Next thing you know, people are going to complain that Nats and Worlds are only a few hours away from each other, and that one should be on the east coast in NYC while the other one in the west coast at LA, er, my mistake - Seattle... Because it's unfair people in the midwest can drive to both events while people on both coasts have to fly to either event.

Agreed. My philosophy on this is; if you want to play in exclusive events, be prepared to travel. Don't expect that they are going to put an event in your city. Just assume your going to take a trip. They won't be exclusive events if they put them in every city. FF created the Store Championships for that.

I think people are utterly misinterpreting the mostly sane arguments that are being made here. It also doesn't help that the majority of people making those misinterpretations have no perspective because they have a regional location relatively nearby. I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

I'm less familiar with the X-Wing scenes and the population/distance ratio in other parts of the country, but it's utterly foolish that there's no event in the DC/Philly/NYC corridor when it's proven that there are a lot of players active here.

Also, I know of multiple stores in this area that applied to host the regional event, so it's not like they didn't try.

It would REALLY suck to make that drive, spend the time and money, just to attend an event with fewer than ten players where there might only be three rounds of gameplay. If nothing can be changed this year, hopefully store championship attendance is a factor for the decisions on where to hold regionals next year.

Washington DC does have one close. Monroeville is only 4hrs away. That's close. It's closer than any of them that I can go to, which btw, Monroeville is one of them.

I will admit that Chicago/Wisconsin one are redundant, but honestly, FFG could just delete one of them, and the doesn't help anyone else out.

As for the people crying the NYC doesn't have one, Boston is only ~3hrs away. But Boston is 3hrs close for all the people up in VT and NH and ME.

I think people are utterly misinterpreting the mostly sane arguments that are being made here. It also doesn't help that the majority of people making those misinterpretations have no perspective because they have a regional location relatively nearby. I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

I'm less familiar with the X-Wing scenes and the population/distance ratio in other parts of the country, but it's utterly foolish that there's no event in the DC/Philly/NYC corridor when it's proven that there are a lot of players active here.

Also, I know of multiple stores in this area that applied to host the regional event, so it's not like they didn't try.

It would REALLY suck to make that drive, spend the time and money, just to attend an event with fewer than ten players where there might only be three rounds of gameplay. If nothing can be changed this year, hopefully store championship attendance is a factor for the decisions on where to hold regionals next year.

lol, I think there will be more than 10 players in Monroeville. I don't know why you think there wouldn't be.

Washington DC does have one close. Monroeville is only 4hrs away. That's close. It's closer than any of them that I can go to, which btw, Monroeville is one of them.

I will admit that Chicago/Wisconsin one are redundant, but honestly, FFG could just delete one of them, and the doesn't help anyone else out.

As for the people crying the NYC doesn't have one, Boston is only ~3hrs away. But Boston is 3hrs close for all the people up in VT and NH and ME.

Again, that's not what I'm saying. The NYC/Philly/DC corridor is densely populated with a lot of people playing. A location in the Philly area would be able to serve them all well.

I think people are utterly misinterpreting the mostly sane arguments that are being made here. It also doesn't help that the majority of people making those misinterpretations have no perspective because they have a regional location relatively nearby. I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

I'm less familiar with the X-Wing scenes and the population/distance ratio in other parts of the country, but it's utterly foolish that there's no event in the DC/Philly/NYC corridor when it's proven that there are a lot of players active here.

Also, I know of multiple stores in this area that applied to host the regional event, so it's not like they didn't try.

It would REALLY suck to make that drive, spend the time and money, just to attend an event with fewer than ten players where there might only be three rounds of gameplay. If nothing can be changed this year, hopefully store championship attendance is a factor for the decisions on where to hold regionals next year.

lol, I think there will be more than 10 players in Monroeville. I don't know why you think there wouldn't be.

I never said anything about Monroeville. I was speaking generally.

I think people are utterly misinterpreting the mostly sane arguments that are being made here. It also doesn't help that the majority of people making those misinterpretations have no perspective because they have a regional location relatively nearby. I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

I'm less familiar with the X-Wing scenes and the population/distance ratio in other parts of the country, but it's utterly foolish that there's no event in the DC/Philly/NYC corridor when it's proven that there are a lot of players active here.

Also, I know of multiple stores in this area that applied to host the regional event, so it's not like they didn't try.

