Direct action to promote VTES in Spain

DIRECT ACTION ============= A PROJECT TO IMPROVE THE PARTICIPATION IN V:TES EVENTS IN SPAIN by Mario Sopena, a.k.a. Prías Pablo Vicente, a.k.a. Las Voces Iñaki Jiménez, a.k.a. Redvenom Ginés Quiñonero, a.k.a. Damnans Raúl Perfecto, a.k.a. dRAcÚL Year after year, we have been realizing that the attendance to V:TES Official Events is going down. The average age of the Spanish “Methuselahs” is becoming higher and higher (ca. 30 years old), and the number of newbies is lower than the people quitting the game. The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. Many playgroups do not find the official competition attractive enough and prefer to stay at home, thus becoming decadent “Inner Circles” who do not evolve with the novelties of the game or the new rulings, and finally disappear in the medium term. For this reason we have decided to promote the Spanish tournaments by means of some initiatives to make them more attractive for the players, focusing on the playgroups who only play at home, and giving an incentive to player mobility from one city to another to play V:TES. These are the actions we are taking since the beginning of this year: ACTION 1: A NATIONAL RANKING In order to give some incentives to the competitive soul of the players in Spain, we have created a National Ranking, parallel to the V:EKN one. The Spanish V:TES Community has welcomed this proposal so far. The National Ranking is based on the standard White-Wolf rating points system; including the new bonus for the finals: 90 rating points for the winner, 30 rating points for the remaining finalists multiplied by the coefficient of attendance. In addition, by the end of the year, the top 5 players in the Spanish Ranking will automatically qualify for the Second Day of the Spanish Championship (that will be a two day event), which makes the Spanish Ranking more attractive and a good prize for player regularity. Adding to this, the top 5 players, just one week before the Spanish Championship, will receive some extra prizes depending on the money collected during the 2008 VTES campaign (more details about financing below). As mentioned above, this year’s Spanish National Championship will be a two day event: DAY 1: Last Chance Qualifier (the finalists qualify for Day 2) First Day of the Spanish Championship (the top 30 players qualify for Day 2) DAY 2: Second Day of the Spanish Championship: 40 players (top 5 ranked players in the National Ranking; the 5 finalist of the LCQ, and the top 30 players of Day 1). National standings will be coordinated and weekly updated by Raúl Perfecto in the Spanish forum on www.vtes.net. In addition to player names and their rating points, these standings will also include the titles gained by those players in the tournaments in which they have participated: Prince (in the case of a Praxis Seizure tournament), Archbishop (in the case of a Crusade tournament), Baron (in the case of a Fee Stake tournament), etc. The winners will also show their honorific titles on their signatures in the Spanish VTES forum. ACTION 2: THE SPANISH GRAND SLAM We have designed a calendar of “big” events coordinated and approved by Princes and organizers. The events are the most successful ones in previous campaigns: • Munduko Txapelketa: Bilbao • Festivo dello Estinto: Zaragoza • Powerbase Catalunya: Barcelona • Batalla por Madrid: Madrid • Cónclave de la Camarilla: Palma de Mallorca • Campeonato de Andalucía: Málaga • Carthage Remembered: Cartagena These tournaments will get special support from the “Cónclave Hispánico”, our National V:TES Association. There will be special gifts for every player in attendance and nice prizes for the winner and finalists. An additional prize for these special tournaments, also called “Grand Slam tournaments”, is that the rating points each attending player gets for the National Ranking are doubled. We hope this measure will attract people from other cities to play, and that some players will even plan to make the complete tournament circuit. In each Grand Slam tournament we will collect 1,00 euro per player to finance the gifts for the top 5 players in the Spanish Ranking at the end of the campaign, i.e., one week before the Spanish National Championship takes place. The “Conclave Hispánico” will be in charge of collecting and spending this money as mentioned above. Some of these tournaments will also have an Storyline taste, i.e., they will not be standard constructed tournaments. For example, the “Festivo dello Estinto”, in Zaragoza, will be a “Sabbat-only” event, with some special rules. -- Damnans http://www.almadrava.net/damnans http://www.vtes.net http://es.groups.yahoo.com/group/vteshispania/ http://iuturna.sorcery.net (IRC channel: #vtes)

On Sun, 30 Mar 2008 20:34:39 +0200, Damnans wrote: >A PROJECT TO IMPROVE THE PARTICIPATION IN V:TES EVENTS IN SPAIN >by >Mario Sopena, a.k.a. Prías >Pablo Vicente, a.k.a. Las Voces >Iñaki Jiménez, a.k.a. Redvenom >Ginés Quiñonero, a.k.a. Damnans >Raúl Perfecto, a.k.a. dRAcÚL This seems to be very well thought out and I hope it does increase your numbers (or at least slows the decreasing of numbers). The increased emphasis on ratings and rankings may turn off as many as it turns on though. I know that in Atlanta we have players that avoid all events labeled 'qualifiers' because of strategy and tactics changes that they experienced at prior events with those labels. I don't see much in your proposal to encourage new players specifically. I seem to remember a storyline event where the country with the most new signed up players got special cards named for them afterwards. Which Spain won, if memory does indeed serve. Is there any chance of LSJ/WW doing something like that again? I don't know if there is something similar that could be done in the US or other countries where the playing populations are farther separated. I would certainly encourage the US princes and coordinators to contemplate it though. Damnans, is there anything I can do on my side of the web to help this out? Carpe noctem. Lasombra http://www.TheLasombra.com Your best online source for information about V:TES. Now also featuring individual card sales and sales of booster and starter box displays.

