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Any problems with always being the winner?

Asked by weeveeship (4665points) August 5th, 2014

Got a situation that I want your input on. So, a local store has been holding bi-weekly tournaments for chess, with prizes. All tournaments are stand-alone, and there are no cumulative prizes for winning more than one tournament. Aside from the bi-weekly tournaments, there are also weekly casual play events on another day.

Recently, I won a resounding victory in a bi-weekly tournament. I think playing in a tournament is quite fun, and I am pretty good at making good moves and playing the game. I wasn’t even running any strange or tricky openings; just a standard Ruy Lopez as White and Sicilian Defense as Black.

There is another bi-weekly tournament coming up. I want to participate in that one, but I have some concerns. As I have already won the previous one in resounding fashion, there is a good likelihood that I might win the next tournament as well. However, I don’t know how other players and the store will take that.

Other players might get jealous and start accusing me of cheating, etc. (even though I always play fairly), or otherwise start acting hostile towards me. Further, the store owner might decide that having the same person always win his store’s tournaments is bad for business and might act accordingly. (To be sure, I did once quit another game where all the local tournaments were dominated by a couple guys because I didn’t see the point of going to a tournament where I am guaranteed to lose miserably. I think that at least some other players might feel the same way as I did.)

I suppose I could go and “give chance.” However, since there is an entry fee and I also have other things that I could be doing, I don’t want to go to a tournament and just lose games (or throw games, which is worse).

I was thinking of going every other tournament, so that way, other players would win the tournament on the weeks when I am not going. However, this limits me to only half the tournaments. Of course, I could go to the casual nights instead, but that may or may not work depending on the date.

So (and also TLDR), I want to ask you: Is there any issue with always being the winner? What should I do in this situation?

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