It would REALLY suck to make that drive, spend the time and money, just to attend an event with fewer than ten players where there might only be three rounds of gameplay. If nothing can be changed this year, hopefully store championship attendance is a factor for the decisions on where to hold regionals next year.

Well I'm one of those people I can can tell you that I'd have no problem traveling (and will travel to a 2nd one). And with respect, if your mentality is that if you have to travel then your not going to go; well then attendance will probably be down. Although I highly doubt the numbers will be as low as 10 even if people don't travel. But you're kind of making your statement a self fulfilling prophecy. Don't you think? I think FF is banking on the fact that most people won't think like that.

Not to mention that you're throwing out statistics about your own area without knowing statistics in other areas. Or maybe you do, I don't know.

Now, to me what would be a valid argument is that the regions are not well planned out. I personally think that western PA should really be in the same region as Ohio for example because there is nothing in the middle of the state. I know I have to drive to Philly for Netrunner (and I will make that trip). But honestly that's really not that bad of a drive. And DC to western PA isn't that bad either. But for whatever reason FF didn't split any states up to determine regions.

We don't know what FFG used to assign who got regionals. Perhaps they did it based on stores that ordered the most W3 stuff. Or maybe based on last years regional attendance. Or maybe they didn't have any justification. Or maybe stores even made bids for them (doubt this). My guess is some combination of sales and previous attendance, but across all 5 of their games...

I think it would be cool if someone could map out all 5 FFG games (color coded of course!) on 1 map, so we could see how the overall distribution worked out.

I never actually complained...I just stated doubts and concerns that I have. It's a little far to drive at 8 and 10 hours for my two closest, but whatevs.

On the other hand, as a consumer and loyal customer, shouldn't my opinion be stated in the first place on a public forum. Is this company not interested in it's customers concerns?

There is obviously an issue here for some...perhaps that interests some of the decision makers at FFG on improving the format of their tournament for all involved.

.....it's not like we're complaining about GW here....they flat out don't care and any complaints are white noise to them...oh wait, they turn the volume down to 0 and just flat out don't care.

I think FFG is still a company that hears the customer base. So if you have an issue, YOU SHOULD come forward with it.

The levels of hurt in this thread make me lol. I used to drive 16 hours round trip to be able to go to miniature tournaments four times a year. And those weren't major events, that was to just get to a tournament that wasn't run by myself. Suck it up princesses.

Agreed. If you really love playing the game suck it up and make a trip out of it. The event in Pittsburgh \ Monroeville is 5 min away from me so I got luck this year. But I'm probably still going to drive out to the event in Ohio as well which is like 5 hours away.

People are upset and they are just voicing their opinion. I've always found that forums tend to stratify people's opinions. It's either you whole heatedly agree or you furiously disagree and there seems to be very little empathy for the other side.

This thread comes down to this question:

Is it reasonable for you to spend $200 dollars (assuming a 4+hr drive's worth of gas and lodging) and up to 10 hours travel to play a mini game for a day?

For me, sadly, it's not reasonable at all. For some, that price isn't too bad. To each their own and while its not the end of the world, hopefully someone from FFG might see this and it might be useful in the future. If people don't speak out on it FFG would have no idea there is a problem for some people.

$200 bucks and a 4 hour drive would not be that bad at all. I think a 6 hour drive is where I would probably start to have an issue.

And I know that people are tossing around the idea of having more regionals. But It looks like FF has decided that store championships are kind of like the old regionals and every store can have one. I kind of like the idea that they are making the regionals a more exclusive event and I personally don't have a problem traveling to things like that.

As far as the distribution goes. You're never going to satisfy everyone in a format like this. No matter what many people are going to have to travel to do these events (and will travel). I got lucky with xwing but unlucky with Netrunner and Star Wars LCG. So if I want to go to the latter two I've got to drive.

If your not able to make a trip out of it then I'm not sure what to say. Maybe these events aren't really for you. I'm not trying to be a jerk or anything. I'm just saying that people should be prepared to have to drive to the bigger events. It shouldn't be such a shock or outrage. Its the nature of the beast. I was fully prepared to have to drive to all 3 to be honest with you.

