Tournament Phenomena

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This page covers some of the weird and unusual events and patterns that have occurred in 4chan's character tournaments, such as Ms. /co/ & Mr. /co/lympus, TagTeam Tournament, Queen & King of /v/, and sometimes Mr. and Ms. /mlp/. These events are usually niche, unnoticeable, and happen infrequently, but in some instances they can be either game-changing or utterly devastating depending on a given tournament's context. They are also useful terms to refer to when said events tend to transpire.

Discussions about certain patterns and tendencies have been talked about on plus4chan's /tnt/ board.

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The following listed below are some of the most (in)famous phenomena found in the tournaments:

Omni-Man Syndrome

"When a character has had huge hype around them but absolutely fails to deliver."

A not uncommon phenomenon (especially compared to those listed below), the "Omni-Man Syndrome" typically involves, but is not limited, to "FotM" (Flavor of the Month) characters that have become famous recently either due to new media releases or board trends, gathering a sizable following and hype around them as a result. These characters are usually claimed to make a deep run or at the very least perform decently in the tournaments (best known examples being the Ms. /co/ champions Spinel and Fang), but there exist some instances where they absolutely fail to make it past round 1 or even not qualify for the bracket at all. The most notorious case and the namesake of this phenomenon is Omni-Man, whose show Invincible made a very big impact on /co/ and all over the Internet during its release in 2021. However, as of Mr. /co/lympus 2021, he has yet to make it past the first round.

Black Canary Phenomenon

"Character that only ever appears in one tournament, makes it to the Elite Eight, and fucks off, never to be seen again."

As the description says, this phenomenon occurs when a character that has never appeared in any other previous tournament pulls a miraculous run that gives them a spot in the Elite Eight, only to never make the bracket again after their one year hiatus. Some anons may claim that their only run is a fluke.

The phenomenon is named after Black Canary from DC Comics, notable for her Cinderella run in Ms. /co/ 2018, but has never managed to come close to qualifying again. Till very recently, this was the only recorded case of this happening until the latest Ms. /co/ 2022, where Shirley the Medium made a controversial appearance in the Elite Eight, with her failing to qualify in Ms. /co/ 2024 after her year-long break. Another recent example would be Mr. Incredible in the Mr. /co/lympus tournaments, whom while had two tournament berths at the time of entering the quarter-finals stage of Mr. /co/lympus 2020, failed to qualify two years later.

The Kronk Effect

"A character appears for the first time in the tournament and manages to take the crown."

Barring the champions of the inaugural tournaments (Jenny, Johnny Bravo, Samus Aran and Senator Armstrong), this list includes Kronk, champion of Mr. /co/lympus 2019; Spinel, infamous champion of Ms, /co/ 2019; Reimu, Queen of /v/ 2020; Recette Lemongrass, Queen of /v/ 2021; and last but not least, The Batter, King of /v/ 2021. Most other winners are tournament veterans with at least two tournament berths at the time of their victory.

In character tournaments outside 4chan, this phenomenon is dubbed "Royal Road", after a term used in the Korean StarCraft esports scene.

Montezuma’s Revenge

"A grudge rematch where a previous popular winner gets defeated by the same character they won against previously."

Named after elite member Chel, who made a remarkable and equally surprising victory against Queen Tyr'ahnee in the Ms. /co/ 2022 quarter-finals. This also occurred when Megamind beat Zuko in 2020 after losing to him the previous tournament. Given most rematches usually result in the same character being victorious, this is a strange sight to see, especially when it isn't motivated by any sort of campaign, like the two examples listed above.

Bejita Theorem

"Characters that are secondary and/or jobbers in their source material do better than most protagonist characters."

This effect is named after Vegeta from Dragon Ball, a prideful Saiyan warrior and rival of protagonist Goku, who became infamous for consistently getting humiliated by many of the series' major villains. The following characters have attained greater success in their respective tournaments than their series' designated main character:

• Kronk over Kuzco, from Emperor's New Groove. While Kuzco made his first Elite Eight appearance in 2018, Kronk would go on to win the tournament the following year.
• Dr. Mrs. The Monarch over The Monarch, Brock Samson, and Rusty Venture from Venture Bros. The series' cancellation prompted the crowning of Dr. Mrs. The Monarch in 2020, but the furthest a character from the series has made it into the male tournament is Round 3 in 2021.
• General Grievous over Ahsoka Tano, from Star Wars. Grievous was champion of the fourth Mr. /co/lympus tournament and had notable tournament history since 2019, while Ahsoka is yet to make it past the second round.
• Zorak over Space Ghost, from Space Ghost: Coast to Coast. Although Space Ghost himself has been a common sight in the tournament starting in 2018, Zorak was eventually winner of Mr. /co/lympus 2022 in his second appearance into the tournament.
• Daffy Duck and Marvin the Martian over Bugs Bunny, from Looney Tunes. All three characters have been in the Elite Eight at least once, but both Daffy and Marvin have made it further than the lucky rabbit.
• Lord Farquaad over Shrek, from Shrek. Even though Shrek is a perfect attendance member for Mr. /co/lympus, he has yet to make it past the third round, while Farquaad managed to enter the Elite Eight after only two tournament berths.
• Wario and Luigi over Mario.
• Midna, Malon and Morshu over Zelda and Link.

