Best Painted and Most Sporting in the UK

[frogboy]

So why we not encouraging these things in the UK?

Not everyone can paint a Crystal Brush entry or hold it together and be polite for 16 turns but it would be nice for the coaches who do make an effort to be recognised. For example my last tournament I've seen a vast contrast in effort in both these categories.

The Dwarf coach (not me the other one) at Gert Bowl on the weekend had a lovely painted team and like wise I would have liked to give Merrick props for being a great guy to play against despite what was happening in the game.

At least it would give more opportunities for people to smile. I know that these awards are always open to abuse with possibly teams submitting their favourite but better that than having to be abused for 2 hours.

Ain't it time to make a change and support fair play and encourage effort?

[Darkson]

I ran Best Painted for 2 or 3 years and in the end came to the conclusion it was more effort on my part than was worthwhile. Getting Blood Bowlers to do simple things is like herding cats.

On year, with about 30 coaches, I asked ALL coaches to leave their teams on the tables during lunch on the Saturday so I and a club-mate could short list - we had 6 teams left out, 4 of which were club teams (3 painted by 1 person) and an unpainted team, then had a coach moan later that he hadn't heard the announcement (listen then). A few examples like that, and I'd rather not bother as it's one less thing to worry/stress about.

That said, Skaffen is going to (try to) run a best painted at the ARBBL next year, so if people want to take part, listen to the instructions.


Best Sportsman I just don't like, as I'd like to think everyone is a goods sport at a Blood Bowl tournament (plus multiple horror stories from the GT when GW used to run it).

[Regash]

Maybe it would be an option if you kept "best painted" as a voluntary option to participate in.

All coaches should bring their teams at a certain time to a certain spot if they want to win this. Have a big printout of the time and purpose of said spot hanging right there. And yeah, remind them by shouting right before the certain time starts.
All coaches who want to vote should do so at this spot in a time range, like when you have a break between games.

So all you have to do is counting votes.
Sounds fair and easy anough to me.

[hissa-lives]

we had one, was only 12 people playing so just took a minute before start of final game to hand out slips for voting and allow 5 mins to put vote in the pot. counted up during that round, nice to get a trophy to hand out for it

[Darkson]

All coaches should bring their teams at a certain time to a certain spot if they want to win this. Have a big printout of the time and purpose of said spot hanging right there. And yeah, remind them by shouting right before the certain time starts.
All coaches who want to vote should do so at this spot in a time range, like when you have a break between games.

Did that at the GTs I ref'd and the first NAFC, and there's always one that "didn't hear" (more like didn't listen) and then moans about it.

I guess as a non-painter it just doesn't bother me.
If I was still going to run one it would be best team rather than best painted - I value well-converted but (only) well painted teams over a excellently painted stock team. I did try the "Team I'd most like to steal" award, where the coaches voted for the team they'd most like to take home, but had the typical half-hearted take-up.

[Pipey]

Best Painted - also some chat in the Golden Gauntlet thread about this. I've allocated plenty of points for BP (more than Most Cas, Most TD) as I think it's a really important part of the hobby, and one that often involves incredible skill and application. A simple vote is pretty straightforward, as much as many do need a kick to vote during the between-round down time! There's a culture of BP in some UK areas e.g. Waterbowl, Monkeybowl, Geordiebowl to name three. As well as NAFC which does an amazing job with best team and the Duel. My opinion is that it'd be great if more tourneys also included a BP award.

Most Sporting - also a nice idea, though I've always felt BB doesn't really *need* this award in the way that other systems do like warhammer etc. 99% of people play in the right spirit; it's incredibly rare that sportsmanship is a problem. I guess that's why I've never included it in any of my tournaments.

[rolo]

At the tournaments that I've been to with a best painted category, a neutral party or two (either the organizer or a volunteer or someone) walk around during the first round and pick out 4-5 of the best looking teams. Those coaches are asked to display their teams between rounds, and all players vote on them.

Needs a well-lit tournament room but it worked pretty well and was simple enough.

[rolo]

Also most sporting is difficult to measure because it's so subjective. If you ask coaches to rate their opponents from one to five, most people give everyone five stars. If an organizer wanders the tables looking for acts of great sportsmanship, they're going to miss stuff. And generally, any given coach only plays a small fraction of the field, so it's hard to spot the true most sporting coach.

I guess in the end, being a good sport should be its own reward. Maybe it would be better if it were just something the organizer held in reserve in case some truly staggering good sportsmanship needs to be rewarded.

[frogboy]

Best Painted does seem more reasonable to judge, i got an idea for it but don't want to share yet.

Most Sporting would likely be a pointless exercise, most people do make an effort to be polite, I think there was a discussion about child friendliness in one of the tournament threads which i read and believe that would perhaps be a better way of, dare i say it, police it.
I mean everyone swears, i do all the time, you know it can be a stressful game, you roll a dice it's a 2 instead of a 3, a swear word slips out, you look around hoping no kids heard you, it's fine were all grown ups. Well its ok to a point, I'm not talking about having the Spanish Inquisition on stand by coming down on every "flipping heck" and "bloody hell" but if someone is using excessive amounts of foul language then you got to ask yourself, is this really acceptable? Even among grown ups. Some people might not want the confrontation to tell a stranger to wind their neck in you know before something gets broken. Been down that road before? may as well just sit here and try and close my ears, acceptable? Kids/women/sensitive types at the venue?? etc.

So yeah common sense says no need for Most Sporting is very subjective but think everyone can agree that swearing in public amongst strangers is somewhat rude, true story.

frogboy

[SinisterDexter]

Australian tournaments tend to do both. Best Painted encourages coaches to paint (and some of our tourneys are painted minis only). Maybe we have an established culture, but my experience in coaches like seeing the teams and voting. We also do best sports. To combat the 5-votes across the board, it is done as a +/- on the first score. So if you give a 3 in the first round, and threes from there on, the net given is actually zero.

[Joemanji]

Tournament organisers are free to award prizes as they wish on an individual basis. If people like particular awards then all they can do is approach TOs and ask.

From a NAF point of view, as NTO I won't be requiring or even encouraging TOs to give out any prizes in particular. Each to their own. Besides, if I was going to use NAF weight to encourage different things, this would not be top of my list.

[frogboy]

Thanks for the feedback, it would be an added pressure for TO's I understand