Topic: Revised Colour Mod explaination
Hello there!
Recently, I've become very interested in possibly creating a short video explaining in detail the exact rules of the Colour Mods for THAC and BRAWL. The reason for this being that either contest can be extremely stressful and quick. An animator may not always have time enough to wait for an official response to their inquiry, and the runners of the contest obviously cannot be expected to be available every minute of the event to provide the answers required.
As they are, the rules are rather clear, however, there is still some apparent confusion every THAC or BRAWL about the colour mod which can be a source of great distress for the animators involved. Not that I mean to criticize the runners of any contest here on BiM for not being clear enough, nor do I mean to to criticize every entrant who has ever not understood the rules fully, but there could be something better.
A detailed video guide could be extremely useful as many people are much better at grasping information visually rather than reading a chunk of text. The video could contain visual examples of possible Colour Mod situations which are either right or wrong. With nice big green check marks and red Xs to emphasize this.
This video could cover subjects brought up less commonly, such as people wondering if a colour printed upon a piece of another colour would count towards their goal.
However, of course, I would need official BiM approval before this video is created. As well as approval for each individual point brought up in the video. Plus, it would be useful for people to point out issue which I myself have not remembered or not thought up. I would want it to be as detailed as possible, with almost no room for confusion, with almost every scenario considered. Alternatively, another person could take over making the actual video if they'd rather handle it personally.
Ideally, this video (if approved) could be linked in every THAC or BRAWL announcement post in the section concerning the Mod Element, as well as that same place in the official start thread for the contests. Thus the contestants would be able to watch it beforehand, but also watch it again during the contest if they had forgotten anything or not seen that announcement thread.
Although, I would recommend actually changing the rules slightly before this.
This rule is somewhat misleading:
[X] brick connected to [Y] brick
As not all elements are literal "bricks" such as minifigure elements. Although this detail is explained in the rules, it is still possible that it may raise some confusion, as when read with a certain mindset, will appear to be contradictory. Also, the rule exists that touching can be used instead of connexion if you want.
I would suggest instead phrasing the rule always as this:
An [X] colour element connected to or touching a [Y] element
This rectification might hopefully mitigate slightly some unnecessary confusion.
Another issue is that currently capes, baseplates, and some other elements are not considered "bricks" but are instead segregated into another category which does not let them count towards the mod element. I personally believe that this exception is unwarranted, as a cape or baseplate are no less a LEGO piece than any other element. Also, baseplates do increase the piece count in LEGO's own official set piece count.
More importantly, this exception is entirely unnecessary, and simply creates additional confusion.
There is no way a contestant could cheat specifically because of baseplates. Especially since they don't come in many colours.
Anyway, that concludes my suggestion. Please tell me what everyone thinks!
I really do think that this video and slight rectifications to the rules would be extremely beneficial to the Bricks in Motion community. That way we could focus more on making really cool films really quickly, and the people running the show could spend less time answering questions.
Obviously, it would not erase all problem entirely, but I truly think that the number of issues might at least be significantly mitigated.
Thanks for reading all of that!