Dear UDE,

In the recent thread about the announcement of OP downsizing I put out a comment about letting players run tournaments. Mr. Donais replied that it was something you would take in consideration but were very hesitant about. I understand, really I do, but let me lay out my idea here and hopefully a lot of others will be able to add their ideas and you can read this in between 5-6 pages of the massive OP Thread and find something in here that can convince you we're capable. You know we're willing. :)

This is the guy you want running your tournaments. You'll find a lot more of him not running a store than you will that DO run a store. Many areas don't have Hobby League. Many areas have ####ty Hobby League. Even if you bring up the level of Hobby League to a more uniform wonderful-ness there will be places where 8 people live close enough to play, but no store owner will organize it for them.

You have a system through which people qualify to organize tournaments, judge tournaments and manage players. Let us organize, judge and manage!

Put together a Not-Hobby League tournament kit with a EA for the winner, 8-10 packs to be distributed to the Top X based on attendance and "random bonus schwag" be it old t-shirts you haven't gotten rid of or excess Hobby League kit material, playmats, whatever. Just something extra for "Door Prizes". Maybe even give out 1-2 PC points instead of counting it towards our ratings. Charge us 15 bucks and don't let us have another until we run a sanctioned tournament, report it on time, distribute the kit and do all of that properly. Let us charge "up to" 5 dollars an entrant. Make us give you the PUBLIC location where it will be held so you can put it on your website. Let us reschedule if less than 4 players show up. And most importantly...

Ban anyone who reports fraudulent tournaments from running or playing in UDE OP.

You're going to get better involvement from stores now that they'll make money off Sneak Peak Release Parties and probably from City Championships. But there will still be areas with higher demand for events. There will still be places where the store owners suck. There will still be places where the store owners don't suck but the store owners think VS sucks.

What is the strongest element of the game? The system? The license? I think it's the community. Even the dickiest of dicks who play VS are rare. And some of them even give good advice in spite of being a dick about it. Put us to work! Some people in the OP thread are complaining that we're supposed to be the marketing force for the game. I'm complaining that we CAN'T be the marketing force for this game.

-Mike

P.S. I haven't read all of the massive OP thread, so there might be more discussion on this all ready, but dammit, I have 8+ pages left and I want to get this idea out there while it's fresh in my head. And I also didn't think to check if there's all ready a post like this. So hopefully not.

You must spread some Reputation around before giving it to RanmaSolo again.

It's a great idea though and it would definitely help the local level out tremendously.

Here here! I think this is a wonderful idea, a friend of mine and I were talking about this very thing today while lamenting the loss of sneak peeks and the fact that I will be stranded at 9 PC points forever. :)

So are there rules against organizing unofficial tournaments. For instance if I wanted to run an open event with a $20 cost to enter and I provide the prizes is that not allowed? I don't see why competitive VS. has to die....if you get 20 people at $20 bucks a pop. thats 400 bucks...say the guy who runs it keeps 100....thats 300 in prizes....possibly in self purchased product....Good way to keep the game going in my opinion

There isn't anything against it, but in order to make it worthwhile, someone's going to have to give up something for no reason - which makes them a sucker. By definition no one wants to be a sucker. Ranma's proposed method smooths everything over and with UDE's support, you can get a level of promotion you couldn't conventionally.

PS: Twenty dollars is A LOT of money to charge for a touranment.

Also I think it breaks gambling laws in most states. Technically. :p I could be wrong, but I'd say check into it before you start broadcasting such a thing.

Unsanctioned tournies are probably just the kind of casual play UDE is trying encourage I think. Like say run a draft/win-a-box tournament. 8 guys pay for 1/8 of a box and the winner of the draft gets to keep the cards. Or maybe he gets to pick 12 rares, second gets 8 and third/fourth split the last 4 and everyone gets to keep their uns/coms. Or whatever. Get people playing. It's good.

UDE helping us to do that is better.

-Mike

I was thinking the same thing but even if you did it in store credit and put it to 10 bucks and the store didnt take any cut

This could be the mega hobby league tournament held one of the months that didnt have the city championships

How is anyone becoming a sucker? I can honestly say that the PCQ's cost us each 20 bucks....and the total product value given away was probably not exceeding 500 dollars including the 260 dollar check card.

