Competitive Tabletop Gaming 101: Tournament Fatigue

Tournament fatigue — when the mental strain of playing multiple games in a row at a tournament causes your play to degrade — can be a major factor in competitive tabletop games, especially in longer events. While a store tournament that’s just running three or four rounds of Swiss might not have fatigue as a big factor, larger (and hence longer) events can be a very different story!

For example, if a card game tournament schedule has six rounds of Swiss into a cut to single elimination top eight, if you make the finals it will be your ninth game of the day. (This actually happened to me at the recent CompetEsport Skirmish — tournament report here if you’re interested!) It turns out that when you’ve played nine games in a row, perhaps without a substantial break, you may well be substantially worse at the game than when you’re fresh-faced, well-rested, and playing your first game of the day!

Miniatures games might well have fewer rounds in a day compared to card games, but each round can be much longer. For instance, it’s not uncommon for a Star Wars: Legion or Warhammer 40,000 game in a tournament to take something like three hours! That means that by the time game four of the day rolls around, you may well have been playing for eight or nine hours straight (albeit likely with at least some breaks). In general, the longer you’ve been playing, especially without breaks, the more fatigue may start to kick in.

Now, one thing to note is that the impact of tournament fatigue can vary a lot based on the specific style of play you are using. Generally speaking, more complex strategies are more vulnerable to tournament fatigue. In Flesh and Blood TCG, for instance, the Wizard Kano has a much more complicated gameplay pattern than a more straightforward deck like Dorinthea or Ira:

This guy has a lot of complexity to making the most of his ability…

…whereas good old Dorinthea is a lot more straightforward to use!

(above card art is © Legend Story Studios)

As a result, a Kano player might well be more affected by tournament fatigue than a Dorinthea player. To put things another way, if by game nine I’m playing my Dorinthea deck at about 80% effectiveness while a Kano player might be playing at about 60% effectiveness, I might have a substantial edge, even if the matchup favors the Kano player while we’re both well-rested!

Now, those numbers are made up and don’t necessarily reflect the “real values” that apply here — but I think the point stands. Note that this can apply even to quite experienced competitors — for instance, Jasin Long (top 8 with Kano at The Calling Auckland) mentioned in his tournament report:

“While I really enjoyed playing the deck, I found it pretty tiring and by the end of it, I wasn’t playing it at the level I really wanted to.”

Would he have experienced the same difficulties playing Ira like many of the other top cut players? Possibly, but the impact of fatigue on Ira’s more straightforward gameplan is in my view a lot less than its impact on setting up a big combo with Kano!

Dealing with Tournament Fatigue

So, that’s what tournament fatigue is — now how to counter it?

One important thing to do is to be sure you are physically prepared going into an event. This may sound silly — we’re playing tabletop games after all, not going to a sports match — but every little bit helps. I’ve had events before where I’ve been up all night (or almost all night) beforehand — that typically isn’t the best way to prepare! Given that fatigue may well set in by the end of an event anyway, no need to give it a “head start” by not getting enough sleep! On a similar note, making sure that you are drinking enough water throughout an event can be important. I’ve even brought chewing gum to events in order to keep my mental alertness up!

Note also that playing in tournaments can drain a lot of calories! This sounds crazy, but research indicates that professional chess players can lose substantial amounts of weight during competitions thanks to the mental intensity — in fact, the infamous 1984 World Chess Championship was cancelled for the sake of the players’ health after repeated drawn games meant the event had been extended to an extreme 48 games (across five months!) and both players had lost substantial weight! While this sort of extreme scenario is well beyond what one can expect normally, bringing protein bars or similar to eat during breaks in a tournament can be a good move!

One special note is that for miniatures games in particular, physical strain on your back/knees can be a factor! I’ve often found my back aching after spending eight hours or so mostly on my feet in a miniatures tournament, and the more you find yourself hunching over the table for line of sight checks and the like the worse this can be! This is especially relevant if the event has hard flooring — in one case, a tournament was being played on an aircraft carrier museum (metal decks!) and a player I knew decided to bring an anti-fatigue mat to set up on his side of the board for extra protection!

Next, just getting experience at more events can help out. I’ve noticed that players who are new to competitive play can be especially surprised by tournament fatigue, while those who have played multiple long events are less likely to be “blindsided” by this effect. I don’t have any scientific data on this or whatever, but I suspect a tournament veteran is less likely to be affected by this sort of thing than someone who has only played one-off games in shops or online before.

Lastly, it may be worth knowing your limitations and playing a deck or army that is easier to run! A complicated army with lots of combos and moving parts that works great in a three hour casual battle at your local game store’s Legion night might not be as well-suited to your first big tournament compared to something easier to use. Familiarity can also play a role here — if you’re very used to using something, you’ll probably do better with it when you’re tired than something that you’re still kinda figuring out.

All things considered, tournament fatigue can be a major factor influencing your performance in competitive tabletop games. Keep this in mind when going to a big event and make plans to mitigate it — and don’t think that just because an event is online this won’t be a factor! I’ve definitely felt quite mentally drained after playing in a long event even if it’s just held on webcam or Tabletop Simulator. Plan accordingly, though, and tournament fatigue can wind up being a powerful factor in your favor — if you’ve done well to plan for it and your opponent hasn’t, that might be just the edge you need to take the finals!