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

I'd sign that petition.

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.

ANd you think holding a tournament in a place like Spokane will do more to group the market than a place like NYC/Philly/DC?

Lots of thoughts and opinions coming out here. May as well add my 2 cents worth.

I like where Regionals from last year were replaced with the Store Championships and this year's Regionals are more exclusive.

Did FFG pick the best locations for all the X-Wing Regionals this year - no. Some areas (population centers) aren't as well represented as they probably should be and some others have a couple (or more) Regionals within a couple hour drive that shows some may have been scheduled too closely. There is not much we can do about it for this year. Hopefully next year FFG moves things around and locations that were shut out this year get one.

I agree letting FFG know the thoughts of their player base is a good idea - if it is done CONSTRUCTIVELY. Just whining is not going to get your point across!!! And I do feel bad for the people that don't have a Regional near them but want to play in one and can't easily travel. (I lucked out, as there is one in Denver an hour from me. I am also one who can/has travelled 2+ hours to play in a Store Championship in my state just to try and help promote the game - so I will probably travel to another Regional anyway if I can.)

Maybe next year a State Championship level being added between the Store Championship and Regional levels would be a good thing. You get the exclusiveness of a higher caliber event in your state, hopefully without having to travel too far (easier on the New England/Mid East Coast area than Midwest/West Coast, but nothing anyone can do about state size). Then with Regionals a step above the State Championships, you pretty much have to expect to travel if you are going to attend one of them and get lucky if you don't!

People have said we don't know the reason FFG picked the regional locations they did and that is true. However it was done is their prerogative. At least all the uproar does show that people like their hobby!!! But that's all it is everyone - X-Wing Minis is just a GAME!!!!! You can't make a living off it, unlike a certain card game that is way too commercial in my opinion. If X-Wing Mini's ever gets to that point, I will probably stop playing.

Let FFG know your thoughts if things did not go your way - just keep it professional. And keep supporting FFG because you like the game. Because without that support, there will be no Store Championships/Regionals/etc. in 2015!

Lee

edited for spelling....

I feel the Emperor's will flowing through this thread. "Good, gooood..."

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.

ANd you think holding a tournament in a place like Spokane will do more to group the market than a place like NYC/Philly/DC?

What I'm saying is that if an area is already saturated with players, the ability to draw new players is less. I can't speak to Spokane specifically. But its a pretty basic retail / manufacturing model that the more customers you have the more successful your business is going to be. And they are counting on a certain % of people from saturated area's to travel. You might not, but a % will. Does that mean they don't care about existing players, no. But they are running a business. Moving the regionals around will grow their customer base more then not moving them around. It's pretty much free advertising for them.

I'm just trying to offer a suggestion to people that are wondering why a regional might not be in their area. Population density isn't everything. Especially when people will travel.

you made the comment that "the more you have to travel the less you are going to spend." I'm saying your not going to spend as much as a new player anyway.

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.

As I stated in an earlier post, I wasn't specifically referring to the Monroeville, PA location, but it's a good example of what I'm talking about. I'm sure the Monroeville store is great (and judging by pictures on their Facebook page, it is). With that said, only 7 people showed up to their store championship. I know that's not necessarily equivalent to how many nearby players they have. Still, at one of our local SC's in South Jersey, we had 12 people. We have 9 people pre-registered at EACH of the two other nearby stores holding a store championship. Our local playerbase have pretty close connections to other groups in eastern PA and Central/Northern Jersey that each have about 20 very active players.

That's precisely my argument. If you're going to have a Northeast region, the sensible spots are probably in Massachusetts (or somewhere in the NE region) and Philly or DC. The best solution, as other have mentioned, is probably to up it to 3 regional events in each zone.

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.

You seem to somehow equate my criticism with the people who are claiming that FFG has screwed them over. That's not my message. Criticism can be offered without being irrational.

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.

ANd you think holding a tournament in a place like Spokane will do more to group the market than a place like NYC/Philly/DC?

What I'm saying is that if an area is already saturated with players, the ability to draw new players is less. I can't speak to Spokane specifically. But its a pretty basic retail / manufacturing model that the more customers you have the more successful your business is going to be. And they are counting on a certain % of people from saturated area's to travel. You might not, but a % will. Does that mean they don't care about existing players, no. But they are running a business. Moving the regionals around will grow their customer base more then not moving them around. It's pretty much free advertising for them.

