Guns Of Icarus Online

Community => Community Events => Topic started by: Urz on February 13, 2014, 02:26:36 am

Title: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Urz on February 13, 2014, 02:26:36 am
Currently I am running the Saturday Box Social at the same 4pm EST (9pm UTC) time slot as the Cogs which preceded it. The Sunday Rumble originally was run at that time slot as well (on Sunday), but was moved an hour earlier to be easier on the Europeans. I'm proposing this question in regards to both the on-going Box Social, and the larger tournament which is coming soon.

Would you guys like to see Saturday events moved to 3pm?
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Skrimskraw on February 13, 2014, 05:13:08 am
+ 1 from our side, but can this be done after the aerodrome?
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Urz on February 13, 2014, 05:14:58 am
It would probably happen after Aerodrome was finished.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Sammy B. T. on February 13, 2014, 11:15:04 am
I got Australians and a few Japanese to look after on the Ducks. 3 PM Saturday means 4:30 AM for the Aussies members of my team and when you factor in most people want an hour before a tourney starts we got people starting at 3:30 AM.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Byron Cavendish on February 13, 2014, 11:51:40 am
I know most of the European Gents would love earlier times (as well as for the Rumble) and I would love that they are less cranky with me on Sunday when I say PRACTICE TIME! *ding, ding, ding*
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Imagine on February 13, 2014, 11:54:05 am
As a note, no matter when you schedule, someone will always live somewhere that gets shafted >.>
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Wundsalz on February 13, 2014, 02:17:55 pm
As a note, no matter when you schedule, someone will always live somewhere that gets shafted >.>
While that's true, the US and EU player-bases are the major fractions of our community. Hence it makes sense to try to find an arrangement which suits the needs of these two.

Rhinos prefer 3pm EST over 4pm EST for any weekend event.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Sammy B. T. on February 13, 2014, 02:28:39 pm
4pm was already havoc for our Australians but was manageable. I don't have as much sympathy for the Europeans starting at 9, 10, or even 11PM as I do for the Aussies having to play at 5:30 AM
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Byron Cavendish on February 13, 2014, 03:32:35 pm
As a note, no matter when you schedule, someone will always live somewhere that gets shafted >.>
While that's true, the US and EU player-bases are the major fractions of our community. Hence it makes sense to try to find an arrangement which suits the needs of these two.

Rhinos prefer 3pm EST over 4pm EST for any weekend event.

Exactly, I feel for the Pacific area peoples, but just looking at demographics across the board, I actually think there are even more Europeans in this game than North Americans.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: ramjamslam on February 13, 2014, 03:35:07 pm
Since you are talking about how Aussies might be affected, I will tell you how it does affect me.

I have definitely missed both Saturday and Sunday events because I have slept in.  Saturday and Sunday events pose different problems for me though.  Sunday Rumble starts at 6am on Monday morning my time, that means if Sacrilege make the final I might not get to work until 10 or 11am which can be stretching the friendship with my Employer.  So for Sunday Rumble I would personally rather it start earlier and not have 1 or 2 hour waits between matches so I'm not late to work every Monday morning.

Saturday Box social does not have the same constraints.  This is an event that my clan has signed up for multiple times, and one that I have always missed due to sleeping in until after 6am on Sunday morning.

For me I prefer Sunday events earlier and Saturday events later.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Morblitz on February 14, 2014, 12:25:40 am
I too request that Saturday stay at 4pm. From my personal example, that's a 5:30am start for me, I need to get up at 4:30am for these events if I'm going to warm up. That's not THAT bad -  well okay it sucks but I can get to bed early and get up in time for it - it's doable. However, a 3pm start means I'm getting up at 3:30 now, it's too late to stay up for it, and it's too early to get any kind of decent sleep before hand. It locks me out entirely, and I think it might be the same way for some other Australians and perhaps some Japanese.

I know there's more Europeans than others, but still, I've always thought 4pm was a decent compromise so that everyone (or at least most people around the world) can attend.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Squidslinger Gilder on February 14, 2014, 03:49:44 am
Well...from what I've seen, we've have a large "competitive" playerbase that is in Europe. One that just keeps growing. Heck theres just myself and I think about 2 US players in our group that are active or semi active anymore. Our EU players have been much more consistent Lot of the folks from other guilds that I know are EU too. Numbers I catch from them also point to larger EU playerbases than US or anywhere else.

