tourney 72 prizes in poor taste?

[burper]

A good fibs friend of mine pointed out that the prizes for tourney 72 are in poor taste, somewhat egomaniacal in nature and generally not funny whatsoever. In fact, at first he thought someone else had sent a message as some sort of parody. They are boycotting the tourney.

First, I apologize if anyone missed the intended humor, and appreciate my friends' candor in pointing this out. Now that I reflect on it a bit, he is probably right. Perhaps I don't take FIBS seriously enough? I'm just trying to have a good time. Most people that know my FIBS persona know that I am a bit whacky. OK, very whacky. I dont' take FIBS or burper seriously at all. Cases in point:

I was the first fibs user to *try* for, and obtain, the lowest fibs rating by giving away matches. I obtained a 925 rating, which at the time was the lowest. What a thrill. Of course since then robots have been created that actually obtained negative ratings! Why would I do this? Just curious I guess, and not just in a technical sense. It was funny for me to hear the same people who took points repeatedly during this exercise shout about how wrong it was for me to do it.

I was the fibster that invented the 99-in-1 match, 11 years ago, which is still played today. Now I ask you: "who really bad?"

You might add the invention of RepBot to this list. Not that RepBot doesn't have value, but really, who in their right mind would bother to implement it? The only sane thing I did with RepBot was hand it's control over to a *very* sane person to run. On a side note, I really wish I had taken patois' advice and given it a soul. That was a major oversight on my part.

So how did I come up with these prizes?

I love TourneyBot. I wanted to have a big tourney with prizes. Seeing the petty disputes in  fibsleagammon, and that it isn't that hard to use a bot to plaly for you, I wasn't going to give away huge sums of cash. I always wonder how snoopy gets away with holding a Spring tournament on fibs, with cash entry fees. So I started thinking about the "fibsy" sort of prizes I could give away.

On the vouch prize. OK, the RepBot purist in me says this is a bad idea, but remember:
-you have to have minimum experience and reputation to get in
-the minimum field is 32
-I have vouched for most of the entrants so far anyway
-there are 8 other prizes that might be chosen
- it's not a complaint, and lastly:
-I didn't say how long the vouch would last for!

Neither did I say how big that digital picture would be, did I? Let some burper-hating fibster try to photoshop a "head up his ass" picture with the 1x1 pixel image I award them. HA! Was this the prize that made you think I was egomaniacal, or just the autographed part? OK, you're right, it's all about me!

It's really because I have actually had several "curious" people ask why I haven't submitted one to that msn.fibster.photos.whatever site, and I was trying to pad the list of prizes out as far as I could without making them expensive for me (digitial picture is easy, and might be fun for me too, if that's the prize chosen, and depending on who the winner is). I guess I don't worry enough about appearances, do I? Afterall, my name is burper. Would I ever admit to that in that other life? No way!

Dropping a 3 point match somehow perverts the fibs rating system. Come on now. It's fibs we;re talking about. The rating system is MUCH more perverted than thisalready  anyway, right? This is tiny. Also consider that anyone winning a 32-entry tourney would probably beat me in a 3-pointer anyway. Also consider that they may chose one of the other 8 prizes. They have to worry about their own appearance too, right? Would any honorable fibster chose this one?

What else was there? a fibs donation, a self-ban, pick my address field, a postcard. Hey, I was just trying to think up as many things as possible to have fun with, get people talking about the tourney and create some buzz. I really wanted to test TB with a big, long-lasting tournament. Some of the people that have issues with me might be attracted to this tourney, and that might end up for the best.

So come on, you know who you are, loosen up and join in! Encourage others to as well. Think of it as supporting TourneyBot! And just think of the possible payback if you win!!! IN YOUR FACE BURPER, YOU EGOMANICAL, RATINGS PERVERTING, SCOUNDREL!!!

[MadMatt]

I thought the prizes were rather funny, with the possible exception of throwing a 3-pt match, which goes against FIBS rules.

What I'm worried about is 22 or so people that have already been banned from this tourney. Yes, I know that they signed up without meeting the requirements, but nevertheless it does have an impact on the overall TourneyBot image, not just the  tourney in question. I can already tell since at least two Fibsters have already whined to me about it.

I should have probably implemented the filtering system before the ban thing. It's a lot less personal if the bot just tells you that you can't sign up because one of your variables (exp, rating, reputation, whatever) doesn't qualify than to be banned specifically. Since this is a highly requested feature from both TDs and players, it's likely to be the next major change. But until there, I guess there's no other way to filter who signs up than using the ban command. But please, do so with caution.

Cheers,

[Tomawaky]

I am with you            

[alef]

One concern I have about any of the additions (RepBot, TourneyBot, FIBS Board, t-shirts...) is that they be genuinely inclusive. How do these look to complete strangers? Does it look like a little clique of friends trying to take over FIBS for themselves in their own style?

Hopefully it's obvious that this is a grassroots movement of backgammon obsessives who simply enjoy extending a server that's been abandoned by its creator. My main concern about burper's tourney 72 was that it would reinforce the clique fears, but I was probably over reacting. FIBS is certainly not a place to take too seriously!

[burper]

I don't really care what it looks like, or if it's a little clique or a large one

So who were the 2 that whined to you MadMatt?

[MadMatt]

I don't really care what it looks like, or if it's a little clique or a large one

So who were the 2 that whined to you MadMatt?

Yes, but they didn't whine about the prizes. They whined because you banned them . Anyway, the tourney seems to be quite popular, 38 people registered, not including the 22 or so that registered but had been subsequently banned.

In related news, I'm already out, got my behind handed to me by Zauberin... I'm really not on form lately, been losing left and right

[webrunner]

In that case.. can we play a match Mat?    

[MadMatt]

In that case.. can we play a match Mat?  

Heh, we can, but it seems the luck has changed, I won a blitz tourney today and got to the semis in Fridays3.  

But seriously... I really feel I haven't been playing well lately. I have to be pretty lucky to win. Did anyone else notice that with their form? Like, you go off form and then you keep playing badly for a while without being sure why... And it's not just bad luck, it's your performance as well. I've been noticing this for quite some time lately...

[webrunner]

Same here.. but then again..i am always a bad player.

But ehhh... we are getting off-topic here

[jinnate]

burper, it was when i read the info for tourney 72 that i became really interested in being a moderator. i just laughed my a** off reading the prize list. i thought it was the funniest thing. i think maybe some fibs players would benefit from a funny bone transplant.