Damnans#
VEKN National Co-ordinator Meeting
Stockholm
4th October 2013
Attendees:
VEKN (5)
JW Johannes Walch - VEKN Chairman [rep. Andreas Nusser, NC for Germany]
GQ Ginés Quiñonero - VEKN Web coordinator & Spain NC
PB Pascal Bertrand - VEKN Rules Team & French NC
BP Ben Peal - VEKN Design Team Leader & US NC
MN Mike Nudd - VEKN Design Team & Storyline coordinator
National Coordinators (10 +4 above in IC list)
DD Dennis Devriendt - Belgium
PD Peter Ducai - Czech Republic & Slovak Republic (Czech Gerhard Breytenbach)
CN Christian Nislev - Denmark (for Jesper Boje)
JL Janne Lönnqvist - Finland
PT Peter Talmacsi - Hungary (for Mate Vaka)
RFa Riccardo Fabiani - Italy
RFl Remek Flasinki - Poland
TB Tiago Brum - Portugal
IB Isak Esbjörnsson Bjärmark - Sweden
HA Hugh Angseesing - United Kingdom and Playtest Coordinator
Guests (1)
RL Ralf Lammert - Extrala
Via attempted live meeting
Neil Muller - South Africa
Start: 22.00
Meeting held in Hotel Scandic Ariadne, Stockholm.
Actions
• JW to organise, with Andreas Nusser, EC 2014.
• GQ to announce EC 2014 location
• JW to investigate promotional material angle around cards.
• GQ to take up new duties.
• GQ update tournament rules on VEKN website to allow multi judge for qualifiers
• JW and Andreas Nusser to update mid-2014 on inventory levels
• PB to organise NC order from for 2014 shirts.
• GQ to organise some volunteers to look at tournament penalties.
• PB and JL to report back on “time ends with when action in progress ends”
• PB to report back on impact of proxies in French Mini Qualifiers
• GQ to get the routing in place allowing the Rating Co-ordinator and the Vice-Chair to approve events.
Minutes
1. JW announced that that there were two volunteering locations for the European Championships in 2014 – Mannheim, Germany and Warsaw, Poland.
JW spoke on behalf of the Mannheim submission, noting previous experience with Heidelberg and discussing relative affordability of the venue, hotels and other costs.
RFl spoke on behalf of the Warsaw submission on behalf of Radoslaw Staszewski. It was noted that the team had good prior experiences from 2011 hosting and it was likely to comparable price to 2011.
IB noted that Warsaw was only two years ago, RFa noted that Warsaw was likely to be a cheaper option for Italian players. PT queried road quality around Warsaw but was assured all very good following European Cup [football] hosting in 2012.
After moderate discussion vote was held with 7 votes for Heidelberg to host in 2014, 3 for Warsaw and 3 abstentions.
Warsaw was suggested as a strong contender [not precluding any other bids] for 2015.
2. JW announced that POD (Print on Demand) is off the table with no reason given by the owners of the intellectual property. Key assumption is that the owners of the intellectual property have limited resources in their legal teams and can only devote time to items that are sufficiently revenue generating.
BP asked JW to investigate exactly what was covered by the VEKN’s right to produce promotional material for VTES e.g. does this include promotional cards.
RFa asked if Kickstarter or other crowd funding could assist and JW noted that funding was not the issue [or not the key issue as a kickstarter would have to raise a substantial sum] and that the philosophy of kickstarter was necessarily appropriate.
3. JW announced he was stepping down as chairman
a. POD has failed to materialise
b. In role or related role for 10 years
c. Will still support both though IC Emeritus role and through supporting and organising events e.g. EC 2014.
This was formally announced on the www.vekn.net forum on 16th August 2013 and the announcement included the rules around nominating a replacement. Only one candidate was presented [GQ with Antonio Cobo Cuenca remaining as deputy chairman] with the option to reopen nominations if the NCs so wished.
GQ gave a brief overview of his intentions:
1. Nominated by the playerbase
2. Has reasonable non-work time in order to make his appointment successful including current work as web coordinator, art director and Spanish NC duties.
3. Main intention is to improve VEKN communication with the community
4. Have key volunteer in mind for Web coordinator role
GQ was elected to be the new chairman of the VEKN with 12 votes and 2 abstentions.
4. HA asked NCs to vote on adding archon approval into Vice Chairman [Antonio Cobo Cuenca] role. This was unanimously passed.
5. HA noted that a number of qualifier tournaments were currently held under multi-judge rues following White-Wolf organised play suggestion.
HA suggested that we formally update the tournament rules to allow qualifiers excluding qualifiers held at continental championship events to be multi-judged.
The vote was passed with 11 in favour and 2 abstentions.
Key points:
a. Qualifiers can still be solo-judged if the organiser prefers this.
b. If an event if multi-judged and the judges/organiser play they will not receive the automatic qualification spot given to head judge/organiser of qualifiers.
Relevant part from updated tournament rules:
2.9. Multi-Judge System
The Multi-Judge System may be used at any non- last chance qualifier, non-championship tournament with at least eight participants (i.e., having at least two tables).
6. PB asked what remaining stocks were available via Andreas Nusser [email]
Reminder from 2012:
AN 2,000 displays were saved from CCP. These include a substantial amount of LOTN and starter displays. Reminder David Tatu/Kevin Mergen’s supplies are separate to the European supplies obtained by Walch and Nusser.
Every promo card that could be saved was, estimates are that there are at least 2-3 years of support stockpiled.