I also realize that deck boxes and playmats would have to go....but if you think about it from a store owners stand point.....Lets say he gets the boxes at roughly 50 bucks a pop....In reality its probably closer to 45...but I am not going to argue over 5 bucks....

So lets say 20 people enter the tournament that costs 20 bucks....which is the same cost as a PCQ. Again...that is 400 dollars. If he decides to keep 100 of it as pure profit for running the event...that leaves 300 dollars worth of prizes....which comes out to close to 6 boxes of product to give away at ZERO loss.

Cut the price to 10 and now its 3 boxes....I don't know of the competitive VS player what thinks that 20 bucks for the shot at winning a full box is a bad deal. I would do it in a heart beat if it was once or twice a month...at 10 bucks I would do it weekly.

Now imagine if you had these events once a month at central locations where you could gather around 30-50 people. Now you are talking about 600-1000 dollars in money at 20 bucks a pop.

Just because PCQ's don't give us pro circuit points or playmats and deck boxes (which could be solved if UDE let TO's purchase them at X cost each for self run events) doesn't mean that there isn't huge potential for events to make it very much worth 20 bucks each....maybe more so than the PCQ was in the first place.

Lastly, yes giving away cash does come into legal grey areas over gambling. However, most if not all states allow entry fee's to compete for prizes that are not cash.

Heck....If I could draw 30 people to an event and walk away with 150-200 bucks for a day of organizing, setting up, and judging.....I would do it without a doubt. That is easy money to be sitting around helping people enjoy a game you love.

Yeah. That's a great idea though. Even if UDE doesn't ever let us run sanctioned tournaments, if you can get tournaments going in a hobby shop, DO IT! Like I said, I think this kind of thing is exactly what UDE wants to do to energize the base.

The point of this thread is just me trying to get ideas down on "paper" for UDE to see and hopefully implement to make that kind of energization easier.

-Mike

Since I'm in Georgia... I looked up gambling laws in Georgia (This is from the interweb, but I have no reason to believe it's NOT accurate, as it aligns with what I've heard in the past):

(Note that the emphasis is mine)

I'm pretty sure that a VS tournament is a bona fide contest for determination of skill (skill can be proven to be a primary influencing factor in performance) - so I'm pretty sure divvying entry fees into prizes is legal, at least in Georgia.

-S

I was thinking last night that a cheap promotional tournament idea designed to draw new players might be to hold a

Spiderman Starter tournament, with packs of Spiderman as prizes, perhaps even a couple of participation packs.

Why?

Starters have the basic mechanics without the excess, everone is on relatively equal footing, it might even provide a challenge for more experienced players, the cost is nominal at $14 a box for Spiderman and $2 for a starter. Everyone radomly gets a Sinister Sindicate or Spiderfriends starter deck. Even if you priced the tournament at $5 a head you should come out ahead with any level of attendance. The Spidey Set ties into the current MTU release so it would be good promotion for the new set as well. If you're a shop sitting on Spidey it could be a good way to get it out the door.

Just a thought, thought I'd put it out there while it might still have merrit.

On the other hand you're allowed to play in a PCQ and Hobby League, so there must be some disconnect in that avenue of thinking.

-Mike

UPDATE:

http://www.vsrealms.com/forum/showthread.php?t=49122

Straight from the horse's mouth, UDE is working on making this an official program!

My first new addition based on this is that I like the idea of a further certification program needed, but please make it accessable online so that as many people as possible can use it. I will definitely be a part of this program if I am able, but I only get to larger tournaments (where level 2 Judge certification is available) when they're in NorCal or my formerly annual trips to PCLA.

-Mike

I definitely think that keeping the certification process online is essential since not everyone has ready access to larger tournaments. Like I have said in other posts, I live in south Louisiana and am too busy providing for my family to travel to any of the large tournaments. If this program does go through it will give me a way to keep my friends more interested in the game as well as giving me an avenue to attract new players.