Yeah, the Regional yesterday really needed to be 2 days. Though, not starting the cut till after midnight suggests that there were some organizational issues.

And why am I not entitled to play in events that better suit my schedule and life? Am I not supporting this company enough or something?

That's really not how this works...like, at all. You buy your models you get, well, your models. That's it. You're not entitled to any tournaments at all, never mind ones that fit your circumstances. It's good that FFG provide a tournament framework but that doesn't give you any rights to demand anything of them as far as those tournaments go.

After reading this comment I'm actually wondering if you're serious. It's so self-evidently wrong it's hard to know what else to say.

And why am I not entitled to play in events that better suit my schedule and life? Am I not supporting this company enough or something?

That's really not how this works...like, at all. You buy your models you get, well, your models. That's it. You're not entitled to any tournaments at all, never mind ones that fit your circumstances. It's good that FFG provide a tournament framework but that doesn't give you any rights to demand anything of them as far as those tournaments go.

After reading this comment I'm actually wondering if you're serious. It's so self-evidently wrong it's hard to know what else to say.

Self evidently wrong?

What kind of goddamn country do you live in? I buy the product, I support the community by hosting my own events. Am I not entitled to do as I like by virtue of my inalienable human rights?

Stop for a second. Realize that all I am asking for is more events officially sanctioned by the company. Not everyone can afford to fly or drive three hours to play a game, but yes EVERYONE is entitled to play. It doesn't matter if you're homeless or unemployed or a racist murdering freak, you are allowed to play X-Wing. Where in the rules does it say that events are to be made accessible to only those who can afford exorbitant holidays?

Am I saying you're not allowed to run 2 day events? No. I'm saying that there should be more Regionals so that those of us who do not have the option to travel can still attend these events. Is that so pants-on-head crazy?

Sure, it might not happen. Why would FFG care after all? You people piss me off to no end. Where is the sanity? I wasn't the first person to say that two day events were bunk for financial reasons. I'm not the only person who would like to go to a Regional but can't. I am the only person with the balls to stand up and call out this elitist bull though and I will! It's total BS to expect players to "like it or lump it" and anyone with half a brain will see that. The game gains popularity, the community grows, but our venues and events don't grow with us? What kind of support is that?

Someone pointed out that this may in fact be a gripe with Canadian distributors being shite. I can see that because I know for a fact that our local retailers often go without stock while larger chains get all the new releases. So what's the deal then? A major Canadian city can only merit one single Regional kit? What about Van Isle? Not more than one store in all of West Coast Canada applied for a kit? I hardly think so. I myself tried to put on an event for a charity comic convention here in town. I had the support of the organizer, I was to be the TO for the event. I emailed Asmodee like I was told to online and weeks - weeks! - later I was told to 'buy a tourney kit from a retailer'... Is that how we promulgate ourselves now? Go buy a kit?

So yeah, okay, maybe my anger should be directed towards Asmodee North America and not FFG, but at this point it's academic. Honestly that's not really what pisses me off so badly. It's this draconian idea that for some reason I have to make some kind of sacrifice to play competitive X-Wing at a provincial level. Somebody says two day events, people gripe about the cost and how they can't afford to go and those people get **** on by those who can afford it. Will the sanctity of the game somehow be tarnished by making it more accessible at higher levels? Hardly.

More events. More support. Now feel free to post your cunningly wrought illustrations of my oh-so-obvious insanity, cuz you know. I'm just a crazy person.

I have to say that i was not a big fan of the idea of a 2 day regional event until today. When the first 6 games do not finish until midnight and you still have 4 rounds to play to determine the winner it is not fun. The final table did not start until 5am. All of the players were tired and mistakes were being made so much it was kind of sad to see. One table of the final 8 quit after losing 1 ship even though he had 4 more on the table. He admitted he made to many mental errors and could not think or concentrate at that point. Every regional has to be determined on an individual basis. Some have no need to be two days. Others like the Dallas Regional coming up soon which is 2 days is suppose to have 150 people pre registered. It is not possible to organize and run 11 games in one day. No player would be in their right mind and the top table games would be no fun to watch.

