User blog:Leolab/Overhaul to User Tourneys

{{Leolab|So the staff has made a series of proposed changes to how the User Tourney system will work. Here's the proposed changes, mostly copy-pasted from the OP:

Basics
The new proposal is simple, but has alot of parts. In essence User tournaments would become Events on the wiki, to be held one at a time and without a que. Tournament ideas would be proposed by the authors in a forum during a defined entry period and the Admins would choose the author to have the spot for that period, the author would need to complete it in that time and an award could be made and given to the winner. So lets get into details about it

Proposals
At the start of the period, the Admins would post a forum in the Bounty Board forum. This thread would be a place for all users interested to pitch their tournement plans. Example User one pitches a Superhero tourney. User two pitches a Army battle tourney. User three pitches a western style tourney.

Any proposed tounrment would have to have as many details as possible, including details, the number of expected participants, and rules to make sure the tournement is viable.

Choosing a pitch
Once as many tournements are pitched, or after a certain amount of time from thread creation. The Admins would elect to choose one to go with. The choice can depend on how creative the idea is, how well its pitched, but also the Author's record:

If we know the Author to not finish their tournaments, or battles, or they've previously had the spot and failed or didn't do so well etc it might weigh in on whether or not that user gets the spot for the three months.

After selection
After we choose the author/tourney that shall hold the spot, they can create their intro blog. The blog must be kept up to date with all of the battles linked on it.

The author has a three month period to finish the tournament and complete the battles. If completed, an award can be made if the Author chooses and given to the winner. If the Author completes the battle earlier, the next tournament does not start right away, but the thread for pitching won't be made until the end of that period. (This makes it more of an event and makes things easier to manage).

The user tournament hub
The user tournament hub will be updated with the new rules a link to the active tournament blog. At the bottom of the page would be a list of all the completed tournaments, this allows anyone to find any tournament.

The current tourneys in the que will be removed. If the authors want to continue it, they will have to pitch it once the application forum shows up.

Out of the three tourneys currently running, the All-Out Mythical War Tourney and the Wild West User Tourney will finish before the first application forum. The User Siege Tourney will run concurrently until its end, since it's too massive to wait for it to finish.

other notes
Other rules will be put in place as needed, for example clauses about users not being able to complete a tournement through no fault of their own.

Anyone wanting to create a massive tournament, akin to the Siege Tourney, would be handled on a case-by-case basis.

Advantages of this proposal
With this plan, User Tournaments are limited to 4 a year. This may sound a bit extreme but its beneficial in several ways.


 * Management- With so few tournaments we wouldn't have to worry about them clogging up the wiki activity or stocking up in a que.
 * Fun- This would make tournaments in effect, a wiki event. This would relieve pressure off the author about having competition with other user tournies and have the spotlight. It would let authors who are good become much more creative and theatrical. In addition, we could give out awards easier, seeing as how it would only be four a year.
 * Better tournaments -Finally instead of everyone and their cat having a place on the que, this forces them to pitch their idea to us, to make sure they all get heard from equally and not just any bland tournament would get in, thus making this much more like events. It also means good ideas and authors don't have to wait behind an endless line. If your idea is good, you actually have a chance of getting in in the foreseeable future.

So, Users, give your comments, questions, and concerns.