Punishing players for Collusion?

[beesuit]

What damage? People were made aware that they intended to split the pot, therefore there’s damage of some kind? Wtf are you talking about?

Yo dawg, imma jus shit on ur balcony u wurked hard to built. Dun worrie tho, imma letting u noe, so der wunt b any dmg, YKWIS

… I wasn’t aware that the entire tournament is really only a prelude to the hype of grand finals and that an anti-climactic grand finals is analogous to shitting on a balcony. …

My apologies, I was trying to communicate in a language that you’d understand and find familiar since you did not understand my first message in proper English. I see that in your confusion you have attempted to reply to my message by going off onto random tangents. Please let me rephrase and explain what I mean by
"Yo dawg, imma jus shit on ur balcony u wurked hard to built. Dun worrie tho, imma letting u noe, so der wunt b any dmg, YKWIS"
is
*‘Greetings, don’t mind me, I am just defecating on your balcony regardless of how much work and pride you have put into it. Please be aware that because I am notifying you of my actions this act will not be damaging the balcony in any way shape or form. YOU KNOW WHAT I’M SAYING?’
*
The use of balcony in this case is an analogy for the whole tournament, not just the grand finals. Shitting on something is a disrespectful act in and of itself, so ‘shitting on the balcony’ is a direct allusion to pretty much disrespecting the tournament and everyone involved by doing dumb shit like what we’re talking about. The notion that because this action is being announced, there would be no damage is entirely having a go at your own notion that because “People were made aware that they intended to split the pot, [how can] therefore there’s [be] damage of some kind?”

To which I will ask, did you even see the rest of the grand finals afterwards? Did you not see how upset Shinsyn, the TO got? Did you see how unhype that GF turned out as a result? Did you not see how instead of match commentary, it was just Shinsyn expressing his disgust at what just happened? Did you not see how his co-commentator try to salvage what was an already fucked GF with the crowd not giving a shit anymore? (Seriously, people just upped and left, it went from a full row of people to empty chairs) Did you not see the two brothers get their pot bonus taken away? Did you not see how uninvolved the match commentary was afterwards? Did you not see that awkward as fuck interviews afterwards? Did you not see how one of the brothers express his fear of not being able to attend again next year? If not, then here you fucking go: http://www.twitch.tv/nobodyexe/b/491082339?t=7h6m5s
That’s the damage done, and I’m sure there’s probably more to be said.

To be more clear: Shinsyn, far from deserving props for “doing something about the problem,” really wrecked his own grand finals IMO. CrazyApe: “If we didn’t think they were gonna take our money away, we might have actually played seriously.” That’s all on Shinsyn. And that’s obvious. Far from the “damage being done,” nothing was fucked just because the brothers had made their intentions known, unless you think knowing that they intend to split the pot wrecks the hype in itself. It was an overreaction to a non-problem in my opinion, but as the TO, he had a problem with it, okay, whatever, but he handled it terribly and is the main reason the grand finals were seen as a disappointment.

Did you even consider why Shinsyn blew the fuck up in the first place? Because the two brothers intentionally goofed off in the grand finals. Which was a big FU to everyone involved in the tournament, intentional or not. So what’s the root cause now? Shinsyn or the brothers? To say that it was “all on Shinsyn” is excusing the brothers of any blame altogether, which is simply not true, especially when it was their own dumb actions that triggered the whole thing. Shinsyn was simply an aftermath or natural by-product of it. You could argue that he overacted and “handled it terribly” sure, but I cut him slack for losing his cool, when it was his own damn money that’s on the line, plus the blood and sweat he put into organising and running it for everyone else. The fact that he only took away the pot bonus shows that it could’ve been much worse (even worse than “terrible”? Oh my, how could he?!).

He made his message clear. Don’t fuck with his tournament, cause he ain’t taking it and he will lay down the hammer. That’s what people are giving him props for. I’d sure as hell rather this message than letting players know that their above TOs and everyone else, and that them goofing up the GFs is entirely a-okay.