Yeah, the Regional yesterday really needed to be 2 days. Though, not starting the cut till after midnight suggests that there were some organizational issues.

Why are these people allowed to do this then? I mean, this isn't transatlantic shipping we're talking here! Gamers aren't sardines to be crammed into town halls at $40 a head. Whoever ran this event should maybe think about splitting his even up into two separate entities.

Now I think I see where the problem is! Greedy ass promoters! Anyone ever been in a metal band? I have and let me tell you, if you let that shyster promoter run the show you'll be playing double headers in every town along the way, sleeping in a cube van with four other dudes eating cheetos while the promoter screws your GF back home in sunny So-Cal!

Regional should be broken up by states/provinces really.

One for each, maybe two based of democratic. California for example

This may help actually cut down on some numbers, and also get players who otherwise may not want or able to drive to other provinces/states

This could also draw out more players that are great players, but they never attend due to other restraints

Instead of one kit for every 4-6 states/provinces there would be one each

Then national I can understand it being in 1 spot since it's a national event.

Now in Europe I believe the distributor their actually sends winners of nationals to the world's, so it may not be far fetch for them to send the winner of a regional to the Nationals

Here in Canada that's a different story.

As I said lion rampant is a piss poor distributor, so I wouldn't expect them to pay for anything.

They don't send the winner of the nationals to the worlds like some spots in Europe.

Here in Canada the winner of a regional would still have to pay out of their own pocket to attend the Nationals, or maybe use the gofundme website which I've seen people use to send people to the Nationals in crossfit.

So my suggestion is have a regional for each province/state

This would include more players.

Decrease numbers for some events

Which may also reduce the time and able to fit it all in a day

Make players feel it's not for "elite" or those with deep pockets.

We may start to see new comers that outshine the ones who are dominating their local area.

That's one thing I always found. If you want to see who is the best, but exclude a lot of people due to some restrictions, then it's really only the best who can afford to. Where as there maybe better players, but have more important commitment like family and finances

I'll use Paul heaver as an example

Yes he's a great xwing player, he's won worlds 3 times, theres no doubt about that, but maybe there are better players out there but they can't afford to take the time to travel.

Therefore we are possibly not getting the best of the best all in one location, but just the best that can afford, or able to travel the far distance or just happen to live close by

Wait, where do you live that driving 3 hours and staying at a cheap hostel is an "exorbitant holiday"? A bed in a multiperson room is what, 10 dollars? And gas for 3 hours each way is not exactly a huge cost (it is manageable here, and we pay like 4x the amount US people pay)...

Well my area it's a big pain to travel

I live on an island

Prince Edward Island

East coast Canada

Just to leave this island is a 45 dollar fee for the bridge, or 60 if you want to take the ferry.

Then your looking at full tank gas, hotel, food

Really if it wasn't for that bridge toll I'd venture to moncton more often.

It's not too bad when there are 3-4 of us, but still it's a couple hours drive

Pei sadly has no xwing community here though I've made couple attempts here

Our game stores are too small, and magic players is what they cater to here.

So sadly most tournaments I have to travel anyway.

I've spent my fair share on travel costs, but am getting to the point of not wanting to bother.

This regional maybe my last tournament sad to say as I've ment sine great guys in moncton.

This year regional could have actually been more central but lion rampant decided on a more inconvenient location for many others.

And if your really ambitious and want to go to two regional, the next closest one is in Ontario, about 1-2 day drive

I believe if every provinces had one regional maybe with the exception of pei because there seems to be Noone here other than a small few who play, it would entice more players to come out.

And why am I not entitled to play in events that better suit my schedule and life? Am I not supporting this company enough or something?