[ quoted text not captured ] The first "big" tournament of the year, Munduko Txapelketa III, has increased the number of players from 23 last year to 39 with some regulars from our tournaments missing the event. The players enjoyed the tournament and everybody went home with some prizes. We had like 4 new players to the tournament scene. Every player in the event took home a booster and 2 packs of promos. For every single vp each player recieved a booster and the finalist played for 5 preconstructed and 25 boosters. The players qualified 6th-10th played another final for 10 boosters and a preconstructed. The 10 first qualified players also took home a exclusive cup from the tournament and the winner also took the "Champion's Txapela" and a patxaran bottle. Such big prizes made the people come to the tournament. I hope to have some pictures of the event soon to show. There are some pictures of the prizes of the "Festivo dello Stinto" available here --> http://dnn.vtes.net/Foros/tabid/403/view/topic/postid/47183/forumid/5/tpage/1/Default.aspx#47231 Cheers, Iñaki

In article <fsomg1$ibd$1...@registered.motzarella.org>, Damnans <damna...@ono.com> wrote: > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. While your ideas for ratings and whatnot seem totally reasonable, I'm kind of confused by "lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf". What do you mean by that? Peter D Bakija pd...@lightlink.com http://www.lightlink.com/pdb6/vtes.html "Find hungry samurai." -The Old Man

On Mar 30, 10:06 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > While your ideas for ratings and whatnot seem totally reasonable, I'm > kind of confused by "lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf". > What do you mean by that? > Look at the images on the link i've posted before. That could be an example of cool tournament support prizes WW could provide

On Mar 30, 6:29 pm, RedVenom <redve...@hotmail.com> wrote: > Look at the images on the link i've posted before. That could be an > example of cool tournament support prizes WW could provide To be fair to the company, they can't really hand out tons and tons of free stuff (although they do have a good record to handing out a lot of free product at big tournaments like qualifiers and championships). And asking them to hand out weird/special things (rings/t-shirts/art/ wacky stuff) is asking just as many people to be turned off as not (yeah, some folks like winning books and t-shirts and whatever, but just as many would rather just get some cards). The current system is totally reasonable--you get boosters at below retail and piles of promo cards (I handed out *8* different promos to each player at my most recent event). For modest entry fees, you can hand out a lot of product ($5 buck/euro per player gets you, more or less, a box of boosters for a 12 player tournament). And as much as I'd be happy for WW to front us booze for prizes, I suspect that is a failing business model :-) What kind of things do you really think would be reasonable for the company to provide? -Peter

> The current system is totally reasonable--you get boosters at below > retail How do I get boosters for below retail direct from WW? This is a great idea for the most part. I think if players in the USA would want to do something like this then it should probably start at the state level.

On Sun, 30 Mar 2008 19:32:15 -0700 (PDT), wrote: >> The current system is totally reasonable--you get boosters at below >> retail >How do I get boosters for below retail direct from WW? Tournament kits. 3 booster and 12 sets of promos for $12. If you figure that each set of promos is worth a buck, then the boosters are free. If you figure that you are only paying for the boosters at full retail, then the promos are free. I would be willing to bet this is what Peter had in mind.

On Mar 30, 11:15 pm, The Lasombra <TheLasom...@hotmail.com> wrote: > I would be willing to bet this is what Peter had in mind. Indeed it is. For a buck per player (assuming a group of 12. Scale up as needed), everyone gets a handful of promos and then 3 boosters as a prize. You charge 5 bucks a player, everyone gets a billion promos and you get 15 boosters as prizes. And so on. A totally reasonable prize system. And again, WW does do an admirable job of fronting product to big tournaments (qualifiers/championships). Any other wacky prizes (t- shirts/action figures/booze) is likely something that you should get based on the wants of your player group, and fund out of entry fees. -Peter

The Lasombra schrieb: > On Sun, 30 Mar 2008 19:32:15 -0700 (PDT), wrote: > >>> The current system is totally reasonable--you get boosters at below >>> retail > >> How do I get boosters for below retail direct from WW? > > Tournament kits. > > 3 booster and 12 sets of promos for $12. > > If you figure that each set of promos is worth a buck, then the > boosters are free. Promos should be free. The tournament kit was only introduced to be able to make a regular product out of the promos and the product needs a price to encourage the retail chain to stock it. > If you figure that you are only paying for the boosters at full > retail, then the promos are free. Problem is that the boosters at full retail are not very realistic. The current market price for 3 boosters is 5,25$. So basically the players are paying 6.75$ for the promos. What needs to be done? I think the tournament kit could be more expensive but should have some items that are exclusively available through the kit and change 2-3 times a year (pool counters and edge markers were quite popular and are highly sought after at the moment, no idea why they were dropped). Promos still need to be free, though, because they are promos ;-)

