Aug. 22, 2022 12:38 AM
The following are words I have to say about "TEAMPALOOZA: Blader Formations!", a ranked tournament using Team Burst Standard 3v3 format.
I recommend the following music for reading the report. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVQjrIcwyEg . Look, I play a lot of good videogames, and although I had a lot of fun it was a VERY stressful day, don't judge me. I was originally considering https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKQ4XaxjjCo given how much of a ball of sress today was, but in hindsight, given our team name, I'm going with the Sonic Generations 3DS track. Folks, my memory is bad, so if I end up repeating tournament report music, just let me know and I'll pick a new track.
- The team TEAMPALOOZA should be TEAMAPALOOZA if it's a parody on the well known music festival Lollapalooza. This angers me.
- We had 10 teams of 3 people, totalling 30 people. It was most people's first exposure to team format. The tournament actually had a limit of 36 people per event imposed on it at kind of the last minute by the main Teampalooza organizer, which is kind of a not great last minute addition.
- We started around 12:30. It went until 4:30. Although we only had 10 teams, a two group round robin of 4 matches for each team, and there were only 20 total first round matches, it took a VERY long time. Matches involved a lot of opposite spin. There were a lot of OS ties.
- I had a stressful day yesterday. I got called in to do some work on the weekend, I spent a couple hours doing code analysis on Saturday. I'm a progammer, you see, and as it turns out it was bad for my mental state. We didn't 100% figure it out and it was just kind of a headache. I'm going to have to deal with it again tomorrow I bet. Combine that with how pre-stressed I am about Friday-Sunday's upcoming 6 tournaments for Beyblade East 2022, and I was pre-stressed. Which, as it turns out for today, was Very Bad For Me. Although, in hindsight, maybe I do best at Beyblade when I'm totally stressed out.
- 8 players registered without a team or without having their teams set up in advance in this thread. That was surely a source of organizational stress. None of them had to borrow parts, or they shared a single deck. We're just lucky this wasn't a restricted format. This is a problem that has solved for future team tournaments by making it invite-only; either you register in the thread ahead of time or you can't click register. It would really help if bladers read tournament threads before registering, but, they don't. That's a well known problem.
- The weather was hot and humid with a lot of rain. We were outside at the park, and it was generally hot and humid in the morning. We got some powerful rains around early afternoon, but the pavilion we were in was covered to the point that no one got seriously wet unless they voluntarily wanted to cool down. A lot of people chose to stand in the rain for a bit, myself included. Honestly, the weather worked out okay, mostly.
- We had 4 or 5 people doing most of the judging. and did the bulk of it. CrisisCrusher07 judged a bunch of matches in the middle seldom used 3rd Beystadium. I judged a bunch of matches in there. And I think was judging a bunch of them at the end. Officially, Crisis was running 3 beystadiums, but in practice only 2 were usually in operation. The way Crisis did it is that he saved most of team "Hyper Carry DL"'s matches for the very end. In the future, I would ask that we not do it this way, team BB Bulldogs had most of their matches almost right away and then was waiting for hours for their last match, and we ideally want to avoid that. Especially if there's a chance they can make it to the finals so they don't want to leave early.
- I was on team "Now Sonic Can be Super Sonic" with (captain) and . I've been on this team before, and they're good. I'm good? I'm good too apparently, not going to argue that point, considering.
- We randomized our blader order each time. Strategy can be countered with strategy. There's nothing you can do against luck. Let's just go for it, the heck with it.
- This was 3v3 team format. That means everyone prepared a deck of 3 beyblades. After several standard tournaments where I made some bad deck decisions, today I finally got my act together. Dynamite Belial2+F Illegal Bearing'-0, Vanish Bahamut Giga Metal Drift+10 (actually -10 as well, it varied), and for the last bey, I originally had it as Xiphoid Xcalibur Fortress Qc'-4, but I failed to get any points with it in my first two matches. So I switched it to Prominence Perseus Nexus+S Morbius-4. This was a hilariously bad idea, I forget that only works well in opposite spin and this wasn't WBO deck format. For the last match in the first stage and beyond, I got fed up with everything and ran Roar Longinus Over Zone'+Z-4. You know what, that could be so much worse. It did score me some points, in both same spin defense. Only in finals, it got KOed in first stage.
