I have emailed them and they still have not answered where it is. Im thinking that all this delay will result in a low turnout.

Pastimes is spread too thin. Running UD events in 5 states is got to be pretty much impossible. They started this trend of not saying where an event is back in May for the St. Louis Yugi regional.

They are their own worst enemy when it comes to bad attendance. Only the hardcore players will come, not causal to semi-competitive players when you don't know where an event is less than a week before. This is getting to be ridiculous. There are stores in the St. Louis area that would love to hold the St. Louis area UD events, but for whatever reason, Pastimes has a strangle hold.

Also, what happened to the store Simply Magic? They held the Indianapolis Yugi regional last February, and really did a great job. There were no real issues and everyone seemed to leave happy. Did they close or why did Pastimes now take over?

I will have to say they did serve pizza courtesy of UD on Saturday and finally had level 2 testing for Yugi and VS (been to 5 of their events before counting 10K Chicago) and they never had level 2 testing for any of those. I thank them for that and not bashing me after I performed so poorly on the level 2 VS test (should of taken the Yugi one.)

But I still wonder if they're being stretched too thin, it's starting to seem so. Maybe I'm wrong, but this is starting to become a pattern that is not helping the game.

Hello,

The event this weekend will occur at

Crowne Plaza Hotel
INDIANAPOLIS-DWTN-UNION STN
123 WEST LOUISIANA ST
INDIANAPOLIS, IN 46225
Tel: 1-317-631-2221


In regards to being stretched too thin - we have recently resolved that issue with the hiring of someone to work on events full-time. We have also set our schedule through May of 2005. We appreciate the concern and will continue to bring you the best events possible.

We look forward to seeing you this weekend!!

Take care,

Thanks guys.

I was in a store that had a quite a few people wondering where the event was to be held.

I can now pass on this info.

Simply Magic isn't a store, it's a TO without a store. They still run Indy events for Magic (PTQs and PRs). I'm not sure what the story is with UDE and Simply Magic, but SM doesn't run UDE events any more.

All (more) info is available on www.pastimes.net

Des Moines Iowa - October 30th Info

Date:
October 30th
Location:
Marriott - Downtown
700 Grand Avenue
DesMoines, Iowa 50309
515-245-5500
*(Free parking across the street)

Time:
Registration is 9 - 9:30 AM for the Sealed PCQ.
Registration for the constructed will begin after round 3 of the sealed ends and end after the 4th round of the sealed ends.
Play begins immediately after registration ends.

Decklists are required for this event. Please plan on arriving early enough to complete one or print one out here (.PDF format) and bring it with you. Or, fill one out at home by using a form you can type into!!

Tournament Structure:
The tournament structure for both the Sealed Deck and Constructed format UDE Pro Circuit Qualifier Tournaments is Swiss with a cut to the Top 8. For players unfamiliar with Swiss format, the number of rounds of play will be determined by attendance and players can participate in each round, win or lose, until the Swiss rounds are over. After the Swiss rounds, the Top 8 players will participate in Single Elimination finals. Note; the Sealed Deck event finals will be Vs. System booster draft.

Format:
Twin Format -- Sealed Deck and Constructed

UDE Pro Circuit Qualifier Tournaments offer both a Sealed Deck and a Constructed format option per event.
In the Sealed Deck format, each player will receive five boosters of the most current Vs. System product. Players will open the five packs, sort the cards alphabetically by team, and register all the cards on the checklist. The player registering the cards must also list his name on the registration sheet in the REGISTERED BY area. Players should be allowed 20 minutes to register card lists. Once cards and lists have been re-distributed, players then have 30 minutes to construct a deck of at least 30 cards. There is currently no side-deck in the Vs. System, so once the deck is completed and the decklist is registered and submitted, the deck must match this list throughout the entire tournament.
Finals of the Sealed Deck event will be Vs. System booster draft.

