Hey,

This weekend, there is an EDH tournament in our shop.
It's a multiplay format.
The prices are judge foils and FtV:Relics cards. The players with the most points can choose a card first. So everyone has something.

But how do you get points?
There are two ways.
1. Certain plays, or deckbuilding. Classics like
"play most for general"
"I know my ABC"
"only creatures and land in deck"
"True Elder dragon"
"no rares"
...

2. each player get 10 Points/player that he or she can divide among the players.
and 15 points for killing someone.

That's a lot of points you can divide. So I was thinking. What is the best way to get a lot of points form other players.
It makes diplomatic plays more important. And combo will not make you popular of course.

Not that I'm going for the win, I go for having fun. But it made me thinking.

So what strategy is best if you play for points.

Well, that point system seems very indefinite (poorly defined), and lacking thought. Given that, I'd say the easiest way to win on points, is to simply be the one that kills everyone else. Go for the Jugular!

Or, you could just try to have a good time.

Yes, of course I go for fun .

But for some reason, I was thinking how you should play to make other people give you points.

The first thing you think of is playing a general like the blue Braids, and give other people all kind of things. But that is forcing it too much and I don't think that will deserve you points. You need a more subtle way.

Well, don't try to be a rat bastard player. Be upfront, honest, show yourself to be trustworthy. Be polite to everyone.

Trying to play group hug will probably not earn you a lot of points.

Screaming and harassing others to do your bidding, will probably not earn you a lot of points either.

IOW, just be cool, probably play some kind of control deck, don't go aggro, especially early. Let the other players kill each other, while you present yourself as a nontarget. (walls, and other obvious defenses).

I wouldn't give my points to the guy who sat back and tried to play puppetmaster.

Exactly why my first post basically said "stuff it, kill them."

And your reaction would depend on you actually understanding that he had been manipulating you.

The problem is one of being subtle enough to not engage ire, but still register on peoples' radar enough to actual earn any of their descretionary points whatsoever. IMO, it probably isn't worth the trouble worrying about.

I guess people generally would avoid giving points to the winner. Try to build something that people would never expect to see hoping to get some points for creativity & fun. Hell, i'd give my points to the Norin player over the Sharuum-fotm anyday.

Even if you should end up choosing some ridiculously underpowered general(or maybe a wierd tribal?) you should still be able to atleast knock one guy out and get most of the politics points.

Get to know the people around you
some people will give you points for super group hug (probply your best bet)
someone will give you points for a creative deck
Some will give points for a cool play even

you should know the people

Play all-creature Vaevictis Asmadi. Oooh yeah. Jund colours have a bunch of CA available through creatures (Hello Garruk's Horde/Oracle of Mul Daya), and a single swing is good for a kill if you have Brawn in the GY.

Or you can just play to combo out the table and claim points for killing everyone - it'll pick up more than they can give out (you take 15 from each player, they can only hand out 10...)

Free for all has too many random variables.

In teams you can give out more points based on how long the game lasts. Like beyond turn 10. 20. 30. somehow.

Good idea for rewarding the style of play.

If you're playing to win, without knowing the actual rewardable points in the league, a surefire strategy is a rather rough to place down. That said, I can assure you that if your shop is using the Armada Games League Point System that you can use a deck that I call "The Point Farmer" to achieve around 40+ points a game, consistantly around turn 8 or so.

It's a deck that I'd rather not post the contents of as it really, really, really destroys the point of a point based league, and can warp the whole league after you play one round.

It really makes you feel like a tool for playing it, as it serioulsy has only one point, and that is to wind up being first place by leaps and bounds by the time you're done with your game.

LOL - this seems like it runs against the whole point of the point system. Why do people always wnt to break things? (myself includeD lol)

If you've designed a point system with a goal in mind other than encouraging the activities to which you've assigned point values, you should probably just ride the short bus back to the Pokemon tournament down the street.

It actually, technically does and does not run against the whole point of the point system.

Yes, the point system is intended to encourage a certain play style. And it encourages less than optimal card choices in order to benefit from the system.

However, that's only on day one. What the point system encourages after day one is a certain deck construction style. Case in point, there's an Armada League point called "English Only" which entails the destruction of a foreign language card with an english language card. In the league I ran, any one who had a foreign langauge card in their deck either A) removed all of them to deprive their opposition from scoring the point, or b) only played the card when they had an immidiate answer to it.

So, that all said, the best way to utilize the point system is to have about 120 achievable point awards, and only have 20 or so active per game. That way no one can build a deck able to achieve every awardable goal, and the game is random enough to where the points they may have built their deck for may nto even be in the mix.

Our local group does a "Gauntlet" where your deck is used multi (4-player pod), 2 v 2, 1 v1.

Points are as follows:

Multi: 1 point per kill, 1 point for last man, infinite combo out nets only 1 point for last man.
Conceding in this portion eliminates you from the event. Suicide from Necro and so on eliminates you from the event.
2 v 2: 1 point per opponent killed, extra point if both teammates survived.
1 v 1: 1 point per game won.