- You're probably wondering about Belial2 on Dynamite. Well, I was discussing it with LJ-Blader, and he assured me that Dynamite was susceptible to bursts from Xiphoid, so I trusted his words and made the change. He himself was running it on Perseus, I think, like I normally do. As it turns out, this was actually foreshadowing.
- A lot of my battle wins were opposite spin. A lot. I'm very cursed.
- I really like team format. Not only can you get some good and honest opinions from your team members before matches on your setup, but also DURING MATCHES. I really like being able to consider different options with my team. There were a couple of times LJ or I would have MamaBey go into high mode or switch the mode on High Xtend+' during one of her matches. I kept asking LJ for suggestions, I kept wanting to go into high mode, and he kept telling me "You've seen this exact matchup before and won as it is now" so I didn't. It helps to have people around to keep me from destroying myself.
- My Sword Launcher started skipping A LOT during the first two matches. I didn't call mislaunches, because 1) Some of them were opposite spin, and 2) Eh, that's really on me, I'll just leave it unless it was REALLY underpowered. I had really enjoyed the sword launcher for a few tournaments, but it's clear that my launching style isn't good for it. You almost HAVE to start the launch slow and then increase the launch speed to fast halfway through the rip. I lack the fine control for that, I switched back to my long DB launchers.
- Our first match was against Team Help Me, which had CrisisCrusher07 on it this time around, as well as and . Guess who had to face Crisis? That's right, it was me. I don't know if most of you know but I have a notoriously terrible record against Crisis. In about the past 6 or so tournaments I've faced him, he's beaten me. Today was a little different, and although one of the points was hazy (I hope the video for that one was saved, I know Crisis wanted a second opinion on it but decided not to press the issue) I was successful against him 3-1. Overally that match was VERY close between THM and NSCBSS. This was a trend that would continue.
- Our second match was against #Other-Systems, which had a TRULY NIGHTMARISH COMBO of TSO,, and . After selecting blader order, I wound up going against Friedpasta. I don't know if most of you know but I have a notoriously terrible record against Pasta. Yes, that should sound familiar, and it's true. Our match, the 2nd, was EXTREMELY close. We actually had a Xiphoid v Xiphoid on Qc' matchup, with him being on Giga and me on Fortress. We tied. Twice. EVERYONE WAS ALARMED BY THIS. I eventually managed to defeat him 3-2? It was very close between our teams but we won again.
- I can't remember if our third match was "yes" or "Team Superstar". I did well in the 3rd and 4th matches, mostly, see the note about Prominence above. LJ-Blader started to have some real difficulties with Dynamite on Bearing', to include busting and a KO in one match, getting swept 0-3. EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY TEAM'S FIRST ROUND MATCHES WAS A DIFFICULT STRUGGLE! ALL OF THEM! How MamaBey and I managed to turn that match around somehow, I will never know.
- I think our 4th match was the one where we went 3-2 across all 3 blader opponents, my memory is hazy. We had one of those. I know it looks like 3-2 times 3 is a 3 point victory but it's really stressful when each match is that close.
- After our first round matches, we were 4-0; there was no question that we were going to the finals match against the top contender from Group B. LJ-Blader took a good look at his Bearing' and determined that the spring on it was VERY WEAK all of the sudden. Maybe since partway through the tournament, but I'm starting to think even before. We checked the disc, the layers, the everything. Nope, it was the Bearing'. That's very unfortunate. We resolved that for his last match he would need to borrow my Bearing'.
- We got to ruin another birthday party! We let them have one of the tables under the pavilion, Crisis is very nice and polite.
- By the end of our first round matches I was tired, exhausted, and stressed. The Arnold Palmer I had been drinking wasn't helping, I didn't eat enough beforehand. The matches had been harrowing. We took a picture to commemorate the occasion. Look behind me to see a 8 year old's birthday party that the tournament is ruining.