That's really not how this works...like, at all. You buy your models you get, well, your models. That's it. You're not entitled to any tournaments at all, never mind ones that fit your circumstances. It's good that FFG provide a tournament framework but that doesn't give you any rights to demand anything of them as far as those tournaments go.

After reading this comment I'm actually wondering if you're serious. It's so self-evidently wrong it's hard to know what else to say.

Self evidently wrong?

What kind of goddamn country do you live in? I buy the product, I support the community by hosting my own events. Am I not entitled to do as I like by virtue of my inalienable human rights?

Stop for a second. Realize that all I am asking for is more events officially sanctioned by the company. Not everyone can afford to fly or drive three hours to play a game, but yes EVERYONE is entitled to play. It doesn't matter if you're homeless or unemployed or a racist murdering freak, you are allowed to play X-Wing. Where in the rules does it say that events are to be made accessible to only those who can afford exorbitant holidays?

You are either seriously confused on the definition of entitlement or seriously confused about the way the world works, take your pick.

Your retail purchase of a tiny plastic ship entitles you to exactly ownership and private use of said tiny plastic ship. Full stop, that's it, that's all. Anything the company wants to do above and beyond that, like whether or not to officially support tournaments and the manner in which those tournaments are run is their choice and in no way is an entitlement you or anyone else can lay claim to. You're free to play in the privacy of your own home, you're free to run your own 1 day tournament, and FFG is equally free to run their tournaments however they like. Of which frankly, based on the replies in this thread, 2 day tourneys seem to be the overwhelming crowd favorite.

Not to mention, as a business and recognizing that tourneys exist to promote and move product not as some inalienable human right, who is FFG and the tourney venue going to want as a customer? Someone with adequate disposable income that a cheap motel room (and therefor their next ship) is a minor concern or someone who can barely afford to buy their products and so will always buy online for the cheapest price possible? Is that "fair"? It depends on your perspective and definition. Is it how the real world works? Absolutely

Wait, where do you live that driving 3 hours and staying at a cheap hostel is an "exorbitant holiday"? A bed in a multiperson room is what, 10 dollars? And gas for 3 hours each way is not exactly a huge cost (it is manageable here, and we pay like 4x the amount US people pay)...

Are you putting 8 people in that room? A cheap hotel near me is going to run at least $80 a night.

Wait, where do you live that driving 3 hours and staying at a cheap hostel is an "exorbitant holiday"? A bed in a multiperson room is what, 10 dollars? And gas for 3 hours each way is not exactly a huge cost (it is manageable here, and we pay like 4x the amount US people pay)...

Not that I disagree with your point, but it should be made clear that $10/night multiple-person rooms don't exist in the US. A "cheap" hotel in most of the places that host regionals here would run something like $100/night. In some, it would be hard to find a room for less than $150. If you know other people going, you could split that across up to four people, but any more than that is actually not legal for most hotel rooms.

Stop for a second. Realize that all I am asking for is more events officially sanctioned by the company. Not everyone can afford to fly or drive three hours to play a game, but yes EVERYONE is entitled to play. It doesn't matter if you're homeless or unemployed or a racist murdering freak, you are allowed to play X-Wing. Where in the rules does it say that events are to be made accessible to only those who can afford exorbitant holidays?

Yes, everyone is entitled to play X Wing.

At home.

The tournaments are not FOR EVERYONE. You're not entitled to a consumer friendly tournament set-up just because you bought some X Wing ships. The cost of the X Wings ships gets you... the X Wing ships and nothing else. They don't come with an implicit guarantee that you'll have access to official tournaments that specifically suit your work/life balance.

We're now seven pages in and frankly I find it mind boggling that there has been no community agreement on the most obvious solution to this problem...

