I am trying to help grow the SWD group at my FLGS. We recently held a sealed league that had strong participation with people showing up for games almost every day of the week. After the league season ended, we tried to transition to a weekly tournament. We went from a good number of participants to barely enough to run the tournament (2-5)! I have a couple assumptions as to why we have struggled, but wanted to reach out here for suggestions.

What advice do you have for bringing in players to the tournaments? What has been successful for your local area?

I am concerned that the 'try-hard's' (those that play at a level above the store and includes myself) have scared away the more casual player base that we have tried to support by playing decks we are practicing for larger events. Do you have any suggestions for casual formats that are new(er) player friendly?

I'm not sure there are any easy answers and I'm likely not the most qualified to respond since we're facing the exact same issues in my area locally...but I can give a couple thoughts on things from what I've seen around the community and that we are trying implement locally:

1. League with style - A nearby community store has an active base of 12-15 players that has been able to maintain a league through 2-3 'seasons' of 9 weeks or so each. How? They keep things interesting with deck restrictions that rotate each week, required cards to be played for points, and other 'fun' ways to keep things interesting and not devolve into just playing the top tier 'meta' deck of the week. The last one they ran was,

1. You must have one villian and one hero character. Only one may be elite. They cannot be the same color. Only 2 total characters
2. Equip 2 different characters with the same weapon.
3. You must have a minimum of 10 dice cards in your deck(dont include character dice)

So, you can just change things up to keep things 'fresh' and keep some of that "local power players kill game" vibe down a little bit that way. And this wasn't the most inventive one they did...but they changed it each week for league, which was impressive.

2. Prize support is key - We've been struggling on this front. We've had a draft run 2 of 5 times in the last few weeks and I think it is in large part to no real prize support other than packs...which I'm only 1 shy of a 2x set so not that appealing...and official FFG stuff few and far between. The most successful areas I've seen are ones that go above and beyond and offer their own custom art cards for players for participating. I'd also say getting regular access to FFG prize kits is great, but they don't seem to have much right now nor have I seen it sent out in large quantities. I'd really like to see more from FFG on this front because I think getting more things that you can get at the LGS level is critical for long-term success. I'd also suggest some 'alt art contest' kinds of things for your store, which I've seen work out well for some. I'm not talented in that area, but that would also get more people actively involved in the game - can't be a bad thing!

Hope that helps! I'm running low on time and know I type too much anyway. Good luck! And please share anything you find that works! We all need to stick with it if this game is going to keep going...and I really am fearing things on the local level at the moment.

TL,DR unstructured games and leagues are good for casual players but don't expect a large conversion from these into tournaments or drafts.

In my opinion there are a few things that are commonly missed in the 'attract new players' topics. The biggest is that a 'casual player' is not a 'competitive player'. This is an absurdly obvious statement but it seems to me that folks tend to confuse 'casual player' with 'inexperienced but so-to-be competitive player once they learn'. The desired progression is casual game groups at FLGS -> leagues -> tournaments -> drafts (or something similar). As a casual player the first two sound pretty good. I can get some games in, get some new product in ways that are more fun than just getting a box from fed-ex, and maybe have a lightly competitive structure. Ultimately I can play just to have fun. Tournaments however are competitive events at their core. The primary audience are players that "play to win". They follow the meta, min/max their decks, etc... i.e. they are investing time, energy and money into playing the game at a level I am not prepared to do. A lot of these folks are great people and we can have fun playing in low tier tournaments. However, I have zero expectation of ever walking away with a prize which makes entry fees insanely expensive. The other draw back is that this is when the hyper competitive, trash talking and/or petty/immature players start getting mixed in. Drafts cater specifically to the highly competitive players. Drafting is another meta game itself that is akin to bluffing and bidding. Drafting pays huge dividends for knowing the meta and card values in detail. Draft players want a constant flow of new players because they know that they'll be more likely to go "Ohh, look, a fairy, that's pretty" and will pass the $40 card. For me this is an absolute no. You couldn't pay me to play in a draft.

I know that is a really long and opinionated preamble.

I really like the "League with style" that Impulse411 discusses. That sounds like a good way to keep the hyper efficient meta decks and the "I will DESTROY ALL OF MY FOES!!! Muahahahah!!" attitudes at bay. Another bonus would be to incorporate some form of Elo or similar ranking so match ups are somewhat relative to the play level. Also, as a CCG trading is a pretty big part of the game community but it can be really difficult for introverts. Maybe something (I don't know what) that could help facilitate that aspect too.

Don't run them to often. Running an event every week sounds taxing and not soecial.

