Actually, I’m quite serious...

My wargaming example wasn’t conjured out of thin air â€" it’s a real-life example of a problem that nearly killed a club I frequented quite a few years ago.

Basically, a handful of members got to the point where they were so sick and tired of getting thrashed every time they showed up and played one of the old-timers that they threatened to leave the club. Was it childish? Perhaps... But in all honesty, I could sympathise with them.

You say that “a lot of thought and consideration goes into setting up a contest and keep it fair to all, but still be fun”. But the problem is that, apparently, some of the members (myself included, I’ll freely admit) feel that this contest isn’t really fair at all. And thus, it isn’t really that much fun either.

As stated before, you don’t want a NFL team to play against a high school team, right? But, in a sense, that’s what’s happening here. We have noobs butting heads with veterans and, honestly, is it any surprise if the noobs feel that that is a bit unfair?

Perhaps my statement about paying for the contest was a bit too much. If so, then I apologize. But look at it this way (just to play the Devil’s advocate): If I build a model as part of the competition I will have to pay for the privilege of getting soundly beaten by the veterans, all the while working under a stressing deadline that always seems to be way too close for comfort. If I don’t participate, then I get to build the model at my own pace with no down payment, no deadline, no competition, and no stress. No, I won’t have a chance at getting any of the loot then, but that doesn’t really matter, does it? Because I wouldn’t have gotten any of it anyway. And I’d still get as much feedback on my build as I would, had I participated in the contest. So why participate in the first place? It actually detracts from my enjoyment of the build...

Now, let me put these questions out there, for everyone to ponder and (hopefully) answer:

What do the veterans get out of competing in a contest where the majority of contestants are no threat to them?

Considering that they won’t stand a chance of winning, what are the noobs supposed to get out of the contest that they couldn’t have gotten out of this site in the first place?

What would be the harm in splitting the contest into categories for noobs and veterans?

Finally, let me just state, once again, that I’m not, in any way whatsoever, trying to detract from what’s being done here. In fact, I’m really happy about having competed in last year’s contest as that helped rekindle my love for scale model building.

What does scare me a bit though, is the thought that, as the contest hopefully grows in popularity, it will become known as a noob-hostile competition where the veterans get to win over the hapless noobs year after year. And yes, I’m speaking from experience here, having seen what happen to the aforementioned club when the split between the noobs and the veterans became too big. And I really don’t want to see that happen here...