[ quoted text not captured ] I don't know how many tournaments you play during the year but in spain lots of players play more than one per mouth so there's no interest in promos. Mostly every player i know buys at least a booster box of each set so the boosters are not really needed. What we are trying to do is to create some kind of unique merchandising to show that it makes the trip to play a tournament more atractive. What would you be your choosen prize for attending to a tournament, a booster box or a mettalic edge like the one in the photo? A booster or a deck protector with the tournament logo? A booster or a Vtes cup for the coffee? I'm pretty sure what i would choose and i'm sure that most of the players would agree with me. -Iñaki

I really do think interesting prizes are the way to go as there's only so much space under my bed or in my closet for more cards. I really appreciated the badge in won in a Swedish tournament several years ago as it's unique and much easier better for my mind than opening a laod of boosters extracting the 2 cards i want & giving everything else to the guy at the tourney with the least cards (not that i mind that either but occasionnaly i want something for me!). I believe the Swedes ran something similar in Goteborg where the player with the most wins (& badges) at the end of the year won a special prize. My only concern is that the prizes as you're giving them are essentially going to those who win lots and although that might be an incentive to improve/try different decks, it might put of those players who aren't as good and who are only attending a few tourneys a year. You probably need to add 'prizes' for attendance e.g. 1st tourney attendance, 5th etc to get the less competitive players interested. Have you asked the general Spainish playerbase what would motitvate them to come to more events?

On Mar 30, 10:06 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > In article <fsomg1$ib...@registered.motzarella.org>, > > Damnans <damnansv...@ono.com> wrote: > > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. > > While your ideas for ratings and whatnot seem totally reasonable, I'm > kind of confused by "lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf". > What do you mean by that? I mean that WW has to rely (mainly) on volunteers to promote the game, unlike other companies. I know WW can't do much more, and I am not criticising that, but giving some ideas for volunteers to promote the participation in VTES events. [ quoted text not captured ]

On Mar 30, 9:15 pm, The Lasombra <TheLasom...@hotmail.com> wrote: > On Sun, 30 Mar 2008 20:34:39 +0200, Damnans wrote: > >A PROJECT TO IMPROVE THE PARTICIPATION IN V:TES EVENTS IN SPAIN > >by > >Mario Sopena, a.k.a. Prías > >Pablo Vicente, a.k.a. Las Voces > >Iñaki Jiménez, a.k.a. Redvenom > >Ginés Quiñonero, a.k.a. Damnans > >Raúl Perfecto, a.k.a. dRAcÚL > > This seems to be very well thought out and I hope it does increase > your numbers (or at least slows the decreasing of numbers). > > The increased emphasis on ratings and rankings may turn off as many as > it turns on though. I know that in Atlanta we have players that avoid > all events labeled 'qualifiers' because of strategy and tactics > changes that they experienced at prior events with those labels. > > I don't see much in your proposal to encourage new players > specifically. Yeah... We are also discussing some actions to encourage new players as a part of this "Direct Action" project. But nothing final yet. > I seem to remember a storyline event where the country > with the most new signed up players got special cards named for them > afterwards. Which Spain won, if memory does indeed serve. Your memory serves you well :-) > Is there any chance of LSJ/WW doing something like that again? I hope so. [...] [ quoted text not captured ]

Damnans schrieb: > On Mar 30, 10:06 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: >> In article <fsomg1$ib...@registered.motzarella.org>, >> >> Damnans <damnansv...@ono.com> wrote: >>> The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some >>> V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they >>> get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. >> While your ideas for ratings and whatnot seem totally reasonable, I'm >> kind of confused by "lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf". >> What do you mean by that? > > I mean that WW has to rely (mainly) on volunteers to promote the game, > unlike other companies. > > I know WW can't do much more, and I am not criticising that, but > giving some ideas for volunteers to promote the participation in VTES > events. Agreed. It is not about throwing money around it is about integrating the really good base of volunteers in a good way. WW needs to give more responsibility to volunteers, because those dedicated individuals regard that often as the best type of "payment" they can get. e.g princes have been called "demo monkeys" quite often, and that is just the wrong way to see it. If somebody puts in his energy and spare time to make the game/events a better experience for everybody that should get some respect from WW. The respect of at least trying as hard as possible to make everything "right" and I think they could try a little harder.

Johannes Walch wrote: > e.g princes have been called "demo monkeys" quite often, and that is > just the wrong way to see it. Not to derail your main point, but just by way of explaining this side point... Demo monkey is not a bad name. It's a name the players (not VTES players --- game players in general) who do this sort of volunteer work came up with for themselves. I'm proud to be a demo monkey, both for WW and (in the past) for other game companies. Naturally, though, if a volunteer doesn't wish to use that appellation, he's free to avoid it and use whatever moniker he prefers.

