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Laura
March 24, 2012, 09:28:47 AM - ORIGINAL POST -

IT'S CAME BACK
BEWARE IT AND PREPARE IT
S.P.E.R.G.I.N. 2
Brought to you by Laura (Laura) and Ben (sfxazure)
With help from Scott (Suko)
4 August 2012
Entry Fee: $5.00 if you preregister, $10.00 at the door.

Important: The tournament pack is now available for download here.  

For those of you unawares, Ben and I ran a not-so-serious tournament last summer called S.P.E.R.G.I.N., which was a traditional double-elimination tournament with a pack made entirely of charts submitted by entrants.  It was awesome and fun, and we can't wait to do it again!  Once again, we need YOUR help to make it happen!

Changes from S.P.E.R.G.I.N.:
- Unlike S.P.E.R.G.I.N., this tournament will NOT be run at ACME.  Rather, Scott (Suko) has graciously offered to allow us use of his garage and private machine.  In order to ensure he does not regret this decision, we will not post his address publicly on the internet.  If you need it, please PM one of the organizers.

Notable things that haven’t changed:
- Songs must still be playable in a public space like ACME.  Although the tournament will be played in a private venue, most entrants only have access to a public machine for practice.
- Rules for passing the song you pick have not changed.  That is, “you pick it, you pass it” does not apply.


Phase One: Pre-registration and Stepchart Submission
Due Date: 1 July, 2012

Preregistration will begin immediately and will run until the end of Phase One.  Attendees who preregister will pay a discounted rate ($5.00 instead of $10.00.)  Preregistration will be handled through PMs to Ben/sfxazure, who will accept payment through Amazon Payments, PayPal, or in person.  To keep things organized, please use the title “SPERGIN Preregistration” for your PM.

You will have from today until July 1st to submit up to four songs (one stepchart each) to be included in the tournament pack. Please use this submission form, and make sure to identify yourself by name/forum name somewhere in the file.   We encourage you to create and submit new stepcharts, but any are fine as long as you had a hand in their creation.  Submitted songs/stepcharts will be rejected if they do not conform to the following rules:

1. The chart must be to a song no longer than three minutes and thirty seconds (3:30) in length.  There are many reasons for this, including but not limited to the fact that we have to keep the tournament moving and the fact that 3:30 is ACME's cutoff for a “long song.”  We don’t want people to have to pay more to practice some charts than others.

2. Songs must be appropriate for play in public venues such as ACME Bowl.  Please avoid profanity or find some way to work around it (clean versions, comedic censoring, etc.)  Any content deemed inappropriate for a public venue will be rejected.

3. Songs must be ITG Arcade Ready.  Details for preparing your songs can be found here.  If your song is over 2 minutes, DO NOT .OGG PATCH IT. Also, it is recommended that you test your file on Acme’s ITG machine before submitting it, as different machines have different syncing.

4. Stepcharts must have at least 50 hittable arrows.  We are all for exploring a wide range of difficulties, but please no “Beginner mode.”  While there may be ways to make an interesting chart with under 50 steps, it would increase the likelihood of ties and slow the tournament down.


We also reserve the right to reject a stepfile for unusual reasons, such as the file crashing StepMania.

Note:  If a song is rejected for any reason, you may submit a replacement; cleaned-up versions of rejected submissions can be submitted, as well as completely different songs/charts.  After a song has been accepted for the pack, it is finalized and can not be replaced or modified.

As soon as a stepchart is accepted into the pack, it will be made available for download at the bottom of this post.  This is because Ben and I will be entering the tournament ourselves, and we don’t want to gain an unfair advantage by viewing songs before they are released publicly.

By submitting charts to the tournament pack, you agree to enter the tournament.  While people who have not submitted stepcharts may enter, those of you who submit stepcharts must enter.  Because of this, we will not begin to evaluate stepcharts from any given entrant before they have preregistered for the tournament; consider your entry fee a form of collateral.  


Phase Two: Practice

During this period of time, the organizers will combine your charts into a pack.  If the organizers feel that there are not enough new stepcharts on which to run a tournament, we will find some quick hack to fix this issue.  This should take about a week.  After this, the pack will be released and installed on the ACME machine, so that you may practice these charts at your leisure.  This should take about a month.


