Zen and the Art of Sandbagging

Sandbagging. There are many schools of thought involved with this, but the general consensus is that it is a bit of a Faux Pas to most of the community. Go to any cosplay reddit page, or a specific comic con cosplay page, and you will see at least one post about sandbagging in some sort of circumstance. Most of the time, it is a cosplayer who was competing bringing to the rest of the community’s attention of this person’s sandbagging. This can often lead to a lot of drama across social media, cosplay groups, and con organizers across states, and at times countries. 

And drama is almost always a lose-lose situation.

But hey, I can write about that all night, and that’s not what I am here for. At least not this time. 

But wait. Sandbagging is different in certain situations. 

So, let’s start here:

In terms of this blog, this is what sandbagging is defined as…

Sand-bag-ging / verb : 

 To go to multiple cons (events) in the same cosplay, then compete in the cosplay contest.

“That Person Competed at both Indypop and C2E2 in that cosplay. They are sandbagging!”

I learned about the term “sandbagging” Memorial Day weekend 2021. A professional cosplayer and I were having a conversation at a con we both attended. They were talking to the winner of the cosplay contest and explaining to them the concept of sandbagging. They said to them that you should not compete at another con with that cosplay now that you won. The cosplayer in question was very confused. The convention we were attending was relatively small in the grand scheme of cons (Total attendance of about 1,000 people)

Having a pro cosplayer tell them that they should not compete in any other con at any other time without seriously overhauling the costume seemed irrational. What if they wanted to go to a larger convention and compete with the same cosplay against more skilled competition? 

It didn’t sit right with me either… 

And being me, I had to investigate further, and come up with my own opinion on this. 

To start, I needed to check out where the cons stood on this. I reached out to a dozen con organizers across the Midwest (Six Anime Cons and Six Comic Cons) If they had a cosplay contest coordinator, or someone on their committee that handled the cosplay side of the event, I was immediately delegated to them. Every Con got the same questions: 

All but one of the comic cons made it past question one. The outlier had a cosplay contest coordinator, had rules to enforce against sandbagging, and their judges were aware of it as well. The rest were smaller, regional cons that were not aware of sandbagging, and have changed their rules to make sure it does not happen at their events. 

All of the anime cons had very specific rules they enforced against sandbagging. They also made absolutely sure their judges knew as well. Topping it off, all of them had situations in the past two years they have dealt with drama involving it. As with all drama, it was quite the cluster. 

Armed with the information I had from cons, I decided to ask a dozen cosplay contest judges I know. All of them have judged at least twenty different cons across several states in the US (and several of them have judged outside the US). All of them were aware of sandbagging, and several of them had been accused of it. All of them agree it is a problem, and outside of attempting to track who won what cosplay at what con all over the world, they do not have a lot of solutions.

Well, There quite possibly could be a solution. What if there was a points system, like in sports such as golf and Nascar? One of the larger Cosplay circuits (Crown, World Cosplay Summit?) could award points to cosplayers that win contests across the world. Competing in certain contests requires you to have a certain amount of points. Points winners get prizes, and other opportunities presented to them. Cons could be separated by attendance, or separated by a committee of organizers and judges that separates them into “tiers”. If you were awarded points for winning a contest in a certain tier, then you are no longer allowed to compete in that tier with the cosplay you won in. This allows cosplayers to “climb” their way up the tiers with the same cosplay, make small adjustments, and not be forced to make a different cosplay every other weekend in the summer. 

It also eliminates drama because Sandbagging can be easily proven, and reolved. If you were caught (which would be easy, as every winner is tracked). Cons and judges no longer have to concern themselves with sandbagging, as it is now regulated by a governing body. Cosplayers now have new goals to make the best cosplays possible, and there are defined wins at every con. 

This is not a perfect solution, and I know a lot of people would be leery of a governing body tracking all of the winners of cosplay contests across the US/World.