Damnans wrote: > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in terms of prize support for a normal monthly tournament? The industry standard in the CCG world is a couple of free promo cards as prize support, and _maybe_ an attendance-based rewards system. Somehow the V:TES community has collectively gotten in its head that we're supposed to receive handfuls of boosters or other cool prizes for free, despite that no other CCG company offers that. Not even Wizards of the Coast offers that for the weekly Friday Night Magic tournaments. All they offer is a pair of promo cards, plus attendance points for the DCI Rewards system. Why don't CCG companies offer better prizes for these tournaments? Cost, of course, is the biggest issue. Cost for the prize support items, plus cost for the shipping, plus cost for the employee whose time is spent making sure it all goes to the right places. There are also problems offering normal product (starters, boosters) as prizes for events held at stores. If you send free boosters for a local tournament or make discounted tournament kits available to tournament organizers, you're hurting sales at the store because you're effectively selling product at someone else's store. If you offer tournament kits with boosters in them which can be ordered from the store's distributor, you can't let the tournament kit cost less than the price of the boosters, or else the store will just order tournament kits instead of booster boxes for their stock because they're cheaper. The CCG company's challenge is to come up with prize support that is inexpensive for the company to produce and distribute, is not a product that would compete with the products a game store sells, and is interesting enough for the players to be an incentive for attending events. Unique, tournament-specific promo cards fit this role very nicely. They take the form of either reprints of existing cards with alternate art or layout or foiling, or they're cards not found in expansions. Occasionally you'll see special items, such as deck boxes, life counters, and play mats, but such items are very typically given out at special events. The V:TES community has also gotten into its head that hard-to-get promo cards will cause irreparable damage to game balance and create an environment of haves and have-nots. The V:TES community demands that promo cards be plentiful and accessible to everyone, and then at the same time discredits them as an incentive for tournament attendance because everyone has them. This denies White Wolf the ability to use hard-to-get promo cards as an incentive, and forces them to seek alternate prize support options. That White Wolf hasn't found an acceptable alternative for prize support is hardly surprising - no other CCG company has found one, either. I have repeatedly asked for the past several years that tournament kits contain a hard-to-get, alternate art/layout V:TES card. Specifically, a new-layout reprint of an old-layout vampire. You could put two in the kit - one for the winner and one as a door prize. It will have no effect whatsoever on game balance. It will simply be cool, for whatever value of cool that may mean to you. Given that development of the game has moved far away from Group 1 vampires, Advanced versions of Group 1 vampires could also be good tournament-support promos if the V:TES community would stop worrying that they'd irrevocably disrupt game balance. It's been a long time since we've had a Storyline event. They're cool, they're popular, and they have neat cards to give away. The Storyline Director has assured us that we'll see new Storyline events starting this summer. That's only 3 months away. Continental Qualifier events need help. If we're going to focus anywhere on special prizes for events, it should be with the qualifiers. Standardization of support (t-shirts, boosters, promos, trophies, cool stuff) needs to be established, and a coordination and distribution system needs to be established. Similarly, respective national championship events may need this treatment. My personal pet peeve is that if we're going to have tshirts for qualifier events, they should be printed and ready prior to January 1 of the upcoming tournament year. The money and manpower overhead required to run a free attendance- based rewards system is beyond White Wolf's capacity. That's the state of things, people. - Ben Peal, flying to the Prague EC for free 'cause he won it as prize support offered by White Wolf

On Mar 31, 5:14 pm, benp...@gmail.com wrote: > Damnans wrote: > > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. > > Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in > terms of prize support for a normal monthly tournament? We are not talking about normal monthly tournaments here, but about special monthly tournaments which attract more players than usual. As I already said in another post, I know WW's limitations. But WW could obviously do more "free" things to promote the game, such as the creation of special cards commemorating a great VTES event (for example, a tournament with a high amount of participants, which was mentioned to Oscar during the Swedish EC). [...] [ quoted text not captured ]

Damnans wrote: > Ben Peal wrote: > > Damnans wrote: > > > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > > > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > > > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. > > > Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in > > terms of prize support for a normal monthly tournament? > > We are not talking about normal monthly tournaments here, but about > special monthly tournaments which attract more players than usual. So, they're not continental qualifiers, national qualifiers, or national championships. They're just Big Events Because The Hispanic Conclave Said So. If you're looking for special treatment for these events, then talk to Johannes or Oscar and ask for special treatment. > As I already said in another post, I know WW's limitations. But WW > could obviously do more "free" things to promote the game, such as the > creation of special cards commemorating a great VTES event (for > example, a tournament with a high amount of participants, which was > mentioned to Oscar during the Swedish EC). Right. Cool, hard-to-get promo cards. I remember reading about that idea earlier in this thread. - Ben Peal

ben...@gmail.com escribió: > Damnans wrote: >> Ben Peal wrote: >>> Damnans wrote: >>>> The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some >>>> V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they >>>> get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. >>> Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in >>> terms of prize support for a normal monthly tournament? >> We are not talking about normal monthly tournaments here, but about >> special monthly tournaments which attract more players than usual. > > So, they're not continental qualifiers, national qualifiers, or > national championships. They're just Big Events Because The Hispanic > Conclave Said So. If you're looking for special treatment for these > events, then talk to Johannes or Oscar and ask for special > treatment. Some of them are national qualifiers. But I guess you misunderstood my initial post, which was an announcement of the actions the Spanish VTES community is taking to promote participation in VTES events. And, BTW, the Hispanic Conclave said nothing about it. Just that it would give its support to those actions. That "Direct Action" idea did not come from the Hispanic Conclave. >> As I already said in another post, I know WW's limitations. But WW >> could obviously do more "free" things to promote the game, such as the >> creation of special cards commemorating a great VTES event (for >> example, a tournament with a high amount of participants, which was >> mentioned to Oscar during the Swedish EC). > > Right. Cool, hard-to-get promo cards. I remember reading about > that idea earlier in this thread. I was referring to cards that could be printed as usual cards in a regular VTES expansion, not as promo cards. [ quoted text not captured ]

