Welcome to the fifth edition of the Lead The Way column, where we examine real leadership moments that often occur under pressure. This time, we will examine the final week of a tournament, when two armies prepare intensely for the final battle, and how leaders would prepare for it.
Designed by MasterDS
With the Legends Cup XV currently ongoing, a single battle will decide the tournament winner. Two armies will appear at the finals, guaranteeing an intense fight as both armies usually max a combined total of over 100 troops and both teams try their best to win. Of course, the leaders can often change the tide of the battle in their army’s favor, either by motivating their troops or by leading on the battlefield itself.
Around The World Cup II – Aliens vs. ACP ( An example )
SCENARIO: PREPARING FOR A TOURNAMENT FINAL
Imagine this: You are sitting as the leader of an army. Your efforts have led you to advancing to the finals of a tournament, and you are just one victory away from winning the entire tournament. However, you are facing an army that has also gotten to the finals of the tourney. Both groups prepared intensely to win the previous battles, and now they face each other to see who can win the trophy.
The two groups each have a week (or sometimes more) to prepare for the battle that decides everything. However, the preparation for the finals will be more intense than for the previous battles, with the whole tournament on the line. Both armies have a different strategy on getting ready, which can often change the outcome of the battle.
Club Penguin Armies reached out to multiple members of the community for their thoughts on how they would prepare their army for a tournament final.
How would you motivate your troops and staff for a tournament final?
Elsa, Templars of Club Penguin: I would motivate my troops and staff for a tournament final by doing a lot of training to prepare for the tournament finals the days before the final!
Trainings in AUSIA, EU and US.Armenzia, People’s Imperial Confederation: Rewards for attending like discord nitro,Currency through a discord bot and game currency for a certain game
Kyra, People’s Imperial Confederation: I would make sure my staff would help motivate other troops, and would try to get staff motivated by possible giveaways (because who doesn’t love free things), and possible promotions
Cobra, Water Vikings: That ultimately ties into the context of the tournament and the opponent in the final.
If it is a long-term rival, you can play into that heavily as a means of generating buzz and importance. This is usually done by a lot of armies when facing a rival (example: DCP with ACP, EGCP with ACP, WV with TCP, all of the inverses). That generally serves as a means for motivation for at least the staff and initiated veterans.
Another thing to take into consideration is the context of the tournament – how has this army performed in the previous tournaments? Has this army reached the finals here before, has this army EVER reached a final in ANY tournament, has this army won this tournament before. That ultimately is a factor that you can consider when generating hype and motivation.
You have other aspects, such as giveways that fuel that. That always does a trick. Medals too. Promotions. You also can generate hype from a sort of egotistical standpoint – “our army is good enough to reach the finals in this tournament”, essentially.
Judy: I’d motivate them first by announcing that we made it to the finals, which would naturally give them hope of winning (after all, we would’ve made it through 3 rounds successfully). With staff, obviously our goal would be to push for the trophy, regardless of history- if you’ve never had one you’re gonna want to finally earn it but also if you’ve had many you want to keep it known how powerful you are with yet another achievement to your name. But I suppose it also depends who we’re up against, if its an ally you wanna push each other as far as you can and alternatively if its a rival everyones going to be hyped that we could beat them in what should be an exciting grand final. Everyones, watching and one thing that motivates troops and staff is showing just what we can do and having the public agree. Of course thats mostly the tournament itself doing a lot of the work but I’d definitely also hand out incentives such as staff/hcom promotions at the end of it and double promotions/currency if we win which always gets people hyped, maybe also promising to host a celebration event in the night club if we win LOL
Are there any things you would do differently to prepare for a tournament final than for previous tournament battles?
Elsa, Templars of Club Penguin: Make sure my troops and staff are motivated for the tournament and make sure they recruit and register alot of people, and make sure they get the new recruits verified and have their accounts activated on Club Penguin Army Battleground. And make sure to do new troop training on CPAB! So they could get familiar with the army!!
Armenzia, People’s Imperial Confederation: Recruit are much more and verify the users and hype the event much more then you did previous events
Kyra, People’s Imperial Confederation: Yea, I would put a lot more pressure on troops & staff to attend, seeing how tournament finals are a lot more important than previous battles.
Cobra, Water Vikings: Usually you go all out hype wise for a finals. That is unless the stakes are extremely high in earlier battles, such as the semi finals
Judy: hmmm, be less pessimistic is probably the big one, the last time i was in a tournament final i panicked a lot and didnt think we would win the second our lineup got announced. in terms of preparing though, less recruiting and more training 100%. new recruits can only do so much and can make things worse in a battle if they dont know enough about the game yet on short notice and recruiting was something i wrongly prioritised over contacting existing troops and thoroughly teaching new ISH members who are active and may need a bit of help
What would you do if a double overtime happened during the finals of the tournament?
Elsa, Templars of Club Penguin: Hmmm… Make sure my troops and staff are trained and reloaded for the double overtime during the finals of the tournament!! And to make sure they don’t AFK or bunch in any of the forms that are mentioned in the VC or Main Chat!
Armenzia, People’s Imperial Confederation: Keep calm and organised while keeping constant communication with people in vc and people in game
Kyra, People’s Imperial Confederation: I would most likely try to encourage troops to stay on, and keep fighting / being active until the judges release the final score
Cobra, Water Vikings: Be impressed by the fact that both armies are this well matched. Also lock in super hard
Judy: cry LOL, but honestly just keep people hyped and explain were doing another room and we’re doing it because we’re doing well enough to push these guys into a tiebreaker twice. like we havent lost yet and with one final push, we win the entire tournament. were both equal then and there and if weve won every other round, we can 100% win the finals too- the tension rises with one overtime and with 2? youll realise the importance of winning and how close you are to victory, okay lowkey id be stressed but so worth it if we come out as winners so yeah, maintain the hype, keep troops and staff informed of what were doing, emphasise how close we are to clutching this and be as ready to lead it as our troops are to fight for it
Is there anything else you would like to share with the army community?
Elsa, Templars of Club Penguin: Stay strong, be positive and just have fun!!
Armenzia, People’s Imperial Confederation: Hope you guys have a good day and FISH :3
Kyra, People’s Imperial Confederation: I’m glad to be back and involved with cpa after my retirement <3
Cobra, Water Vikings: Hopefully the meta will turn away from being overly fixated on tournaments and we can all agree to try to de-regulate and allow an era where larp and (actual, none of that overly regulated nonsense that’s gotten worse since 2020 and probably became truly gross by 2023) warfare can flourish.
Tournaments are fun, and this Legends Cup run has been fun; but if that’s all the community has to offer nowadays then the meta either needs to double down or we need to change things.
Judy: (cat stare sticker)
Leaders’ competency often plays a major role in deciding the outcome of a tournament final, which is usually an intense battle. Their ability to motivate and train troops, create hype and their performance on the battlefield is what mostly decides the result of a tournament final. If you were a leader and a tournament final was upcoming, what would you do?
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