- Some fake launchers today. Other judges, look for these things, please.
- Some of you are taking entirely too long at the stadium deciding your beys. According to the rules, it's supposed to be 3 minutes. I didn't time it but it was WAY LONGER THAN THAT for one of our matches. You had plenty of downtime to figure out your combos ahead of time, do not spend a thousand hours at match time preparing them! Please just make a decision!!!
- I was wearing a mask today, personal choice. Someone asked if I was wearing a mask because I had COVID. Hey, folks? DO NOT ASK WHY SOMEONE IS OR ISN'T MASKING UNLESS YOU WANT AN ANSWER. That answer might include some honesty you aren't prepared for. No, I don't have COVID, and I should hope that anyone who DOES have COVID stays the hell home like they're supposed to. If you come to a public gathering and you actively have COVID, mask or not, you're a bad person.
- We had some integrity problems come up during the first stage of the tournament. One specific team had a blader who was peeking at the opposing team's order choices during initial setup for their 3rd blader's match. I noticed this and immediately told him to stop that. I had to get his attention and explain to him that wasn't an okay thing to do, and then I locked the order of his team's current blader so they couldn't make any changes after that point. I later clarified with the blader's father that I was sorry if I seemed like I was too harsh about it. Unfortunately, one of that same blader's teammates apparently did the EXACT SEEM ORDER PEEKING IN THEIR FINAL MATCH LATER ON, in addition to telling their teammate the upcoming order, which TSO caught, and ordered everyone to shuffle order. If we'd known it was a second offense from the same team instead of finding that out later, there would have been Immediate Counseling with them about this. As it stands, we know which 2 bladers it was and will see if the staff wants followup. We already individually addressed it at match time, but this is a disturbing pattern. If you're going to cheat in situations where cheating is possible, you may be asked to leave.
- We also learned something bad about Prominence today. Remember the Bent Vanguard issue, which the WBO rules somehow permit? Well, now there's a similar issue for Prominence Shield, which Maryland folks first heard about today. You can bend down part of the shield (midsection?) with your fingers to get it to fly off almost immediately. Once again I refuse to resort to such tactics on my own copies of the part, and when I see Prominence shields that fly off instantly, I'll know there was finger-bending. While the WBO rules currently support this as being legal (our rules are just Terrible sometimes), you cannot make me think this isn't an integrity problem for any blader that would use such a modified part. This is RIDICULOUS. That this hand-bending stuff is allowed really speaks to a generally low level of integrity all around. I expect better of you, bladers. It's not banned, but respect for you will drop.
- Finals in Team format don't use deck format, just a regular team battle. You know what? Good. I'm sick of deck format. Also I'm bad at WBO deck format personally, so, obvious bias there.
- "Now Sonic Can Be Super Sonic" made it to the finals from Group A. Group B's winner was "Hyper Carry DL", a dangerous combination of geetster99, Yami, and . All good bladers. The order went MamaBey vs geetster (which was a match we really feared), me vs OnTheDL (which was a match I really feared) and LJ vs Yami (again, our fear is valid and appropriate, supported by facts). MamaBey had a very close match and won 3-2. I did Unusually Well against OnTheDL, 3-0. Yami needed a 4-0 win against LJ, and did not get it. I think Yami ended up winning that one 3-1 with an all attack deck, he was trying to force the 4-0 he needed for a tie between our teams.
- 1st place was "Now Sonic Can Be Super Sonic", with "Hyper Carry DL" in second. Overall, there were a LOT of really powerful teams out there today, a lot of DB and BU layers running around, too many close calls, and some fierce challenges all around.
- I think Team format is still interesting, especially on 3v3. A little time consuming, but good. I especially enjoyed being able to work with my team mid-match, and that really made a big difference for us I think. I'm looking forward to more of these events. I don't know if winning this got us an invite to some larger event later on, I've heard the answer is no.