> I have repeatedly asked for the past several years that tournament > kits contain a hard-to-get, alternate art/layout V:TES card. > Specifically, a new-layout reprint of an old-layout vampire. You > could put two in the kit - one for the winner and one as a door > prize. It will have no effect whatsoever on game balance. It will > simply be cool, for whatever value of cool that may mean to you. > Given that development of the game has moved far away from Group 1 > vampires, Advanced versions of Group 1 vampires could also be good > tournament-support promos if the V:TES community would stop worrying > that they'd irrevocably disrupt game balance. This is an awesome idea!!!! > The V:TES community has also gotten into its head that hard-to-get > promo cards will cause irreparable damage to game balance and create > an environment of haves and have-nots. As a side note, doesn't cards as prize support already create this rift? Typically speaking, the players winning the tournaments don't need more cards.

Damnans wrote: > > So, they're not continental qualifiers, national qualifiers, or > > national championships. They're just Big Events Because The Hispanic > > Conclave Said So. If you're looking for special treatment for these > > events, then talk to Johannes or Oscar and ask for special > > treatment. > > Some of them are national qualifiers. You also wrote: "We are not talking about normal monthly tournaments here, but about special monthly tournaments which attract more players than usual. " Write. Down. Exactly. What. You. Mean. Please. ;) At any rate, we're in agreement that the continental/national qualifier support system needs to be overhauled. > But I guess you misunderstood my initial post, which was an announcement > of the actions the Spanish VTES community is taking to promote participation > in VTES events. I also read this announcement in the same post: "The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work." So, it's not just an announcement of what the Spanish V:TES community is doing, but also a very public complaint about the event support provided by White Wolf. Don't tell me I'm misunderstanding things. > And, BTW, the Hispanic Conclave said nothing about it. Just that it > would give its support to those actions. That "Direct Action" idea did > not come from the Hispanic Conclave. As far as anyone outside of Spain is concerned, there is no functional difference between the Spanish V:TES community and the Hispanic Conclave. I doubt there's much difference for anyone inside of Spain, either. ;) Humor me, Gines. Which of the people mentioned in the original post are not members of the Hispanic Conclave? > >> As I already said in another post, I know WW's limitations. But WW > >> could obviously do more "free" things to promote the game, such as the > >> creation of special cards commemorating a great VTES event (for > >> example, a tournament with a high amount of participants, which was > >> mentioned to Oscar during the Swedish EC). > > > Right. Cool, hard-to-get promo cards. I remember reading about > > that idea earlier in this thread. > > I was referring to cards that could be printed as usual cards in a > regular VTES expansion, not as promo cards. Or they could be used for prize support. White Wolf doesn't seem to be having any difficulty designing expansions and printing them at a rate that is deemed too fast by every web forum poll we've seen. White Wolf does seem to be having difficulty providing prize support that the V:TES community is happy with. - Ben Peal

On Mar 31, 8:39 am, RedVenom <redve...@hotmail.com> wrote: > I don't know how many tournaments you play during the year but in > spain lots of players play more than one per mouth If people are playing more than 1 tournament per month on a regular basis, is there really a lack of participation that needs addressing? > so there's no interest in promos. Well, if anything else was given away at tournaments like this, people would have no interest in those, either. > Mostly every player i know buys at least a booster > box of each set so the boosters are not really needed. What we are > trying to do is to create some kind of unique merchandising to show > that it makes the trip to play a tournament more atractive. Which is reasonable, but my suggestion is that rather than try and get the company to make this happen, *you* guys should make it happen for your tournaments--it doesn't cost any more than buying boosters. And you know what your players like. > What would you be your choosen prize for attending to a tournament, > a booster box or a mettalic edge like the one in the photo? A booster box. I'm not interested in special edges or deck protectors or a VTES coffee mug. I mean, they are cool and all, but I already have an edge I like, I don't like garish deck protectors, and I have plenty of coffee mugs. And with a booster box, I can either get a bunch of cards I need, or do that *and* play lots of Duffin Draft, which everyone likes doing around here. Fun! Like, this is not to say that coffee mugs and t-shirts and edges and stuff aren't cool prizes if folks like them, but it is likely that just as many people are not interested in special jank as are. For a while, the prize support packs came with cool pool counters. And folks were all like "Huh, that's kinda cool. But I'd rather just have boosters to hand out". The same when the prize packs contained T- shirts and books and comics, and whatever. The obvious prize for a VTES tournament? VTES cards. Most likely to work out. If your players want something else? Use prize money to get them t-shirts or special edge things or booze. Whatever works. But having the company do this tends not to work out so well. -Peter

On Mar 31, 6:27 pm, devil_in_the_pale_moon_li...@yahoo.com wrote: > As a side note, doesn't cards as prize support already create this > rift? Typically speaking, the players winning the tournaments don't > need more cards. Yes hence fun alternate artwork cards would be cool - it always interests me an a non-mtg player to look at the alt.artwork for cards i used to use! Agreed most players winning tournaments don't need more cards but I do know places where that doesn't seem to be true (e.g. Sweden where the players seem to be permanently students :D ) Of course alt.artwork also costs but I think it would be a worthwhile investment, a new WWEF picture would be a good start perhaps.