A response like yours is a bit more reasoned. I understand some people don't see the big deal but if you told me to play in some of the cool events I'd have to be willing to drop 2 Benjamins and do 10 hours of driving to play, I might look at you a little incredulously. If you you explained that to someone on the street they'd probably laugh in your face. The street example isn't really pertinent to something like a regional championship, but I guess it might be kind of close to the conversation some are going to have with their wives/husbands (at least for me ). I just don't think I can make that trip in good conscience.

I'm in no way suggesting that you take away a regional from someone. Just expressing a little disappointment. I finally decided to make the jump an play competitively and won a store championship. Maybe I'll try for Nationals.

The best part of this thread are the people attacking the people who are making rational discussions based on travel time and/or costs as though it affects them personally. The level of fail on a human level is truly awe-inspiring.

That being said, I'm glad someone noticed PNW has 2 regionals, so that at least "evens," by raw count, that argument and the conspiracy theories about that.

However, it doesn't explain why Boise (205K population, 615K metro population) and Spokane (209K, 419K metro) have regionals hosted while Seattle (635K, 3.5 million metro) and Portland (605K, 2.2 million metro) don't. While geography should be a concern, it should be distant to population centers and (by association) anticipated player base. If getting the most players accommodated to these events is your goal, that's where you start.

Quick radius check, using ~200 miles as a guide (should be more or less about 3 hours of freeway travel):

Boise: 1.33 million

Spokane: 2.23 million

Seattle: 8.364 million

Portland: 8.998 million

Does this look remotely reasonable?

This took 10 minutes of google, zip-codes.com to find most populated zip code as a base, and a free Census-based radius tool to get population totals. 10. minutes.

http://www.searchbug.com/tools/zip-radius.aspx

http://www.zip-codes.com/default.asp

If FFG can't find 10 minutes per region to find a better method to identify better locales for their tournaments, it's a pity because they do so much else right with their system.

I think people are utterly misinterpreting the mostly sane arguments that are being made here. It also doesn't help that the majority of people making those misinterpretations have no perspective because they have a regional location relatively nearby. I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

I'm less familiar with the X-Wing scenes and the population/distance ratio in other parts of the country, but it's utterly foolish that there's no event in the DC/Philly/NYC corridor when it's proven that there are a lot of players active here.

Also, I know of multiple stores in this area that applied to host the regional event, so it's not like they didn't try.

It would REALLY suck to make that drive, spend the time and money, just to attend an event with fewer than ten players where there might only be three rounds of gameplay. If nothing can be changed this year, hopefully store championship attendance is a factor for the decisions on where to hold regionals next year.

lol, I think there will be more than 10 players in Monroeville. I don't know why you think there wouldn't be.

I never said anything about Monroeville. I was speaking generally.

Yeah but I think his point is that Pittsburgh can serve Philly and DC. It also serves WV, Columbus, Cleveland, Buffalo, Erie, northern VA.

It's not that your point isn't invalid. It is. However it's an argument that can be applied to many locations around the country.

Reacting to a few common threads and specific comments above:

Feedback is a gift too rarely shared, and I think sending FFG thoughts and inquiries regarding their decisions here is completely valid and a good exercise for everyone involved - but only if the intent and tenor of the feedback is constructive and is likely to be received as such. If the message is instead sent with vitriol, full of language about being screwed/hosed/disrespected or any other words that assumes ill intent by FFG and puts purpose behind their decisions that is completely a fabrication of your own negative response to the situation, then the likely outcomes will be for your words to be dismissed or for them to actually be harmful to the situation.

Regardless of anything further that comes out of this situation, the reactions I am seeing from some members of this community are disappointing and at points even shocking to me. Before people who aren't pleased with this decision respond further to the situation, I really recommend taking a few hours or days to calm down and try to shift perspective on this - put yourself in the shoes of FFG and try to think through what intent could have been behind these decisions besides them just hating their player base in the Pacific Northwest or Mid Atlantic. That kind of thinking may be where you legitimately are in your thinking and a true expression of your feelings on the matter, but it seems unlikely to me that a game company went out and consciously chose which parts of their player base they dislike the most and made their decisions based on that. Having said that, we don't have any real insight into how the decisions were made (though "as equally inconvenient as possible" seems to be at least one possibility based on the evidence) and it may be helpful for them to talk a bit more about that process openly. I don't know - that's a business decision for them to make.