RUN YOUR OWN **** TOURNAMENTS! You don't need FFG kits to run a tournament. You just need a venue, some prizes and some players. I have zero interest in X Wing as a competitive event, but a lot of people obviously do, are obviously unhappy with the current state of affairs, so why not DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT? Hire a local school hall, advertise on Facebook and other X Wing internet places, buy some nice prizes, and run it however you want! Even just clone the FFG format and run half a dozen 'regionals' a year instead of one!

Just to put my 2 cents in, I played the 2 day regional in Mass today and it was vastly preferable to the store championships I've been to which finished well after midnight. Might not be for everyone but it worked for me.

I note in passing that two day tournament structures are standard at even what would be thought of as 'store champ' events in almost every major system I've played.

In fact it's seen as making the travel etc 'worth it' - if we could book hotels with big halls and get convention discounts it might even be crazy awesome.

That said, if it's two days the structure needs closer examination - perhaps there should be an annual themed format as well, that's run at regionals on day #2 and available at store level as well - a little like the league packs but explicitly for tournament structures; the casual players get a day of Swiss, the serious fight on.

Though you'd want to construct it so you can jump in part way and 'just have fun' for any top X knockouts, that's doable too!

Alternative: two days of Swiss would let you do proper Swiss. Though I'm sure folks wild still appreciate a 'finals' match, perhaps.

RUN YOUR OWN **** TOURNAMENTS! You don't need FFG kits to run a tournament. You just need a venue, some prizes and some players. I have zero interest in X Wing as a competitive event, but a lot of people obviously do, are obviously unhappy with the current state of affairs, so why not DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT? Hire a local school hall, advertise on Facebook and other X Wing internet places, buy some nice prizes, and run it however you want! Even just clone the FFG format and run half a dozen 'regionals' a year instead of one!

People run their "own **** tournaments" all the time. I know. I've run some of my own. But the thing is, Store Champs and Regionals and above are a different beast. They're "official." And they bring certain rewards that can't exactly be matched by someone running their own tournament, even if it were huge and they called it a "Regional" (which I suspect FFG might have something to say about that). So there's a legitimate concern over what the duration of these major tournaments is going to be.

I personally dislike the idea of 2-day events. But then, when your nearest regional is 6.5, 7 hours away, and a 2nd day quite possibly means having to pay for another night in a hotel, that certainly doesn't help (and before the issue of driving back tired is brought up again, that's EXACTLY why there's an extra day of hotel cost -- my trip is already a 6.5/7 hr drive each way, and 2 days of hotel costs).

Add to this that if there ISN'T a side event at the same time as the rest of the tournament, and the fact that in my experience, gamers tend to travel in packs, what happens when one of our number makes the cut, but the other 3 of us don't? What happens if there is a side event, one of us makes the cut, the other three join up in the side event, and then our 1 in the cut loses after the first round, but is too late to join the side event?

Hey all, I just got back from San Diego Regionals. 112 people, 6 rounds of Swiss, cut to 16. I was fortunate enough to make the cut, and had a successful second day. There's simply no way I would've had a meaningful chance had I been forced to continue the same night, and the final table might have greeted the cold gray of dawn.

I understand the frustrations, but these are not Store Championships. Regionals are a huge jingleblasting deal. "Region" does not mean your local area. I'm in the Southwest Region 2 which comprises 4 states totaling 50 MILLION people. We have 4 Regionals this year for that entire space. FOUR. My home, Los freaking Angeles does not have an event.

If you're lucky enough to have one next door, congratulations! If not, you have to decide if it's worth the sacrifice. Balancing my work and family with competitive X-Wing is a tremendous effort. If the experience doesn't meet whatever your criteria is, then it doesn't make sense (to me) to complain about that decision. For me, the chance to spend two days playing and discussing this game I love, with hordes of my favorite people/top players (San Diego's field featured 25% of Worlds top cut!) is something I'm desperate to participate in. The time and money spent (to me) was a bargain . If you don't get the same value out of the investment, I'm sorry you're not one of the lucky few to have a Regional at your FLGS. I'm not one of those lucky few either.

