Prize Support for Legacy Events?

[Prospero]

Morning gents.

I'm a Vintage T/O who is looking to run Legacy events on Long Island. I wanted to reach out to the Legacy community here because I was unsure as to what the most desired prize support for an event would be.

Running Vintage events is easy enough, in that if you have a good piece of power, or a couple of less desired Moxen, you're set. Running power as the prize support seems awkward for this format - is it something that players actually want, or is it just the dollar value of the prize that's at issue?

As a Legacy player would you rather play for power, some number of good dual lands, or some pimp foils? If I was going to run a tournament would you be more likely to show up if the prize support were a Black Lotus or a set of foil Tarmogoyfs?

Thanks in advance...

[Cthuloo]

Dual lands (in particular blue duals) are probably the best choice, they're the building blocks of 99% legacy decks and are very easy to sell should one want to.
A step below are other legacy staples: wasteland, force, goyf, confidant, fetchlands.
Pimped stuff is usually welcome, while probably vintage staples (power, library, drain, baazar...) aren't: many legacy players don't play vintage and aren't interested in starting, and vintage staples are somewhat harder to get rid of.

I hope I've been helpful, good luck!

[Einherjer]

My ranking is something like this:

1)Duals
2)Duals
3)Duals
4)Staples
5)Pimp

Greetings

[Esper3k]

People will still show up for Power just because of the high dollar value.

Stuff like Beta Duals would also be pretty awesome too.

[Richard Cheese]

Yeah I'd show up for power, if for no other reason than the high value in trade. Also bragging rights.

[Chikenbok]

Duals.

Also, I'm more interested in Legacy events on Long Island.

Lets do that.

[Prospero]

Duals.

Also, I'm more interested in Legacy events on Long Island.

Lets do that.

The response seems pretty solid and duals seem like the way to go.

It's going to take some time to work out all the details, but there will be something along the lines of an Eternal Weekend at Brothers Grim in Selden, New York. Saturday will be Vintage with $12, 8 man Legacy side events for blue duals, along with an evening qualifier for a round one bye into Sunday's Legacy tournament. Sunday will be a Legacy tournament for some awesome prize support, with more of the aforementioned $12 dual side events, Commander side events, and maybe some Vintage side events for anyone interested.

As soon as everything is worked out, I'll post all the information here. It's going to wait until the local area PTQ's are announced.

Thanks for the responses guys.

[Dark Ritual]

Duals and legacy staples are the best prize support as long as they're top dollar. If you want to have a really top dollar item say almost the same price as power I suggest the tabernacle at pendrell vale and moat since they are quite expensive. People also love FBB duals or beta/alpha duals as big ticket items.

People will show up for power but expect to have it in your hands at the end of the day as they will likely sell it back to you for cash. Most legacy players don't care about owning a piece of power as it is hard to trade power and they generally don't have a use for it.

But duals are generally the best prize support you can give out along with FoW and wasteland.

[r0ckstAr]

Duals are the stuff.

A playset of FBB seas is probably twice as desirable to a legacy player than a good condition black lotus

[Purgatory]

Our local legacy tournament are arranged by our local gaming club, and we have rather modest but decent prizes, considering that there are usually only 20-ish people there. Still, usually the prize is a playset of staples to the winner (Rishadan Ports, Tops, Vials etc.) and something a little less desireable to the runner-up, with boosters to 3-8th place.

That said, I would probably travel for at least an hour or a couple of hours to go to a tourmament with duals in the pool, duals are, as the young ones say, "teh shit" when it comes to luring people to Legacy events. If that's not possible, than I think any decent staple, like the ones I mentioned above, would be good prizes.

[lordofthepit]

1. Cash
2. Duals
3. Power
4. Other Legacy Staples
.
.
.
9001. Store credit (a lot of stores I see overprice their singles way too much)
9002. Foils and foreign cards
9003. Boosters

[deviant]

I read about a TO giving out handjobs as prizes.
That would get at least me interested..

[cmorndorf]

I read about a TO giving out handjobs as prizes.
That would get at least me interested..

Those turnouts must be amazing...

[jandax]

1. Cash
2. Duals
3. Power
4. Other Legacy Staples
.
.
.
9001. Store credit (a lot of stores I see overprice their singles way too much)
9002. Foils and foreign cards
9003. Boosters

I agree with this suggestion the most.

Cash tournaments are some of the smoothest events one can run. Likely, the top 4 or Finals will just split, sometimes the whole top 8, and the tournament wraps up earlier than it would playing it out for merch.

And you can probably put judge foils high on that list. At least as pay out to top 4/8

[Sloshthedark]

well the problem with duals and staples is that winners usually have them (FoW and Waste especially), so you just give them low-liquid money, I'm personally don't like cash prices much as it feels against spirit of the game... I would sure have use for P9 pieces but FBB or A/B duals would be just awesome! i wish those were prices in my country tourneys!

so for me its

Pimp duals
Vintage
cash/duals
pimp stuff
staples

[mchainmail]

well the problem with duals and staples is that winners usually have them (FoW and Waste especially), so you just give them low-liquid money, I'm personally don't like cash prices much as it feels against spirit of the game... I would sure have use for P9 pieces but FBB or A/B duals would be just awesome! i wish those were prices in my country tourneys!


