[quote=“Infilament, post:16, topic:18180”]
As I’ve said, there is no way to determine what is “poor sportsmanship” or “excessive rudeness” within the game, aside from one person’s random definition which cannot be enforced or upheld in any reasonable way.[/quote]
Most sports have in-game arbitrary rules on poor sportsmanship or fouls, and instances are not always clear cut and judgement calls. You could make this argument for all of them, but they still exist. Even penalties that are defined in writing can come down to interpretation and personal judgement calls. I totally think an arbitrary set of rules of conduct can be “reasonably” enforced and upheld even if it is not an exact science. I just can’t agree on this point.
Also, fwiw, for your example, I would call banning in-game mechanics like throwing absolutely unreasonable and ridiculous, but trying to enforce a reasonable code of sportsmanship pre/post match both in-game and out something that could be reasonably handled. Obviously the key word in all of this is reasonable/reasonably, and some slack can be given so as not to be overbearing.
Let’s be clear here, I wasn’t talking about physical violence or even the threat of it as an egregious example of a mind game.
Also, that line of in-game action may be obvious to you, but others have a different line. Some think it’s okay to look at their opponent or even trash talk.
Keits even mentioned that pro athlete trash talk as something comparable to teabagging, and implied acceptance of trash talking in terms of pro sports at the very least.
However, it’s safe to say that jawing with your opponent is not “part” of the game in the sense that you don’t have to do it; it’s not dribbling a ball or stealing a base or shooting a puck. So should pro athletes be allowed to trash talk, or would you hold them to a different standard than pro tourney players?
Either way, I’m not trying to say whether you’re right or wrong. I’m just trying to say that everyone has a different line for what’s acceptable. Some people think that outside of the game intimidation / annoyance / mind games should be prohibited, just as some people think that blatantly mashing down on your prone opponent in between rounds or at the end of matches is disrespectful and should be prohibited.
We might just disagree on this, and that’s fine. But, I think that the line is a bit more arbitrary, or at the least individually determined then you seem to think it is. I think that each tournament organizer should be able to determine that line within reason.
To that end, I don’t think that Brandon and Rotendo made that rule with the idea that anyone pressing down twice was automatically ejected. I think that they were probably trying to focus on people doing it blatantly. But who knows, I could be wrong.
Now you might say “yeah but what constitutes blatant?” To that, I’d say it’s up to the TO’s to explain it. But maybe they just assumed people would understand the gist, just as they seemed to last year when the rule was in effect with zero community outrage. I don’t think that’s an overly unreasonable assumption in their part, but maybe many just didn’t know about it, who knows.
EDIT: Sorry, I didn’t see that you were done talking about this. Didn’t mean to draw you back in. Just saw your reply and thought I’d send one of my own. I’m actually kind of done with this topic too and hope we can go back to talking about the rest of the interview, but if other people want to continue, obviously that’s their right. Of course, there’s a giant thread topic about it, even if it’s been rendered largely pointless given what Brandon said.
Just for discussion, I was trying to think of an example of technically in-game behavior that one might consider “unreasonable”. What about on the character select screen between matches someone dawdles excessively, or rapidly selects/deselects character as much as they can, or just scrolls around wildly for as long as possible before picking but not technically going over their allowed time. It could easily be seen as trying to irritate you opponent, Most might find that within the letter of the rules, but excessive. They’re just using the controls given in the game, and it’s not even in the active gameplay section where both are competing, but would an organizer be out of line in wanting to curb that, or should it be fair game? There would be no hard metric to enforce it, but if they wanted, wouldn’t people familiar with the game be able to make a reasonable attempt to curb it if they desired?
Everything outside the game is up to the person directing that specific tournament.
At my tournaments, trash talk and gesturing out of game were perfectly fine, but getting in someone’s personal space or trying to intimidate them physically was not okay. Physical violence was not okay. We had zero tolerance policies for these things and the interpretation of these rules was up to the tournament director. All attendees signed papers acknowledging these rules before they were allowed to play in tournaments.
Which is part of the beauty of video game competition. The game interprets (enforces) its rules identically 100% of the time without fail. The game, and its rules that never bend at all, are the ONLY thing that determines who wins.
It amuses me that we’ve turned our community into a tea-bag meme. And by amuse I mean embarrasses me.
While other communities have debated about seriously impactful subjective rules like banning a block infinite from being used in the game. We occupy ourselves with mashing down repeatedly. I guess that speaks to the quality of KI being that that’s the worst thing we can come up with.
Rules should be objectively based on the construct of the game, if they cannot be that speaks to how broken the game is, typically those games don’t last long competitively. If you hate that KI allows tea-bagging that’s certainly within your right you’re entitled to pull your support from the game because of it.
Edit: I also left the tea-bag stuff out of my original post because I didn’t want this discussion to devolve to that debate. I think there are a few interesting points in the interview which would have been better to discuss. Success in multiple games, the progression of elitism with players in a game for example.
True, but at the same time I don’t think you can ignore how the tools are used in terms of the perception the game could receive, especially those on the outside or those wanting to get more involved, but not comfortable with a certain aspect of this.