Andreas Nusser indicated via e-mail that there are:
• Substantial numbers of promos available.
• 100-150 displays of LOTN, Blackhand, KMW, NOR, Gehenna, SoC but some products e.g. 3rd, KOT and LOB only being available as starters.
JL noted that www.fantasiapelit.com/ had large supplies of VTES available including sets not on VTES.de.
JW indicated that a link on VTES.de to the Fantasiapelit stocks could be made available for these items.
Concerns were highlighted that David Tatu may have too much stock and may need to dispose of some for space concerns.
BP noted he did not think this was the case and either way US players would be able to make use of the product.
7. PB asked Andreas Nusser [via email] for an update on 2013 qualifer t-shirts.
a. Shirts sold out
b. GQ arranged art and Radoslaw Staszewski printing.
c. Some shortage due to late ordering.
d. 2014 EC shirts need to be ordered now by all NCs to ensure correct printing level.
Reminder from 2012:
e. Old VTES artwork is unavailable however Danse Macabre artwork is available for 2013 t-shirts.
f. It was noted that a pamphlet listing EC/NAC/SA/Asia/Australia dates in each support pack would be very useful.
Additionally it was asked if they t-shirts could be other than black and it was generally noted that the 2008 green Twilight Rebellion t-shirts were the most popular.
8. HA noted that it would be useful to have 2015 –t-shirts ready and available for the NAC in May/June 2014.
JW indicated that this was difficult due to the capital investment required in advance but a February 2014 date could be achievable for the 2014 shirts.
9. PB noted that current tournament penalties e.g. Game Loss, were unsuitable for a multiplayer game. HA noted that he, Jesper Boje, IB and TB had re-drafted the judging guidelines and this included a brief look at penalties.
After some discussion of Game Win, Victory Point and Rating penalties it was noted that more work should be done in this area by a volunteer team who can then present their ideas back to the NCs/Rules team.
10. RFa noted that current 0.5VP for a time out was having an adverse impact on some players who were playing with the intention of getting 0.5VP.
PD noted that has had examined some data which suggested that overall removing 0.5VPs for all players would have little impact but removing 0.5VPs from tables with no ousts would have a larger impact upon final composition.
Consensus was to leave the rules unchanged for the moment but encourage players to play to win and examine if this behaviour can be changed.
11. RFa noted that current rules for finalist seating did not always work e.g. in cases where the first seed did not know deck information at the table and also that the first seed is encouraged not to ‘play’ in the final but rather to maintain game state.
Alternative options:
a. Random finalist seating
b. Use “obvious” crypt place makers for laying down players in order
c. All finalists lose if there is a final timeout
Discussion centred around how a two hour [or even 2.5. hour timelimit used in some finals] was a key part of the game and how it was possible to increase length of final under current rules if wanted.
How difficult it is to determine if revealing one crypt gives anyone information about a deck [some crypts may be obvious some less so]
Consensus was to leave the rules unchanged for the moment but encourage finalist to play to win as always.
12. It was noted that some groups have playing finish current action [where applicable] when time was called. JW, PD noted that they also judged this/played like this as standard and JL indicated he would trial this.
PB, JL to trial this in non-sanctioned events e.g. French Mini Qualifiers and report back to see if it has a positive impact on players [e.g. removes the dead but didn’t have time to say no block and lose the three pool]
13. Proxy Cards
PB noted that he had been trialling via French Mini Qualifiers limited use of proxies to see how this impacts playerbase [but not rated tournaments].
JW noted that if full scale proxies are produced this would condemn POD to never exist.
BP noted that we need to know how many players would we gain versus lose over proxy addition.
RFl noted that once we started full scale proxies it would be hard to stop.
IB noted that it was generally easy to produce proxies for home use [as is common] but for tournament play you need a group to allow card sharing for real cards. This becomes much harder for new groups who want to play VTES [or returning groups].
PB suggested allowing proxies at smaller tournaments but not qualifiers/nationals/continentals
General view was to not allow proxies at any sanctioned tournaments at the moment [excluding pdf sets].
14. RFl asked the InnerCircle to note what work they had performed for the VTES community during 2013.
GQ
• Translated cards into Spanish [on www.vekn.net]
• Website coordinator
• Membership director [cleaning up NCs, Princes etc]
• Permissions to playtesters on playtest forum
• Artwork for Danse/Indy set and Artwork director
MN
• Limited work on storylines [Ragnarok for Stockholm]
• Open invite for players to work with him on their own storylines – use him as a resource/library.
• Designed new cards for independent set currently in testing.
• Working on VTES unglued for 20th anniversary.
• Interested in running a series of mini-storylines for EC 2014, running up to the event.
PB
• Rules questions
• POD in mind with Vincent Ripoll – templating cards in the background
• Gather all rulings to create a database ~10% complete [lots of rulings in lots of different places].
RFl interested in a small, tight board so he can see clearly defined roles and expectations. Expect ~8 hours per week from his princes.
IB it’s important for variable pacing as well as a sensible balance or work/life/vtes
15. It was agreed that as well as the Vice chairman, the Ratings coordinator should be able to approve events on the vekn website.
Improvements
1. To test the connectivity of NCs not at the meeting if this is required, meeting needs to be kept simple, effective and timely.
2. One person to run meeting [e.g. PB] and one to minute [e.g. HA] for effective movement of the discussion due to limited timeframe.
CLOSE 23:40
V:EKN Website Coordinator