Tennis Tournaments: Difference between revisions
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[[File:Goldenrule.jpeg|thumb|alt=No one wins at tennis, ever!|The golden rule of tennis.]] | [[File:Goldenrule.jpeg|thumb|alt=No one wins at tennis, ever!|The golden rule of tennis.]] | ||
Forum sites will often have accolades for participating in tournament matches and a rarely-given one for if a tournament is won; on the [[YouChew]] forums it was usually a micro-sized render of a standard real-life tennis trophy, having been used in its most familiar form from July 2010 until September 2018. Since 2019, when {{dew}} designed a new version of the award for YTPMania<ref>https://ytpmania.net/t/tennis-badge-request-backlog-goes-here/4528/15</ref>, the "Golden Cube of Victor" has gone to the tournament winner. Expanding on a YouChew-era award of a "silver wreath" for completing 10 tournament matches, various "precious metal"-themed tennis racquet badges also go to players who have won (or later on, participated in) enough individual tournament matches, now accounting for 1, 10, 25, and 40 tournament matches played<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/29/awarded-list</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/30/awarded-list</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/31/awarded-list</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/32/awarded-list</ref>. Even if players end up winning more than a single tournament, every winner only ever receives one maximum. | Forum sites will often have accolades for participating in tournament matches and a rarely-given one for if a tournament is won; on the [[YouChew]] forums it was usually a micro-sized render of a standard real-life tennis trophy, having been used in its most familiar form from July 2010 until September 2018. Since 2019, when {{dew}} designed a new version of the award for YTPMania<ref>https://ytpmania.net/t/tennis-badge-request-backlog-goes-here/4528/15</ref>, the "Golden Cube of Victor" has gone to the tournament winner, with this being expanded into including "The Silver Cube of Second Best" for tournament finalists and "The Bronze Cube of Admirability" for tournament semifinalists, which were added to [[YellowTealPurple]] on June 17, 2025<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/forum-changelog.403/post-26907</ref>. Expanding on a YouChew-era award of a "silver wreath" for completing 10 tournament matches, various "precious metal"-themed tennis racquet badges also go to players who have won (or later on, participated in) enough individual tournament matches, now accounting for 1, 10, 25, and 40 tournament matches played<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/29/awarded-list</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/30/awarded-list</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/31/awarded-list</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/ozzmodz-badges/32/awarded-list</ref>. Even if players end up winning more than a single tournament, every winner only ever receives one maximum. | ||
= History = | = History = | ||
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==[[YouChew]] era== | ==[[YouChew]] era== | ||
The proper YouChew era of tennis tournaments is considered to have begun with the [[Tennis Cup]]. It was the first tournament to occur during the Rabbit/TINS era, and the first tournament where the [[tennis staff]] had become established as a central element to the tennis community. All members that would be on the staff during the event participated, and one({{NS2}}) even made it [[Ishkibibl vs. NS2|to the final match.]] | The proper YouChew era of tennis tournaments is considered to have begun with the [[Tennis Cup]]. It was the first tournament to occur during the Rabbit/TINS era, the first based around player elimination as determined by voting, and the first tournament where the [[tennis staff]] had become established as a central element to the tennis community. All members that would be on the staff during the event participated, and one({{NS2}}) even made it [[Ishkibibl vs. NS2|to the final match.]] | ||
Up until about the end of the [[Tennis League 3]], an ill-fated event which became considered failed after only a month, competitive tennis was seen to have been at its most freewheeling, with players clearly participating out of a sense of mutual enjoyment. As the initial events mostly took place as a way to bring people together and play matches entirely, there was no clear "meta" for victory in competitive matches up to this point; players clearly engaged matches in the ways that they felt most comfortable, and whether or not they won was purely by fortunate happenstance. A clear moment when this began to change can be identified with the beginning with the [[Doubles Cup 1]], the first tournament in which the tennis staff assumed control and influence over their taking place. The match of Terrorist + Nuthead vs. GameBop + MycroProcessor(2008) ended up failing after only 4 rounds, with no collaborative rounds being made, due to Terrorist finding tennis becoming "more competitive and serious than it is fun" and subsequently deciding to retire