In the Constructed format, each player must supply their own deck containing a minimum of 60 cards (no maximum) and have no more than 4 copies of a card with the same name. There are two exceptions to the '4 copies' rules:
- Characters can be included up to 4 times in a deck for each different version you put in the deck. For example, a deck can contain up to 4 copies of Wolverine, Logan and up to 4 copies of Wolverine, Berserker Rage.
- Army characters have no limit for purposes of deck construction. You can have any number of a card in your deck if, if the word army appears in the version line. For example, a deck can contain 60 copies of the army character Doom Guards.
Players will use their own deck for the duration of the tournament and will not be allowed to alter the contents of their deck between games or matches.
Finals of the Constructed event will be single-elimination.
Round length for PCQ tournaments is 60 minutes.
Match Structure:
The time limit for PCQ tournaments is one game with 30 minute length, regardless of format (effective October 1).

Top round length is best of three, 90 minutes per round.

This formula is used for one-game match tournaments.
_
4 to 8 players 4 rounds of Swiss ___________Cut to Top 2*
9 to 16 players 5 rounds of Swiss Cut to Top 4*
17 to 22 players 6 rounds of Swiss ___________Cut to Top 8
23 to 36 players 7 rounds of Swiss ___________Cut to Top 8
37 to 52 players _________8 rounds of Swiss ___________Cut to Top 8
53 to 94 players _________9 rounds of Swiss ___________Cut to Top 8
95 to 152 players _______10 rounds of Swiss __________Cut to Top 8
153 to 256 players _____11 rounds of Swiss __________Cut to Top 8
257 to 440 players _____12 rounds of Swiss __________Cut to Top 8
441+ players 13 rounds of Swiss __________Cut to Top 8
_


Cost:
$25 for sealed / $20 for constructed (if you play in both we offer a discount of $5. You must drop from the Sealed if you want to play in the constructed)


Prizes:
These prizes are awarded for each format.
_
1st Place
- $250 (paid via check from UDE)
- PCQ Invitation
- Extended-art foil promo card

2nd Place
- 24 Vs. System boosters - most current set
- Extended-art foil promo card

3rd - 4th Place
- 12 Vs. System boosters - most current set
- Extended-art foil promo card



Hope to see many Iowans there - we have not run a PCQ in Iowa before - but plan on coming back often!!!!

Well, to my knowledge, part of the reason for the delay in finding a venue is that they try to hold out for better venues to lower their prices. It saves them money, but causes exactly the type of frustration exhibited here.

Greetings from Simply Magic Premier Events. It's amazing the kinds of things you can find while doing random web searches.

I've had a number of e-mails asking what the status of Yu-Gi-Oh is in Indiana, and when/if we're going to have another Regionals. I've also been asked about Vs.

If my response sounds petty or whining, I apologize. It's not intentional.

We're going to set the way-back machine to early March, 2004.

Apparently, I made some operational mistakes regarding our Yu-Gi-Oh Regionals in February, 2004. These involved two major areas:
1) I was never told Upper Deck's tournament software Mantis would not work under Windows 98, only that they had some minor problems, and that it should be immediately evident if my system was going to have those problems or not. I loaded it, and it looked like it would work. As those of you who attended the February regionals know, it didn't.

According to Upper Deck, we were told explicitly that it did not work, on several occasions. I assumed I'd missed those e-mails, but upon meeting the Upper Deck staff in March, I showed them my records, and they conceded that there had only been the one message, but that I misinterpreted it.

Strangely enough, I had just removed Windows ME from my machine and installed 98, so that it wouldn't need as large a memory or drive footprint in my emulator. (I'm running Windows through Virtual PC for the Mac OS.) Even more strangly, I switched back to Windows ME and attempted to run Mantis, and was STILL unsuccessful, but upon returning to 98 again, it worked fine!

So, I began slowly plugging away at moving the results from DCI Reporter to Mantis...

2) I was severely chastised for charging $20/player for our event. I was told I was not to charge over $15. I was never told that. The guidelines said the entry fee should be between $5 and $15.

In the end, however, everything had been cleared up -- I have Mantis working, and I know I'm not supposed to charge over $15. As it is, after reevaluating the space needed and the estimated attendance, I dropped my entry fee for the next Regionals down to $11/player. At this point, we could probably go even lower.

So we set upon the task of scheduling the next Regionals.

