RE: Simple Piecemaking Tournament
I agree and understand (as disrightthereismy said earlier) it isn't best to rely / leave the ability explain itself just by name. But I only agree with it for the point of this competition, because then anything could be put there with this justification / excuse.
There are existing mechanics more unclear in game, without better explanation. So as far as actually providing thoughts / inspiration for things that do get put in game, I don't really mind if the description is included (or how long it is).
Also, that is some high level thinking - to know what you were thinking about is so specifically same and yet being extremely unclear what it was in the first place.
Main-gi started pointing out the rules being (extremely) unclear, about what is ability. Since being clear seems important, let me add that:
- Inspires fear from across the field (e.g. rook, comet, wisp)
- Breaks common chess intuition with a surprising move (e.g. frog, lilith, frostmage)
- Causes aggressive matches (e.g. firemage, snake, siren)
These categories are opinion-based at best, and the examples for them are not true. Wisp = fear ? I am happy everytime I see someone wasted champion slot on it.
Yes, the categories are opinion based. So is every other piece-making tournament. I do not think it is possible to make a tournament without opinion based categories. Don't be mislead by the fact that some categories are not opinion based.
The rules may not be clear to you, but that is why you are allowed to submit early and get feedback and change your piece. The scoring I gave you is feedback, not a final score. I am a fairly harsh judge.
As for your argument, there is no game mechanic that is even close to as vague as your 'backstab'.
As for the first category being unclear: a better phrasing of my intent for the first point is 'can effect squares far away from it'. Even if wisp is far away from a battle, it can have big impact on the results. That's just my opinion and you can disagree. But, I'm the judge.
"So is every other piece-making tournament. ..."
No. The one that just finished, 0.54 themed, had the rules for creation very clear, everyone knew what he was supposed to create. Judging / scoring is opinion of each judge, that is not the point here.
"there is no game mechanic that is even close to as vague as your 'backstab'."
Unblockable for example, very commonly used (yellow squares, e.g. Wizard+). Does it mean pathing is unblockable ? By other pieces in straight line, or unblockable by not being / requiring straight line ? Or attack is unblockable ? By some property on target, that maybe blocks non-unblockable attacks (you don't know of existence of armor from description of Unblockable either) ? Or by things other than on target, that in other circumstances can block it (you don't know of existence of shieldsman / guardian from description of Unblockable either) ? Is it not blockable by some status on attacker (petrify, freeze, similar to Unstoppable on Vampire, you don't know anything about either of these from description of Unblockable) ? Unblockable by other own property of attacker (e.g. overriding augment, that Chastity has, just for yellow attack squares, but not regular ones, you don't know anything about either of those from description of Unblockable) ? Unblockable by immunities / enchant (on target ? on you vs king ? ) ?
So, paraphrasing you, there was nothing in my suggestion that was even close to as unclear or wrong as you are.
Let's agree to disagree on those points. If you want to change your piece you can do so. I'm not in the mood to stoke a flame war, and I don't have any points to add besides what I've already said.
To be fair, though I understand where you're coming from and I do think that the rules weren't 100% clear for this tournament, at the end of the day it is his RP that he's giving out so he technically doesn't have to be fair in the judging at all since he can do whatever he wants with his crowns.