from it: | Up until about the end of the [[Tennis League 3]], an ill-fated event which became considered failed after only a month, competitive tennis was seen to have been at its most freewheeling, with players clearly participating out of a sense of mutual enjoyment. As the initial events mostly took place as a way to bring people together and play matches entirely, there was no clear "meta" for victory in competitive matches up to this point; players clearly engaged matches in the ways that they felt most comfortable, and whether or not they won was purely by fortunate happenstance. A clear moment when this began to change can be identified with the beginning with the [[Doubles Cup 1]], the first tournament in which the tennis staff assumed control and influence over their taking place. The match of Terrorist + Nuthead vs. GameBop + MycroProcessor(2008) ended up failing after only 4 rounds, with no collaborative rounds being made, due to Terrorist finding tennis becoming "more competitive and serious than it is fun" and subsequently deciding to retire from it: | ||
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Whatever the case, a schism began to develop for the first time here, and the community at large began to ascribe many of their own individual values as to what made a good tennis round, especially with regards to this developing competitive context. The final match of the [[Doubles Cup 1]] became AjaxCubed + Aesaun vs. MycroProcessor + GameBop(2009), a lineup composed entirely of high intensity, high effect players, three of whom were still relatively new to the community as a whole. It can be argued that the reason that AjaxCubed and Aesaun won this tournament was entirely due to the execution of a 3D visual effect in Final Cut Pro 7 by the former player almost never before seen by the community at the time, gaining them their votes purely from the impression. In the early posts of the Tennis Theory thread on [[YellowTealPurple]], this was a theory posited by {{dew}} as she began to attempt to chronicle the journey of tennis to the present day<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/tennis-theory-five-oh-build-me-up-and-tear-me-down.15/post-4873</ref>. | Whatever the case, a schism began to develop for the first time here, and the community at large began to ascribe many of their own individual values as to what made a good tennis round, especially with regards to this developing competitive context. The final match of the [[Doubles Cup 1]] became AjaxCubed + Aesaun vs. MycroProcessor + GameBop(2009), a lineup composed entirely of high intensity, high effect players, three of whom were still relatively new to the community as a whole. It can be argued that the reason that AjaxCubed and Aesaun won this tournament was entirely due to the execution of a 3D visual effect in Final Cut Pro 7 by the former player almost never before seen by the community at the time, gaining them their votes purely from the impression. In the early posts of the Tennis Theory thread on [[YellowTealPurple]], this was a theory posited by {{dew}} as she began to attempt to chronicle the journey of tennis to the present day<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/tennis-theory-five-oh-build-me-up-and-tear-me-down.15/post-4873</ref>. | ||
On March 12, 2009, an image macro containing the phrase in impact font text "NO ONE WINS AT TENNIS EVER", created by Emperor Ing, began to get posted and circulated around the tennis section. This has since become embraced as the Golden Rule of tennis, a foundational principle upon which to remember to allow players to remember that fun, above victory, is what matters most in tennis. {{dew}} has subsequently referred to the very concept of tennis tournaments as the "Great Riddle" of tennis, outlining the question "How do you win in a game where no one wins?", with the answer intended to be that there isn't - or shouldn't be - any strictly defined way to do so.<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/tennis-theory-five-oh-build-me-up-and-tear-me-down.15/post-21591</ref><ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-three-way-tennis-tournament-ii-intermission-period.653/post-22775</ref> | |||
Ultimately though, the readiness of the community at the time to fully and truly embrace this philosophy was either slow, scattershot or questionable at best potentially due to the social competitive nature of the rest of YouChew itself. 