RUN YOUR OWN **** TOURNAMENTS! You don't need FFG kits to run a tournament. You just need a venue, some prizes and some players. I have zero interest in X Wing as a competitive event, but a lot of people obviously do, are obviously unhappy with the current state of affairs, so why not DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT? Hire a local school hall, advertise on Facebook and other X Wing internet places, buy some nice prizes, and run it however you want! Even just clone the FFG format and run half a dozen 'regionals' a year instead of one!

People run their "own **** tournaments" all the time. I know. I've run some of my own. But the thing is, Store Champs and Regionals and above are a different beast. They're "official." And they bring certain rewards that can't exactly be matched by someone running their own tournament, even if it were huge and they called it a "Regional" (which I suspect FFG might have something to say about that). So there's a legitimate concern over what the duration of these major tournaments is going to be.

I personally dislike the idea of 2-day events. But then, when your nearest regional is 6.5, 7 hours away, and a 2nd day quite possibly means having to pay for another night in a hotel, that certainly doesn't help (and before the issue of driving back tired is brought up again, that's EXACTLY why there's an extra day of hotel cost -- my trip is already a 6.5/7 hr drive each way, and 2 days of hotel costs).

Add to this that if there ISN'T a side event at the same time as the rest of the tournament, and the fact that in my experience, gamers tend to travel in packs, what happens when one of our number makes the cut, but the other 3 of us don't? What happens if there is a side event, one of us makes the cut, the other three join up in the side event, and then our 1 in the cut loses after the first round, but is too late to join the side event?

This is a less serious super-competitive format; might as well embrace the fact. Keep prizes relatively 'flat' in scope so the stakes are lower, and with the plan that the 'second day' kits later trickle out to stores so the guy that came 4th presumably goes home and has a 'real' crack at those prizes later, and... yeah, it could work.

Wait, where do you live that driving 3 hours and staying at a cheap hostel is an "exorbitant holiday"? A bed in a multiperson room is what, 10 dollars? And gas for 3 hours each way is not exactly a huge cost (it is manageable here, and we pay like 4x the amount US people pay)...

Are you putting 8 people in that room? A cheap hotel near me is going to run at least $80 a night.

Here in Australia we have one regional per state currently. To put that into perspective for those in the USA, that's 7 regionals spread across a country marginally smaller than the US.

And the closest regional to me is over 1300km (800 miles) away (and there are X-wing groups 300km (200 miles) further north).

I'd certainly hope that a regional was big enough to give me two games of gaming if I'm having to fly half the length of the country to get to it!

PS: of those seven regionals, only one is a single day event... But many gamers here come from the 40K/WHFB/FOW/WMH tradition, where two day events are pretty much the norm...

Now in Europe I believe the distributor their actually sends winners of nationals to the world's,

That is entirely up to the distributor, with only a few doing so.

I ran our regional in Austin this weekend and I will not be doing any tournaments with >64 players in a single day. It's simply too much. Even if I have an army of people, there is just too much going on to finish in one day. My biggest gripe (and this comes even from a competitor) is that games continue after time until the end of the round. That usually adds 20 minutes. Over the course of 6 swiss rounds and 4 rounds of cut, that's easily adding 3 hours to the day. Personally, I would like a game to end immediately when time is called.

I have to say that i was not a big fan of the idea of a 2 day regional event until today. When the first 6 games do not finish until midnight and you still have 4 rounds to play to determine the winner it is not fun. The final table did not start until 5am. All of the players were tired and mistakes were being made so much it was kind of sad to see. One table of the final 8 quit after losing 1 ship even though he had 4 more on the table. He admitted he made to many mental errors and could not think or concentrate at that point.

Boy would I not want to be driving anywhere near that store when however many players who have been awake for nineteen hours or more start staggering out to their cars to drive home. Forget about finances and logistics, it comes down to a matter of safety.