Most players like a game where they have a fair chance of winning or at least putting up a good fight.

A casual player doesn't have either the time or resources to invest heavily in a game, whereas a highly competitive player will go all in.

As a semi competitive player who has taken some time out, I know I am out of touch with the meta and will not therefore shell out hard earned cash to enter events where I will get owned. I would rather pick up casual games or play in a league to get up to date and then maybe enter an event.

I am keen to see more team events, where players are randomly put into teams of 3 and the team wins or loses the tournament as a whole. That way players are encouraged to help one another with strategy, deck design, a few missing cards to optimize decks...etc.

Hardcore single player events are ok, but should be limited to a few times a year, once the general community skill level warrants it.

As an entirely casual player who just picked up the game, I may give some feedback as requested ...

First of all, I like the game for its excellent core mechanics - simple, fast, tense, but becomes deep and requires skill due to the multitude of characters and cards involved. The combination of custom dice with cards is not that common, and it works. With the SW theme, it should appeal both to casual and competitive players.

I might count three modes of playing, not two: (1) play only at home/family, like myself, (2) gather and play at the FLGS, (3) invest time and money to travel to formal/competitive/remote events. I'm sure that 1 and 3 exist and players have fun. Would I enter (2) ?

Locally at my FLGS, SW Destiny has completely disappeared after the first year, before I got my first cards. MtG and other games are strong. I was told that some of those people tried out SWD but quickly returned. Maybe the CCG support doesn't fit their expectation, maybe they just don't like dice in such a game? On the other hand, outside specialized stores you can't find SWD stuff, except online. This means that you have to actively search for it. I probably wouldn't have noticed the game at all if I didn't visit the FFG website regularly. Probably, many people who would like playing SWD (casually), never heard about it.

Now, if there were semi-regular SWD events at my FLGS, I might come if I have time, and some newcomers might also become interested. I wouldn't mind being shown how a competitive deck plays out, but I also wouldn't like being tabled any single time. Other posts contain suggestions how to achieve this, and they sound interesting. In essence, there should be formats where you can reasonably play with just starter deck(s) and some random add-ons, and there should be formats which encourage variety in deck-building if you own more stuff. The competitive format where you practice and optimize a consistent deck, comes last. However - the local SWD community just doesn't exist.

On 4/17/2018 at 7:59 PM, McTavish said:

In my opinion there are a few things that are commonly missed in the 'attract new players' topics. The biggest is that a 'casual player' is not a 'competitive player'. This is an absurdly obvious statement but it seems to me that folks tend to confuse 'casual player' with 'inexperienced but so-to-be competitive player once they learn'. The desired progression is casual game groups at FLGS -> leagues -> tournaments -> drafts (or something similar). As a casual player the first two sound pretty good. I can get some games in, get some new product in ways that are more fun than just getting a box from fed-ex, and maybe have a lightly competitive structure. Ultimately I can play just to have fun.

Precisely.

And I might add that even if I liked a game so much that I wanted to become competitive, I simply couldn't afford the time to practice and travel. That might be true for a rather large fraction of FFG customers, many of whom are beyond their 20s and have a family.

Speaking of which, the game can be real fun for 10-15 year-olds, as we realized. Unfortunately, FFG has done everything to not get those potential future addicts involved. The obvious entry point, a (cheap) two-player starter set, only appeared after a year. It didn't feature prominently (or at all) in larger stores. The box is incomplete, you have to buy two identical copies to staff a regular game. From a family-game perspective, this is just ridiculous, you rather buy expansions before you add an identical box. Then, there is the 'pay to win' attribute of CCGs which also scares all casuals away before they even try. FFG announces rotation -- essential for healthy competition and irrelevant for casual gamers. But again, such an announcement implicitly discourages any small-scale investment. The only reason that I bought the two-player starter nevertheless is the fact that FFG games are usually interesting and have replay value. As I found out, the game does not disappoint, and cards that you get in a few boosters are random but useful and fun, in particular if you tweak the rules a bit to include all cards in play.

In short, FFG produces another game with great potential - but somehow failed to properly address either group of potential customers. I don't think this is the fault of over-competitive players. However, the game itself is still solid and interesting, there is no reason why it shouldn't reappear in more places.

On 4/16/2018 at 5:25 PM, Impulse411 said:

1. League with style

2. Prize support is key

I like the league with style idea! I love the challenge of having to deck-build for different scenarios and it has the added bonus of getting people thinking of Destiny through the week. I am going to start collecting ideas for 'formats'.

On 4/17/2018 at 12:59 PM, McTavish said:

TL,DR unstructured games and leagues are good for casual players but don't expect a large conversion from these into tournaments or drafts.