I don't mind either time. I kinda like the later cause I'm west coast and generally stay up till 5am anyways. But ultimately thats just an alarm clock away from resolving. If we really have a larger EU competitive playerbase then I'd rather see them be able to make matches. Heck, even switch the servers to EU servers. I hear they were moved to France now and it is visible the difference. EU servers used to be the worst but now I'm having less lag issues than I am on US servers which is nuts. Having a better connection to France than I am to a US server...never thought I'd see the day.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Von Zincington on February 14, 2014, 06:23:00 am
4pm was already havoc for our Australians but was manageable. I don't have as much sympathy for the Europeans starting at 9, 10, or even 11PM as I do for the Aussies having to play at 5:30 AM

You may not be seeing this as an issue, but some of us do have things to do on a Sunday morning and starting at 10 or 11 at night in Europe would really be an issue for some. Given that the matches take up to 1hr 45min (including time between maps), that means in a tournament with 6 teams the finals could finish as late as 3:15 UTC with a 22:00 UTC (17:00 ET) start (this is a worst case scenario with either 2 streams or 1 half of the bracket being unstreamed). And that's just for the UK and Ireland time wise, I know many (if not most) of the communities euro players are in UTC+1.

No ill will to our Aussie or Asian players, but a later start is not ideal from a European perspective. I'd be fine with 1600 ET, but would prefer 1500 ET.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: RearAdmiralZill on February 14, 2014, 08:05:57 am
I prefer 4pm.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Sammy B. T. on February 14, 2014, 09:12:30 am
I'm not trying to push it later than 4PM ET. I know its tough for the Aussies but it is still doable. They represent a fairly active minority in the com scene.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Tropo on February 14, 2014, 10:27:20 am
sacrilege has a lot of aussies. im one of them i would like to see everyone happy with the time, i think the 4est is a good and fair time i have 3 members from uk 3 and 3 usa and 2 aussies in our core member and a whole lot of other people and that is our favrite time to play. western Australians would have to get up and 4am which would be crazy. 6am for my queensland brother ram
and im lucky 7am for me

just so people know there is currently a good number of aussie coming in to our competitive teams sac has 3 i hear duck has a couple and i know there are a couple in other clans so i have been told

there a 2 full aussie/Asian teams coming up they haven't made it to competitive yet but i hope to see them here soon

on that note i would like to see it stay on 4est times Saturday playing from 9 to 1 or 2 in the morning with no work on a sunday the next day. sounds way better then getting up early on a Sunday.

plus competitive wise the oceanic region has i higher grade of competitive players (in other competitive games)and would be a shame to rule them out all together due to just a time restraint
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: Captain Smollett on February 14, 2014, 01:11:35 pm
sacrilege has a lot of aussies. im one of them i would like to see everyone happy with the time, i think the 4est is a good and fair time i have 3 members from uk 3 and 3 usa and 2 aussies in our core member and a whole lot of other people and that is our favrite time to play. western Australians would have to get up and 4am which would be crazy. 6am for my queensland brother ram
and im lucky 7am for me

just so people know there is currently a good number of aussie coming in to our competitive teams sac has 3 i hear duck has a couple and i know there are a couple in other clans so i have been told

there a 2 full aussie/Asian teams coming up they haven't made it to competitive yet but i hope to see them here soon

on that note i would like to see it stay on 4est times Saturday playing from 9 to 1 or 2 in the morning with no work on a sunday the next day. sounds way better then getting up early on a Sunday.

plus competitive wise the oceanic region has i higher grade of competitive players (in other competitive games)and would be a shame to rule them out all together due to just a time restraint

The former paddling had a composition very similar to what tropo has now.

Honestly to me the fairest thing would be to keep the 4pm time but to structure the event so that it takes less than 3 hours.  Cogs used to frequently take less than 2 and at times took less than 1.

The new Saturday event will be the preminent event in GOI.  Having things like, two streamers, best of 1s time limits etc could really move things along making it better for spectators, castors and players alike.

tl;dr I think it would be best to start at 4pm so everyone can play but keep the tournament relatively short so that Europeans can get a fair amount of sleep and everyone else can have enough time for their non goi life.
Title: Re: Saturday tournament scheduling: 3pm EST or 4pm EST (or other)?
Post by: ramjamslam on February 14, 2014, 06:16:47 pm
and im lucky 7am for me
Daylight savings doesn't last forever though :p

On that note though EST does go in and out of daylight savings so it does make it confusing when agreeing on a time to do it in EST rather than GMT or UTC.  With EST going into daylight savings soon and other timezones coming off daylight savings it will change the difference between EST and local time by 2 hours in some places so are we going to have this same conversation next month when all the times change?