Ugh, cash prizes? I really hope this stays separate from the community and OP play as a whole. I really hate overly competitive play, and I have seen what cash can do to other games. If WK starts going in this direction, I may be done.

That being said, I like the intent of FPBP and I salute you Howard. This is a huge undertaking.

I did a mapquest and sure enought warner robins is actually closer to me than Fort Walton Beach by an hour. I live in Melbourne Florida, which is near cocoa beach on the east cost in the middle of the state. So 7 hours to your event in GA and 8 hours to the event in FL.

What do you want them to do about it? They've already said WK isn't supplying LEs for this. And the secondary market probably can't supply them on the level they seem to want to operate on.

Maybe the prize pool will expand in non-plastic ways as this thing gets rolling, though.

I am sure if you ask Wizards of the Coast they would say something pretty different about Magic the Gathering. I am not a big MTG fan but having basically a professional league is going to boost the interest in your game no question about it. Wizkids did not refuse to support this because they feel it drives the wrong kind of behavior, they refused to support this because they view the ROC as a threat to their own organised play system + Nationals. This is a very short sighted view point and smacks of behavior similar to Games Workshop where they are trying to control every aspect of their game and don't want to play nice with other people.

Which is why I said "historically speaking", since I had no real knowledge of what was going on this time.

Honestly, I don't know. But its pretty apparent to myself and a lot of others (based on the replies in this thread) that the current structure probably isn't going to cut it. Is it a terrible idea? No, not necessarily. Does it need some more work? Yes, absolutely.

Regardless of what happens though, I don't think this ever becomes more than a niche event unless WK is behind it. And that's the big difference between this and the Magic Pro series tournaments.


With that, I'll bow out of the thread. The ROC is doing the best it can with what it has (that much had been made apparent multiple times). Hopefully its enough.

And while you looked at it the fair honest way, I looked at what the likelihood was of someone cheating the system. It costs $600 to buy your way into Heat 3. There are 68 points given out at every local qualifier. If one player has 16 friends (not even Heroclix players, just friends who can be names on paper), he can pay the $200, judge the event, report results for how they did (having none of them play), and keep the 68 points. Do this 3 times and he just bought his way into Heat 3 by obtaining 204 points. Seems like a potential problem that runs the risk of being exploited.

But the ROC isn't like Wizkids and the WES. You have to give notice of an event two months in advance. They advertise the event as well, meaning there will be people other than those 16 friends showing. And even if somehow you manage to pull it off, let's be honest here, anyone who has to drop $600 to make it to the finals of an event is not good enough to win. I don't see anyone trying to buy their way in. Maybe some people that got some points trying to get enough to get to the next level. A guy with 15 trying to get to 20, a guy with 120 trying to get another 80, that sort of thing. But anyone that has to pay for 200 points because they can't win them can't possibly think they would survive the finals and win $4,000.

Sample points card is now in the prize list.

The 4th map will be up later today. Bring your coat when looking at it, Might be a little chilly.

Does anyone know if the cards that TCGPlayer use come with serial numbers or the like. I can't imagine they won't have some way of checking on potential abuse such as this, however unlikely it is that someone can pull it off.

I have never actually held one in my hand as I do not play magic.. I was thinking they may be printed with a bar code or something.

Okay I now know something more. A few people have asked what keeps the cards from being reproduced so I asked TCGPlayer.com.

Answer: They are holographic

If you know you can't play in any super qualifier, and you know you can't talk your store into running 5 tournies on their own dime, buying your way in wouldn't show inability to compete, it would show that you may actually be the best player in the top 256 because you were able to figure out how to make it into that bracket without being able to drive days on end to play in the New York ROC events when you live in Texas, or something.

Added in 5 more Super Qualifiers. Also changed cost of entry fees to suggested cost. I am about to make a post concerning one of our prizes..we are about to enhance it...looking for suggestions from the community so visit the general forum in a few minutes.