Marshaling is a rough job. You’re like expected to know the rules and stuff, and actually pay attention, and even though I’m being glib right now, it’s really just exhausting.
In my experience there are really two main strategies to marshaling, and really an infinite variability between people on how well they live up to either ideas.
So the first idea is this: It’s the player’s job to call their shots. Thus, I am here to just really sort out any confusion that might arise in that process. You might not see this marshal make any calls, except a lay on, and they just sort of watch from the sideline. Due to the amount of things going on, this strategy is most often employed during war tournaments, where there may be 50 people clashing at a time, and just one marshal watching.
What’s the down side of this strategy?
Well if you believe that it is the player’s responsibility to call their own shots ( Note: It is. ) and you reinforce that by minimizing your interactions within the fight, you’re more likely to call a refight.
What’s wrong with that? Well, let’s a set up a scenario.
Combatant A and Combatant B are in a single short tournament, one on one.
Combatant B lands a killing shot on Combatant A, followed a second later by Combatant A landing a shot on Combatant B.
CA should have called Dead first, or Don’t Take That, but for some reason does not.
In a fight a second is actually a long time, so Combatant B is confident that his shot landed first, and also does not call dead first.
Late shots are important, and they look to the marshals to handle it. Now a more proactive marshal will probably just call it as it lay, but let’s say they think that player A should have called it, so they just call a refight to give them the opportunity to do it the right way, or something.
More or less the same thing happens--where CA should have made a late call but doesn’t, and CB has to fight a third refight.
Again.
Again.
Finally CB gets killed first, and makes the late call. The match is over, with CA being called the victor.
So like I said this is a made up scenario, and generally speaking not something I’ve experienced. But it illustrates my point very well--- re-fights encourage poor shot calling, because they give the person who should have lost the opportunity to win.
So what might be the answer to that?
The second ideology? Yes.
The second ideology is more or less this: I am the marshal, it’s my job to make sure everything is done correctly and I’m going to make it happen.
This marshal does their best to call everything as it happens. They don’t care if you’re going to get up in their business because you think they’re wrong. Your opinion doesn’t really matter.
Sounds great, right? An impartial marshal that calls the shots for you so you can focus on the fighting instead?
Where is the downside?
The downside here is pretty simple; if the marshal removes all the responsibility from the player to call their shots, we end up with a series of fights where the fighters crash into each other, and don’t call anything. Then when both agree that someone, or both of them is dead, they stop, and look at the marshal.
The marshal is then expected to do something that is factually impossible, and see things from every angle, all at once, and then process it at a rate fast enough to explain to the players what they did. As someone who has marshaled competitive tournaments with both of these perspectives in mind, I can tell you that in a war tournament this is a ridiculous expectation to have of a person. It’s fairly challenging in a 1 on 1 tournament, sometimes.
If a marshal can’t tell what happened because neither competitor cared about calling their shots, then it turns into a refight. Which I already told you encourages poor shot calling.
You might think, “Wow Keith hates refights.” And you’re not wrong, I don’t like them, I avoid them if at all possible, by trying to fight cleanly and getting clean and clear wins. But they do happen, and I do call them myself when I have to.
Generally speaking I try to find a middle scenario, where I let the players figure it out where it’s possible, and I call shots that seem egregiously missed, to me, and call refights as minimally as possible. The reason I aim for the middle is because both strategies have merits. It's important for players to have the responsibility of playing honorably and correctly. It's also important for an impartial person to make sure the game is played fairly when desire clouds truth.
Good luck in the ring, and look out for future rants on theoretical marshaling.
I'll see you on the field,
Keith “Saegan” Cronyn