2009 in particular is seen as an era where the constituency for "simple, classic" tennis competed directly with the "complex, effect-based" constituency for attention across multiple tournaments that took place that year, though it was almost always done out of a positive, good-natured spirit. The [[Windows Movie Master]], [[Tennis Season]] and [[Grey Tennis Tournament]] all saw matches played separately in both camps of style preference as well as matches with a player each representing either side becoming directly matched with each other, leading to exchanges of near diametric opposite approaches such as piodx vs. RAKninja(2009), GameBop vs. Emperor Ing(2009), and [[vvaluigi vs. MycroProcessor]](2009). Around this same time, complex and heavy editing began to very definitively take over the very nature of tennis itself, as players such as {{CorruptionSound}}, rapskallionxyz, Skrimpish, DanielRadcliffe777 and Sploltoen either entered into the community already steeped in this language of editing out the gate or began to truly become prominent as they took on many elements of this language of editing that became part of their signature. During this era, older players such as TangerineImpz continued to express grievances with "what tennis has become" in regards to their own disenchantment<ref>https://ftlfw.net/archives/websites/youchew.net/archive/forum/16-poop-tennis/57018-the-gray-tennis-tournament-champion-revealed/1</ref>. From late 2009 onward, a lot of these earlier generations of players would leave the game behind entirely. | Ultimately though, the readiness of the community at the time to fully and truly embrace this philosophy was either slow, scattershot or questionable at best potentially due to the social competitive nature of the rest of YouChew itself. 2009 in particular is seen as an era where the constituency for "simple, classic" tennis competed directly with the "complex, effect-based" constituency for attention across multiple tournaments that took place that year, though it was almost always done out of a positive, good-natured spirit. The [[Windows Movie Master]], [[Tennis Season]] and [[Grey Tennis Tournament]] all saw matches played separately in both camps of style preference as well as matches with a player each representing either side becoming directly matched with each other, leading to exchanges of near diametric opposite approaches such as piodx vs. RAKninja(2009), GameBop vs. Emperor Ing(2009), and [[vvaluigi vs. MycroProcessor]](2009). Around this same time, complex and heavy editing began to very definitively take over the very nature of tennis itself, as players such as {{CorruptionSound}}, rapskallionxyz, Skrimpish, DanielRadcliffe777 and Sploltoen either entered into the community already steeped in this language of editing out the gate or began to truly become prominent as they took on many elements of this language of editing that became part of their signature. During this era, older players such as TangerineImpz continued to express grievances with "what tennis has become" in regards to their own disenchantment<ref>https://ftlfw.net/archives/websites/youchew.net/archive/forum/16-poop-tennis/57018-the-gray-tennis-tournament-champion-revealed/1</ref>. From late 2009 onward, a lot of these earlier generations of players would leave the game behind entirely. | ||
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==YTPMania era== | ==YTPMania era== | ||
The end of | The end of YouChew created a complete system reset in the tennis community, with many people calling it quits with the site, including the entire lineup of active tennis staff. As a result, new members of staff were chosen, with much of the mentors from the previous era simply were not there or choosing to not be very outspoken. Supported at least in part due to certain favoritism toward the highly technical matches of old by members such as mrdoognoog, a distorted view of tennis developed that focused much more on competitive behavior than before - younger members once again dominated the community with few elders present to provide a historical context around how tennis has evolved into the present. The tournaments created in this era - The [[Tennis League 5]], [[Match Voting Tournament 2]], [[Doubles Cup 4]] and the [[Tennis Cup 5]] - became very grandiose and long-going, with turnovers becoming much larger as rounds became much more complex and designed specifically to impress viewers rather than to use the previous round in creative ways. The collective attitude was also much more prone to drama and negative sentiments due to unchecked competitive behavior, and is thusly considered to be a relative dark age for the medium. The [[Tennis Cup 5]], the final tournament of the YTPMania era, whilst announced on the forum and discussed there to some extent, there were very few threads created for the matches of this tournament. Whilst there were very few major arguments, this tournament is seen as a general low point. | ||
As the TC5 concluded, a wave of old tennis regulars including NESfanboi, {{TheChutley}}, {{dani_phantump}}, {{trepmaws}}, and {{theFXexpert}} returned to the community, inspiring the additional return to video craft by players such as {{Metroid998}}, {{GameBop}}, fiv95, Sid, and even {{AshcrementVII}} from the fringes. {{dani_phantump}} in particular returned to an outspoken role regarding discussions, theories and dissections around tennis where and the journey it has been on across its history, leading to the return of more critical thought than was previously present in the community. This would set the stage for the events and the era of tennis that was to follow. | |||
As the TC5 concluded, a wave of old tennis regulars including NESfanboi, {{TheChutley}}, {{dani_phantump}}, {{trepmaws}}, and {{theFXexpert}} returned to the community, inspiring the additional return to video craft by players such as {{Metroid998}}, {{GameBop}}, fiv95, Sid, and even {{AshcrementVII}} from the fringes. This would set the stage for the events and the era of tennis that was to follow. | |||