Phase Three: TOURNAMENT!
4 August 2012, 12:30 PM, Suko's place
Please note:  You will see the phrase “Because this is not intended to be a serious tournament...” many times.  This is because this is not intended to be a serious tournament, and is supposed to be for fun!   Please do not get too caught up in minor details.

This will be a double elimination event with room for up to 32 entrants.  Only songs from the S.P.E.R.G.I.N.2. pack will be playable in this tournament.

Seeding:  Because this is not intended to be a serious tournament, seeding will be random.  If you complain about this, we will make fun of you on the internet.

Matches:  High seed gets first choice of machine side or pick order.  The other choice goes to low seed.  Each player will then pick one song of their choice to play against the other player.   Whoever gets the highest percentage (as calculated by the machine) on a given song wins that song.  (You know how this works by now.)  If both players are tied at the end of two songs, a third song will be chosen from the S.P.E.R.G.I.N.2. pack by way of the ITG machine’s “random” function.  If both players are still tied, another random tiebreaker will be chosen until the tie is broken.  

Song Selection:  Each player may only use a song as their “pick” once over the course of the tournament.  Because this is not intended to be a serious tournament, either player may fail any song throughout all tournament rounds with no additional penalty - once you fail, your percentage is “locked” as your score.  

Level Caps:  Because this is not intended to be a serious tournament, there will be no level caps. Any chart may be picked at any time in the tournament, regardless of difficulty (or opponent, since seeing is random.)  

Prizes:  Once preregistration ends and we have a better idea of how many entrants we will have, we will determine a prize structure based on 100% of the entry fees.

Please note that although the “IN” in “S.P.E.R.G.I.N.2.” does stand for “In the Northwest,” out of state players are still more than welcome to participate and submit stepcharts.  

« Last Edit: July 17, 2012, 09:01:10 PM by SomeLauraChick »
 
Tyrgannus.
Read March 24, 2012, 10:09:32 AM #1

1.) Yay! You were talking about this being a probability, but it seems that's definitely an actuality with date and everything. I'm excited.

2.) Looks like I'm starting from scratch though. Accidentally had to reinstall SM and all my songs. Well, this will force me not to copy pasta an old step chart, so I guess in some ways this is an opportunity to turn over a new leaf.

3.) First post? First post.
 
manyminimoos
Read March 24, 2012, 10:36:46 AM #2

Question that I am particularly interested in.

Last time, if you made a chart, you had to enter.  I will be unable to enter this no matter how hard I try, but I want to submit charts anyway.  Please?  Pleaaaaaaaaaase? 

=p
 
sfxazure
Read March 24, 2012, 10:38:37 AM #3

Question that I am particularly interested in.

Last time, if you made a chart, you had to enter.  I will be unable to enter this no matter how hard I try, but I want to submit charts anyway.  Please?  Pleaaaaaaaaaase? 

=p
Like last time, you will have to preregister to submit charts.  That said, there's nothing forcing you to show up to the tournament.
 
manyminimoos
Read March 24, 2012, 11:00:32 AM #4

Well, I'm also not paying a fee to submit charts so that's that I guess.
 
Keby
Read March 24, 2012, 11:10:05 AM #5

Ooooohhh boy do I have some stuff lined up for this.
 
neempoppa
Read March 25, 2012, 12:20:43 AM #6

I am sold. Plenty of notice. See you there.
 
Dr.Z
Read March 25, 2012, 04:53:14 AM #7

Nice to see a date for our 2nd custom songpack tourny~

Is there a 3min 30 sec song time limit again?
 
Laura
Read March 25, 2012, 05:23:47 PM #8

We will have rules for you soon, but yes, there will be a 3:30 limit due to that being the "long song" cutoff on most machines that allow customs. Smiley
 
sfxazure
Read March 25, 2012, 10:49:55 PM #9

Laura and I are still working on the ruleset.  In the meantime, have a thing.
 
Laura
Read March 26, 2012, 12:14:07 AM #10

Ruleset has been edited into the first post!  It's on, you guys!
 
Lhet
Read March 27, 2012, 01:49:56 PM #11

I'm almost certainly in, this sounds like fun. If nothing else it will be motivation to make some stepcharts.
 