Omnipresent Egg Paradox

"A character that is eligible to join in every board tournament and is considered a powerful contender in all the tournaments."

Named after the rather obvious Dr. Eggman, who is among the few rare characters who is eligible to compete in both Mr. /co/lympus and King of /v/ and be considered a powerhouse in both. It is also made as an inside joke in /tnt/ to find weather or not he'd be able to participate in some hypothetical tournaments such as SaiGAR, Mr. /tv/, or King /lit/ due to his widespread presence in general media. Dr. Eggman isn't the only character who is capable of participating in both /co/ and /v/ tournaments, many cases such as Miss Pauling, Saxton Hale, Princess Zelda, and characters from Wakfu are capable of intermingling in both /co/ and /v/ but they are rarely if ever successful. To date this remains one of the rarest phenomena as there are few characters that can participate in two board tournaments and be considered successful.

OC Snowballing

"Character doesn't start off strong, but over the course of the tournament they become a stronger contender."

This phenomena is a very recent and now prominent since Queen and King /v/ 2021 onward. This phenomena usually includes characters that would barely qualify or be round 1 eliminations, but in their lucky year they get a huge campaign and OC boost which results in them gaining popularity and hype which makes them contend with tournament heavy hitters. In /tnt/, this phenomena is separated into two different categories which are:

• Shattered Snowball: Character who has a lot of hype and OC but faces a heavy hitter early rounds and stops it's momentum before it could gain more popularity. Examples would be John Silver and Charles from Mafia City, who had a lot of hype and campaigns going for them but were stopped by heavy hitters and board classics such as Squidward and Heavy and had their momentum stopped.
• Avalanche: A character who has gotten so much momentum that they enter Elite Eight or win the crown. The most notorious case is Recette who is the winner with the lowest seed in board tournament history (seed #113), managed to garner hype and momentum due to a dedicated drawfag who would pump high quality OC for Recette. More recently, Zorak experienced the most dramatic OC snowballing to date, who went from a round one elimination to the Mr. /co/lympus 2022 due to it's dedicated campaigners and overall good nature of his supporters.

Runner-up Curse

One of the many used reaction images of Batman laughing

"A character that has previously gotten 2nd place becomes S̶̶̶H̶̶̶I̶̶̶T̶̶̶ ̶a̶̶̶n̶̶̶d̶̶̶ ̶F̶̶̶I̶̶̶N̶̶̶I̶̶̶S̶̶̶H̶̶̶E̶̶̶D̶̶̶ de facto barred from winning the tournament in the future."

For several years since the start of mainline 4chan tournaments in 2018 a character had never won the tournament they have gotten 2nd place in before, and has never repeated finals until Eggman in KoV 2023. Despite this, characters with previous E8 placements and even 3rd place have gone on to win before (e.g. Fang). This may be attributable to the idea of the character not being a "fresh" enough finalist to be seen as the winner, and supporters losing morale as a character gets so close only to lose. There was speculation that with enough passage of time this "curse" could be broken. Following Eggman's double runner-up loss the curse had taken a renewed perceived strength, as well as more anons wanting to see it broken. This phenomenon had also been conversely dubbed by some tourney-goers as "The Batman Laugh" due to association with ritualposters bad mouthing these characters with the phrase "SHIT and FINISHED", often accompanied by reaction images of Batman laughing. This form of posting began with Johanna in anticipation of her return in Ms. /co/ 2023.

The moment of the "curse" breaking finally happened in Queen of /v/ 2024 when former 2021 runner-up Madotsuki returned to finals and won the crown, leaving doubters and Batman in shambles.

Nigger Buff

"A character becomes notorious for having an especially eye grabbing or memey poll picture."

This phenomena has been associated with several characters, with the phenomena's name coming from Alex Eagleston from YIIK's King of /v/ 2023 appearance, where his poll picture contained a zoomed in shot of Alex screaming "NIGGER", which gained criticism from some anons due to the assumption that his matches were won solely because of /v/irgins voting for the picture saying nigger than the character himself as well as that shouting nigger does not accurately reflect the character of Alex, who is an overbearing millenial soyboy.

Other characters accused of having been buffed due to their poll pictures are certain female characters in Ms. /co/ and Queen of /v/ with off-model fapbait images as poll pictures due to attracting a perceived bias from the coomer voters, as well as Jimmy Neutron in Mr. /co/lympus 2023 who was notorious for having the "↑ this person has 500gb of child porn" meme image as his poll picture, which caused Sneed and Iroh to be framed as pedos.

GIF Buff

A related sub-phenomena which has been observed in various tournaments is the GIF buff; as the name suggests, this occurs when a character is suspected to have been buffed by an eye catching animated image on the poll. This has been noted to differ from the Nigger Buff since, unlike the aforementioned, images that apply a GIF buff tend to accurately depict the character as he/she appears in canon rather than an OOC shitpost/meme or off-model image.

Commonly referred to examples of the GIF Buff include Optimus Prime in Mr. /co/lympus 2023, whose poll picture depicted him flying into the air to slam dunk a basketball, and Blackfire in Ms. /co/ 2024, whose poll picture depicted her dancing at a nightclub from the Teen Titans episode "Sisters".

See Also

Terminology