Hey guys!

Well not really having had much too do with FFG in the past, do any of you more experienced guys have knowledge of how FFG will be rolling out their organised play?

I'm generally a competitive tournament player (although the beer and pretzel nights are still ace), and am really interested in what prize support they generally offer; is their a ranking or a ladder system? official tournaments..pre-releases?

I realise the game isn't out yet but any players from their previous LCG's like to chip in here?

Osiris

From what I can gather from the boards...LCG metas are no longer what it was a few years ago. It's more local. Here's what posters in an AGoT thread had to say about the state of affairs if you want an honest opinion.

Thanks Ruvion appreciate the linkage.

Hmm, so the feedback from aGoT is :

"That's not to say there aren't ANY events, tournaments, etc., but they tend to be smaller, local affairs with very little travel. The competitive community has gone from a large national/international community that discusses and argues strategy at the card, deck and event level to a much more local, grass-roots affair"

Which isn't necessarily a bad thing (my local MtG scene is thriving despite being all but dead a few years ago), but it does make me hesitate to drop quantities of cash on 3 x complete playsets IF there is nothing more substantial.

Chances of FFG initiating a new play program?

Their Organized Play has been vigorously discussed in the last several months...there has been many suggestions from many LCG players. FFG staff are open to suggestions...so you are always welcomed to send in a friendly email.

What more substantial do you want?

Qualifying regionals that pay out 5K to the top 4, funneling to some special worlds event with 10K in prizes to the top 8, and then a cruise?

...

I anticipate counters, play mat, t-shirt, accesories, that you'll have to pay for to have for the events (at a discount). Then there will be the occasional larger things at large-ish conventions, like Gencon, which will have some trophies and perhaps the reward to create your own card like in CoC / AGoT.

UFS is pretty much the same thing (or it will be pretty much the same thing) as the LCGs, except it has some local play / tournament exclusive promotional cards (only obtainable through playing in local events, or attending larger events), and then Play Mats, counters, and the design a card AKA THE GREATEST PRIZE IN GAMING (your likeness and photo on a card, named whatever your name is, with your creative design, which you will own all 500 copies of, to distribute as you see fit, not to be released in any other format, ever).

If you've suggestions, feel free to post them here!

vermillian said:

Well nobody mentioned this until you just did so how was I to know?

I hope there will be some not American organised play.

I definitly want a WI T-Shirt.

Judging from the other LCG's, organised play will revolve around 'TO kits' with some goodies, and a yearly Gencon event, possibly with a 'design a card' prize.

Hopefully this isn't too far off topic, but with the Tournament Kits that appear to be FFG's method of organized play is there any sort of online tracking of what stores are running events? I ask because if there is it makes it easier for me to figure out which local gaming stores are supporting the game.

It's also worth noting that FFG was looking for a new Organized Play director a few months ago for AGOT and CoC. (I presume this new person would also be responsible for W:I.) So the current state of organized play may not be the same as the future.

Arma virumque said:

Any idea if they filled this vacancy?

I would hope so, but I don't know.

I found the news item that mentioned the job: www.fantasyflightgames.com/edge_news.asp ?eidn=488. It's dated back at the beginning of April. Most of the item is specific to A Game of Thrones -- those who don't play AGOT can skip to the section called "Other Concerns" for the mention of the job opening, and the section called "And the LCG?" for an invitation to players to give suggestions on what they would like to see out of an organized play program.

krootish said:

The organised play site includes UFS, GoT and CoC. The tournament search isn't perfect, but it works. Presumably this will be expanded to include Warhammer.

Ah, just noticed this chaoschild, thanks for the linkage.

Hopefully this will be expanded to include Warhammer Invasion. Does anyone on these forums from England have any experience of the support they have received for either CoC or AGoT?

I'm just totally clueless about this company in general, having been (and still am) a love child of Hasbro/Wizards of the coast.

Cheers

Osiris

Osiris said:

I picked up the first CoC League Kit, cost me about £15.00, so no major outlay there and it contained Art Prints, Cthulhu Poker Chips, Small Tokens, A Cthulhu deck of Playing Cards, faction badges and a huge league poster. If they do something like this for Warhammer Invasion I will be a happy camper.

I will be running a league type thang up in Aldershot no matter as soon as the game is out. Toying with the idea of making it a map based campaign, early days on that one though.

Ah brill, well thats a great start already. Looked on the map and Aldershot is no more than an hour away by car i would imagine, so no big outlay there,

Starting to feel more confident about investing in this game now, Thanks TG!

Osiris

While I've found tournament play to be exciting and cool (and necessary for a game's long-term success), I'm not terribly worried if they take a bit of time to get it sorted out first. I'd prefer it if they avoided having special cards or promos that you can ONLY get by participating or by winning.

The whole concept of the LCG revolves around the fact that people want to be able to own all the cards in a game without having to break the bank - providing limited-edition promotional cards seems to go against the grain of all that.

If they DO insist on offering special-edition cards, my hope is that they'd ONLY be for participation, rather than victory. Nothing would cause me to lose interest in this game faster than the knowledge that I will not be able to own all the cards in the game. I'm a collector in that regard it would disturb me to know that I wouldn't have a shot at owning all the cool powers and units and so forth in this awesome game.

Just a few thoughts...

Wytefang said:

I quite liked the way Sabretooth dealt with that issue by adding 'gold' cards to booster packs and then offering promo cards in exchange for these gold cards. Of course that was a method that fitted a CCG business model.

In this instance I would agree with you and like all cards to be available for a limited expendisure. Otherwise it might as well be a ccg

Osiris

They could just make some of the tournament promos be full art prints of cards one already gets in one of the expansion packs or full packs. Like L5R, where you can get a version of the card without all the pre done card layout artwork and have a full image card.

They could also just do alternate artwork cards or just preview cards where you can get copies of cards due out in the next set.

Easy things to do, but not breaking the game balance.

Anyways . . . back on topic. I will plan on running events for this at our store in GA, and hopefully it catches on. I'm excited. I'm done with CCG's . . . long live the LCG format !!!

There are a ton of things that I think would work well for OP support:

-Alternate/Extended/Foil versions of existing cards.

-Preview cards from future sets. They give players only a slight advantage for a short time, esspecially if the cards picked are not too powerful. Then a month or so later they would be available to everyone else.

-Alternate versions of the capitals. A giant foil capital would be really even cooler.

-Deck boxes.

-Binders. Though I've never been a big fan of them as a prize.

-Alternate token sets. Having chaos symbols for resources and random severed heads of the races as damage counters would be kind of nifty.

-Then of course the whole create a card for the big marquee type tournaments.