Wait, where do you live that driving 3 hours and staying at a cheap hostel is an "exorbitant holiday"? A bed in a multiperson room is what, 10 dollars? And gas for 3 hours each way is not exactly a huge cost (it is manageable here, and we pay like 4x the amount US people pay)...

Not that I disagree with your point, but it should be made clear that $10/night multiple-person rooms don't exist in the US. A "cheap" hotel in most of the places that host regionals here would run something like $100/night. In some, it would be hard to find a room for less than $150. If you know other people going, you could split that across up to four people, but any more than that is actually not legal for most hotel rooms.

Also, a hotel room might go for $100 a night, but they'll also add on for each extra person above the room's base occupancy. It can add up.

Wait, where do you live that driving 3 hours and staying at a cheap hostel is an "exorbitant holiday"? A bed in a multiperson room is what, 10 dollars? And gas for 3 hours each way is not exactly a huge cost (it is manageable here, and we pay like 4x the amount US people pay)...

Are you putting 8 people in that room? A cheap hotel near me is going to run at least $80 a night.

You pay per bed...

I don't know that I've ever seen anything like that here. I had assumed you meant splitting a room with the people you traveled to the tournament with, not paying for a bed in large room full of strangers. It did not even cross my mind that that was a thing.

Someone coming down from northern part of LA to the San Diego regionals (about a 3 hour drive) would probably go through 15 gallons of gas (assuming 20 MPG) at about $3 a gallon. They'd pay $100 to $150 a night for a place to stay (but it might be more). So depending on where they stayed they'd be looking at about $150-$200 for the trip. The costs could probably be split 2-4 ways depending on how much you want to snuggle up with your buddies.

While it's not an extravagant expense, it's not cheap either.

honestly if you can't find a hotel for $50-75 you're not looking very hard. I found a number of them near Chicago, Dallas and Roseville MN for that price.

Not that $50 isn't a lot of money, but it doesn't cost $100 for a room in most cities that will host a Regionals.

Yeah, the Regional yesterday really needed to be 2 days. Though, not starting the cut till after midnight suggests that there were some organizational issues.

I don't think there was an organizational issue. Sure I could've been a little more efficient, but some things I can't cut out. For example, waiting for a dozen games to finish the round after time is called adds typically 20 minutes, which is 3 hours over the course of the day. I think the efficiency issue I had was not having someone to collect results, but I don't think that would've added time because I was usually done entering results of completed games when I called time.

If you ballpark for 95 minutes a round, that's still about 10 hours. That's assuming you don't have any issues along the way or do any lunch. Yes, I had a few pairing mistakes identified that added some time and we did have lunch.

I am considering requiring lists at registration so that we can have the first round ready before the day starts. This way you come in, confirm your verification, and sit down at your table.

If you have ideas on how I could improve the event, please let me know. I'm always interested in improving my events.

So to sum up this thread:

-Driving home mentally exhausted 6+ rounds after at 2am is getting too dangerous for people.

-Like any hobby, anywhere there are going to be expenses at the upper levels and any championship event.

-If you can't afford the once a year regional (the best of the best tournament in your region) then perhaps the Season Kits, Vassal Tournaments and Store Championships are best suited for you. Every other game from Warhammer to Warmachine/Hordes has gone through this exact debate.

-IF 40$ is getting too cost prohibitive: encourage your Regional to adopt a community/GT feel. Bring board games, share beverages, meet other local gaming communities. The best parts of the old Warhammer/new KoW GT's is going out for dinner and drinks with old friends you've made in the community after years of gaming and then coming back to the hall for fun doubles games. There's nothing stopping X-Wing from becoming a game which can promote a community such as this and it will make your 40$ and hotel fees seem more like a mini-vacation.

- LGS and Regionals TOs are adapting to a new tournament system and are genuinely interested in constructive feedback for future years. There's a ton that goes into hosting these and it is perfectly fine if they make a profit on a quality product.