Suggestion for change to qualifier rules/status

Time for me to chime in. Please hold your applause.

Given this is a few posts in now lets summarize. VTES is stagnate and in slow decline. I would say this is accurate. If you don't believe that statement then simply look at the average attendance for a normal tournament versus a year ago. Perhaps VTES will roughly maintain the numbers of followers it currently has for a while, but I really don't see the number of newcomers matching those that drop. With that out of the way we can confirm the necessity to keep attendance numbers up, if not growing.

Kevin's post on the matter is a kickstarter to what many people have been talking and/or thinking about. And given the majority of the responses so far to this thread and/or local conversation I do believe our community would be up for the idea of qualifying more people for championship events so long as it doesn't effect the average skill in the player pool at said events.

First of all an adverse effect to qualifying more people might fetch higher attendance levels at normal tournaments, let along championship events. Secondly, when VTES had official support the number one thing that veteran players wish they had was a larger player pool. That was when the game was officially support and alive. Now the game is no longer being published and I would think that sentiment would be an even larger magnitude. Granted, no one wants scrubs to ruin their games, the idea is that we can add needed fuel and attendance numbers to the game if we act sooner rather than later and hopefully at least combat the decline in numbers if not keep it even keel for at least a short time.

There have been many suggested methods as to how we do this and Kevin suggested making two final tables. Pascal and others simply suggest a game win. While we have a small few suggesting just qualify the final table or don't change anything.

Let me first start by saying the previous change to qualifying for championships was a good change and proved to help. Next let me address some of the above ideas.

1.) Changing nothing would be a bad idea. The game has been in decline and stagnant. There is no reason to believe this slow trend will not continue. Thus some change to the system needs done and no small print and play set is really going to effect that.
2.) Making the entire final table qualified is also a bad idea. Many tournaments are 10-12 players. And many of those tournaments have people who did not get a game win or may have simply taken someone else's spot who could not stay for the final. If you want to keep the championship tournaments at a higher caliber this route should be avoided. If the average tournament were 20 players perhaps this would not be a bad idea. But, given the fact of many tournaments being 10-12 players prove this idea simply doesn't hold water to keep championships to the more elite and skilled players.
3.) If we simply let those who have a GW qualify then I do believe people who need to qualify may indeed play a Stealth Bleed deck to simply qualify and then play other decks they may normally play. Fact is there are plenty of decks that excel at getting VP's, but don't win tournaments as often. With all that being said this is a better idea than the the first two. Given the modern size of a normal tournament this would probably qualify 3 people at a normal 10-12 player tournament which eliminates those who limped in without any GW. The best idea so far I believe.
4.) If someone makes final table twice they qualify. As stated this would be harder to track as you have to look back an entire year and unless we have an easy to search database where we can set a date range and look strictly at those who made final tables then this is probably a bad idea. Plus it isn't like you can just set that task to the local Princes to keep track of. There may be people who attend tournaments out of area. Lastly, someone could make the final table twice and still have no GW. In Ohio, it is typical to see familiar faces at the final table and familiar people will have the GW's. I don't believe someone who had 2.5VP's at their best during the year is justified to attend a championship event.


In conclusion my current belief is that those who get a GW in a tournament qualify for championship events is the best current idea there is. I wish we had three times as many tournaments going on and a player base 5 times the size we currently have, but that isn't the case. If it were this conversation would not be going on.

Kevin, I do like your idea, but I also feel that if my local area had 10 tournaments a year we would have far more people qualified for championship events than if we just qualified those with a GW.

And as far as the qualifiers go I believe they are worth having if the average qualifier nets 20 or more players. If not then I don't think they are worth having. However, at this point they are serving as a vehicle (at least in the US) to qualify people who aren't necessarily in the top 25%, but at the final table.

If we don't change the qualifications for championships to a GW on a normal tournament level then maybe we need to have access to more than one regional in a year. For instance, each Prince could simply be allowed to run one qualifier a year where the top 25% get qualified. That might also solve issues of where to run a regional when we are already having trouble with attendance.

the best way to make sure more good players get in is to do what kevin originally suggested, but i have no idea how to track that. as it stands now, unless someone types a report of how a final table played out, we have no idea who was at the final table other than whoever wins.
Rodd is from the same area i am, so our cheif problem with having a huge playgroup, many competent players, and not all of those qualifying is this:

anyone can beat anyone at this game, but players who win tournaments almost monthly are obviously slightly better at it than most. we have scrubs that play stealthbleed and make final table with at least one gw, and have scrubs who never get a vp. we also have vets who are solid and competent players that constantly get multiple vps and gws, make it to finals, and lose to other vets (the running joke is john bell has to let someone else win eventually...). we've had scrubs qualify maybe once, but we've had vets not qualify tons of times. i've met people from other playgroups nationally who are solid players who just haven't won a tournament in a given year.

the real problem for many players qualifying is that they have to survive the final table, which is the end all be all, as opposed to the previous rounds and their results mattering for much other than making finals.
if all organizers started keeping track of the finalists (and i have no idea if any other continent has similar feelings, just going off a basis of US/North american players) then a consensus could be drawn of who is good enough to make finals consistently but hasn't for whatever reasons won any tournaments.

I am all in favor of expanding access to the first round of championship events by relaxing the qualifying rules. But, there is still a need to balance increased access against maintaining a decent standard of quality. Perhaps a hybrid approach is best. Suppose...

At a regular V:EKN sanctioned tournament, you qualify for the continental championships if:
1) You make the final table AND EITHER
2a) You win the final table OR
2b) You earned 1+ GW in the preliminary rounds.

* There is increased access to qualify.
* Those who consistently do well enough to make finals get some reward.
* Those who luck into the finals with 0 GWs in small events have to win it all to qualify.

I don't think it is possible to completely eliminate the small incentive for shenanigans if someone earns a GW in Round 1 of a small event and then tries to collude to get someone else a GW in Round 2 (or to eliminate a rival). However, judges are there to ensure Play To Win so hopefully any change to the qualifying rules will be communicated to them with this situation as a point of emphasis.

Edit: After my post the guy above me essentially states my sentiments and I full heartedly agree.

Original Post:

It can vary by region, but another issue is that there are many places which maybe hold a handful of tournaments a year. And many of those places, as is the norm now, have 10-12 players in the tournaments. Thus having to qualify twice isn't horrible in thought, but bad in execution because again, you will have plenty of people without GW's now qualified to play in the championships. To me it doesn't seem like they earned their due. At least a GW gives them more credit.

It isn't like we can do some hybrid idea where normal tournaments with 20 or better players will qualify the final table and those under that mandate a GW. Even so, we don't have enough tournaments with 20 or better players and if we did you would probably need a GW to get into the final. I still think the GW idea is better so more people aren't playing bad decks or scrub moves in a championship environment. Yet, a GW during a normal tournament means you are competent enough to get to the final table and have some credentials.

I don't want people who limp in with 2 VP's during two different tournaments potentially creating an issue at a championship.

Another possibility is to award an invitation to anyone who earns a game win in each preliminary round of any event. This is a significantly higher standard to achieve, however...

It encourages PTW for every round. It also helps mitigate the not-so-subtle impact of the incentive for everyone else to gang up against the #1 seed at a final table (since victory would be theirs if the table timed out).

Yet again I agree.