(no subject)
I have often been asked about the difference between Scrabble tournaments and boardgame tournaments, and given that the World Boardgaming Championships happens during the same week as the National Scrabble Championship -- and I'm attending the former -- I thought it might be interesting to talk about those differences. When I first started playing competitive Scrabble three years ago -- I had been playing boardgames competitively for more than 20 years -- I found the differences particularly striking. Here's my list:
1) Scrabble tournaments are quiet. So quiet that if a person talks during a game -- or even worse, if a cellphone goes off -- the noise is drowned out by a chorus of Sh-sh-sh-ing,. Boardgame tournaments are noisy - very, very noisy. People often comment on their moves, their position, other people's moves, and so on. And it's not uncommon to hear cheering in the midst of a boardame tournament. At a big event like WBC, several different tournaments will go on in the same room, and some games are noisy by their very nature. If you want to concentrate, don't even think about playing anywhere near the Can't Stop tournament (and I can think of a lot of games that applies to).
2) Boardgamers are going for trophies or plaques, not money. In fact, I've never seen money awarded at a boardgame convention, except maybe in the form of game store or dealer's room gift certificates. At WBC, the top players (usually the top 3 or 4 or 5 finalists, depending on how many people competed in that particular tournament) get plaques -- the first place plaque is bigger than the second place plaque, etc.. These plaques are so popular that WBC participants talk about how badly they want to "win wood". I am the proud owner of three WBC plaques -- a first, a third and a fourth., as well as about 8 trophies from other game conventions. And long after the Scrabble money is spent, the plaques and trophies are still there for all to see.
3) There are a lot of similarities between competitive Scrabble players and competitive boardgame players: they both tend to be smart, and yes, there is a preponderance of "nerds" (and I use the term affectionately, because I count myself among them). But Scrabble tournaments appear to be more diverse: there are more women (particularly in the lower divisions), there are more people of colour, and the age range is much greater. In Scrabble, it's common to find people in their 60s, 70s or even 80s competing.. As I look around at my fellow boardgamers as I write this post, it looks like everyone is in their 40s or 50s. That's not really true -- there are kids and older folks (including my husband Jim) who compete. But the group here appears to be more homogenous.
4) The competitive boardgame hobby has tried for years to develop a rating system, but so far, all attempts have been pretty dismal. There's something called an AREA rating based on a player's performance at WBC, but since many game masters don't bother handing in detailed results, the ratings are not very acccurate. Several years ago, WBC started awarding "laurels" (like rating points) to players who placed in the final rounds of their games, and our badges list how many laurels we have acquired over the years (I have 107, for example). But unlike Scrabble ratings, no one really pays attention to them, and there is nothing to show what game they won the laurel's for.
Well, it's off to my next game. I lost my first heat of Empire Builder by a measly $8 (given that you win when you reach $250 and I had $242, that's like losing a Scrabble game by a handful of points. There are two more heats, so there's still a chance for me to make the semis. In the meantime, I'm off to play Ivanhoe, a light card game with a medieval knight theme.
1) Scrabble tournaments are quiet. So quiet that if a person talks during a game -- or even worse, if a cellphone goes off -- the noise is drowned out by a chorus of Sh-sh-sh-ing,. Boardgame tournaments are noisy - very, very noisy. People often comment on their moves, their position, other people's moves, and so on. And it's not uncommon to hear cheering in the midst of a boardame tournament. At a big event like WBC, several different tournaments will go on in the same room, and some games are noisy by their very nature. If you want to concentrate, don't even think about playing anywhere near the Can't Stop tournament (and I can think of a lot of games that applies to).
2) Boardgamers are going for trophies or plaques, not money. In fact, I've never seen money awarded at a boardgame convention, except maybe in the form of game store or dealer's room gift certificates. At WBC, the top players (usually the top 3 or 4 or 5 finalists, depending on how many people competed in that particular tournament) get plaques -- the first place plaque is bigger than the second place plaque, etc.. These plaques are so popular that WBC participants talk about how badly they want to "win wood". I am the proud owner of three WBC plaques -- a first, a third and a fourth., as well as about 8 trophies from other game conventions. And long after the Scrabble money is spent, the plaques and trophies are still there for all to see.
3) There are a lot of similarities between competitive Scrabble players and competitive boardgame players: they both tend to be smart, and yes, there is a preponderance of "nerds" (and I use the term affectionately, because I count myself among them). But Scrabble tournaments appear to be more diverse: there are more women (particularly in the lower divisions), there are more people of colour, and the age range is much greater. In Scrabble, it's common to find people in their 60s, 70s or even 80s competing.. As I look around at my fellow boardgamers as I write this post, it looks like everyone is in their 40s or 50s. That's not really true -- there are kids and older folks (including my husband Jim) who compete. But the group here appears to be more homogenous.
4) The competitive boardgame hobby has tried for years to develop a rating system, but so far, all attempts have been pretty dismal. There's something called an AREA rating based on a player's performance at WBC, but since many game masters don't bother handing in detailed results, the ratings are not very acccurate. Several years ago, WBC started awarding "laurels" (like rating points) to players who placed in the final rounds of their games, and our badges list how many laurels we have acquired over the years (I have 107, for example). But unlike Scrabble ratings, no one really pays attention to them, and there is nothing to show what game they won the laurel's for.
Well, it's off to my next game. I lost my first heat of Empire Builder by a measly $8 (given that you win when you reach $250 and I had $242, that's like losing a Scrabble game by a handful of points. There are two more heats, so there's still a chance for me to make the semis. In the meantime, I'm off to play Ivanhoe, a light card game with a medieval knight theme.