CrazyApe: "If we didn’t think they were gonna take our money away, we might have actually played seriously."
This shit doesn’t cut it. They entered the tournament, it’s their job as a participant to know the rules and what is expected of them. If you don’t and mess up, that’s on you, have fun getting bopped. Some things you learn, you learn the hard way. You decide to shit up the GFs by trolling it up, then you deserve the repercussions of your actions. Just like if you fought hard and earned 1st place, you deserve 1st prize. What you put in is what you get out.

You mention that it was “It was an overreaction to a non-problem”. And you know what?You’re actually right in that regards since you only bring up pot-splitting over and over again, (which we’ve already established since page fucking 1 that’s not the issue at hand) and fail to mention the grand finals goof off. For someone actively involved in this discussion, you ain’t doing a good job following along.

The intention to pot-split itself isn’t as causing any damage, no where near as much as goofing off in the grand finals is anyway. That’s the real issue that we’re discussing now that you keep neglecting to mention.

I don’t know why you keep insisting that I’m failing to mention that [i.e Goofing up GF], because I’m not. …

I keep insisting it, because you do fail to mention anything about the GF trolling. You repeatedly say pot-split, but it’s not the same thing even if your intention is for it fall under the same definition. If so, then in other words you’re misusing the term, stop it. Conveying arguments strictly through text causes enough confusion as it is. Step your shit up. Whatever they do with the money is a different matter entirely, but we’ve already made that point.

In MY opinion, as I already stated (!), there’s no problem if the brothers said “we don’t even want to play it out, tourney’s over, we are co-champions, now pay us 1st and 2nd place money plz.” I don’t expect that to be a popular stance because people have come to expect a show…

They could do that and it would be unpopular, but don’t be surprised if the TO DQ’s them for failing to show up and play, forfeiting their winnings. People really aren’t expecting a show so much as a competitive match, because you know it’s a tournament and a competition to determine who the best is. If it were a show first rather than a tournament, then there may as well be just be exhibition and show matches instead. See BlackShinboi’s comment on this as well.

…but in poker tourneys it happens all the time. Celerity’s idea of the players agreeing to an 80% split so that they have something to play for is a good one but I don’t see any way to enforce that.

Again, you’re bringing up money and talking about potsplits and failing to consider goofball matches. Money/potsplitting is besides the point, that is apart from providing an incentive for players to douchebag a match up. But just because there is an incentive to do so, doesn’t mean that it should happen. (i.e someone gives u $5 to kill yourself, extreme example but just because there is a $5 incentive to take your own life, isn’t justifiable it).

A final poker table is also a much longer process to go through than a fighting game grand finals, so a ‘no-play’ may be more acceptable in that scene based on that reason alone. With Celerity’s poker point, the players are still playing it out, even if they are pot splitting to an extent. But hey you know what that proves? You can potsplit without goofballing and pissing everyone off!

My point, again, is that “trolling in grand finals” or whatever you want to call it, is basically failing to deliver a show for the TO and other competitors who are still watching, and I’m dead against putting any kind of obligation to entertain on the players. Never mind the fact that often it’s late and everybody just wants to go home anyway and would welcome the event ending ten minutes sooner. What I meant by bringing up the brothers’ statement that “if we knew they’d take our money away we might have played serious” is just that: if the perceived problem, that shinsyn perceived as the problem too apparently, is that they didn’t play serious, well then why the fuck blow up after they’d already agreed to change characters and play it out? Because as you said, the “damage was done,” well what do you mean by that if the pot split is no problem? If that’s no problem who cares if they did a bit of trolling but then agreed to play it out? WHAT “damage” exactly had been done if you aren’t talking about the fact that the ILLUSION of a real competitive GF had been destroyed? And people accuse me of not reading?? Smh…

What I mean is that it hurts the scene. Like everyone has already mentioned, it spits on the efforts of everyone who volunteered their time and effort to bring you this tournament. Out of their own fucking good will! If a person can’t respect that, then what does that say about that persons character?
If the reason why illusion is in capitals is because you’re trying to quote my usage of the word allusion, then you’ve again misinterpreted what I’ve written. Otherwise I have no idea why you would even bring the usage of the word illusion, since it is a real issue that is in indeed hurting the scene. You think if this shit were the norm, people would still continue supporting tournaments just to be spat on?