I'm just trying to offer a suggestion to people that are wondering why a regional might not be in their area. Population density isn't everything. Especially when people will travel.

you made the comment that "the more you have to travel the less you are going to spend." I'm saying your not going to spend as much as a new player anyway.

I guarantee the potential market in NYC/Philly/DC dwarfs the potential market in Spokane and Boise combined, even if you take out existing players. There are more than 30 million people in the NYC/Philly/DC metro areas combined but there's a little over a million in the Boise and Spokane metro areas combined.

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.

I was a bit hasty typing/editing my original post and didn't make my message clear. I'm sure more than ten people will show up to the event and I know people will travel long distances for events. With that said, it certainly seems as if FFG is leaving a huge metro area of their NE region hanging.

No offense, but if people are suggesting it's smart business to make the core fans of a game that represent, say, 80% of the business, who build huge collections and stockpile expansions to the point they run out of stock across the country/world between print runs, if you're saying you want them to shoulder the burden of time and cost to bring in the 20% areas that have smaller growth/market share potential, then you're bats. Those smaller communities already play X-Wing at roughly the same percentage of their population as NYC, DC, etc., I can virtually guarantee you that, if not more, just at much smaller scale.

If you have, say, 100,000 potential players in one area and 10,000 in another, how much higher is your potential for increased sales and how much lower of a percentage shift do you need to get to that figure? In the one, you can increase players by 5% and the other by 50% and achieve the same net sales effect. Which is easier? Further, the smaller areas probably have higher densities of players already, as fewer stores/gaming groups probably leads to higher adoption of the game against a larger area with more choices and less exposure, so that means there are already less new people to add to the fold in all likelihood.

Store championships are already in place to reach out to the smaller areas. That's your outreach to smaller communities since they receive identical support as the large. Regionals by DEFINITION should be trying to reach out the largest groups within a region, not cater to the smallest.

Again, this isn't a gripe with FFG. They do a great job, but if they want to do it better, address this issue in 2015.

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.

ANd you think holding a tournament in a place like Spokane will do more to group the market than a place like NYC/Philly/DC?

What I'm saying is that if an area is already saturated with players, the ability to draw new players is less. I can't speak to Spokane specifically. But its a pretty basic retail / manufacturing model that the more customers you have the more successful your business is going to be. And they are counting on a certain % of people from saturated area's to travel. You might not, but a % will. Does that mean they don't care about existing players, no. But they are running a business. Moving the regionals around will grow their customer base more then not moving them around. It's pretty much free advertising for them.

I'm just trying to offer a suggestion to people that are wondering why a regional might not be in their area. Population density isn't everything. Especially when people will travel.

you made the comment that "the more you have to travel the less you are going to spend." I'm saying your not going to spend as much as a new player anyway.

I guarantee the potential market in NYC/Philly/DC dwarfs the potential market in Spokane and Boise combined, even if you take out existing players. There are more than 30 million people in the NYC/Philly/DC metro areas combined but there's a little over a million in the Boise and Spokane metro areas combined.

Well I'm not sure why your comparing Spokane to the NYC/Philly/DC area. Because its not like they are going to move the Spokane regional to the NYC/Philly/DC area. Its not like those two regions were even competing for regionals.

As far as exploiting the potential market. First I'm not in any position to identify what the potential market is for x-wing. But I'm guessing that population isn't the sole factor. I'm guessing a lot has to do with the specific store and their willingness to grow the business. And I'm guessing that maybe, just maybe sales growth in certain area's might have played a factor.

Look, as far as advertising goes, you typically don't waste money advertising in areas where you already have steady sales. You advertise in areas where you have sales growth. And I'm simply saying that if you move the events around your probably going to grow your business more then if you don't. I'm not making any specific statement about the NYC/Philly/DC area (which for some reason seems to be the most offended area in this thread).

Like I said, I'm just offering an alternative perspective as to why you might not have a regional in your specific area and it might not have anything to do with population or the existing player base.

I guess I would sum up my situation as 'very disappointed'.