Suko
Read March 28, 2012, 09:47:08 AM #12

I hate to be "that guy", but why did you decided not to change the rules for people choosing those ridiculously hard songs and then failing out immediately after their opponents gave up? I remember that was the one hot issue at last years event. I feel that if someone chooses a song, they should either pass it, or at least get 50%+ on it for it to count.

I don't think anyone enjoyed watching the matches where Player A got decimated in 20 seconds, then Player B immediately fails-out. I mean, where's the fun in watching that?

Other than that issue, I'm looking forward to this event.
 
Tyrgannus.
Read March 28, 2012, 03:43:45 PM #13

Also, it is recommended that you test your file on Acme’s ITG machine before submitting it, as different machines have different syncing.

I've actually been somewhat worried about this exact thing. While admittedly it would only affect it a few milliseconds, does anyone know the exact global offset of the ACME machine? Also, in that case, is there a significant sync difference between Acme's machine and Scott's machine? I just want to make things synced as well as possible for all participants
 
Suko
Read March 28, 2012, 05:21:50 PM #14

I've actually been somewhat worried about this exact thing. While admittedly it would only affect it a few milliseconds, does anyone know the exact global offset of the ACME machine? Also, in that case, is there a significant sync difference between Acme's machine and Scott's machine? I just want to make things synced as well as possible for all participants
My machine and ACME's machine were originally both r1 Andamiro cabinets. Granted, ACME's machine has a new CPU, which might do something to the timing (we'll have to wait for Tony's reply for details on that), but the speaker/monitor/pad hardware should be identical between the two machines.

Also, if there IS a sync difference, it should be universal. If you sync it up perfect to ACME's machine and it runs a tad bit earl or late on mine, at least know that everyone else's charts will also be slightly early/late, too.

« Last Edit: March 28, 2012, 05:24:16 PM by Suko »
 
ancsik
Read March 28, 2012, 05:44:58 PM #15

The impression I'd gotten from reading up on the matter is that Linux, being relatively stripped down, makes for an extremely consistent OITG platform timing-wise, regardless of the exact version you're running.  Basically, even with the completely non-standard computer, the base timing should be nearly identical, meaning the global offset and polling rate are the only things that can matter.

That said, there's a good chance Acme is running slightly different timing than Scott's machine.  I know r16 changed the offset by 6ms or something like that, and I believe Acme is running the pre-r16 value (since Chromatic is an r2-based theme), whereas I don't know what Scott is running.  I also don't know what the current JudgeWindowAdd is on Scott's machine, but JWA was changed at the same time as the offset, so I'm pretty sure that the way polling is handled is skewed in one direction (hence changing the polling rate required a change in offset), so lining up the offsets identically may not make that much sense.

Scott's point definitely stands, though - whatever slight difference there may be will be completely consistent across the pack, so no one file will be ruined because of the different machine.
 
Suko
Read March 28, 2012, 05:49:08 PM #16

My JWA=0.0015 now. If you want to know why, read the details here:
http://aaronin.jp/boards/viewtopic.php?t=9459

Edit:
Also, I will be testing these (training) on my machine, too. So if anything feels significantly off, I will notify everyone.
 
Laura
Read March 28, 2012, 09:03:10 PM #17

We actually gave a LOT of thought to the you pick it you pass it thing, and decided not to change it NOT because we don't value your input, but because we couldn't find a suitable replacement rule that didn't cause other, worse problems.

The issue is that the point of this tournament is for people to make weird, experimental stepcharts, many of which will not be easily passable for a VARIETY of reasons - not just stamina.  If we institute a penalty for failing your own pick, the result is going to be that people only feel comfortable picking from a small set of charts that are super easy for them to not accidentally fail.  Essentially, there is a really good chance that we will run out of content for people to pick OR penalize the person picking unfairly if we require people to do well on their own picks.

DOWNS had one good chart.  It was to Cannibal by Kesha.  If you talk to anybody who went to DOWNS, they will tell you that everybody picked Cannibal every round because it was the only "playable" chart.  Simply put, no you pick it you pass it means that it is less likely for this situation to happen at our tournament.