Giving out staples is fine... they're really easy to turn around and sell / trade for cards that are actually needed.

On topic, Foils / Duals, with a very reasonable cash / credit buyback and cool things to buy from that credit are awesome.

[Koby]

Offering the option of Staples or store-credit equivalent is a good way to allow people to get something they otherwise wouldn't.

Suppose a 20 person tournament ended with the winner getting the choice of 1x Underground Sea or $120 store credit.

Also, having a well stocked Legacy inventory helps to bring in more players.

[mchainmail]

Offering the option of Staples or store-credit equivalent is a good way to allow people to get something they otherwise wouldn't.

Suppose a 20 person tournament ended with the winner getting the choice of 1x Underground Sea or $120 store credit.

Also, having a well stocked Legacy inventory helps to bring in more players.

I don't know if you want to give 100% in credit, but 80-90% is definitely appropriate. Don't give players the line "We'll buy a USea for $70 in credit"

[Koby]

I don't see what the big fuss is about giving out equivalent credit. If the card would normally sell for $120, why not issue $120 worth in credit for that winner? Buy price should be lower, but this is strictly speaking about the "winner prize" being traded for credit. You get the option of "Win this card, or its equivalent in store credit"

[mchainmail]

I don't see what the big fuss is about giving out equivalent credit. If the card would normally sell for $120, why not issue $120 worth in credit for that winner? Buy price should be lower, but this is strictly speaking about the "winner prize" being traded for credit. You get the option of "Win this card, or its equivalent in store credit"

It's a bigger issue for power, aka "win my dumb expensive card" tournaments, but you want to incentivize people to take the prize you worked hard to acquire.

It's a running joke... if I bought P9 and ran monthly tournaments for the whole set, how long would it take for me to need to buy more power?

A: Never, people would just sell it back to me.

[MirrorMask]

I agree with lordofthepit on this. Cash ALWAYS comes first. I have the duals and I have the decks. If I ever need to buy anything I ll do it myself using money won at a tournament or earned the usual way. There is absolutely no need to win a piece of cardboard and try to sell for money which you never get exactly when you plan to. Just give cash to the winners...


1) CASH (MOAR CASH)!!!!!
2) Duals
3) Staples
never) Boosters( I'm sick with them! Every goddamn ignorant T/O offers this crap
which would be ok as an entry gift ONLY)

[dontbiteitholmes]

It's a tough call. Cash is obviously tops, the problem is it's hard sometimes to guarantee cash prizes and I'm personally not going to travel to any event more than an hour away unless the prizes are guaranteed or it's sure to fire.

If you can get $400 worth of cards for $200 then by all means make cards the prize. If you have guaranteed prizes more people will probably come and the more prizes you have the more people will show but if you fail you could end up losing money. Most events I go to have the sliding scale of prize support where say a Mox is guaranteed and if 16+ people show up 2nd is a Underground Sea, and if 20 people show up 3rd is a Force of Will, and if 24 people show up you get the idea. If not having cash as the prize means you can give out better prizes don't be a slave to cash. A lot of stores will come across people from time to time selling old cards to make rent. Cards like Moats and Tabernacles are hard to sell for a fair price in a lot of areas so they always make great prize support. The store ends up getting near or over retail on cards they bought cheap and we all get to play, it's a win/win. If you own a store and you are handing out cash you end up having to take a significant cut or have a big turnout to make it worth your while. If you give store credit or hard to sell merchandise the tournaments are still paying the bills.

[Goin Aggro]

In addition to what has been said already,

I.e. Cash, Duals, Staples.

I prefer tournaments that don't topload the prize support. Ex. First place gets a playset of underground sea, 2nd place gets 20$

Especially if you're going to do a something like a cut to T8, it might encourage more participation if the prize payout is more evenly spread throughout the T8 rather than just up in the finals.

[rocketrae21]

Yeah winning power is nice for the high value only. I won 2 Black Lotus and never even touched them. Just sold them to the store immediately for cash/credit

[Fossil4182]

1. Cash: ya... nuff said. Just as an aside, you may want to check with the laws in your area regarding cash payouts. I know for in our county we can't offer cash payouts because it is classified as gambling.

2. Dual lands/Power with an emphasis on Dual Lands: There is a cash value to these cards in that people can flip them if desired. Additionally, there is some bragging rights/rite of passage associated with winning cards like this. This is also true to a lesser extent on Staples such as Goyf, Dark Confidant, etc.

2.5 Legacy Staples (see above)

[MirrorMask]

Of course there should be a sliding scale to the prizes no matter what they are and yes money prices are often classified as gambling unfortunately. If that's the case then just give duals and the like. There is still money to be gained from these as well.