The reason why Shinsyn still came down on them anyway after they straightened up was to send a message that he wasn’t putting up with that shit. If he let them off scott free, then he’d be sending a weakass message and the brothers wouldn’t have learnt their lesson as well as they did otherwise. I’m sure if he wouldn’t have done anything about it, the brothers would’ve continued to joke it up and then afterwards everyone would’ve blown up Shinsyn, the tournament and the entire region for letting shit like that fly as well. That’s the type of damage that would’ve been done, but it was minimized thanks to Shinsyn taking a stand.

I do not understand what problem ANYBODY, TO or otherwise, could possibly have with what they did, if the reactions of stream monsters are not taken into account. It looks to me like spectator appeasement and this shit ain’t no professional spectator sport no matter how much some people want to make it one.

It really is bigger and affects more than just the two grand finalist players. If you still can’t see how it hurts the scene by this point, then I sure as hell ain’t going to be the guy to convince you any further. I’ve already written more than I initially intended already and I feel like I’m actually getting trolled by this point.

[Missing_Person]

I can’t believe you’re still entertaining crap(e) with engagement in his argument.

Yes, “collusion still happens in poker.” Do you know what happens when they’re caught?

They get the shit kicked out of them. And poker players know what to look for when it comes to collusion.

I’m with d3v, I really think you’re the asshat that did this at FF. You ought to feel lucky that we don’t have that unwritten law in the FGC. Bear in mind, 20 years ago, you bet your ass you would’ve gotten the shit stomped out of you.

[crabe]

I keep insisting it, because you do fail to mention anything about the GF trolling. You repeatedly say pot-split, but it’s not the same thing even if your intention is for it fall under the same definition. If so, then in other words you’re misusing the term, stop it. Conveying arguments strictly through text causes enough confusion as it is. Step your shit up. Whatever they do with the money is a different matter entirely, but we’ve already made that point.

No bro, I am not failing to mention it, I mentioned it explicitly several times now, I don’t know what to do at this point. Please tell me what “damage” was done by a little goofing off - why doesn’t agreeing to play the match out with their mains make everything right? Of course that match was ass, they weren’t trying because they were wondering if they were going to lose out on even more of their prize money.

[S00perCam]

Honestly I feel like the blow up and the pettiness of ShinSyn is the greater of the two evils very unprofessional.

[Celerity]

Yes, “collusion still happens in poker.” Do you know what happens when they’re caught?

They get the shit kicked out of them. And poker players know what to look for when it comes to collusion.

Again, two different definitions. What you’re talking about (I assume) is a player feeding chips to another player subversively, which is illegal but unenforceable, and furthermore it never really happens. And people don’t really get the shit kicked out of them at poker tournaments unless you’re playing in back alleys with guys named Mad Dog.

Anyway, I think he was just talking about players who split the money at the final table and then call it a day, which isn’t technically collusion, but it would be according to the FGC.

[LivewireX]

I’ve got to admit, after reading all of this, my take on it is still that it’s a couple of douchebags behaving like pieces of shit. And the people that defend it can try to argue over terms or little things all they want, but the bottom line is that no matter what you call it, shitty behaviour, is still shitty behaviour. Trying to give it a different name doesn’t change what it is or what happened.

[d3v]

I keep insisting it, because you do fail to mention anything about the GF trolling. You repeatedly say pot-split, but it’s not the same thing even if your intention is for it fall under the same definition. If so, then in other words you’re misusing the term, stop it. Conveying arguments strictly through text causes enough confusion as it is. Step your shit up. Whatever they do with the money is a different matter entirely, but we’ve already made that point.

No bro, I am not failing to mention it, I mentioned it explicitly several times now, I don’t know what to do at this point. Please tell me what “damage” was done by a little goofing off - why doesn’t agreeing to play the match out with their mains make everything right? Of course that match was ass, they weren’t trying because they were wondering if they were going to lose out on even more of their prize money.

The fact that you don’t realize that TOs tolerating this kind of behavior could lead to lower turnouts tells me that you’re either stupid or that you don’t give a fuck about the community as a whole (or maybe both).