The main reason I got fully invested into this game was because of regionals last year. I love the tournament scene for X-Wing, and I was 50/50 about going to the Worlds since I got a bye (no way I would have gone otherwise if I didn't win one of the LA area regionals). I didn't expect to do as fantastic as I did (getting to 1 hullpoint away from winning the whole thing), but it did seem like a good chance to get away for a long weekend, and since a friend was going I figured I would know at least one person there.

However, since then the tournament scene has been drying up (at least for myself). The store I usually play at is barely getting attendance for the monthly tournaments (thankfully we had 8 people show up last week when we were expecting 4). The recent Strategicon only had 4 people show up for the tournament. Also, 3 out of the 4 'local' Store Championships are all on the same day (don't ask), and are at least an hour away if I'm really lucky with traffic. So I don't know if I can make more than one. Finally, we now know that all the people in the LA area (2nd largest city in the USA) have to drive over 6 hours to get to either of the closest regionals. Just really puts a damper on things. I know I can't ask FFG for special treatment, but I don't think asking for something closer than half a day's drive for ALL the players in LA would be going to far. I just fear its another step towards the game dying out in my area.

Yes, not the end of the world. Before the announcement, I was 100% sure I was going to make a regional. Now, I'm not sure.

No offense, but if people are suggesting it's smart business to make the core fans of a game that represent, say, 80% of the business, who build huge collections and stockpile expansions to the point they run out of stock across the country/world between print runs, if you're saying you want them to shoulder the burden of time and cost to bring in the 20% areas that have smaller growth/market share potential, then you're bats. Those smaller communities already play X-Wing at roughly the same percentage of their population as NYC, DC, etc., I can virtually guarantee you that, if not more, just at much smaller scale.

If you have, say, 100,000 potential players in one area and 10,000 in another, how much higher is your potential for increased sales and how much lower of a percentage shift do you need to get to that figure? In the one, you can increase players by 5% and the other by 50% and achieve the same net sales effect. Which is easier? Further, the smaller areas probably have higher densities of players already, as fewer stores/gaming groups probably leads to higher adoption of the game against a larger area with more choices and less exposure, so that means there are already less new people to add to the fold in all likelihood.

Store championships are already in place to reach out to the smaller areas. That's your outreach to smaller communities since they receive identical support as the large. Regionals by DEFINITION should be trying to reach out the largest groups within a region, not cater to the smallest.

Again, this isn't a gripe with FFG. They do a great job, but if they want to do it better, address this issue in 2015.

All I'm saying is that a new player is going to spend more money then an existing player.

It's not about catering to the smallest. They know a certain % of loyal players are going to travel for these events. They also know loyal players are going to by models. Why not get the best of both worlds?

Take a step back a min and ask yourself what FF gets out of doing regionals? The events themselves don't make them a ton of money. Existing players aren't going to buy more models then new players. The stores make most of the money and they make most of it by getting people into their store.

The real benefit is growing strong retail outlets that sell their product(s). So if you have an opportunity to grow a new retail hub in an area why not? People keep talking about the DC/Philly/NY area. What I'm trying to say is that it's saturated with players and retail stores. When your trying to grow your business you don't expand into markets you already have a strong footprint in.

Look I could be way off base and I don't have stats to back any of this up. But I did work in corp retail for a long time. I have some idea of how they think and I'm guessing that what I'm talking about played / plays a factor.

The NYC/Philly/DC guys are feeling slighted and think FF made a bad business decision (blunder even). How many of you are going to quit playing over this? How many of you are never going to buy another x-wing model over this? How many of you will travel to one of these events? Put your marketing executive hat on for a sec and just think about it.

Another thing to consider, FFG might be spreading out the Regionals among all the games. Has anyone looked at and compared the locations for the Regionals for all of FFG's tournament games? I know that Chicago has a different venue for the Netrunner Regional than they do for the X-wing Regional.

Note: Did some checking, and noticed that the Chicago and Ohio venues that have X-wing Regionals also seem to have another Regional (AGOT for Chicago and CoC for Ohio). It may still be a factor.

