I love the fact that there are a variety of dates and locations for Regionals this year, I really do, BUT…

There are so many! Are the sheer number of them going to keep players from travelling around? For example, Louisville has two regionals, will the players there bother to go to other cities when they already have two in their own town? Will all of the events end up being really small if few players are travelling; should I expect our event in Cincy to consist mainly of our own meta with maybe 2-3 out of towners who just find our weekend to be more convenient than the next closest city that has a regional?

And will FFG still offer a free Round @ GenCon to winners of the regional events? I think there are 42 AGoT events, assuming some of them will be won by the same players, will we have like 25 players at GenCon that get a free final Round win before the cut?

Sorry to start out regionals discussions on a such a negative note…

While I understand your point, I'm happy players have some options on where they want to play and hopefully encourage their metas to grow.

For example, we (MI) have a limted player base that is located all over the state. A friend of mine has formed contacts in local stores and this year we got our own event. Does this mean we might not go to Cincy or Chicago area? Probably. Do I wish we could? Yep.

The reality for us however, is that it is tough for us in metro Detroit to devote up to 12 hours roundtrip in a car and play all day. We've been doing it (2-3 guys) for years now and I enjoy it, but I'm also pumped to be driving less than playing in the actual tournament. We are even holding the event in the western part of metro Detroit so we hope we can get some out of state people, although I doubt that will happen.

Last year I felt bad we didn't hit up Chicago area, but going to two tournaments for a total of 24 hours in a car is daunting. I guess you can call me an old man, but I'm sick of it. I truely hope the other tournaments are a sucess but unless I get some extra time and money, I'll be sticking closer to home.

I LoVE that they did so many, just wish they double checked the NE corridor dates. Way to cramped to hit them all like I was planning. A wife can only stomach so much.

Ps: I think regionals winners get buys at worlds, not gencon.

dcdennis said:

That's correct. The free entry if for Worlds, not Gen Con. With 42 Thrones, 72 Netrunner, 77 Star Wars LCG and 100 X-wing regionals, could you imagine the cost to FFG for that many admissions? We'd be back to about 12 nationwide.

And, yes, I do feel that there are too many regionals. It doesn't seem like a Regional event when there are so many of them out there. However, I am glad to see some many stores willing to host these events. I had thought about putting in for a Thrones and a Netruuner Regional, but decided not to since FFG planned to hold their own at the Event Center and expected more people to travel to their event than to mine. Now that I see that there are two others in MN and multiple ones in both IA and WI I'm glad I didn't, since I doubt I could have gotten enough players to make up for the cost of holding the events.

My guess is that Regional winners will get (the announced) free entry to the World Championship, but I would also bet that with so many Regionals, they will not get a first round bye. Honestly, unless there are fewer than 3-4x the number of total entrants as there are first round byes, it really screws up the second round pairing.

Whether or not there are "too many" regoinals depends on what you are trying to accomplish.

- On the one hand, given how informal the Organized Play Program is outside of the regional season, a regional is the only chance players have to organize, host, and play a formal, sanctioned event. That's huge. And the fact that there are so many regionals is a great sign that a community is growing that wants participate in such sanctioned events. That's good for the game, and good for injecting life into the constructed environment. As the community grows, there will actually be room for even more regionals.

- On the other hand, with 40+ regionals, the prestige of winning such an event starts to pale - at least to those people who still think of the AGoT competitive community as about 100-150 hardcore guys who travel and try to show up at as many events as they can. Being 1 of 12 regional winners sounds a lot more impressive than being 1 of 50.

Ultimately, whether or not there are "too many" regionals depends on whether you like the relatively small, intimate competitive community we have - where 90 players at the Gencon Joust is considered a triumph - or whether you like the prospect of a larger, extended competitive community that would need to hold the Gencon Joust over two days or in heats in order to manage the multiples of 90 that show up ready to play.

Ktom, good points. I will say however, I think I'd trade prestige for the greater good. By that I think more regional events will hopefully create more visibility for the game by sheer volume. 40 plus events on a Saturday (by most accounts the busiest day) means more for the greater growth than 12 events perhaps.

I would gladly trade the prestige of winning a regional (if I ever win one) for a 2day 200player Gencon or Worlds. Bigger = better for this game imo when it comes to community size (insert "it's not the size of the community…" joke here).

Skowza said:

A few of us will come to yours, I expect; I certainly will. And I'm planning on going to a few others in addition to yours and the two we have here.

