Unifiedshoe said:
I'm not ambivalent about the game. I love the game; I think it's great. I just don't get excited to play anything without a tournament structure attached.
The title of the thread was not meant to be read as this: Explain why tournaments are important.
It was meant as this: Why are people treating this game as though tournaments are acutally important?
That's why I spent time talking about how they are not important (no prize support, the company doesn't actually support them in a traditional manner, etc.). That idea is what leads into the next point about how people should stop worrying about what they see as flaws in the game (poor balance, etc.) because those things only manner in the context of a tournament structure that we don't have.
I, personally, don't believe that either social or casual players ought to be ignored. I don't think ANY group of people should be ignored for this game. I do, however, believe that the only organized play that will avail FFG anything in the long run where W:I is concerned is a league environment. Reason being that they have shown an uncommon amount of commitment to their stance that conventional TCG marketing tactics will not be used here. Namely, promo cards and cash prizes, THE two most coveted awards at tournaments. Therefore, it would be significantly counterintuitive to then turn around and cultivate a high-end tournament environment.
Ask yourself this: what big-shot card games did W:I's Regionals feel the most like? Magic? Yu-Gi-Oh? WOW, VS., UFS, any of the recent heavy hitters? Not hardly. It felt more like V:TES/Jyhad or HeroClix or L5R - extremely small turnouts, collectible product-based prizes, rookies mixed in with "vets", for lack of a more fitting term. Do you guys realize that of the 13 players at the Regionals I directed, 4 were players who learned the game within the week prior to the event? Does this sound to anybody like a tournament scene of ballers? Dudes flying in from hundreds of miles away, team t-shirts, custom deckboxes, etc., etc.?
We need to be honest with ourselves. Whether or not the game could be big-time, whether or not there's a vocal minority of players who pine for money prizes or, at the very least, promo cards, the company initiatives simply don't line up with making that a reality. Ever. For Pete's sake, the Tournament Floor Rules were on 1, count it, ONE sheet of paper! And three paragraphs were devoted to fair play (which I was enthusiastically in support of, by the way). No tie-breakers, no mention - in or out - of sideboards, no list of legal Battle Pack releases (some Regionals were run before the release of Arcane Fire, others after), an Errata Sheet current only as of Path of the Zealot, and the list goes on. Believe me, I am NOT complaining. I love everything about this game. I'm trying to bring home the fact that no matter how frustrated the tournament enthusiasts may be, it would take a colossal turnaround in FFG's stated LCG doctrine to create the sort of game identity that they're describing. With the minimal time and monetary investments demanded by W:I, the game would be best utilized as a satellite game played in addition to one's main games. It has its place, just not as your lead sled dog.