[S00perCam]

I’ve got to admit, after reading all of this, my take on it is still that it’s a couple of douchebags behaving like pieces of shit. And the people that defend it can try to argue over terms or little things all they want, but the bottom line is that no matter what you call it, shitty behaviour, is still shitty behaviour. Trying to give it a different name doesn’t change what it is or what happened.

The whole point is what really happened? It was THEIR grand finals they eliminated all the other competitors even after all this drama NOTHING can change that. They can play it out however they want to, they can do whatever they want with the prize money its THEIRS. American style open character double elimination rules has room for these situations, we choose this style over the Japanese character lock style because it favors fun. If your an eliminated player and your salty about it stay salty your eliminated your irrelevant you wanna change the outcome of grand finals or what goes on in grand finals get to grand finals.

From the spectator/ sponsor point of view it was not the two competitors who ruined the viewing experience it was the TO. It was so uncomfortable watching the stream after the blow up I had to cut it off. I tuned back in eventually but no one was commentating it was dead silence with every couple of minutes ShinSyn cutting back in to go off about the situation it was just bad. If your worried about sponsorship and viewers in any capacity when something like two players going random select happens that’s your golden opportunity. You start having as much fun on the mic as they are in the game. Your the hype man of course eveyones gonna be pissy and have a pissy memory of what happened when you start going off like that. When your a professional and wanna show your a professional you gotta show your above all that, you don’t start cursing like a moron.

[_Insert_Name_Here]

All the other shitty points aside…

American style open character double elimination rules has room for these situations, we choose this style over the Japanese character lock style because it favors fun.

Lol no, it’s because it allows counterpicks to be a thing.

Honestly I feel like the blow up and the pettiness of ShinSyn is the greater of the two evils very unprofessional.

ShinSyn has said that he regretted blowing up but not the taking away of the pot money.

[d3v]

I’ve got to admit, after reading all of this, my take on it is still that it’s a couple of douchebags behaving like pieces of shit. And the people that defend it can try to argue over terms or little things all they want, but the bottom line is that no matter what you call it, shitty behaviour, is still shitty behaviour. Trying to give it a different name doesn’t change what it is or what happened.

The whole point is what really happened? It was THEIR grand finals they eliminated all the other competitors even after all this drama NOTHING can change that.

It was ShinSyn’s tournament and as the Tournament Director, he had every right to punish them for what they did. He still has final say on something which I believe was clearly stated to be “illegal”. Heck, they were lucky they weren’t just DQed on the spot as recommedned by the EVO ruling.

They can play it out however they want to,

Yes they can, as long as they do not “intentionally underperform” which, as previously stated, is not allowed.

they can do whatever they want with the prize money its THEIRS.

And we never said that they can’t split the pot. Just play it out like a proper GFs.

American style open character double elimination rules has room for these situations, we choose this style over the Japanese character lock style because it favors fun.

No, we chose this because it allows us to be counter picking bastards. Back in the old ST days, folks would run with 2-3 characters including counterpicks. It’s not so that people could pick randoms or low tiers just to troll. “For fun” my foot. This is a country that not only runs a system that favors top tiers (double elim with long sets), but that also prefers to tier whore and counter-pick.

[S00perCam]

All the other shitty points aside…

American style open character double elimination rules has room for these situations, we choose this style over the Japanese character lock style because it favors fun.

Lol no, it’s because it allows counterpicks to be a thing.

Honestly I feel like the blow up and the pettiness of ShinSyn is the greater of the two evils very unprofessional.

ShinSyn has said that he regretted blowing up but not the taking away of the pot money.

I love how everytime I’ve discussed this situation first on twitter and FB and now SRK the point that these two were the best in the competition is always considered a non issue. Even if we say this was some heinous act in which these two should be outlawed never to play again like most people are acting like it is you CANT take away the fact that they were better than everyone else there. If some one could have they would have but they didn’t. I just don’t see how anyone thinks its ok to tell two people how to play a goddamned video game against each other it baffles me it really does. If people think locking people into their “main” and their “alt” characters is the road to esports and is the “proper” way to play the game put it in the rules. Otherwise they didn’t break any rules and it was fucked up what happened to them.