Honestly, to me if someone taunts uses any in-game mechanic, whatever. It’s not a big deal. I don’t care about that aspect. That’s not why I’m discussing this topic.
My only actual concern in all this is how the various methods used are interpreted and how it reflects on the game/community. If the game/scene is negatively impacted by a specific kind of taunt and outsiders don’t like it being tied to something lewd, and it hurts the game/scene, I don’t think it’s too unreasonable to accept this nerf to the taunt meta game in tournaments for the better good of the game. In this case, I feel like that is a reasonable concession. Obviously, many have a no-bend viewpoint on that, and consider people not wanting to get involved for those reasons a fair loss. That’s fine. My opinion is that there’s room to budge for growth and the slippery slope isn’t as steep as many feel it is on this particular taunt, and players can adapt.
The only thing that irks me, and probably why I’m writing more than necessary on such a goofball topic is people not being willing to call a spade as spade in terms of what “tea-bagging” actually comes from and the connotation. It wouldn’t bother me as much if people just simply said, “yeah it’s derived from something lewd. I realize that, and if you don’t like it, too bad”, than “it means nothing, it’s just moving your character up and down”, which I think is disingenuous and glosses over a lot.
This behavior already exists and occurs, for a variety of reasons. I recall back in S2, Rico had a tendency to flit about the character the select screen, rapidly selecting and deselecting characters - the purpose of this is was obvious, to send a message to his opponent (and the audience) that he could bop you w/ most of the cast, and it was a matter of who he WANTED to bop you with, not necessarily gain a tactical advantage with, because he was the apex predator and you were just food; for entertainment purposes, he was going to play w/ his food. Should Rico have been DQ’d from several tourneys he wound up winning (or just Top 8ing) because he exercised intimidation w/in the context of the game rules? The game does, after all, allow you deselect your character and move about the character select screen rapidly.
Then the other side of it, the dawdling. It is quite mundane to return to character select after losing a round (or even asking your opponent to return to character select after winning) and picking the same character after dawdling a moment, so as to calm ones nerves and reassess how to approach the match. Should players be forced to change their character if they return to character select? Should every FT3 in tourney be character locked? The game does, after all, allow you to return to the character select screen and choose the same character.
Keep in mind that virtually every tourney enforces a time limit on the character select screen if the game itself doesn’t enforce one.
Totally w/ you on the disingenuous part.
Tea-bagging is slamming a virtual crotch into a virtual avatars personal space because the person controlling the avatar sucks and what are you gonna do about it, scrub? (don’t take that personally, I’m just being illustrative)
And then we’re supposed to shake hands and walk away, no biggie, it’s just a game. I think it’s more important that we acknowledge how rarely polite post-match decorum is exercised, and if we’re making any silly meta-rules, we ought to be enforcing a handshake policy, but that’s a total derail.
The thing is, we’re not on ESPN, and children aren’t often entering our tourneys. If you’re teabagging a kid, that’s fk’d up and maybe that individual’s ability to participate in future events ought to be considered by a panel of sorts or something. Same if we were getting SF levels of exposure - don’t do the nut dunk in places where it’ll make us look bad.
But the fact is that those are almost never factors. What is a factor is emotionally stunted adults and nigh-adults using the concept of morality as a deflection for their personal insecurities, and trying to push that into policy.
Also, for real, if you’re adequately familiar w/ some KD timings for your character, using a couple teabags as button bait can be very powerful, depending on your opponent. I wouldn’t try it on a rando I don’t know, but live, depending on your opponent, is hella legit. It’s on them to have the mental fortitude to NOT go for that DP they think I deserve for disrespecting them so egregiously. An ENORMOUS aspect of being any sort of good at FG’s is exercising mental fortitude. So, instead of barking back and forth about the social implications of the teabag, maybe we can all just keep calm and crouchblock?
There is a reason my mate’s game League of Legends spends so much time and money trying to encourage people to play nice with others. No-one wants to play a game where abuse is encouraged by its devs.
KI has enough mind games inherent in it’s design that making out Tea Bagging or triple ultras is an additional mind game that is required in any way is hard to substantiate.
If you don’t want as many people to enjoy playing your game..so be it. But a very odd stance to take imo.
Really, then how does that work then? 'Cause I’ve had matches in ranked where my opponent quits and yet they get the win (or at the very least, I don’t). It’s rare, but it does happen. That, to me, hardly seems fair.
Also, while you could argue that the game decides who wins, what I mean by a true victory is having the actual match where skill is involved as well as the learning experience it would provide. Teabagging is not a skill, because anyone can do it. If you never get to fight anyone because of your behavior and they often leave as a result, you’re depriving yourself of an opportunity - cause and effect.
Ahh your right. However the act of teabagging isn’t the skillfull part of the two way interaction, but the ability to not go full tilt and make mistake after mistake because your angry. The ability to play calm and level headed, in fact to tighten your focus even further to prove to your opponent that that particular mind game doesn’t work on you
Edit lol two way interaction lol that sounded way deeper and meaningful than I expected