I had an opening in the 2nd weekend of June, and was really anxious to run one of "the last" Regionals prior to the events at Origins. I suggested this to Upper Deck on a few occasions, but didn't get anything definitive from them. It wasn't until speaking to them in mid March that I was told the deadline was in late May, and was inflexible, so I wouldn't be able to hold one in June.

So, I talked to them about trying for late April, barely within their advance time frame that they wanted (amount of time event is scheduled prior to it happening). I spoke directly with these people, and they were anxious to get the ball rolling quickly.

So I did. I made calls the day after returning (from Las Vegas, where I met them), and within a week had realized I couldn't hold it in Indianapolis on that date, but that I could hold it in Louisville, since the TO there had decided not to do events for Upper Deck.

Two weeks later, barely a month before the proposed date, Upper Deck replies that someone else is handling Kentucky and that I shouldn't plan dates there.

So both of the remaining dates I had available for that season were negated (other dates were taken up by two Magic PTQs, a Magic Prerelease, and visitation rights with my son).

Keeping up on their directive to be pro-active and keep communication going, I contacted them roughly once every three weeks after that, wanting to know when we could start scheduling the next season, and when it would begin. Literally months went by, and I didn't get any response, until an e-mail in late May gave me the impression things had started, or were very close, so I again urgently asked when things were going to be starting.

Unsatisfactory event planning... I've been pushing every possible date, and pushing to find out when we could schedule more, and that's unsatisfactory...

This surprised me not just because of their reasoning, but because just a month before I'd been told that I WOULD be doing Yu-Gi-Oh events in the future, but not Vs. events.

I should clarify one thing -- I didn't say I didn't want to do any Vs. events. I said my organization wasn't yet set up to adapt to multiple systems at the same time, and that I wanted to ask around and see if this Vs. thing was going to catch on. Within a week I had my answers - 1) yes, it was, and 2) it would be a lot easier to do this than I was letting myself believe, and so I went about setting up procedures to run not only Magic but Yu-Gi-Oh, Vs., Duelmasters, and whatever else came down the line. Apparently, that was too long of a delay.

Plan in advance...check. Order product further in advance...got it. Be more prepared...got it. Maintain communication...yep. I've covered all that. I heard their concerns, and acted upon them. More and more, what e-mails I DID get from them indicated they weren't aware of any of this, but not being here in Indiana, there's no reason they should be.

Even more interesting is that I spoke to the replacement TO (Pastimes) and he had been told by Upper Deck that we'd had a long phone conversation and that I had no problem with them giving him my territory. Actually, what they were referring to was a conversation we'd had before I even ran the February event in which I'd commented that if they decided to have someone else run the events in Indianapolis, that there was really nothing I could do about it.

So at this point where do things stand?

Well, first, I don't know if I'll ever be running Upper Deck events in Indiana or not. I seriously doubt it. There was potential that the organization in charge of Kentucky would have me run their events there FOR them, and I'd have no problem doing that, but I havn't heard anything in months, and they appear to be handling things themselves. If that happens, believe me, I'll be in touch.

Secondly, I still don't have the results for the February Regionals uploaded because of two technical issues, both of which I have been e-mailing Upper Deck about for months and haven't received a response, aside from one early note that only helped partially. I don't know when I'll get those issues resolved, and thus I unfortunately don't know when the results will be submitted.

I should note -- the winners list and winning decklists were submitted promptly. These technical problems only affect the players actual rating/ranking.

I have no problem encouraging Yu-Gi-Oh in Indiana, and if you are holding regular non-premier events and would like, I'd be more than happy to post your information on the Yu-Gi-Oh page, but I don't know what else there is to do at this time. As I don't have a Vs. page, I really can't offer the same to Vs. players at this time.

I'll try to stay in touch as more information comes available, and if opportunities come available in the future. You can also contact me directly, as I don't go forum-trolling all that often.

Thanks for hanging in there. I appreciate it. It was fun while it lasted.

Victor E Aldridge III
Simply Magic Premier Events
[email protected]
http://www.geocities.com/simplymtg/

good job on bringing back a thread from god knows when. =/