[Announcement] Outplay 2022 Final Judgements

[Bhelogan]

We have reached the end of Outplay 2022. It was a neck-to-neck race in the finish line with two very different styles of players, showing different strengths and bringing their own flavors to the final showdown with the Benefactor. Between Bushi's Amari and AnotherDragoon's Legion, who would take the round? The finale had no mechanical scores, and no bonus points to influence the end results. Only the word of the Judges decided who the winner will be. The scores were tallied, and the results are as follows:

Scoring Summary - Round 4
Category AnotherDragoon Bushi Marshmallow 35 36 GleefulNihilism 33 34 Retry 38 35 rhaiber 34 36 Judges Average 35.00 35.25

Winning by a single point (0.25 points in the overall average) Bushi, who will be crowned the champion of Outplay 2022! Congratulations, and a huge shoutout and thank you to all of our players who helped make an exciting, adrenaline-filled event this year.

[Marshmallow]

Scoring Summary - Finals
Category AnotherDragoon Bushi Enjoyability & Creativity 9 8 Clarity, Formatting, and Technical 9 10 Grammar & Writting 10 10 Moved the Plot/True to Character 7 8 Total 35 36

Honestly, it's a super close & difficult call for me here, both participants brought something to the table and both offered a strong argument for either or, but ultimately I have voted in favor of Bushi.

[GleefulNihilism]

Player Name	AnotherDragoon	Bushi
Character Name	Legion	Amari
Enjoyability and Creativity	9	9
Clarity, Formating, and Technical	9	10
Grammer and Writing	8	7
Movement and Action	7	8
Totals	33	34

Heh, I feel very closely the same way as Marsh. It's an extremely close and difficult call.

The short version I feel that AD was stronger in general but didn't quite stick the landing and Bushi's strategy of supplimenting posts with original art and music might have been a bit of a Hail-Mary-Pass tactic but it worked. That strategy could easily have blown up in Bushi's face.

Ultimately that's the only real difference I think. Bushi was a little more willing to Gamble and the bets happened to pay off. At the DnD table AD's character would probably be a little better mechanically - but Bushi would end the night with the big play that everybody would talk about forever and come back to the table next week to see if it happened again.

So Bushi gets my vote- but don't get cocky kid, we're talking *barely*. :P

[Retry]

Retry's Final Score Scoring Summary - Finals Category Amari(Bushi) Legion(AnotherDragoon) Enjoyability & Creativity 8 9 Clarity, Formatting, and Technical 9 10 Grammar & Writting 9 10 Moved the Plot/True to Character 9 9 Total 35 38 I'm not going to do a breakdown only for the simple fact that we're at the end. There is nothing more you could tweak for future rounds. I hope you will forgive me for that. Just know that you two did fantastically and grading was quite difficult as Amari and Legion had two very different playstyles. Both characters handled their objectives swimmingly. Amari took on the big bad as one would expect of an offense-styled character. Legion provided aid from afar while securing the main objective for this entire event: Find/Rescue Jake. Both of you pushed the plot along excellently providing hooks for one another to play off of while shining yourself. We have been spoiled by Bushi's art for this whole competition and now we're getting music added into the mix. There were also references galore from both the contestants AND the GM that were absolutely wonderful and had me going "I understood that reference!" This has been a heck of a debut you have made to the site, Bushi, and I hope you stick around! At the end of it all, I believe Legion came out as the stronger contestant here.

[rhaiber]

Scoring Summary - Finals
Category AnotherDragoon Bushi Enjoyability & Creativity 8 9 Clarity, Formatting, and Technical 9 10 Grammar & Writting 10 8 Moved the Plot/True to Character 7 9 Total 34 36

If anyone is interested in how I picked those numbers, here is my elaborated descriptive rubric:

 

	1-2	3-4	5-6	7-8	9-10
Enjoyability and Creativity	Posts are tedious to read.Appears to be directly copying other players or some outside source.	Writing is a bit derivative and lacks originality.	Overall tone is awkward or out of place. Ideas seem a bit repetitive.	Attempts to connect with the reader are evident but sometimes fall flat. Makes some effort to switch up moves, but overall strategy is somewhat rigid and non-adaptive.	Balances humor and dramatic tension while remaining true to the tone of the setting. Employs a wide variety of strategies and tactics.
Clarity, Formatting, and Technical	Glaring errors in formatting make portions unreadable. Overtly (perhaps intentionally) breaks the rules.	Formatting is used in a way that makes it difficult to follow the post. Makes an effort to follow the rules, but may inadvertently step over the line.	No effort made to enhance formatting - one big wall of text. Seems confused on some parts of the technical rules.	Some effort is made to highlight certain aspects of the post with versatile formatting. Follows all technical rules.	Creative use of formatting options enhance the readability of the post. Takes advantage of rules mechanics in creative ways.
Grammar and Writing	Frequent errors make the post hard to understand.	Glaring errors make parts of the post unclear, but the main gist is easy enough to understand.	Minor errors interrupt flow, but the author’s intent can be inferred	Insignificant errors did not impact the readability of the posts.	Little to no errors detected.
Moved the Plot / Acted true to Character	Offers “dead-end” posts that don’t contribute to the story. Character is underdeveloped, making it hard to know what is true to character.	Spends too much time repeating what others have already said. Character’s behaviour is erratic/inconsistent.	May spend more time reacting to others than adding anything new to the story. Some actions make more sense for a player meta-gaming than for a character in-game.	Achieves a good balance between acknowledging others’ posts and adding something new to the story. Actions are perfectly logical given what we know about the character.	Takes agency and sets the story’s pace that others seem to follow. Posts provide real insight into the character’s psyche, explaining why they do what they do.

