Author’s Note: The series name has been changed to Hear Me Out to better reflect the goal and ideas behind this series.
Hear Me Out is a series where I explore some Schmoedown ideas that are either out there or somewhat controversial. The goal is to convince you these ideas can work or be beneficial to the Schmoedown and all you need to do is hear me out. This time, we are talking This time I talk about the idea of support factions and how they can add interesting dynamics to the storyline, but also minimizes the downsides of this major change.
Next season the faction system will be going through major changes. Factions will likely be shrinking from twelve to five and be restricted to one singles player, one team, one Innergeekdom player, and one Star Wars player. Kristian Harloff will have more control over the factions and use this control to greater prioritize storylines. Because of these changes, there is a lot of uncertainty heading into Season 9. We truly will not know the impacts of the change until we see it in action. Will players and fans still care about factions after this change? Only time will tell. However, one clear effect of the change is there will be more storyline flexibility. More room to experiment without the worry of faction fairness. One of the ideas that I think is worth experimenting with is the idea of support factions.
So, what is a support faction? The idea of a support faction is a faction whose sole purpose is to develop players and help another faction train. For example, the Quirky Mercs could have a faction of Kevin Smith, Shazam!, Jesse Swift, and Andrew Dimalanta, with a support faction of Beth May, Press Room, John Humphrey, and Eric Whiteley with May as a player-manager. The clear advantage of this is Coy Jandreau can still interact and have a connection with this year’s Mercs even after dwindling the roster down to five. Just like the Mercs, many other factions currently have a lot of ties and interesting dynamics with their players, and support factions can allow those dynamics and relationships to continue even with some players leaving the main faction.
The addition of this type of faction will easily better storylines. Firstly, it will add some interesting managerial relationships. Two managers being on friendly terms has not been explored much within the Schmoedown. This is a shame because friendship can be just as compelling as rivalries. After all, there is underlying tension behind each match. Will the match be a fun and friendly battle like the all-KOrruption Innergeekdom tournament final between Mike Kalinowski and Chance Ellison from Season 7, or will it cause the same in-fighting that destroyed the Finstock Exchange in season 7? John Rocha’s turn against Dan Murrell would not have been as effective if we did not see their friendship for the past three years. By having built-in friendly relationships between managers, the Schmoedown would also be building in fan investment with that manager relationship which would make a future betrayal more effective. Overall, there are many promising dynamics that support managers bring to the storyline. What happens if the support faction starts doing better than the main faction? What happens when players or managers start to get tired of just being a support faction? What if there is a support manager that starts undermining the main faction? These are some of the many scenarios support factions can bring to the storyline.
Not only would support factions help the storyline, but it would also continue to build the sports aspect of the Schmoedown. Season 8 is arguably the most competitive season of the Schmoedown to date. This is mostly because of the faction system. To have twelve competitors and a manager training each other for matches clearly improves performance. This also has resulted in factions gaining a strong connection and investment with one another. Some of the major examples of this are The Den, The Finstock Exchange, KOrruption, and The Quirky Mercs. There is some worry that this new system will take away this aspect from the Schmoedown since factions will be much smaller. Yet with support factions, the relationships that were built in Season 8 can continue. The family some made this season can continue to support and help each other without being on the same faction. Support factions would also allow Harloff to have the flexibility of smaller factions, while not taking away all the major advantages Season 8 factions had, which included the competitive advantage and close ties between the twelve who trained together.
For some, support factions may seem impossible to pull off in a competitive environment. No sport has two teams openly and actively working and training together because it seems antithetical to the competitive aspect. However, the Schmoedown is not like any other sport. It is a sport where entertainment is heavily prioritized, and there is unexplored potential the Schmoedown can tap into like no other sport can. There are so many interesting storylines and developments that can happen because of support factions. As mentioned before, this also will improve overall performance and make the Schmoedown a much more competitive space. Most of the worries fans have about the faction system change are minimized by support factions. Allowing and promoting more collaborative effort is not a bad thing especially for the Schmoedown, which is already a very supportive space. I even think help outside the faction already happens within the Schmoedown. So why not structurize this system of helping and use it to help improve and advance storylines?