Another thing to consider, FFG might be spreading out the Regionals among all the games. Has anyone looked at and compared the locations for the Regionals for all of FFG's tournament games? I know that Chicago has a different venue for the Netrunner Regional than they do for the X-wing Regional.

Note: Did some checking, and noticed that the Chicago and Ohio venues that have X-wing Regionals also seem to have another Regional (AGOT for Chicago and CoC for Ohio). It may still be a factor.

Kublacon has a large Netrunner event scheduled (64 players) which is not a regional. There may be something to this.

Even the expected stores in the DC/Philly area didn't get the LCG or Netrunner regional. :-/

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

I'd sign that petition.

Hit the report button every time. Every time. That's the best petitioning you can do. I'm seeing lots of new posters and already I'm wishing there was a Mute poster button for some. These boards are doing well again after a rough winter (I blame all the delays); speak out and report.

All I'm saying is that a new player is going to spend more money then an existing player.

Maybe. But who's more likely to buy a core and a few expansions, versus who is likely to buy the max amount of each ship to be able to field a 100 point list consisting solely of one type of ship?

Take a step back a min and ask yourself what FF gets out of doing regionals? The events themselves don't make them a ton of money. Existing players aren't going to buy more models then new players. The stores make most of the money and they make most of it by getting people into their store.

I don't think stores get much profit necessarily from this, aside from random sales of other gaming items or food/drink purchases. The people who show up to a regional probably already have all the X-Wing stuff they need.

The real benefit is growing strong retail outlets that sell their product(s). So if you have an opportunity to grow a new retail hub in an area why not? People keep talking about the DC/Philly/NY area. What I'm trying to say is that it's saturated with players and retail stores. When your trying to grow your business you don't expand into markets you already have a strong footprint in.

I don't think Regionals are about growing the player base. It's about building the community.

The NYC/Philly/DC guys are feeling slighted and think FF made a bad business decision (blunder even). How many of you are going to quit playing over this? How many of you are never going to buy another x-wing model over this? How many of you will travel to one of these events? Put your marketing executive hat on for a sec and just think about it.

No one has stated so thus far in this thread, merely voiced their disappointment in the presentation of the events. With that said, I don't see how Regionals are meant to get new players in.

Even the expected stores in the DC/Philly area didn't get the LCG or Netrunner regional. :-/

Actually, All Things Fun in West Berlin, NJ (30 minutes from Philly) got the SWLCG Regional, and as far as I know, they had the highest attendance (23 players) reported thus far.

All I'm saying is that a new player is going to spend more money then an existing player.

Maybe. But who's more likely to buy a core and a few expansions, versus who is likely to buy the max amount of each ship to be able to field a 100 point list consisting solely of one type of ship?

Take a step back a min and ask yourself what FF gets out of doing regionals? The events themselves don't make them a ton of money. Existing players aren't going to buy more models then new players. The stores make most of the money and they make most of it by getting people into their store.

I don't think stores get much profit necessarily from this, aside from random sales of other gaming items or food/drink purchases. The people who show up to a regional probably already have all the X-Wing stuff they need.

The real benefit is growing strong retail outlets that sell their product(s). So if you have an opportunity to grow a new retail hub in an area why not? People keep talking about the DC/Philly/NY area. What I'm trying to say is that it's saturated with players and retail stores. When your trying to grow your business you don't expand into markets you already have a strong footprint in.

I don't think Regionals are about growing the player base. It's about building the community.

The NYC/Philly/DC guys are feeling slighted and think FF made a bad business decision (blunder even). How many of you are going to quit playing over this? How many of you are never going to buy another x-wing model over this? How many of you will travel to one of these events? Put your marketing executive hat on for a sec and just think about it.

No one has stated so thus far in this thread, merely voiced their disappointment in the presentation of the events. With that said, I don't see how Regionals are meant to get new players in.

I don't think there's any way I can convince you guys that more comes into play with their decision then simple population. If you can't see these events as free, moving advertising then I can't convince you. But you're not the ones they are trying to target with advertising anyway (not the type I'm talking about).

I'll just try to make my point one last time and then pose one question;

As far as getting new players into the game, here are a couple ways moving regionals around the country can do that. I'm not suggesting that the new players will actually be playing in the regionals (although there will be some).