And I’m glad to hear he regrets his actions though this truly is a petty issue alas as Charles Philip Issawi says “In any dispute the intensity of feeling is inversely proportional to the value of the issues at stake.”

[Pertho]

Man…if dudes don’t understand the difference between deciding not to play the finals of a weekly tournament and shitting up the GF of a major…then we are hella boned.

What’s funny is that the real problem with this isn’t that the players are splitting the pot. I don’t think there’s anybody that has a problem with what happens to the money after everything is said and done. But to try and rationalize that its ok for the winner of one of our bigger events to be decided purely in a fuck around manner is just disrespectful to the whole event.

If any of you are arguing with people that don’t understand anything said in this post, save yourselves the trouble.

[ShiroPhantome]

No, we chose this because it allows us to be counter picking bastards. Back in the old ST days, folks would run with 2-3 characters including counterpicks. It’s not so that people could pick randoms or low tiers just to troll. “For fun” my foot. This is a country that not only runs a system that favors top tiers (double elim with long sets), but that also prefers to tier whore and counter-pick.

This is why Japanese players (and other Asians because pretty much all Asian countries competitive in fighting games are like this) are better at fighting games as a whole. The Japanese mindset is that there are no bad matchups, only bad players. I think the reason Americans are so obsessed with matchups and counter-picking is because of Marvel, that Marvel mindset has unfortunately carried over to SF4. Last year’s EVO finals are proof that tiers aren’t that big of a deal.

Hell even Juicebox knows what’s up.
You could tell the two brothers were either colluding or doing a button check not because it was an Izayoi mirror match, but because they were clearly fucking around and not taking the match seriously.

[CaptainGinyu]

I’ve got to admit, after reading all of this, my take on it is still that it’s a couple of douchebags behaving like pieces of shit. And the people that defend it can try to argue over terms or little things all they want, but the bottom line is that no matter what you call it, shitty behaviour, is still shitty behaviour. Trying to give it a different name doesn’t change what it is or what happened.

The whole point is what really happened? It was THEIR grand finals they eliminated all the other competitors even after all this drama NOTHING can change that. They can play it out however they want to, they can do whatever they want with the prize money its THEIRS. American style open character double elimination rules has room for these situations, we choose this style over the Japanese character lock style because it favors fun. If your an eliminated player and your salty about it stay salty your eliminated your irrelevant you wanna change the outcome of grand finals or what goes on in grand finals get to grand finals.

From the spectator/ sponsor point of view it was not the two competitors who ruined the viewing experience it was the TO. It was so uncomfortable watching the stream after the blow up I had to cut it off. I tuned back in eventually but no one was commentating it was dead silence with every couple of minutes ShinSyn cutting back in to go off about the situation it was just bad. If your worried about sponsorship and viewers in any capacity when something like two players going random select happens that’s your golden opportunity. You start having as much fun on the mic as they are in the game. Your the hype man of course eveyones gonna be pissy and have a pissy memory of what happened when you start going off like that. When your a professional and wanna show your a professional you gotta show your above all that, you don’t start cursing like a moron.

My friend, can you please stop advocating tone-policing? It’s counter-productive, avoids the issue at hand and only promotes victim blaming.

Ask yourself, why would ShinSyn get mad? Would it be because he worked hard to put on an event that he presumably didn’t even play in only to have two people disrespect not only him, but the staff, other players and everyone interested in the event.

Why should ShinSyn have to adjust himself to accommodate disrespect?

[Lord_Raptor]

Hey stupid IT WASN’T THEIR MONEY GRAND FINALS WASN’T OVER YET SO THEY HADN’T EARNED SHIT.

[Spirit_Juice]

Fairly certain crabe is a troll at this point; no one is this dense.

[crotchpuncha]

Can’t believe you guys are still going at this. The rules are the rules, you break em you get bopped. There’s no other argument here. Fuck off, get fucked over.

/thread.

[crabe]

Ah yes, if you disagree or defend an unpopular stance you’re a troll. That’s great for fostering open discussion…NOT

I keep insisting it, because you do fail to mention anything about the GF trolling. You repeatedly say pot-split, but it’s not the same thing even if your intention is for it fall under the same definition. If so, then in other words you’re misusing the term, stop it. Conveying arguments strictly through text causes enough confusion as it is. Step your shit up. Whatever they do with the money is a different matter entirely, but we’ve already made that point.