And here is my more specific, day-by-day feedback:

 

• Bushi - The Peter and Tony reference was cute, but a little over the top, especially since you immediately contradicted it, making it a bit superfluous. Good job driving the plot forward by thinking to use the crab transportation. It can be tough in an establishing post to know how far forward you actually can drive the plot without getting more input from the GM, but you struck a good balance here.
• AnotherDragoon - I appreciate that you took the time to acknowledge the absence of your fallen comrades and let Legion react to that. But this post was very reactive. “Taxi crab” was arguably the better pun than Bushi’s “called an UBER” line, but it still felt like you were just reacting to what they did. You did tactically advance the plot a bit by sending a sprite to scout ahead, but I would’ve liked to see such actions take more of the spotlight.

 

• Bushi - This post had a lot going on for it. You used the environment that the GM gave you - in this case a mess of unconscious allies. You got creative and ran with it. You packed a Pokemon reference, a DBZ reference and an LotR reference all in there. You justified Amari’s defiance so she’s not just fighting the bad guy cuz she's the good guy. And you gave us music?!? This was a total package for me.
• AnotherDragoon - Your experience as a gamer and an adventurer showed in this post. You acknowledged every part of the GM’s post, from the change in setting, to the recomplining of your sprite, to the Big Bad’s offer. You also asked the questions we were all dying to know. Imveros created an amazingly rich storyline for this contest, but with so many storyline threads, it’s easy for a reader to get lost. You had the wherewithal to ask the BBEG to tie up all the loose ends. If I had to nitpick something, it’s that your posts could use a quick editing pass before you click submit. There was some minor redundancy as it felt like you had two different opening lines for Legion to use: “You’re the Benefactor? I'm afraid I left my credsticks in my other suit.” and “Uh, Mr. Benifactor, can I call you Benny?" A good editor would tell you to pick one or the other.

 

• Bushi - Amari takes charge again! Also, the multiple choice decision making was a fun and creative stylistic choice.
• AnotherDragoon - Once again, you do a great job of picking up on the prompts and responding with a “yes, and.” You even acknowledged the little Franky Bear call. You took Bushi’s suggestion to wake everyone up and ran with it, adding your own flavor. But ultimately, it fel a little bit reactionary - you built off the preceding posts, but didn’t add much new. However, the Elton John reference was excellent.

 

• Bushi - I don’t know if you were specifically paying attention to my amateur notes from last round, but you addressed two of them in this post. You found a way to add something new to your NEON VIOLET OVERDRIVE! (is it possible to mention that move without shouting it? I think not.) And then there was this “Luckily, no one was here to grade her for clarity, grammar, formatting or writing.” Now that is how you break the fourth wall. Also, you shattered your blade, effectively giving up your signature move when you knew there was still one more post for the week. That’s the kind of risk I like to see people taking.
• AnotherDragoon - You do a good job of keeping your eyes on the prize - namely securing Jake - while still acknowledging everything your partner is doing and lending a hand when you can. But somehow this post feels a bit like treading water to me. You’re kind of in the same place you were in the previous post.

 

• AnotherDragoon - This post finally allowed Legion to put a hand on the wheel and take charge. It wasn’t just because you posted before Bushi this time, but because you limited your reactions to the first paragraph or two and then the rest was acting independently. I have to admit, on first reading I was a bit lost (this was the first reference you made that I didn’t get immediately, so it didn’t make as much sense until I googled “Giga drill breaker” and watched a couple of YouTube clips. Is Gurren Lagann well known? Is my age showing?), but once I figured it out, it was a nice way to cap off the contest for Legion.
• Bushi - You let Amari feel loss, which was great. Between last round and this round, I feel like you’ve really taken her to a different place emotionally from where she started the competition. If Imveros lets her make it out alive, it’s clear that she will not be the same person anymore. Although, closing things with Amari being a cheerleader, getting everyone to chant for Legion felt a bit too saccharine for me, evoking shades of Peter Pan and “I do believe in fairies. I do, I do!”

Overall Bushi - You have been growing as a writer with every step of this contest, and this round was the best so far. You really took control of the narrative. Not only did you take action to advance the plot in every post, it also felt like Amari took charge in directing Legion on what to do. You took chances experimenting stylistically. My one major critique would be that this experimentation led to some inconsistency in style and tone, but I’d rather see people take chances any day. Also, I appreciate that even though mechanics are not being judged in this round, you still made an effort to use your established moves and actually roll for them in every post. AnotherDragoon - You are an amazingly consistent player. As a GM, I would want you in my games because you acknowledge and work with every prompt, while keeping your eyes set on the overall goal. As a player, I would want you in my party because you are a collaborative team player who always works to lift others up.Unfortunately, as a judge of the contest, I have to say that your posts were sometimes a bit too reactionary. It let Amari set the pace and tone for the round, almost dragging Legion along for the ride.