- There were a lot of interesting prizes today! The advertised first place team could choose either from a Xiphoid for everybody or a Zest set for everybody, provided by from https://www.BeybladePremier.com . Thank you! We chose Ziphoid, we already have Zests with good disc stars, we didn't use Zest itself today, and both LJ and I have the less-good Xiphoid molds, we're trying for the good ones. Additionally, the first place team got custom painted black Savior Valkyrie beys by Crimson Cursed Customs! https://linktr.ee/crimsoncursedcustoms I believe Crisis has photos/video of that. Thank you, these are very cool! Not tournament legal, but still very cool. Sometimes cool is enough.
- I had a lot of fun at today's tournament and the 3 of us did really well but we are all incredibly stressed out. Everyone has good and bad days, I shudder to think what's going to happen to LJ-Blader's burst ranking after today, he had a bunch of losses today, but hey, those numbers don't mean a heck of a lot. Although it will be funny to everybody involved when Mamabey2122 outranks him once this tournament is processed. That's hilarious for all the best reasons.
- Collectively, our team is considering a name change to "Nervous Breakdown" because all 3 of us had varying degrees of nervous breakdown today. I didn't even suggest that, but I agree with it wholeheartedly. So, that's where We're at.
- I am DREADING the upcoming Beyblade East 2022 weekend. 6 tournaments in one weekend is too many. I'm not typing up full reports for all of that, no.
Team Format: Your team is a useful resource, when they play fair! Play fair, bladers.
I recommend the following music for reading the report. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MVQjrIcwyEg . Look, I play a lot of good videogames, and although I had a lot of fun it was a VERY stressful day, don't judge me. I was originally considering https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IKQ4XaxjjCo given how much of a ball of sress today was, but in hindsight, given our team name, I'm going with the Sonic Generations 3DS track. Folks, my memory is bad, so if I end up repeating tournament report music, just let me know and I'll pick a new track.
- The team TEAMPALOOZA should be TEAMAPALOOZA if it's a parody on the well known music festival Lollapalooza. This angers me.
- We had 10 teams of 3 people, totalling 30 people. It was most people's first exposure to team format. The tournament actually had a limit of 36 people per event imposed on it at kind of the last minute by the main Teampalooza organizer, which is kind of a not great last minute addition.
- We started around 12:30. It went until 4:30. Although we only had 10 teams, a two group round robin of 4 matches for each team, and there were only 20 total first round matches, it took a VERY long time. Matches involved a lot of opposite spin. There were a lot of OS ties.
- I had a stressful day yesterday. I got called in to do some work on the weekend, I spent a couple hours doing code analysis on Saturday. I'm a progammer, you see, and as it turns out it was bad for my mental state. We didn't 100% figure it out and it was just kind of a headache. I'm going to have to deal with it again tomorrow I bet. Combine that with how pre-stressed I am about Friday-Sunday's upcoming 6 tournaments for Beyblade East 2022, and I was pre-stressed. Which, as it turns out for today, was Very Bad For Me. Although, in hindsight, maybe I do best at Beyblade when I'm totally stressed out.
- 8 players registered without a team or without having their teams set up in advance in this thread. That was surely a source of organizational stress. None of them had to borrow parts, or they shared a single deck. We're just lucky this wasn't a restricted format. This is a problem that
- The weather was hot and humid with a lot of rain. We were outside at the park, and it was generally hot and humid in the morning. We got some powerful rains around early afternoon, but the pavilion we were in was covered to the point that no one got seriously wet unless they voluntarily wanted to cool down. A lot of people chose to stand in the rain for a bit, myself included. Honestly, the weather worked out okay, mostly.
- We had 4 or 5 people doing most of the judging.
- I was on team "Now Sonic Can be Super Sonic" with
- We randomized our blader order each time. Strategy can be countered with strategy. There's nothing you can do against luck. Let's just go for it, the heck with it.