1. A new store that gets regionals is going to probably work pretty hard to promote the event as opposed to a store that's just use to people showing up for stuff like that (its free, new, advertising for FF). And if you move that advertising around it reaches more people then if you don't. It reaches more markets then if you don't.

2. If you have regular customers in your store who play other games and now see a big xwing event played out in front of them for the first time they may decide to get into it. And you've got experienced players there talking to them and showing them how fun it is.

3. It offers a way for casual players in an area an opportunity to get into the game more seriously where they may not have had the opportunity before (or even knew that you could get into the game more seriously).

And if you move these events around the country your exposure is larger. I don't mean to offend but you guys are thinking like experienced players who play in these events all the time. Your not the target of this type of advertising. I'm not saying that they aren't catering to their player base. They are, you just have to travel to the events. I'm saying they are looking at it two ways. They can cater to their player base and they can grow new markets. As far as the "community" goes. I'm talking about bringing that "community" to new places and growing it.

So my question is why? Why wouldn't FF cater towards the NY/Philly/DC area this year? Bad business (some have stated that)? Are they just really that bad at marketing?

Another thing to consider, FFG might be spreading out the Regionals among all the games. Has anyone looked at and compared the locations for the Regionals for all of FFG's tournament games? I know that Chicago has a different venue for the Netrunner Regional than they do for the X-wing Regional.

Note: Did some checking, and noticed that the Chicago and Ohio venues that have X-wing Regionals also seem to have another Regional (AGOT for Chicago and CoC for Ohio). It may still be a factor.

I posted this very thing a few pages back but it quickly got burried.

If you go to the main Regionals page and click on the different games (SWLCG, Netrunner, Game of Thrones, etc) you can see the full picture.

Aside from a handful of stores getting Regionals for more than 1 game, it is clear that they are spreading things around to more stores.

Essentially, if they were to be able to find the absolute best possible list of cities to host Regionals that spaced everything out as evenly and fairly as possible they would have to use that same list for all of their games Regional schedules and thereby exclude literally dozens of game shops from hosting Regionals of any sort.

I said it in the previous post but it bares repeating: looking at only the X-Wing Regional list is looking at things in a vacuum.

This year other games have events in the coastal PNW, and NYC, Maryland, WV, NC, etc. With those games they don't have the same coverage in other Regions. It's all relative and if they keep the same format next year perhaps the X-Wing players feeling shafted this year will be the big winners next year.

I don't think there's any way I can convince you guys that more comes into play with their decision then simple population. If you can't see these events as free, moving advertising then I can't convince you. But you're not the ones they are trying to target with advertising anyway (not the type I'm talking about).

I'm not arguing to be combative and I'm not doubting that the very fact of people playing X-Wing isn't a valuable marketing tool. A lot of our new players get interested just by seeing people playing it on the table. Visually, it's a striking game. In addition, I don't think anyone is arguing that population is the sole deciding factor in regional placement.

I'll even grant you that what you're talking about might be a tertiary factor in their decision process. However, if it's their primary or even secondary consideration, it would be very unwise. Even if all 16 stores actually have small/developing metas, that's an incredibly minute effect on their sales. If they wanted a marketing campaign, I imagine they'd do something closer to the Netrunner tour they did last year.

1. A new store that gets regionals is going to probably work pretty hard to promote the event as opposed to a store that's just use to people showing up for stuff like that (its free, new, advertising for FF). And if you move that advertising around it reaches more people then if you don't. It reaches more markets then if you don't.

On the flip side, established stores already have experience marketing and running events.

3. It offers a way for casual players in an area an opportunity to get into the game more seriously where they may not have had the opportunity before (or even knew that you could get into the game more seriously).

Again, this is such a small window of effect that I don't see how it could be a consideration.

And if you move these events around the country your exposure is larger. I don't mean to offend but you guys are thinking like experienced players who play in these events all the time. Your not the target of this type of advertising. I'm not saying that they aren't catering to their player base. They are, you just have to travel to the events. I'm saying they are looking at it two ways. They can cater to their player base and they can grow new markets. As far as the "community" goes. I'm talking about bringing that "community" to new places and growing it.