No bro, I am not failing to mention it, I mentioned it explicitly several times now, I don’t know what to do at this point. Please tell me what “damage” was done by a little goofing off - why doesn’t agreeing to play the match out with their mains make everything right? Of course that match was ass, they weren’t trying because they were wondering if they were going to lose out on even more of their prize money.

The fact that you don’t realize that TOs tolerating this kind of behavior could lead to lower turnouts tells me that you’re either stupid or that you don’t give a fuck about the community as a whole (or maybe both).

Anything COULD lead to lower turnouts, but this shit has been happening for decades and AFAIK, only recently has the consensus seemingly shifted to where people feel that disciplinary action is the way to handle it, therefore the recent “global rule” which has kind of been forced on tournaments in a more-than-slightly heavy-handed way, and IMO it is directly related to the people who want to “clean up” the FGC to make it more “ready for prime time.”

As far as disrespect goes people in the FGC disrespect each other all the effing time in ways that are way more of an actual slap in somebody’s face than two people horsing around in a grand finals that doesn’t even matter at that point (since they’ve agreed to split). So maybe I am stupid but I’m certainly not the only person who feels this way, just the person writing the longest posts in this thread. I agree with what S00percam wrote - the bros in question dominated the tournament and that’s the most important thing.

I certainly can’t tell Shinsyn how to feel but I guarantee one thing, the brothers in question didn’t intend to disrespect him. They seemed pretty flabbergasted that he took it the way he did, and why not, since they weren’t hurting anybody. I said it before, I enjoy watching streams but get the effing cameras out of there and this isn’t an issue.

Lord Raptor I would love to see you make a legitimate case how the two finalists, having defeated all other claimants to the title, deciding to share 1st and 2nd place have not yet earned their money.

I get that the pot bonus was Shinsyn’s own money to take away, so I can’t really say much more than I’ve said about it. I think he overreacted and many agree with me, but whatever. But you also have lots of people saying that further sanction would have been totally warranted.

The only reason I keep bringing the split up is because once they’ve agreed to split, there doesn’t seem to be any purpose to them playing it out and I want to know where people who want them to pretend like they aren’t splitting are coming from. And I have a tough time believing that the people saying “just play it out” are really trying to put themselves in those competitors’ shoes.

[S00perCam]

I’ve got to admit, after reading all of this, my take on it is still that it’s a couple of douchebags behaving like pieces of shit. And the people that defend it can try to argue over terms or little things all they want, but the bottom line is that no matter what you call it, shitty behaviour, is still shitty behaviour. Trying to give it a different name doesn’t change what it is or what happened.

The whole point is what really happened? It was THEIR grand finals they eliminated all the other competitors even after all this drama NOTHING can change that. They can play it out however they want to, they can do whatever they want with the prize money its THEIRS. American style open character double elimination rules has room for these situations, we choose this style over the Japanese character lock style because it favors fun. If your an eliminated player and your salty about it stay salty your eliminated your irrelevant you wanna change the outcome of grand finals or what goes on in grand finals get to grand finals.

From the spectator/ sponsor point of view it was not the two competitors who ruined the viewing experience it was the TO. It was so uncomfortable watching the stream after the blow up I had to cut it off. I tuned back in eventually but no one was commentating it was dead silence with every couple of minutes ShinSyn cutting back in to go off about the situation it was just bad. If your worried about sponsorship and viewers in any capacity when something like two players going random select happens that’s your golden opportunity. You start having as much fun on the mic as they are in the game. Your the hype man of course eveyones gonna be pissy and have a pissy memory of what happened when you start going off like that. When your a professional and wanna show your a professional you gotta show your above all that, you don’t start cursing like a moron.

My friend, can you please stop advocating tone-policing? It’s counter-productive, avoids the issue at hand and only promotes victim blaming.

Ask yourself, why would ShinSyn get mad? Would it be because he worked hard to put on an event that he presumably didn’t even play in only to have two people disrespect not only him, but the staff, other players and everyone interested in the event.

