OngoingWorlds blog

News & articles about play-by-post games, for roleplayers & writers

Jan
31

By

Announcing the 2024 ToS Winners!

Category: Advertising your game, Awards, Competition, Roleplay Systems, Roleplay-related projects, Roleplaying community Tags: Leave a Comment


Image by Willvoy

The 64 outstanding nominations received from the community were evaluated, and now we have some winners! Before we announce those amazing games, in case anyone is unfamiliar with this program: the Tournament of Simulations (ToS) is an annual competition, sponsored and run by Ongoing Worlds, that is open to all sims and online role-playing games, regardless of format or genre.

This year’s tournament resulted in 26 unique winners. As it is seemingly every year, the participation and excellence displayed among the entire field is a true testament to the ongoing strength of our simming and online role playing community, despite the naysayers out there.

As I frequently remind myself and others: evaluating sims is a subjective art, and this is true with ToS.  We’re not here to identify the best games as this is impossible.  Instead, we’re here to identify what we think are outstanding sims that exude excellence.  A different set of judges might very well chose a completely different set of winners.  And that’s okay! If you’re interested, this is how we select the winners. With that on the record once again, here are your 2024 Tournament of Simulation winners:

Play-by-Post

Play-by-Chat

Congratulations to all of our Tournament winners! Well done! Believe me when I say that there were some really, really good entrants this year that didn’t make the winners list. For that reason, I’d like to personally thank everyone who took the time to enter their games in the competition: Thank you for providing a fantastic role playing experience for your players–that was more than evident in ALL of the entries. And that’s really what it’s all about. The individual grade sheets have been emailed to each sim’s respective representative.

I would also like to acknowledge our outstanding panel of judges: Amanda Rose, Ametheliana, Blitzen, Christie, Edwina, Ennom, Greenfelt, Gregory, Hadir Prenar, Ken Gillis, Kevin Riker, Malcom Llwyedd, Matthew Desmond, Mel, Nikki, Raz. Rosie B, Shran dh’Klar, Spiral, StarDuster, and Willvoy. All 21 of them were amazing professionals from start to finish. They volunteered hours of their time to serve the simming and online role playing community, and I can’t thank them enough for the wonderful job they did!

OWCH

While we’re on the subject of judging, Amanda Rose, Ametheliana, Greenfelt, Ken Gillis, Raz, and Shran dh’Klar are hereby awarded the Ongoing Worlds Community Honor (OWCH) for serving as a judge in three different Tournament of Simulations.  They have volunteered hours of their time to serve in this capacity.  Their selflessness and volunteer attitude are an example for us all to follow.  Without these six and others like them, we simply wouldn’t be able to hold major events like the Tournament. Thank you!

A few statistical notes…

  • This is the 14th year in a row that a tournament was held (2011-2024). Six tournaments were held 1999-2007. No tournaments were held 2008-2010. Twenty total tournaments have now been held to date.
  • Twenty-six awards were bestowed this year, tied with 2021 for the second most ever. The record of 36 awards was set in 2022. 316 total awards have now been conferred dating back to 1999.
  • Five clubs brought home multiple awards this year: Theta Fleet (7), Obsidian Fleet (5), Independence Fleet (4), RPGWriting (2), and Star Army (2). All five are repeat winners from last year. The record for most awards in a single tournament is 10 (Starfleet Legacy Alliance, 2005). Starfleet Legacy Alliance also holds second place (9, 2006) and third place (8, 2007) in the category.
  • Independence Fleet (30) stays put at #2 on the all-time awards list with Theta Fleet (29) also closing the gap on all-time leader
    Starfleet Legacy Alliance (31). Rounding out the top 5 are Obsidian Fleet (21) and Star Army (20). RPGWriting finds itself tied at #7 with total 13 awards.
  • Star Army extends its record of tournaments with at least one win to 12 (2012-20, 2023-24). Independence Fleet and UCIP are tied for second place with wins in nine different tournaments. Star Army additionally holds the record for most consecutive tournaments with at least one win (9, 2012-2020). RPGWriting has the longest active streak (6, 2019-current), with Independence Fleet, Theta Fleet, and Obsidian Fleet currently tied for second (5, 2020-current).
  • This was the 16th tournament to have a club pick up its first win (Mystic Fans). The only tournaments not have at least one club get their first win are 2001, 2013, 2017, and 2023.
  • Three independent sims won this year. The record of 11 was set in 2021. Independent sims were shutout in five tournaments (1999, 2001, 2002, 2005, and 2020).
  • The following simulations that placed this year have won multiple awards:

All results are final and are not subject to appeal.  Look for the 2025 tournament to be announced very soon.  Until then, continue the incredible simming and online role playing!

How Does the Tournament of Simulations (ToS) Work?

Past winners: 2011 | 2012 | 2013 | 2014 | 2015 | 2016 | 2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023