Meandeck Open - Columbus, Ohio - 12/26/2010

[OneBigSquirrelGod]

1. The Venue Sucks. Id love to come, but if I forget basic land, and have to buy it, I may not have gas money to get home.

2. I've been a big supporter, but with the times I went with 18 people, 24 people, It is not worth it to me to drive 2 hours. If I have a car of 4 ppl, gas is 8, entry is 20, and BD's is 20, which after 4 pops is 50, and to win only "30" dollars doesnt really show a productive day... call em crazy.

3. I think moving it to Comic Town, and calling it a different name will bring more people... lets face it, the Meandeck isnt exactly the cool kid in school..... Try and work it for the shop to take as little as possible... and make it worth people's time..

4. Don't have them by holidays... the day after Xmas... Valentines day, etc.... That is personally why I didnt go.. and I know there's at least 12 other people with that mindset too...

[Hitman82]

I would have expected to have at least half as many more, as a CASH, MEANDECK, PUBLICIZED tournament should draw people willing to travel, as well as pulling all of the occasional local players.

But my point was that the date hindered me from coming and I'm sure others felt the same. It doesn't matter how publicized you make it if you schedule the tournament on a day that few are going to be willing to attend.

1. The Venue Sucks. Id love to come, but if I forget basic land, and have to buy it, I may not have gas money to get home.

2. I've been a big supporter, but with the times I went with 18 people, 24 people, It is not worth it to me to drive 2 hours. If I have a car of 4 ppl, gas is 8, entry is 20, and BD's is 20, which after 4 pops is 50, and to win only "30" dollars doesnt really show a productive day... call em crazy.

3. I think moving it to Comic Town, and calling it a different name will bring more people... lets face it, the Meandeck isnt exactly the cool kid in school..... Try and work it for the shop to take as little as possible... and make it worth people's time..

4. Don't have them by holidays... the day after Xmas... Valentines day, etc.... That is personally why I didnt go.. and I know there's at least 12 other people with that mindset too...

Regarding the stores take, I'm fine with that. If you want them to hold tournaments, you should pay them for the space, especially considering that no one's buying any cards from that place because of the prices. I know they had some stuff I wanted but their prices were outrageous. That's fine. I just don't have to buy from them. At the same time, they need to make money to make it worth their while. If they dropped their singles prices they might be able to take less from the tournament and make it up in sales but that's speculative. The venue is pretty clean albeit cramped and close to food. The tournament isn't more costly than any other. I'm fine with the structure.

I wish they would plan the dates better since I'm almost never able to go. Being the day after Christmas is pretty terrible for anyone not living in the immediate vacinity. Like I said before, you draw locals but put off everyone else. Since eternal formats are smaller than supported formats, how large can local Legacy communities be? I doubt they're any bigger in Columbus than anywhere else. If you dis-incentivize players from coming by scheduling the tournament on a weekend reserved for families, parties and things of this nature you're bound to get worse-than-usual turnouts.

I'm pretty sure few people care that it's a Meandeck tournament or are concerned how much your external costs are considering everyone else is in the same boat and would be the same or worse if you were playing out of state in a PTQ/GP.

If you guys didn't plan these things close to holidays and put them on Saturdays, I'd be able to make a lot more of these. Just my opinion.

[Mark Sun]

3. I think moving it to Comic Town, and calling it a different name will bring more people... lets face it, the Meandeck isnt exactly the cool kid in school..... Try and work it for the shop to take as little as possible... and make it worth people's time..

This is already in the works. Ryan, the store owner there, already has a full proposal from me with tournament structures, suggest prize pools for cards or cash percentages, as well as a shared goal of getting a Level 1 Judge to attend the events. A lot of tournament structures were based on events that I have either attended or have seen on here, with some extra advice coming from Eli on how to get more customers to the store. There is a portion of the MTG community in Columbus that are willing to play if these events were held at Comic Town, I myself have voiced these opinions to the management there. Perhaps it is a good time to poke and prod again for some updates at locals this Wednesday. Unfortunately for myself, I am likely to be leaving the area pretty soon anyways, so I may never see this come to fruition.

But you are correct. Team Lucksack owns these opens, sorry to say. We have a lot of younger members (both in age and Legacy experience, I suppose I could fall under both categories), but are very passionate about Legacy and always looking to improve ourselves. It may soon become the Lucksack Open, whether it's at the Soldiery or not.


Metagame breakdown here, btw, sorry, didn't get a whole lot of sleep last night, but I forgot to finish this earlier.

<Stuff>

I agree with your sentiments. Unfortunately, I do not set the dates, it's generally Menendian who does all that type of work. It has, in my opinion, been harder to get advertising going ahead of time. The reason it was the day after Christmas was because of last year's event, which worked out pretty well. Sadly not this time. If you have any suggestions Paul, of course let me know.

[Smmenen]

Part of the difficulty I've had in scheduling is that for the last 6 months, the Soldiery has been booked up more than a month or two in advance. In October, I discovered that there were almost no dates available for November or December.

Saturday is not possible, as we've stated before, because the Soldiery holds large Yu-Gi-Yoh tournaments at that time. Saturdays are out as long as the Soldiery is the venue.

I'm not dissappointed in the turnout for the day after Christmas. Our post-Christmas, pre-New Years tournaments are usually very successful, but it's usually midway between those two holidays, not wedged up next to one.

As for the store/take, I think that them doing ALL of the work and taking 20% of the entry fees is more than fair. We've been over this a hundred times. It takes alot of work to set up the computer, run the DCI repoter, print out match slips, input match data. It also costs ink, paper, and time. I have absolutely no interest in doing all of that.

The only "Meandecker" that actually ever attends these tournaments is me, and it has that name by convention.

I encourage folks to try to organize other tournaments in the area.

[OneBigSquirrelGod]

Nothing against you Stephen. I actually think you bring more Outsiders in as a "Known" Magic Player.

I think making a tourney structure more like the "SCG 5K's" Maybe even do the Sat Standard Sun Legacy may attract more people to make a weekend ordeal of it.

Columbus Open Sounds Pretty Sweet.... I hear that and Am like, Columbus.. Thats the capital of Ohio.....

I hear Meandeck Open, Im like... Oh Sheesh, that Menendian Guy is at it again! (jk)

[Hitman82]

I didn't know about the Yugiyoh tournaments. I agree that they should get the 20% for the work they do. However, if the venue was changed and the tournaments were held on Saturdays, I would be able to attend far more of these. How big is the other store? Sometimes, the Soldiery can get pretty crowded and if the other store is smaller, that would suck. I couldn't care less what you call the tournament. Basically, every Magic player wants clean bathrooms, ample room to play in, good tournament structure, good judging and good prizes. I live in Michigan and don't have a problem with the prize support for the Meandeck Opens as they stand now so take that for what it's worth. There should be a judge on hand if it's sanctioned but at least a laptop so rulings can just get looked up online. I've always liked the swiss and cut to top8 with the side tournament for the dropouts from the main tournament. As long as there's plenty of room and dates more accessible for me, I'd make as many of these as I could. I've been away from playing Magic for a little while now but I'm back and rearing to go.

[blarknob]

The only "Meandecker" that actually ever attends these tournaments is me, and it has that name by convention.

I attend them every once in a while :P