LET'S HOOK 'EM UP
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There's a lot we need to cover and not much time! YOUR LIFE AS YOU KNOW IT CHANGES HERE!
What is Bash Wars? I keep explaining this every year, but people still don't know! It is the ultimate form of fake combat on the internet, as people from around the world select warriors to represent them in a single-elimination tournament to the death! Imagine the honor and prestige that comes with choosing the competitor who wins the fearsome Bash Wars tournament and becomes the annual Bash Wars Superking! Imagine the horror as your hero is defeated and dismembered, carried out on his/her shield, his corpse trampled by horses, at least knowing he/she had the nads to try! It's just like that Stallone arm-wrestling movie, except you might have to fight a dinosaur.
If you have a LiveJournal account, you are already ONE STEP AWAY from testing your skills in the ancient tradition of fake fighting. Simply fill out the signup sheet below with the name of the man/woman/robot/etc. you think could kick everybody else's ass. Then keep that name a closely-guarded secret, lest you lose the all-important element of surprise! Once signups are closed I will seed the names into the tournament brackets, and then WAR WERE DECLARED!
Traditionally we end up with just over 32 combatants every year, but as ever I am shooting for SIXTY-FOUR gladiators to make up THE BASHEST WARS IN HISTORY. So tell your friends, tell your enemies, tell your frenemies. The more the murderier!
You'll find the signup form, along with the complete entry rules, under the cut. Note! Our rules have changed; you've been warned!
To enter and participate in Bash Wars VI you must have a LiveJournal account and you must join the gore_sports
community. Membership is moderated so I can screen for alt-accounts and sockpuppets, but generally people get approved pretty quickly. I must take a hard line against anyone trying to use multiple LJ accounts to pass himself off as multiple players. I reserve the right to disqualify an LJ account that looks like it's an alt-account, or all of an individual's accounts if I think he/she's abusing the system.
Rules for selecting your player:
- Entry of combatants is first-come, first-served. If somebody has beaten you to your guy, I will contact you to name a second choice.
- You can use somebody from last year's Bash Wars, but the person who used that guy last year gets right of first refusal. You are free to enter Mr. T if you want, but mike_smith comes in later and enters Mr. T, you're SOL even if you beat him to it. Again, I'll ask you to pick someone else.
- You may only enter one competitor. One per person. If you have fifteen LiveJournal personas, only one of them gets to play. I will be enforcing this as much as humanly possible, so don't be an ass about it. This isn't worth the trouble.
- You can change your entrant as often as you need to until signups are closed. LJ lets you resubmit the poll and change your answer. Of course if you switch to someone who was picked ahead of you, I'll ask you to switch again.
- You can't enter a collection of people/things. This is the "Eugene Levy's eyebrows" rule. If you enter a group of people (e.g., the Legion of Doom) I'll either narrow it down to one person (e.g., Lex Luthor) or make you do it over.
- You may enter almost anyone to compete in Bash Wars. Fictional characters, celebrities, and public figures are largely fair game, with some exceptions:
- No political figures. We had Dick Cheney one year and I realized I might have the Secret Service on my ass.
- No unfamous people without permission. If you're entering your buddy or your enemy or whatever, you must have their consent.
- Deities, giant robots, living planets and such are legal in Bash Wars. Note that none of them have ever won, though, so you might want to think twice about it. I reserve the right to level the playing field however I see fit--e.g., Godzilla vs. Cy-Kill when both are shrunk down to human proportions, Galactus vs. Stone Boy in a staring contest, etc. Do NOT count on me to make it fair, because sometimes I can't/won't. The outcome of Stay-Puft Marshmallow Man vs. Conker the Squirrel amused me greatly, and should be a cautionary tale.
- Identities of the combatants are kept secret until the tournament begins. Please don't talk about your guy in the comments to this entry.
- If you have questions or concerns, bug me. If you need to discuss your pick with me, send me a LiveJournal PM. Otherwise, leave a comment in this or any future posts on gore_sports and I'll see what I can do.
NEW RULE: I reserve the right to reject any entrant that I consider unworthy. If I am unconvinced that your entrant could win a fake fighting tournament, I will contact you privately to give you a chance to persuade me. If I am not persuaded I will reject that entrant and you will be asked to choose someone else. (You'll get unlimited tries, so no worries about that.)
This has been a long time coming, so let me explain.
I started Bash Wars because I was making up fake fights myself and people were voting for none of the above a lot, so I was like "OK, you pick people to fight!" I let people pick whoever they wanted because I figured it would be survival of the fittest--the people who picked Brock Samson and Spider-Man would do well. The people who entered the president from Battlestar Galactica (not Starbuck, mind you, but Starbuck's head of state) would get reamed in the first round, and everyone would learn the folly of doing that. That hasn't really worked out, as joke entries have become more and more successful and people seem to genuinely avoid choosing characters that might pose a threat to anyone. Now, I liked some of the joke entrants too--I openly backed all 150 pounds of brandawg when he entered himself, and I thought the Inanimate Carbon Rod was pretty funny. But Bash Wars V had two housecats in the first round, and Popeye of all people almost lost to some janitor. This is not what I had in mind.
I am concerned that people will view this as a reaction to Doctor Who winning last year, or that I want to filter out characters I don't personally like. Far from it. I enjoy watching everybody think outside the box. (Although I think it's a pity a lot of really strong choices never even get entered because people would rather compete to find the most obscure DC Comics character.) If I wanted the entrants and the winners to always meet with my approval, I'd do the whole thing on paper at home. However, since I'm the one who has to present the matches and explain this crazy shit, I would like to know ahead of time how Doctor Who could beat Wolverine, not merely that people would like him to. I know it's technically a popularity contest, but I'd at least like to be sure it's a popularity contest among a bunch of badass dudes.
Hopefully this won't seem like a big dramatic deal, because I don't want it to be. I just gotta make sure I lay out this rule up front so that when frito_kal enters Rebecca Black she knows I will be coming over to have a talk with her.
All right, with that boring stuff out of the way, it's time for action.
Poll Bash Wars VI signup sheet!!!
Signups will remain open through October 15, maybe longer if I think we need more guys. until whenever 'cause I feel like it! If I wuz you I wouldn't wait around, y'know?