On Mar 31, 8:14 pm, Peter D Bakija <p...@lightlink.com> wrote: > On Mar 31, 8:39 am, RedVenom <redve...@hotmail.com> wrote: > > > I don't know how many tournaments you play during the year but in > > spain lots of players play more than one per mouth > > If people are playing more than 1 tournament per month on a regular > basis, is there really a lack of participation that needs addressing? Yes, since we are not getting as many participants as before. [...] > > Mostly every player i know buys at least a booster > > box of each set so the boosters are not really needed. What we are > > trying to do is to create some kind of unique merchandising to show > > that it makes the trip to play a tournament more atractive. > > Which is reasonable, but my suggestion is that rather than try and get > the company to make this happen, *you* guys should make it happen for > your tournaments--it doesn't cost any more than buying boosters. And > you know what your players like. And that's what we are doing. Were in our proposal did you read that we are trying to get WW to make it happen? [...] [ quoted text not captured ]

On Mar 31, 7:41 pm, benp...@gmail.com wrote: > Damnans wrote: [...] > > > > But I guess you misunderstood my initial post, which was an announcement > > of the actions the Spanish VTES community is taking to promote participation > > in VTES events. > > I also read this announcement in the same post: > > "The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work." > > So, it's not just an announcement of what the Spanish V:TES > community is doing, but also a very public complaint about the event > support provided by White Wolf. Don't tell me I'm misunderstanding > things. It means we would like WW to do more on the issue, and that we understand it is not possible. Hence our proposals (in which we ask nothing from WW). > > And, BTW, the Hispanic Conclave said nothing about it. Just that it > > would give its support to those actions. That "Direct Action" idea did > > not come from the Hispanic Conclave. > > As far as anyone outside of Spain is concerned, there is no > functional difference between the Spanish V:TES community and the > Hispanic Conclave. I doubt there's much difference for anyone inside > of Spain, either. ;) Yeah... People tend to exaggerate things :) > Humor me, Gines. Which of the people mentioned in the original post > are not members of the Hispanic Conclave? Mario Sopena and Pablo Vicente. And the "Direct Action" idea came from them. [...] [ quoted text not captured ]

On Mar 31, 3:00 pm, Damnans <damnansv...@ono.com> wrote: > And that's what we are doing. Were in our proposal did you read that > we are trying to get WW to make it happen? Nowhere. But the implication of "we think that the tournament support that White Wolf gives us suboptimal" comes with the implied solution of "so we think White Wolf should give us other stuff". Which might not be what is being suggested here. But it is not unreasonable to think that what is being suggested. -Peter

> Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in > terms of prize support... Take a look on this link, this kind of things should be made by WW, but, in case you consider it's a high cost in terms of logistics, maybe WW could finance such projects with money, reserving some dolars for every country and concrete events, in our case the Spanish Grand Slam. http://dnn.vtes.net/Foros/tabid/403/view/topic/postid/47183/forumid/5/tpage/1/Default.aspx#47414 We, the Princes and Organizer in Spain, we spend a lot of time mounting this kind of events; and we put the money from our own pockets hoping that enough players will come to the event to balance the investment. In case WW can support us with this, it would be easier. Boosters and Promos would be also appreciated; for example in the Festivo dello Estinto, I will offer the players one Booster per Victory point, in this way not only the finalist get part of the treasure. But, in order to do so, I'm forced to request 11,00 Euros to every player, otherwise I lose money. Raúl Perfecto, dRAcÚL Organizer of the FdE II http://dnn.vtes.net/Foros/tabid/403/forumid/5/postid/46672/view/topic/Default.aspx

On Mar 31, 11:14 pm, benp...@gmail.com wrote: > Damnans wrote: > > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. > > Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in > terms of prize support for a normal monthly tournament? As to the question of what else a company can do, companies have had systems whereby you gain credit for events (rather than just getting redeemable credit for purchases, though companies have done that too) and can spend the credit to get special stuff. For people who like things like mugs and counters and playmats, they can get them when they get enough credit. For people like Peter who couldn't care less about such stuff, they can get whatever is offered that is useful, maybe save up until you can get a free trip to an event or something. These systems seem to be useful to the companies as people aren't good about redeeming their credit (see airline mile plans, et al), give options to the playerbase assuming the company comes up with some meaningful variety, and limits shipping expenses to only when someone does redeem. > The industry standard in the CCG world is a couple of free promo > cards as prize support, and _maybe_ an attendance-based rewards > system. We used to get 24 boosters for free for V:TES tournaments. I think that's where some people got in their heads that there should be good prize support. As to alternate artwork promos, Ben, maybe you can commiserate with me as to why anyone wouldn't be well aware of this idea that has been floated forever and which is used on a regular basis for Magic, a CCG that seems to be reasonably well marketed. I haven't bothered reproposing it in years since you are more likely to get listened to than me and because I'm so tired of people saying "this wouldn't interest me" when, duh, obviously, nothing interests everyone. That a company with a trackrecord has embraced this promotional strategy might, in some bizarre parallel universe where CCG companies rip off good ideas from each other on a regular basis (can you say rarity indicators?), suggest that it's worth trying.