- This was 3v3 team format. That means everyone prepared a deck of 3 beyblades. After several standard tournaments where I made some bad deck decisions, today I finally got my act together. Dynamite Belial2+F Illegal Bearing'-0, Vanish Bahamut Giga Metal Drift+10 (actually -10 as well, it varied), and for the last bey, I originally had it as Xiphoid Xcalibur Fortress Qc'-4, but I failed to get any points with it in my first two matches. So I switched it to Prominence Perseus Nexus+S Morbius-4. This was a hilariously bad idea, I forget that only works well in opposite spin and this wasn't WBO deck format. For the last match in the first stage and beyond, I got fed up with everything and ran Roar Longinus Over Zone'+Z-4. You know what, that could be so much worse. It did score me some points, in both same spin defense. Only in finals, it got KOed in first stage.
- You're probably wondering about Belial2 on Dynamite. Well, I was discussing it with LJ-Blader, and he assured me that Dynamite was susceptible to bursts from Xiphoid, so I trusted his words and made the change. He himself was running it on Perseus, I think, like I normally do. As it turns out, this was actually foreshadowing.
- A lot of my battle wins were opposite spin. A lot. I'm very cursed.
- I really like team format. Not only can you get some good and honest opinions from your team members before matches on your setup, but also DURING MATCHES. I really like being able to consider different options with my team. There were a couple of times LJ or I would have MamaBey go into high mode or switch the mode on High Xtend+' during one of her matches. I kept asking LJ for suggestions, I kept wanting to go into high mode, and he kept telling me "You've seen this exact matchup before and won as it is now" so I didn't. It helps to have people around to keep me from destroying myself.
- My Sword Launcher started skipping A LOT during the first two matches. I didn't call mislaunches, because 1) Some of them were opposite spin, and 2) Eh, that's really on me, I'll just leave it unless it was REALLY underpowered. I had really enjoyed the sword launcher for a few tournaments, but it's clear that my launching style isn't good for it. You almost HAVE to start the launch slow and then increase the launch speed to fast halfway through the rip. I lack the fine control for that, I switched back to my long DB launchers.
- Our first match was against Team Help Me, which had CrisisCrusher07 on it this time around, as well as
- Our second match was against #Other-Systems, which had a TRULY NIGHTMARISH COMBO of TSO,
- I can't remember if our third match was "yes" or "Team Superstar". I did well in the 3rd and 4th matches, mostly, see the note about Prominence above. LJ-Blader started to have some real difficulties with Dynamite on Bearing', to include busting and a KO in one match, getting swept 0-3. EVERY SINGLE ONE OF MY TEAM'S FIRST ROUND MATCHES WAS A DIFFICULT STRUGGLE! ALL OF THEM! How MamaBey and I managed to turn that match around somehow, I will never know.
- I think our 4th match was the one where we went 3-2 across all 3 blader opponents, my memory is hazy. We had one of those. I know it looks like 3-2 times 3 is a 3 point victory but it's really stressful when each match is that close.
- After our first round matches, we were 4-0; there was no question that we were going to the finals match against the top contender from Group B. LJ-Blader took a good look at his Bearing' and determined that the spring on it was VERY WEAK all of the sudden. Maybe since partway through the tournament, but I'm starting to think even before. We checked the disc, the layers, the everything. Nope, it was the Bearing'. That's very unfortunate. We resolved that for his last match he would need to borrow my Bearing'.
- We got to ruin another birthday party! We let them have one of the tables under the pavilion, Crisis is very nice and polite.
- By the end of our first round matches I was tired, exhausted, and stressed. The Arnold Palmer I had been drinking wasn't helping, I didn't eat enough beforehand. The matches had been harrowing. We took a picture to commemorate the occasion. Look behind me to see a 8 year old's birthday party that the tournament is ruining.
- Some fake launchers today. Other judges, look for these things, please.
- Some of you are taking entirely too long at the stadium deciding your beys. According to the rules, it's supposed to be 3 minutes. I didn't time it but it was WAY LONGER THAN THAT for one of our matches. You had plenty of downtime to figure out your combos ahead of time, do not spend a thousand hours at match time preparing them! Please just make a decision!!!