==YellowTealPurple Era== | ==YellowTealPurple Era== | ||
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The next tennis tournament's planning phase began relatively early, right in the middle of the second set of 3WTT2. On March 30th, 2025, it was announced that the next tournament would be decided based on a vote from the people rather than internally; the first of its kind. The three options were a third Match Voting Tournament (MVT3), a second Tennis Season (TS2), or a second Triples Tennis Tournament (TTT2). While the Tennis Season 2 initially jumped from a close to a clear lead in votes<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-video-tennis-cafe-today-i-opened-the-gate-and-was-about-to-begin-modifications-when-a-figure-suddenly-appeared-on-the-other-side.30/post-19269</ref>, some votes ended up pivoting to the last minute to the Match Voting Tournament 3 as the next "official" event (not accounting for other side events that could take place concurrently<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-video-tennis-cafe-today-i-opened-the-gate-and-was-about-to-begin-modifications-when-a-figure-suddenly-appeared-on-the-other-side.30/post-19216</ref>). This was reasoned to be for allowing a focus on match quality to take precedence to allow the newer community to truly embody the full "spirit" of tennis as its long been understood, along with allowing time for another Season to fully develop as an event.<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-video-tennis-cafe-today-i-opened-the-gate-and-was-about-to-begin-modifications-when-a-figure-suddenly-appeared-on-the-other-side.30/post-19798</ref> | The next tennis tournament's planning phase began relatively early, right in the middle of the second set of 3WTT2. On March 30th, 2025, it was announced that the next tournament would be decided based on a vote from the people rather than internally; the first of its kind. The three options were a third Match Voting Tournament (MVT3), a second Tennis Season (TS2), or a second Triples Tennis Tournament (TTT2). While the Tennis Season 2 initially jumped from a close to a clear lead in votes<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-video-tennis-cafe-today-i-opened-the-gate-and-was-about-to-begin-modifications-when-a-figure-suddenly-appeared-on-the-other-side.30/post-19269</ref>, some votes ended up pivoting to the last minute to the Match Voting Tournament 3 as the next "official" event (not accounting for other side events that could take place concurrently<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-video-tennis-cafe-today-i-opened-the-gate-and-was-about-to-begin-modifications-when-a-figure-suddenly-appeared-on-the-other-side.30/post-19216</ref>). This was reasoned to be for allowing a focus on match quality to take precedence to allow the newer community to truly embody the full "spirit" of tennis as its long been understood, along with allowing time for another Season to fully develop as an event.<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-video-tennis-cafe-today-i-opened-the-gate-and-was-about-to-begin-modifications-when-a-figure-suddenly-appeared-on-the-other-side.30/post-19798</ref> | ||
The 3-Way Tennis | The 3-Way Tennis Tournament 2 proved to further reveal various tensions and frustrations with the current state of tennis - with deep-rooted problems surfacing or coming to light for the first time in the community. | ||
In both the Tennis Theory thread and the tournament thread itself on the forums, very thorough and passionate posts were made in which various members expressed these feelings, whether about what they observed in tennis in general or about what they observed in specific matches they played - recontextualizing the previous tournament as a general low point, and cementing the word "trapezoidium" into common tennis jargon | |||
{{dew}} was the writer of the majority of the longest posts, in addition to reviews written for each match of the tournament in which she expressed her initial thoughts, in an effort by her to chronicle the exact current state of tennis and where it could go while taking in the input of other community regulars. | |||
Whilst the 3WTT2 was seen by some as an improvement over the previous tournament<ref>https://yellowtealpurple.net/forums/threads/the-three-way-tennis-tournament-ii-intermission-period.653/post-12720</ref>, allowing for more fun than the low, slow burn of TC5, it was apparent the overall experience remained a turbulent one, and so ultimately, due to observing that many players in the tournament including herself were feeling exhausted and stressed from the competitive pressures that had come to pervade this side of tennis, an "Intermission" period of one month was instituted by her into the tournament to allow everyone to cool off and relax, lasting from May 6 to June 6, 2025. This pushed the start of Set 3 of this tournament a month in advance to allow the chance of refreshment for all still involved. | |||
==The Future== | ==The Future== | ||