Recent comments

Angus, I've never seen you write anything so 100% on the money. (I'm talking about your post "I don't know much about what has gone into Oly's decision. But I'm going to take a guess...")

Which state did DeRanged, Psycho Babble and Ecko reside in? How far did they have to travel to practice with and play for RMRG?

At this point in the game's development, "doing everything they can possibly do to win" is not necessarily the best thing for the sport. From standing to sausage to flying in players, just because something is legal doesn't mean it's right. Having a fast, hard-hitting, exciting game that keeps bringing fans back is the best thing for the sport.

I work in the board and roleplaying game industry. There's nothing the vast majority of players hate than "rules lawyers", those players who exploit loopholes in the rules so they can win, the spirit of the game be damned. I certainly don't like it any more in D&D than I do in roller derby.

Our league teaches new skaters when they join that they should think "league first, team second, yourself last". Perhaps we should place "the sport" in front of that.

Around Besterns/Transfergate last year, Atomatrix alluded to Oly getting "our car tires slashed, cut off our pony-tails, or be called shady old bitches."

This kind of stuff keeps coming up when talking about Oly, so I have to wonder if it isn't a coincidence.

I don't support vandalization, but was there any evidence that the vandalization of their rink was done by people from the derby community as opposed to some bored thurston county sociopaths?

By my highly unofficial count: Around 50 in 2012, probably a dozen or two more this year, so far. But that was more than enough play time to change the things that were obviously bad and needed to be changed immediately, like effectively having different rules during regular jams and power jams regarding the pivot's scoring abilities, or having an eight-seat penalty box., etc.

The thing that's going to take time is refinement, and confirmation if that refinement actually works. Having a lot of games played under a ruleset helps with that a lot, obviously. So part of the challenge facing USARS is not only working on an alternative ruleset, but having teams choose to play it. The more teams play it, the more games are played, the more they are refined, the more attractive they become to teams, and so the cycle goes.

So like I said, three years is a fair grace period to see how their rules are coming along, as well as how many teams they've got, if they're making meaningful inroads as far as growth in that department, if/how they'll play into international sanctioning or compeition, etc. etc., But USARS landing The 2009 WFTDA Champion Oly Before-They-Were-Really-A-Superteam Rollers is a pretty staggering way to open their account.

The whole slow-pack play deal that Denver invented happened in 2009. Some series of events later, the sausage was born. It's still here in 2013. It may still be around in 2014. Who knows.

I don't know for sure what is or isn't good for the game. The only thing I know for sure is the game. Ultimately, my end goal in all of this is to do whatever I can to help make sure the best possible game is being played by the players I know in my heart of hearts are capable of playing it, in whatever form or forms it takes; and that it's always available for all players, at all levels, from recreational, to amateur, to eventually the professional level.

I've heard the USARS horror stories. I know that they've screwed it up before. And every once in a while, I hear something that gives me pause about them. But for all the people worrying that USARS is going to change roller derby for the worse, I say this: Isn't roller derby amazing enough that it could change USARS for the better?

Yes, that's my tagline. It's not, "Observations on Derby From The Only Derby Fan That is Also a Sports Fan." Just thought I'd point that out.

People- they didn't play the bouts needed to qualify. That this is unique does not make it strange, new, suspicious- or anything else. I feel for Oly in that they cannot have one routine set back (if it even IS one for them) or make an alternate decision without ceaseless assumptions and conspiracy theories. The tournaments are there for them qualify for, and they know it.
Enjoy the moment, enjoy a newly opened opportunity for another team- and save the drama for when the enter the next tournament with an upset.

How many games are played under the USARS ruleset? How many have been played? They don't exactly have a good laboratory to test things out in just yet. As opposed to yes, years played by many teams under the WFTDA rules. It's easier to find things out that way. Like I said, things have just changed, it's fun to see how things shake out before making more drastic changes.

Four years? There was passive offense happening four years ago? I don't remember it happening back then. I know it's passive offense that you're talking about because you've got one song that you sing, you're a one hit wonder. I think the timeline is a little different than what you're saying.

Why is it that your opinion that what is or isn't good for the game more valuable than that of the voting body of the WFTDA? Who are you exactly? I feel like there's good reason not to trust USARS, and you're pretty close to them.

USARS just fixing things it deems loopholes, willy nilly, without any testing or consensus. Sounds like a great idea. I don't see any potential problems. USARS' ruleset doesn't have any problems, right? Runaway what?

Hey, you liked MADE'S ruleset too, except when smart players like Magnum and Bonnie called off jams in a way you didn't like, though allowed by the ruleset, then you called them names.

I think the problems that you perceive in derby aren't big enough for the majority of skaters in WFTDA that they'd want to give up control to an organization like USARS. The process they have is the process, and it seems to work for the organization. They made some interesting changes this year, and it's neat to see how things are shaking out. A lot of skaters testing and pushing the boundaries of rules is great. Also, skaters are just getting more skilled in general. I do like Hurt's idea about condensing the democracy, but I like the idea of democracy.

Skater oriented vs game oriented? I don't think it's quite what you think.

If you didn't brag about how you're in such close discussion with USARS all the time, I'd call you a shill.

Exactly this.

One of the first things that made stop giving the WFTDA the benefit of the doubt is when they issued the "clarification" back when knee-down starts were starting to become a thing. It was legal to do in the rules, technically. But they had no consensus of what "roller derby" should entail, there was never the process a step above the rules that said, "you know, does this really belong in the contact skating sport of roller derby?" Had that been in place, and not just a judicial review of The Rules As They Are Written, the problem would have been fixed a lot sooner if not right away.

The players' job is to find them, otherwise they're not doing everything they can possibly do to win. However, it shouldn't be the players' job to patch them. You'll inevitably run into a situation (and we're likely seeing it in the WFTDA now) where someone finding a loophole or slight unfairness in the rules tries to preserve it for as long as possible so they can continue to help themselves win by using it.

The process of developing a game platform in the long-term is made a hell of a lot easier if the individual wants and desires of a league is removed from the (direct) process. People shouldn't be thinking, "this is what we want, how do we make our rules fit that?" It should be, "this is what the game is, how do we make our rules fit that?"

At the moment, anyway, this is the difference between the WFTDA "skaters first" philosophy and the USARS "game first" philosophy. In WFTDA, if someone finds a loophole, everyone picks up on it and uses it. After some time, people begin to realize that it may not be the best thing to have in the rules, frustrating a lot of players and fans along the way. But it only then, maybe gets changed when a majority of skating leagues (and no one else) agrees to change it.

In USARS (or at least, this their plan based off my conversations with them) if someone finds a loophole, it will be fixed as soon as possible. This skips the skater/fan frustration and wasting-time parts of the equation, which, in my book, is something worth giving the benefit of the doubt over. For the first couple of years, anyway.

I guess we differ on what we consider a high number. 2-3 games is not a high number to me. The other thing I didn't mention is that playoff teams are incentivized not to schedule additional games since any regular season game will take away the weight playoff games are given.