- I was wearing a mask today, personal choice. Someone asked if I was wearing a mask because I had COVID. Hey, folks? DO NOT ASK WHY SOMEONE IS OR ISN'T MASKING UNLESS YOU WANT AN ANSWER. That answer might include some honesty you aren't prepared for. No, I don't have COVID, and I should hope that anyone who DOES have COVID stays the hell home like they're supposed to. If you come to a public gathering and you actively have COVID, mask or not, you're a bad person.
- We had some integrity problems come up during the first stage of the tournament. One specific team had a blader who was peeking at the opposing team's order choices during initial setup for their 3rd blader's match. I noticed this and immediately told him to stop that. I had to get his attention and explain to him that wasn't an okay thing to do, and then I locked the order of his team's current blader so they couldn't make any changes after that point. I later clarified with the blader's father that I was sorry if I seemed like I was too harsh about it. Unfortunately, one of that same blader's teammates apparently did the EXACT SEEM ORDER PEEKING IN THEIR FINAL MATCH LATER ON, in addition to telling their teammate the upcoming order, which TSO caught, and ordered everyone to shuffle order. If we'd known it was a second offense from the same team instead of finding that out later, there would have been Immediate Counseling with them about this. As it stands, we know which 2 bladers it was and will see if the staff wants followup. We already individually addressed it at match time, but this is a disturbing pattern. If you're going to cheat in situations where cheating is possible, you may be asked to leave.
- We also learned something bad about Prominence today. Remember the Bent Vanguard issue, which the WBO rules somehow permit? Well, now there's a similar issue for Prominence Shield, which Maryland folks first heard about today. You can bend down part of the shield (midsection?) with your fingers to get it to fly off almost immediately. Once again I refuse to resort to such tactics on my own copies of the part, and when I see Prominence shields that fly off instantly, I'll know there was finger-bending. While the WBO rules currently support this as being legal (our rules are just Terrible sometimes), you cannot make me think this isn't an integrity problem for any blader that would use such a modified part. This is RIDICULOUS. That this hand-bending stuff is allowed really speaks to a generally low level of integrity all around. I expect better of you, bladers. It's not banned, but respect for you will drop.
- Finals in Team format don't use deck format, just a regular team battle. You know what? Good. I'm sick of deck format. Also I'm bad at WBO deck format personally, so, obvious bias there.
- "Now Sonic Can Be Super Sonic" made it to the finals from Group A. Group B's winner was "Hyper Carry DL", a dangerous combination of geetster99, Yami, and
- 1st place was "Now Sonic Can Be Super Sonic", with "Hyper Carry DL" in second. Overall, there were a LOT of really powerful teams out there today, a lot of DB and BU layers running around, too many close calls, and some fierce challenges all around.
- I think Team format is still interesting, especially on 3v3. A little time consuming, but good. I especially enjoyed being able to work with my team mid-match, and that really made a big difference for us I think. I'm looking forward to more of these events. I don't know if winning this got us an invite to some larger event later on, I've heard the answer is no.
- There were a lot of interesting prizes today! The advertised first place team could choose either from a Xiphoid for everybody or a Zest set for everybody, provided by
- I had a lot of fun at today's tournament and the 3 of us did really well but we are all incredibly stressed out. Everyone has good and bad days, I shudder to think what's going to happen to LJ-Blader's burst ranking after today, he had a bunch of losses today, but hey, those numbers don't mean a heck of a lot. Although it will be funny to everybody involved when Mamabey2122 outranks him once this tournament is processed. That's hilarious for all the best reasons.
- Collectively, our team is considering a name change to "Nervous Breakdown" because all 3 of us had varying degrees of nervous breakdown today. I didn't even suggest that, but I agree with it wholeheartedly. So, that's where We're at.
- I am DREADING the upcoming Beyblade East 2022 weekend. 6 tournaments in one weekend is too many. I'm not typing up full reports for all of that, no.
Team Format: Your team is a useful resource, when they play fair! Play fair, bladers.