There are more effective ways to do what you're talking about. If anything, the Store Championships accomplish what you're suggesting far more effectively. Again, if this was a deciding factor, there would be considerably more stores chosen than 16.

So my question is why? Why wouldn't FF cater towards the NY/Philly/DC area this year? Bad business (some have stated that)? Are they just really that bad at marketing?

Good questions.

FFG is indeed spreading the various Regionals around to different venues. I know that Pandemonium (Cambridge, MA) only got 2 of the ones they applied for.

For the Northeast, I see Maryland and New York got Game of Thrones. Cambridge and Philly got Netrunner. Monroeville got Cthulhu. Worcester, MA and New Jersey got Star Wars LCG. In the grand scheme of things, they're pretty evenly spread around. But with only 2 of each, there will be in/conveniences for gamers of all the systems. Boston is a good central hub for New England. NYC is quite a haul from Maine and seacoast New Hampshire. Game of Thrones may not see a lot of New England representation.

Had other X-Wings been anywhere on the BosWash Corridor, I would have tried to attend — with ample commuter flights and Amtrak to choose from, as well as driving options I even would have gone down to Baltimore. Had the Quebec one gone to Montreal instead of Ottawa (!) I would have planned to go up there too, Montreal is only a 5 hour drive from here, and it has the best pastries on the continent ^,^

For any BosWash Corridor folks who do want to make the pilgrimage, Pandemonium is conveniently located 2 blocks from the Central Square subway stop on the Red Line which connects directly to South Station and the Amtrak terminal, or connecting via the Blue Line to Logan Airport.

The regional in Burlingame, CA is on the 25th at 9am per the KublaCon schedule.

Are you referring to game ID 64137? If so, that was the Regional in 2013.

I have extremely mixed feelings about the regional release.

1.) first I was ecstatic when I saw the list and realized that I could attend three of these events. Then a began to think about it.

2.) there is nothing stopping players from region jumping. This is all fine but at the same time I can see some strong player groups having players win more than one of these events. For example without naming names, there is a player in my area who is on his fourth store championship. This is fine but I think it has a negative affect on the larger play community. I played in and won my first regional last weekend. I know that there were players who didn't show up to the event because they didn't want to play against me or some of the other players. Again this has a negative impact on the game.

3.) I think regional events should be limited to one win. If you win a regional you shouldn't be allowed to play in another regional.

I think with so few regionals FFG needs to find a better way to officiate these events. IE some type of TO certification. I know of at least one regional last year and a few store championships this year were TOs are asking players rule questions. At a regional this can't happen.

4.) ALL regionals should be on the same day. (Weekend)

5.) FFG should get rid of the bye. It's causing more problems.

6.) FFG shouldn't take a regional for their store. I think they should offer up a FFG tournament weekend and "pay out" a deeper field of players with top prizes instead. They should put on an extravaganza like they do so well.

7.) disappointed that there is no Star Wars weekend this year. That was a good time.

8.) they need to investigate the venues that are hosting the regionals. I know of at least one venue that has little to no player support.

I miss the fly casual aspect that this game used to have. With the player base growing and the attitude becoming more competitive it's not the same as year one.

Around here, I've found that regional jumping last year (not going to happen around here this year with Ottawa being 7 hours from Boston and Pittsburgh 9,) and store jumping this year has actually worked very nicely for building a friendly and larger community. No one store around here has a large X-Wing core.

Those of us who travelled the New England circuit last year made solid friendships, and we were always encouraging folks at the other venues we went to to come travel to the others as well. Same thing is happening this year as well with the store championships. And now we bump into each other from time to time at local conventions and it's a great reunion — I got to play with some familiar folks with the big scenario game I ran at TotalCon last month, and hope to see some at PaxEast next month ^,^

For myself, I really enjoy these chances to see old friends, make new ones, and play against a bigger pool of experienced players who will bring so many different lists and playing styles than what I'm used to facing.

Back when I was playing BloodBowl (and might get back into that if we can get a local league going again...), there were no big stakes in the tournaments. There were always some prizes the TO scrounged up, but really it was all about the bragging rights and fun! It was just a delight to travel to have a great weekend of gaming and seeing friends. There was a strong comeraderie on the Boston-Philly-Montreal circuit, that also overlapped with circuits beyond that.