You will note that all of my serious tournaments DO have the you pick it you pass it rule.  This is because I DO think it sucks when someone uses their slightly better stamina to edge out an otherwise better player on a well-written chart.  I wish there was a way to discourage this without penalizing people for failing charts that aren't actually meant to be passable.  Think about the Pink Fuzzy Bunnies challenge at the Pump tournament - a lot of the SPERGIN charts people make end up looking kind of like that, where the point is to hit as many of the arrows accurately as possible, but you're still going to have to fail in the end. Unfortunately, three of us put our heads together and could not find a good way to make the distinction between a douche player and a player who just wants to pick an experimental song because that is supposed to be the spirit of the tournament.

We did not open this issue up to public discussion because every time an organizer has done that on these forums, it quickly turns into drama and libel.   
 
ancsik
Read March 29, 2012, 11:23:56 AM #18

I'll jump in and point out that SPERGIN's main stamina offenses were all targeted at me in late rounds, and they were all legitimate attempts at passing the song on the part of my opponents - none of the "edge them out, then stop" shit happened.  It was a little offputting at the time to have it happen 3 separate times (Tuan did it twice, Ben once), but when it comes down to it, the chart distribution actually forced Tuan into it - there was one (kind of weird) 12, one 13, one 14 and Tuan needed to go above 11's to ensure wins, since I was doing pretty well that day.  Ben probably made his stamina pick to play the chart he wanted to play as much as, if not moreso, to be overcompetitive, since that's the stuff he normally plays.  The main abuse was either done for fun or because of the specific charts available, rather than because people are dicks, so I'm definitely not that worried about the rule in retrospect.

Also, DOWNS did have 2 other playable charts (Dirt Devil and Estella), but they were pretty awkward crossover charts with all kinds of weird timing, which the DOWNS crowd apparently weren't fans of, hence all the Kesha.
 
Gerrak
Read March 29, 2012, 09:56:41 PM #19

{Tournament} Sakuracon - April 7th, 2012

Can we focus on this first please since it still doesn't even have a ruleset and it's 1 week away.... I know SPERGIN totally isn't a waste of time but Sakuracon is always the biggest ITG tournament of the year and it's gone virtually unrecognized Tongue

« Last Edit: March 29, 2012, 10:08:22 PM by Gerrak »
 
Laura
Read March 30, 2012, 07:47:49 AM #20

Both of these tournaments are important to me.  We are still working on Sakuracon rules because we are going to do some cool new things this year.  SPERGIN is virtually unchanged from last year, meaning the time and effort required for me to post about it is much lower. Those rules SHOULD be coming later today.

I get that SPERGIN isn't your thing - you made that pretty clear last time.  But can we please keep these threads on topic, IE by complaining about the lack of Sakuracon rules in the Sakuracon thread instead of this one?
 
sfxazure
Read March 30, 2012, 08:27:14 AM #21

Bringing this thread back on track:

Guys I made a chart look at it.

This will probably change a bit before I submit it officially, but I want to get it out to you asap since people have seen me practice it at ACME, and it's a chart that takes some learning.

Also unrelated thing:
Since people had trouble with song submissions, I'm gonna try to work on a small uploader website that will hopefully smooth the process out a bit. Just remember that you can't submit any songs officially until you preregister. Cheesy

« Last Edit: March 30, 2012, 08:39:09 AM by sfxazure »
 
Dr.Z
Read March 30, 2012, 01:17:20 PM #22

Yeah, that thing gets faster than Vertex...
Memorization required. Hmm

Need more Technika charts in ITG  Wink
 
Suko
Read March 30, 2012, 02:30:43 PM #23

LOL @ Gerracks "Badges". Founding Member of the U.S. Power Squadron Dragonforce Anti-Canadian Tyranny Brigade.
 
NSX
Read March 30, 2012, 02:54:48 PM #24

Regarding my picks against Tony from the previous SPERGIN tournament: I picked a lot of 10+ songs mainly because those were the only charts I knew (since I didn't really sit down and study them all). I was just trying to stay in my comfort zone and not go crazy with anything I didn't know. I'll be a lot more adventurous this time around when SPERGIN 2 hits.
 
 
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