive spirit in you! It doesn't have to be a prize, it could just be a rivalry, or the desire to prove your skill.

The catch-all argument that comes up every time is that it should be about fun, not competition, as though the two can't exist together? I have fun competiting, win or lose. What is NOT fun is when the pressure is so high to create a "tournament" that is open, available, and "fair" to all skill levels that an event is born with two very different pools of players seeking very different things. Someone who has not played the game very often does not want to get stomped by someone who plays the game on a daily basis, and vice versa.

League of Legends is such a poster child for this argument because it rewards players who have more time and experience. It literally gives them an advantage, and when this is explained to people who aren't familiar with it, the response is usually pretty negative. It's not like an FPS where you can jump into a game and be on a somewhat even playing field. And people don't like that.

But it's a different genre! Any MOBA, and really any RTS game, requires knowledge of the game, the units, the items, the maps, positioning, objectives, roles... so much more than just trying to kill the enemy player. All these things are why I love the genre so much, why its such a huge spectator sport, and why Riot is heradling in unprecedented numbers of viewers.

So as an attendee, I want to see that sort of competition on a local level. I don't want to see every attendee of the LAN thrown into a random mess get frustrated with one another because there is such a segregation of skill levels. I'm not just talking about high skill players to low skill players, but vice versa as well. As a participant, I want a competitive match, I don't want to be on a cannon fodder team because we live in a perfect world where everyone gets to participate.

Why is that such a bad thing to say, that players who are not as experienced in a game shouldn't be allowed to particpate in a tournament? Because the word tournament has become subjective. Its interpreted differently to different people. To some, it stands for a time organized by staff in which everyone is focusing on playing one game. To others, such as myself, it means that people at this LAN who think they are good at the game want to find out how good they are against other people at the LAN. You could refer to this as competition.

I don't know what the solution is. We have people participating in "tournaments" expecting very different things. I'm tired of reading posts that suggest that competition is this ultimate no-no that has no place at LAN parties. In between events at a recent LAN party, we played all-random-all-mid League of Legends with ANYONE who answered when we yelled out to the crowd. I know of at least two in each game that hadn't played League very often before, if at all. And we had a ton of fun. Why can't there be both? Why can't there be a tournament for those who want to compete, and just organized play for those who don't?

Thanks for reading, and I hope that this post is taken as what it's intended for, which is a defense of competition. I'm just tired of feeling like a bad guy because I expect a competitive environment out of tournaments.

garfi3ld wrote: *Edit* I should also point out that I just avoid tournaments that are to competitive, normally because I don't want to get angry or in the case of team games I don't want to ruin someone elses chance

And I'm not saying you should doubt yourself. If you want to participate, do it. My first League of Legends tournament I thought I was a bad ass. I wasn't. I was level 30, but had only played against actual people a few times. Still, I thought I was ready, and I brought the team down. Probably the reason we lost. Sure, they were upset. I was even more upset at my performance. But I learned a lot from that game, and kept playing.

I learned the game and got to the point where when on a team, pre-made or random, I understood my role and how to play with the team. I was on a team that took first place at one of our events.

You don't have to be an amazing player to be on a winning team. It helps, sure. But as long as you understand the mechanics of the game, you stand a chance. Just as much as any random person picking up a gun in an FPS does. There's just a little more research that goes into it because people aren't as familiar with MOBAs as they are FPS. And any sort of level requirement isn't saying you have to be this good to play this game, its just asking that they do that research.

garfi3ld wrote: In a pick your own team situation there shouldn't be a need for level requirements. If people want to have lower level people on their team so be it imo.

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Well, I don't want to hijack the purpose of this post, but I personally believe that a bring your team option should have a PUG option. And that would be where a level requirement would be instigated.

But that's at the staff discretion. I have my opinion on level requirements but they're not realy relevant or important here.

My opinion on this is that anyone who thinks tourney's at LAN's are not competitive , needs to pimp slapped with a quickness.

Yea you might enter to have fun but deep down inside , you want to win, you want to beat the other team , that friends is just basic human nature.

Just like I hate it when I see kids playing soccer and they say they don't keep score and everyone wins and everyone gets to play - all you are doing is teaching kids to not compete and in the real world you have to compete and no one gives you anything that you haven't earned.

At DLF , we had cash prize tourney's and we know how that turned out , BYOT's showed up for that event , played and then went home. Additionally they were not the type of crowd you typically wanted at your event for the most part.

There were also prizes set aside for the tourney's and these were BYOT and you had the same thing there as well.

I think that if you can run a 2v2 or a 3v3 tourney for a game and it is BYOT and competitive along with a 5v5 random team tourney then you can fill the void for both aspects.

I used to play in TWL for America's Army and we did the 4v4 format and it was some intense gameplay especially since it was a timed round for the map.

Perhaps with the FPS that would be the way to go for that.

For LoL or the RTS , I dont have a suggestion unless there is a way to equalize everyone from the start but since you play on your own account , that makes it kinda hard.

Perhaps you can have a 3 person BYOT but you have to PUG 2 from a random pool at the start so that you split the experienced people with the ones that are not. This would let teams not get face rolled potentially and let the players who have skill really shine as they would be able to carry the day.

Either way you cut it , competition is in our DNA and to quote a movie , "If you ain't first , your last!!!"

en.wiktionary.org/wiki/tournament
A series of games; either the same game played many times, or a succession of games related by a single theme; played competitively to determine a single winning team or individual.

I think that brackets and serious prices bring forth a competitive sense, as players want a fair opportunity to prove that they deserve the win. When I knew I didn't deserve the win because my opponent was better, I accept the loss. When I have 3 guys on my team AFK (just theoretical exaggeration) and we can still win some fights, I'll be mad at the loss. Mad at my team for not trying, and maybe mad at the tournament for matching me with them.

If Olympic bobsled teams were required to random group, the whole thing would be less competitive as they don't know each other, and in a sport where every move is critical, you need people to be in sync.

Team shooter games are less involved, as you are just cooperating and less of a combined unit that feasts or famines.

Organized play and such is fine and easy, but when you start laying out orders, best of 3s, winners and best teams, the system has become serious and competitive. The International is not for fun. League Championship Series is not for fun. Winning can be fun, but the results are serious. Players there don't rage from the format, even though IMO determining the world's best should be more extensive and thorough than 1 day or a weekend.

I think with the size of the LAN's growing to the point that people are turned away. A little more competition isn't going to hurt anyone. There are still people who come and just play WoW or other online games with their guilds, there are still people who just play LoL or other of those types of games the whole time. The difference is between games you can get up, hang out with friends and maybe even score a new upgrade to your rig, or even an entire computer.
Back when LAN's were only 30-40 people, we needed everyone to be on the same page per say and play the same games and everyone participate in all the tourneys to have enough teams to make them tourneys. Now that we have tons of people showing up, bringing their friends/teams, i can see the landscape changing a little for certain games. It's no longer the TF2 tournaments of ole where everyone had the same 5 weapons to choose from. Games have gotten more complex and i think the level of competition has increased for those who enter the tournaments.
I'm not saying that all games have to be fiercely competitive, but there are prizes to be won, and no-one enjoys the taste of defeat. After-all to the victor goes the spoils!

My two cents is a new tourney that is a random tourney. Say you get a pool of games with a random chance for say a hero/character. Then add random teams. Then add a bunch of other random stuff(if applicable by the game). Like with LoL Random Teams with ARAM.