dRAcUL <raul.perfe...@gmail.com> wrote: > > Here's a question for you: What are we expecting from White Wolf in > > terms of prize support... > > Take a look on this link, this kind of things should be made by WW, > but, in case you consider it's a high cost in terms of logistics, > maybe WW could finance such projects with money, reserving some dolars > for every country and concrete events, in our case the Spanish Grand > Slam. > > http://dnn.vtes.net/Foros/tabid/403/view/topic/postid/47183/forumid/5... I know that White Wolf has already looked into custom deck boxes and edge markers for tournament kits. Last I checked, the cost to have them made was too high for inclusion in tournament kits (presumably because of a cost per quantity thing, but I don't know for certain). For special events like qualifiers and championships, I think such things should be made (and they were made in the past - I have two custom edge markers from a qualifer and an NAC in 2001). Like I said, the qualifier support system needs a big overhaul and standardization. - Ben Peal

Hey, I have to say, this is a very interesting post for Frenchies, since we have EXACTLY the same problems. First the ranking system, then by trying to make tourneys more attractive by any mean. For a long time, we've tried to have a better attendance by providing everything we could do to the visitors, that is, hosting, eventually meals with everyone, which happened in the tourneys in the south, the problem is that Paris thus becomes really attractive, but not really the rest of France, because the hosting possibilities are not equal since there are not as much players there.Anyway, this worked for a long time, but apparently, not anymore. So now, the idea of VEKN France is to do what they call a methuselah tour, in which you would do a ranking system for tourneys you did in other cities than the one you live in, and if you pay some money to the association in advance, you get a discount in entrance fee. This still sounds awkward to me, and help mostly a very few playrs who has the financial means to travel a lot I think, and does not affect the overall community. Now, about the alternate prices we've had interesting things done during the nats, usually things related to vampires or trophies, but apart from that, nothing really. So I think that you're on the right track here, and you're providing some interesting solutions, but on the other hand, White Wolf should serioulsy consider doing something to help, starting with having a working ranking system. Arthur

Prize support, in my opinion, should be V:TES related things that are not available via other channels. Boosters is in my opinion the worst form of prize support as people both buy boosters themselves and/or win them at a tournament. In Gothenburg the cost of the tournament basically pays for most of the final tables boosters, so the tournament itself doesn't suffer financially (at least not much). We have no cost for the location we play which probably factors in to lower costs. Usually we get promos which also take it's cut from the tournament cost. Boosters are usually bought from wherever it is cheapest in order to cut costs. So in practice, the prize support worth mentioning is the promos. I don't mind paying for promos that are worth getting, i.e. in order to get cool promos it is worth to help with the costs (since as many have pointed out, handing out prize support is not viable in the long run). At the same time handing out prize support (that has a small production cost) would help motivate people to get more people into the game which means more starters/boosters sold which means more profit, so it is a circle but that has to be started by WW in order to help WW get more money. Also, it needs to be meant seriously and pushed very hard in order to work, any half-attempt would probably fail and cost loads of money for no gain. As Hugh said, in Gothenburg we have a small badge which we had made with the tri-snake logo and some text around it. Also as Hugh said, we have/had a special price for the one who had most at the end of the year. One year the prize was a box of Sabbat boosters. All this was financed via the tournaments for that year. I would very much like to see the return of a V:TES edge counter and V:TES blood markers. I would also love to see V:TES table cloths, V:TES card sleeves and or even a V:TES specific deck holder. In large enough quantities all these should defenitly not cost too much and that cost could still be partly paid for by setting a small price of the prize support which princes buy. Archie

Archibald Zimonyi schrieb: > V:TES table cloths, I am working hard on this one. Unfortunately the incredibly cheap supplier we used for the existing ones is bankrupt (probably due to being incredibly cheap). We have not succeeded in finding a new one that delivers the same awesome quality for a similiar price :-/

[ quoted text not captured ] Well if you ask me, WW shouldn't have any trouble finding an eastern (i.e. cheap) cloth making factory/business that could provide enough cloths with a V:TES logo for an exceptionally low price. Shipping would be no more then shipping anywhere else and the cost of sending these cloths to a distributor or retailer should hardly affect their already heavier purchases of books and/or boxes of cards. And again, taking a smaller charge to get back part of this cost (not all since again, the more incentive we have to bring in new players, the more they sell) should not be a problem. I bought, at a retailer, a poker like felt(?) cloth for roughly $40 which would probably cover two tables. This was at a retailer which naturally has higher prices then a distributor. I would guess that you could easily cut that cost in half if you went to a source closer to the ones who actually make the cloth. Archie