As for the idea that those who have Regionals near them don't have valid opinions or feedback to offer on this discussion because we lack the proper perspective, that also feels like painting with a pretty broad brush and serves only to weaken this community. As I mentioned in a previous post, I fully EXPECTED to drive 5-6 hours to a Regional, discussed this with other friends locally, and had a fun road trip in mind - and then found out we have a Regional locally in AZ. While that's a nice surprise, I really question whether FFG's decision to do it means I no longer have anything constructive to add to the dialogue here that I HOPE the intent of is, mostly, to help iron out any faults in this year's Regionals process and ultimately make it better next year.

That is really what I hope we can ultimately get to here. The 2014 Regionals are what they are. Let's try to encourage the stores hosting them to make them they best they can possibly be (because I completely agree that making sure these events are run with the utmost of consistency and professionalism is important, and hopefully what the stores hosting them will want as well), and at the same time give FFG constructive helpful feedback (and the benefit of the doubt on any gaps in their decision making) so that 2015 will be even better, and 2016 better than that, etc.

Sentiments that come out of a feeling of entitlement are generally BS. Basically, word your complaints better..".no one cares about you...you are not a special flower. "

However, as a company that wants to get peoples money AND participation in their product, pretty much ALL feedback is of interest to them.

After all, if they make everyone happy all the time....shouldn't their product sell insanely well?

The best part of this thread are the people attacking the people who are making rational discussions based on travel time and/or costs as though it affects them personally. The level of fail on a human level is truly awe-inspiring.

That being said, I'm glad someone noticed PNW has 2 regionals, so that at least "evens," by raw count, that argument and the conspiracy theories about that.

However, it doesn't explain why Boise (205K population, 615K metro population) and Spokane (209K, 419K metro) have regionals hosted while Seattle (635K, 3.5 million metro) and Portland (605K, 2.2 million metro) don't. While geography should be a concern, it should be distant to population centers and (by association) anticipated player base. If getting the most players accommodated to these events is your goal, that's where you start.

Quick radius check, using ~200 miles as a guide (should be more or less about 3 hours of freeway travel):

Boise: 1.33 million

Spokane: 2.23 million

Seattle: 8.364 million

Portland: 8.998 million

Does this look remotely reasonable?

This took 10 minutes of google, zip-codes.com to find most populated zip code as a base, and a free Census-based radius tool to get population totals. 10. minutes.

http://www.searchbug.com/tools/zip-radius.aspx

http://www.zip-codes.com/default.asp

If FFG can't find 10 minutes per region to find a better method to identify better locales for their tournaments, it's a pity because they do so much else right with their system.

You know one thing that people probably aren't really considering is FF wanting to grow the game as opposed to just accommodate people who already buy the product. If it was up to me the regionals would never be held in the same place twice. You guys are talking about population centers and stuff. I'd personally make known player population bases travel to areas where the game might grow. And I would hope that my loyal player base would get up off their couches, take a trip, and be good ambassadors for the game.

In that case maybe the next sumo world championship should be held in Texas.

Except that they can't make everyone happy.

I think people are utterly misinterpreting the mostly sane arguments that are being made here. It also doesn't help that the majority of people making those misinterpretations have no perspective because they have a regional location relatively nearby. I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

I'm less familiar with the X-Wing scenes and the population/distance ratio in other parts of the country, but it's utterly foolish that there's no event in the DC/Philly/NYC corridor when it's proven that there are a lot of players active here.

Also, I know of multiple stores in this area that applied to host the regional event, so it's not like they didn't try.

It would REALLY suck to make that drive, spend the time and money, just to attend an event with fewer than ten players where there might only be three rounds of gameplay. If nothing can be changed this year, hopefully store championship attendance is a factor for the decisions on where to hold regionals next year.

lol, I think there will be more than 10 players in Monroeville. I don't know why you think there wouldn't be.

I never said anything about Monroeville. I was speaking generally.

Yeah but I think his point is that Pittsburgh can serve Philly and DC. It also serves WV, Columbus, Cleveland, Buffalo, Erie, northern VA.

It's not that your point isn't invalid. It is. However it's an argument that can be applied to many locations around the country.

