Every break since the Ping Pong and Foosball table were added, there has been a long line of people waiting to play these games in the HOP and Jalsa. However, it takes a long time for one given person to play a single match because there is always one person who keeps winning the games - “King of the Court” - a rule which lets the person who wins the game keep playing.
This slows down the line significantly since only one person can be eliminated at a time. Even though there is a rule in place that specifically does not allow for someone to win more than 5 games in a row, many people do not follow this rule. And for the few that do, they don’t even go to the back of the line. This also mostly means the person who wins the more matches gets more practice; in turn, getting better at the game and winning more matches with their superior skill level- while the people who get to play 1 or 2 games per break get eliminated in a matter of seconds, giving them next to no practice or time to build on their skills. While people could practice on their own, many people do not have the sufficient resources to do so.
The moment the teachers shout “break is over!” There is disappointment and dissatisfaction among the students who couldn’t play many matches.
“King of the court rule is the main reason for this problem” students say.
“King of the court should not be forced upon and should be an option for students.” others claim
We noticed some students who wanted to play. But, some fail because the king has defeated their friend. If their friend doesn’t win, they cannot play with their friend and needs to play with someone else. Even though all those people wanted to do was play just one match with their friends, they fail and even leave the line, upset they couldn’t play with their friends.
We interviewed various students playing the games. They said the waiting time between games has been observed to be around 3 minutes for Foosball and even longer at 6 minutes for Ping Pong.
We have also seen people leaving the line due to the long line, looking for something else to do, but it is very hard for them to find it because they have already wasted time in the line. There are social distancing problems as well. As time passes, it becomes harder for students to keep social distance. People are feeling the importance of limited time. One of the ways of shortening the waiting time is getting rid of the king of the court.
A solution that could replace King of the Court might be letting them play until one player scores 3 goals but both of the players leave no matter what. In this way, we could let players play and give many opportunities for other people to play. We hope everyone could have fun, enjoying foosball and ping pong.