I was dismayed they scheduled an A:NR Regional at one store the same day "my" store has an AGOT Regional, so I can't play in my own town's first A:NR Regional. Other towns have the same issue, but it's a disappointment. But the fact that they scheduled Iowa's AGOT Regional the same weekend as Springfield, MO's really surprised me. Those two metas are pretty well known to have a lot of cross-pollination.

my nearest regional is 5 hours away, in a place my play group loathingly calls "ken-tuckel-ville", the other is cincinatti again 5 hours away. so im happy to have options just really wish one were a lil closer, and where do i find the times for the events?

Hey @Skowza

There is a group of players up in Columbus, OH that are most definetly going to the cinci regional and the Centerville one. We will also be headed to the two in Louisville.

Wolfbrother said:

Its pretty much up to the stores that are hosting to provide additional details, but when we get closer to the dates you'll probably see announcements here no the forums. I know last year ours started pretty early and we'll probably be doing a 10 or 11 AM start time again, more info to come later…

I don't understand how Louisville and Carry, NC (no offense to anyone in those cities) each get two, but Baltimore can't even get one.

I'm on the fence here. On the one hand, I'm thrilled that Austin, TX has two Regional locations this year and there's another in Plano, TX as well. But, one of those events is in a store I didn't even know supported the game. If there's even a tiny player base at that store - this bodes well for the game because it's a chance for disjointed groups to finally start connecting and creating a more unified "meta" in the Austin area. If that store has no player base and it's only holding a regional because it can… then, that gives me slight pause.

Overall, I'm happy to see a lot of regional events. AGOT isn't really that big in Austin anymore - most of the folks I'd heard of up north moved to the new shiny during the lull in CP releases (Netrunner and Star Wars). Those of us who have been playing in South Austin have stuck with AGoT and nothing else. My hope is my impression is wrong and the stores will have solid turnouts for the regional events. I'm hopeful that a few new regional events will encourage more people to pick up the game.

I can tell you forsure that next year we will be appling for 3 or 4 regionals in or around are city. This will let us jam pack a weekend full of regional events. Go to city X to play a regional event on Friday, Saturday and Sunday…. Ok seriously now.

I think regional events lose their umf when they are not a regional. i.e. their should be regions and each should only be able to host one event. Other ranked events could be held but those would not be regionals.

In all honesty, the concept of traveling to a regional dilutes the amount of valid information being provided to FFG on the success of their game. If you're going to multiple regionals then you're adding another "player" that technically doesn't exist. I would recommend that tourney organizers doing attendances create two lists of attendees. The "first regional" attendees and the overall attendee list. The "first regional" attendee list should just be those players for whom this is the first regional they've attended for the season. This will give an accurate size of the competitive meta if every regional were to do so. I know we had 20 or so players in New York City, but I would guess 6 - 10 were actual local players last year. These numbers are probably doing some misrepresentation to FFG's organized play department, for good or ill.

mdc273 said:

Thats actually not a bad idea… I'll try to do this when we have ours in Cincinnati.

HoyaLawya said:

I am a member of a small but growing meta (15 attended our joust tourney last Sunday ) in the Central NC / Raleigh area, which includes Cary. We play at Gamer's Armory and asked the store to apply for a Regional which it got. We were surprised to see another Regional in the same area, at a store where none of us play (All Fun & Games). If there are indeed AGOT players there, our meta is not aware of it, which could mean that we have an opportunity to merge our groups to grow the meta. Alternatively, as doulos2k mentioned, it could just be the store looking to bring some attention to themselves. We did see a post on thier FB page dating back to mid-January looking for people to demo some of the LCGs. The post got a few responses, but none regarding AGOT. It will be interesting to see the response the regional there gets.

I agree with some posters that the huge amount of Regionals (especially the concentrated pockets in certain areas) does give the impression of a diluted/false sense of "Regionalism." I think the real problem is that Regionals are the only widespread form of organized competetive play in the LCG format. Sure you can hold local tournies and pass out Kit prizes, but winning them has no impact on your standing within the perception of the larger national scene. If people want clearly demarked lines for Regions, a single Regional per Region then we first need a tier of organized tournaments below. And "do-it-yourself" kits won't work, because that just creates inconsistency within the OP program. The kits themselves are great, but a more standardized tournament system would be better to pair with them (with a way to report results to FFG towards building a player ranking system with its own unique rewards). Then that lower tier could do the job the Regionals are currently doing, and the Regionals can become more in line with what some seem to expect they should be - Regional in nature.