Yep, basically. I presumed he would be going to Monroeville because it's the most logical tournament that someone living in the NYC-PHL-WAS corridor* would go to. It seemed to me that he was either insinuating that no one lives in that area so the tournament would be small, or he was forgetting that people would travel for a few hundred miles around to go there for the tournament. Or both.

*Aside from people in NYC going to Boston for that tournament.

Well put ManOnAWire. I hope most posters will react a little, examine a lot, and stop name calling and using offensive and inflammatory language. Since I saw the "1 new reply" message 5 times while typing this up, I'm afraid that isn't going to happen; hope I'm wrong.

Everyone has the right to input, just pause and do a little info grabbing first. I'm more offended by some of the forum responses than FFG's choices in locations.

One positive thing about the disappointed posts is they show how much people care about the game.

I'd add that if you really want to provide feedback or give your opinion, contacting them more directly would be more valuable.

Finally two last thoughts. One is that it seems the title and shift of regionals ended with results that disappointed people since regionals went from being too accessible to a multiple hour drive for many. As people pointed out, it's really a new

level with an old title, which honestly is fantastic and should be good news for where things are headed Last, I think it's likely FFG had solid reasons for doing what they did and that simple numbers we can come up with in ten minutes don't do them credit. They have far more information and different goals for the placement than we might expect, but it's very tough to imagine they'd make the egregious errors people seem to imply they did without having very clear reasons for doing so.

I really think there are some regional differences here too. I really feel for the guys on the West Coast. The East Coast guys are complaining about having to drive 4 hours and the West cost guys are like "I wish." As a land locked "Midwesterner" I guess I'm used to traveling 4-6 hours to do just about anything.

And I really think everyone is overlooking the fact that FF might be trying to grow the game in new areas as opposed accommodating existing player bases. Like I said in an earlier post, I think they know a certain % of existing players are going to travel for these events. Why not have them travel to area's where they want to grow the game. I think its smart business to move the regionals around (within reason).

Let's make this plain and simple.

The more money we have to spend on travel and lodging and food(since we can't eat at home from our own pantries), and the more time it takes to make the trip, the LESS MONEY WE HAVE TO SPEND on miniatures/expansions and the less time we have to go to our LGSes to get games in and maybe buy more stuff.

The distro of the events has nothing to do with the actual player base, and that is profoundly wrong when you want players to spend money on miniatures.

Bad business decision by FFG, all the hurt about it aside. That can't be argued.

I can guarantee those very same people would also be voicing criticism if the situation was reversed.

Guarantee, can you? Hm. Well, let's see.

The SF regional right now is at Kublacon. It might change, and I hope it does, but it's currently listing 16 open slots. Honestly, that might as well not exist at all - store championships in the area have been drawing 25 or so players, and we've got like 7 of them.

That might change - we hope it will, but if they tried to take what started as a normal event and up-convert it to a regional, in a popular con with limited space to handle an event like that, it might just be that. If that happens - and right now that's where it is - I don't have one closer than 11 hours away. If we look at my previous home, there's nothing closer than 4 hours away. That's much closer, to be sure, but one of the events went to a game store none of us have ever heard of.

So, checking... Rage... frothing... sputtering... Nope. Pretty much fine. So much for that guarantee.

It's called perspective. Whatever they do is going to be far away and very painful for SOMEONE. You can respect that, accept that you pulled the short straw this time, and move on, or you can rage like an entitled ten-year-old who doesn't care if he has to take the candy away fro his neighbor, he WANTS IT!

Most of this thread has chosen the latter.

Let's make this plain and simple.

The more money we have to spend on travel and lodging and food(since we can't eat at home from our own pantries), and the more time it takes to make the trip, the LESS MONEY WE HAVE TO SPEND on miniatures/expansions and the less time we have to go to our LGSes to get games in and maybe buy more stuff.

The distro of the events has nothing to do with the actual player base, and that is profoundly wrong when you want players to spend money on miniatures.

Bad business decision by FFG, all the hurt about it aside. That can't be argued.

Well I'll try to offer a counter argument. Existing players are only going to spend so much money on the game. Most likely, if your like me, you've got all the models you need. I only buy when they release new expansions (and I buy them no matter what). However, getting new players into the game will make them a lot more money. You can complain about having to travel. But its not "bad business" to try to grow the market.

Can we please stop with the "butt hurt". Offensive and inflammatory language is not needed nor appreciated here.