The odd thing is that we previously have had a lot of success 'converting' players into 'casual tournament goers'. I love Destiny draft and have been trying to come up with a way to encourage drafting while avoiding the concerns you brought up. Including making my own 'cube' (taken from MtG) from which to draft in order to focus on the strategy and game-play over who gets what.

On 4/17/2018 at 9:25 PM, ozmodon said:

Don't run them to often. Running an event every week sounds taxing and not soecial.

I don't know if I agree with you on this. We have had plenty of success with other games and weekly meet-ups, or open-gaming times for league on specific days. Destiny has been the oddball of excellent sealed league support with little transition into tournaments.

On 4/18/2018 at 3:47 AM, Alphastealer said:

Most players like a game where they have a fair chance of winning or at least putting up a good fight.

I am keen to see more team events, where players are randomly put into teams of 3 and the team wins or loses the tournament as a whole. That way players are encouraged to help one another with strategy, deck design, a few missing cards to optimize decks...etc.

Hardcore single player events are ok, but should be limited to a few times a year, once the general community skill level warrants it .

A fair point, I just don't know how to find out if this is why we lost players after the league.

I like the concept of team events but worry that is adding a layer of organizational complexity on top of the lack of interest in events. Team events have historically been a challenge for us to get organized on a local level.

This might be the disconnect. In my opinion the skill is there for a small competitive scene; as [previously mentioned, maybe the desire isn't.

On 4/20/2018 at 10:25 AM, Canopus said:

[1]...even if I liked a game so much that I wanted to become competitive, I simply couldn't afford the time to practice and travel. That might be true for a rather large fraction of FFG customers, many of whom are beyond their 20s and have a family.

[2] In short, FFG produces another game with great potential - but somehow failed to properly address either group of potential customers. I don't think this is the fault of over-competitive players. However, the game itself is still solid and interesting, there is no reason why it shouldn't reappear in more places.

1. I would say this accounts for a significant portion of our player base, myself included (Former MtG PT grinder that is married with two kids). This is actually why I want to have the friendly competitive environment to encourage play and innovation.

2. I am relatively new to FFG (X-Wing and SWD) so maybe I just have too much hope...

We are gathering more info from the community now, and once we have some ideas I'll bounce them off yall.

Quote

1. League with style - A nearby community store has an active base of 12-15 players that has been able to maintain a league through 2-3 'seasons' of 9 weeks or so each. How? They keep things interesting with deck restrictions that rotate each week, required cards to be played for points, and other 'fun' ways to keep things interesting and not devolve into just playing the top tier 'meta' deck of the week. The last one they ran was,

1. You must have one villian and one hero character. Only one may be elite. They cannot be the same color. Only 2 total characters
2. Equip 2 different characters with the same weapon.
3. You must have a minimum of 10 dice cards in your deck(dont include character dice)

Man, I love this idea!

Not to distract but is there a place where I could see more information about the various "styles?"

Quote

In my opinion there are a few things that are commonly missed in the 'attract new players' topics. The biggest is that a 'casual player' is not a 'competitive player'. This is an absurdly obvious statement but it seems to me that folks tend to confuse 'casual player' with 'inexperienced but so-to-be competitive player once they learn'. The desired progression is casual game groups at FLGS -> leagues -> tournaments -> drafts (or something similar). As a casual player the first two sound pretty good. I can get some games in, get some new product in ways that are more fun than just getting a box from fed-ex, and maybe have a lightly competitive structure. Ultimately I can play just to have fun.

This is me and my group - we avoid the meta to do fun and varied things. We never go to a FLGS to avoid some of the issues we've seen with the hard core players . We actually have some people in our group that are fairly high level in other games (like magic) but want to play with people trying to do fun and interesting things.

I'm in a weird situation where I don't find shelling out for the cards an issue but I refuse to make the time to participate in a tournament that's going to take hours and will result in try-hards smashing me repeatedly with the same old tired decks. 1-2 hours a week for 9 weeks with a design challenge integrated sounds awesome and something I may try and get our store to host.

11 hours ago, RangerMankin said:

Man, I love this idea!

Not to distract but is there a place where I could see more information about the various "styles?"

Most of this is a few months out of date, but I was gathering info for my local store for a league idea and this is what I found. I searched through a LOT of FB groups, stores that were hosting events, and other groups online. I think I included the store name or group when I took things mostly, so can always check with them for more intel as well. Hope it helps!

Achievements.docx

Star Wars Destiny Achievements.pdf

Suggestions for Achievements for Destiny League.docx