Why should ShinSyn have to adjust himself to accommodate disrespect?

I definitely Agree that its his event and if he had expectations that weren’t met he has all the right to be disappointed

The whole collusion thing seems like its about appearances more than anything since the real collusion the splitting of the pot was a non issue.

My point is and the reason im “tone policing” is because the blowup and the aftermath of that looked FAR worse than the actual gameplay.

[d3v]

Ah yes, if you disagree or defend an unpopular stance you’re a troll. That’s great for fostering open discussion…NOT

I keep insisting it, because you do fail to mention anything about the GF trolling. You repeatedly say pot-split, but it’s not the same thing even if your intention is for it fall under the same definition. If so, then in other words you’re misusing the term, stop it. Conveying arguments strictly through text causes enough confusion as it is. Step your shit up. Whatever they do with the money is a different matter entirely, but we’ve already made that point.

No bro, I am not failing to mention it, I mentioned it explicitly several times now, I don’t know what to do at this point. Please tell me what “damage” was done by a little goofing off - why doesn’t agreeing to play the match out with their mains make everything right? Of course that match was ass, they weren’t trying because they were wondering if they were going to lose out on even more of their prize money.

The fact that you don’t realize that TOs tolerating this kind of behavior could lead to lower turnouts tells me that you’re either stupid or that you don’t give a fuck about the community as a whole (or maybe both).

Anything COULD lead to lower turnouts, but this shit has been happening for decades and AFAIK, only recently has the consensus seemingly shifted to where people feel that disciplinary action is the way to handle it, therefore the recent “global rule” which has kind of been forced on tournaments in a more-than-slightly heavy-handed way, and IMO it is directly related to the people who want to “clean up” the FGC to make it more “ready for prime time.”

So in other words we should just ignore problems within the community simply because they’ve been happening ever since.

Then again, you’ve made it pretty obvious that you don’t give a fuck about the community

As far as disrespect goes people in the FGC disrespect each other all the effing time in ways that are way more of an actual slap in somebody’s face than two people horsing around in a grand finals that doesn’t even matter at that point (since they’ve agreed to split). So maybe I am stupid but I’m certainly not the only person who feels this way, just the person writing the longest posts in this thread. I agree with what S00percam wrote - the bros in question dominated the tournament and that’s the most important thing.

Doesn’t matter. They broke a rule and therefore have to face the consequences.

I certainly can’t tell Shinsyn how to feel but I guarantee one thing, the brothers in question didn’t intend to disrespect him. They seemed pretty flabbergasted that he took it the way he did, and why not, since they weren’t hurting anybody. I said it before, I enjoy watching streams but get the effing cameras out of there and this isn’t an issue.

As the saying goes “ignorantia legis neminem excusat”, in other words ignorance of the law excuses no one. Applies especially so in this case since what they did goes against the point of a tournament, which is to find out which single individual player, among those who joined, is the best.

Lord Raptor I would love to see you make a legitimate case how the two finalists, having defeated all other claimants to the title, deciding to share 1st and 2nd place have not yet earned their money.

Because they haven’t. Not until the grand finals are over and the TO has paid them is the money theirs. Right up until the GFs are done, the tournament director has every right to pull the plug and DQ them if they can see that something fishy was going.

I get that the pot bonus was Shinsyn’s own money to take away, so I can’t really say much more than I’ve said about it. I think he overreacted and many agree with me, but whatever. But you also have lots of people saying that further sanction would have been totally warranted.

The only reason I keep bringing the split up is because once they’ve agreed to split, there doesn’t seem to be any purpose to them playing it out and I want to know where people who want them to pretend like they aren’t splitting are coming from. And I have a tough time believing that the people saying “just play it out” are really trying to put themselves in those competitors’ shoes.

Because money isn’t the only thing on the line. More importantly, not caring about actually winning the tournament at GFs is a flat middle finger to the tournament, the tournament organizer and everyone who played their damned hardest at the tournament.

My point is and the reason im “tone policing” is because the blowup and the aftermath of that looked FAR worse than the actual gameplay.

FAR worse? The brothers got off easy. They should have been disqualified right then and there without ever seeing the money (which is what would have likely happened were this a Road to EVO event).