Damnans <damnansv...@ono.com> wrote: > Ben Peal wrote: > > So, it's not just an announcement of what the Spanish V:TES > > community is doing, but also a very public complaint about the event > > support provided by White Wolf. Don't tell me I'm misunderstanding > > things. > > It means we would like WW to do more on the issue, and that we > understand it is not possible. Hence our proposals (in which we ask > nothing from WW). Well, you ask nothing from White Wolf, but at the same time you're expecting more from them, as indicated by the very direct comments you make about them. You can't have a "lack of enough tournament support from White Wolf" without having a need for enough tournament support from White Wolf. There is no language at all in the Direct Action post stating that you understand that it is not possible for White Wolf to assist you further. It is very plainly a statement that El Equipo de la Acción Directa sees problems with V:TES participation in Spain, White Wolf isn't providing the expected amount of assistance, and they'll be taking matters into their own hands as indicated by the measures listed. It isn't a bad thing for you to be saying. We need White Wolf to overhaul the event support system from top to bottom. Basic tournament kits need help. Qualifier events need help. Championship events need help. Storyline events need help. Special events need help. Demos need help. There used to be a structure and system in place for qualifier support, and that appears to be gone, apart from "Talk to Oscar or Johannes and they'll take care of it". More to add to my V:EKN to-do list. :) > > Humor me, Gines. Which of the people mentioned in the original post > > are not members of the Hispanic Conclave? > > Mario Sopena and Pablo Vicente. And the "Direct Action" idea came from > them. Nergal works in mysterious ways. :) - Ben Peal

Howdy, On Mar 30, 11:34 am, Damnans <damnansv...@ono.com> wrote: > DIRECT ACTION > ============= > > A PROJECT TO IMPROVE THE PARTICIPATION IN V:TES EVENTS IN SPAIN > > by > > Mario Sopena, a.k.a. Prías > Pablo Vicente, a.k.a. Las Voces > Iñaki Jiménez, a.k.a. Redvenom > Ginés Quiñonero, a.k.a. Damnans > Raúl Perfecto, a.k.a. dRAcÚL > > Year after year, we have been realizing that the attendance to V:TES > Official Events is going down. The average age of the Spanish > "Methuselahs" is becoming higher and higher (ca. 30 years old), and the > number of newbies is lower than the people quitting the game. > > The lack of enough tournament support by White Wolf has caused some > V:EKN Princes and tournament organizers to get frustrated, since they > get poor or no results at all after investing a lot of time and work. > > Many playgroups do not find the official competition attractive enough > and prefer to stay at home, thus becoming decadent "Inner Circles" who > do not evolve with the novelties of the game or the new rulings, and > finally disappear in the medium term. > > For this reason we have decided to promote the Spanish tournaments by > means of some initiatives to make them more attractive for the players, > focusing on the playgroups who only play at home, and giving an > incentive to player mobility from one city to another to play V:TES. > > These are the actions we are taking since the beginning of this year: <snip> I suspect that many playgroups suffer from the 'greying' of the player base. As you note, V:TES has a lot of long-time players, many of whom are in the 30-40-ish age range now. While most would love to play, it gets harder and harder to find and coordinate opportunities when you have a full time job, spouse, and/or little Embraces. It also gets harder and harder to coordinate with younger players, who generally have no concept of the political savvy/logistical mastery that goes into even getting to a game when you are married. This, plus just generally not hanging around with younger people, tends to reinforce the greying. All of which is to say: What could playgroups do to boost attendance? Provide child care. You laugh, but man would it work. Hope that helps, Alex

Johannes Walch wrote: > Problem is that the boosters at full retail are not very realistic. The > current market price for 3 boosters is 5,25$. So basically the players > are paying 6.75$ for the promos. > Johannes, I quibble with this fact. I don't know of anyone who is selling individual packs, or even batches of 3 packs at US$1.75 each. If you buy a box, and divide it by 36, indeed $1.75 is the default retail. But you had to spend $63 (not including shipping) to get that price, not $1.75. best - chris -- Super Fun Cards www.superfuncards.com *NEW Website!* auct...@superfuncards.com

Archibald Zimonyi wrote: > On 1 Apr, 12:59, Johannes Walch <johannes.wa...@vekn.de> wrote: >> Archibald Zimonyi schrieb: >> >>> V:TES table cloths, >> I am working hard on this one. Unfortunately the incredibly cheap >> supplier we used for the existing ones is bankrupt (probably due to >> being incredibly cheap). We have not succeeded in finding a new one that >> delivers the same awesome quality for a similiar price :-/ > > Well if you ask me, WW shouldn't have any trouble finding an eastern > (i.e. cheap) cloth making factory/business that could provide enough > cloths with a V:TES logo for an exceptionally low price. Shipping > would be no more then shipping anywhere else and the cost of sending > these cloths to a distributor or retailer should hardly affect their > already heavier purchases of books and/or boxes of cards. > To interest a Chinese or Indian manufacturer, you usually need to deal in container quantities - in the case of the table cloths, that would be about 50,000 of them. Think WW can afford to move 50,000 table cloths? And the shipping is still not insignificant on something that will be a freebie. Honestly, I think boosters are the best. I will respond to a point in your other post - use the money you would have spent on booster prizes (you mention you get booster prizes), and spend it on something neat, like that pendant thing. "Neat Things" should be unique to the region/playgroup, not something WW makes. best - chris [snip rest] [ quoted text not captured ]

[ quoted text not captured ] At Mike Courtois' house, Paul J and Rob G's kids come and play X-Box and generally entertain themselves. I haven't ever brought my kids, because they are younger. But this is a seriously good idea. When one spouse brings the kids, the other one is glad - they get a break. best - chris [ quoted text not captured ]