Need help on getting something set up

[JohnyHungry]

Ok, so I have been brought to a cross road in a "project," I am trying to do. This project is a local type tournament for people in my countywho play Yu-gi-oh. The thing is I don't know exactly how to do this. Obviously its not gonna be offical, but I still want people playing by Advanced format, both single and double ruleing. Now, the only thing is, I dont know really how to get this tournament out to people, where to hold, how to have judges watching duels, what to do for prizes, or even if I should have prizes. Basicly, I am a man with a dream to have a tournament, but not sure how to do it.

My original plan was to just get people to meet up at a park, and we would do a battle city/duelist kingdom type thing. you get some sort of item you have to barter to duel adn winner gets that, whoever can collect x amount advances to the semi-finals which would probably be held on a later date. Then I figured, no ones gonna buy that, no one is gonna wanna come out to a flockin' park to duel and this is all effertless.

Anybody out there have an sort of suggestions, I could really use the help.

 

[Digital Jedi]

Well, I guess it depends on the weather and how well you know people will react to the weather where you live. Sounds like you have a good idea that people will generally not show up at a park, unless of course, you where referring to a rec center within the park or something like that.

One thing I would advise, is to be sure to get some judges ahead of time. People you trust and people you know are at least somewhat knowledgeable of the TCG. It doesn't have to be a lot of them. And starting out, you may only need one good one.

The other thing I'd recommend is to get the word out using all the free resources you can. Do the Yu-Gi-Oh! players in your area frequent some online forums? Find out if you can post your event announcement there. A lot of forums, like CoG, will allow you to post your minor unsanctioned events in their Regional or Tournament sections. Make a flyer on your computer, nothing fancy, just location, price and prize details and make two or three dollars worth of black and white copies and see if some of the local comic shops will let you distribute them there. While your at it, see if maybe the comic shop owners would be willing to work a deal out with you. Then you'd have a sure fire way to get to some players who may not have seen your advertising.

Theses are just a few suggestions and their not all inclusive. I'm sure our member have some others.

 

[Maruno]

I think it would be better to hold the tournament somewhere indoors, so that rain can't call it off. It also means you don't need to worry about stray gusts of wind. It's also a better way of making sure who's in the tournament and who isn't.

Having each player play against a number of other players is a nice idea, although it will make the tournament last that much longer. And I don't like the idea of splitting up the tournament to several days (qualifiers and finals, for example), since a) it's more of a hassle making sure you've got a placed booked and everyone is available at those times, and b) not many people are going to show up again to watch the finals (because it would just be for the sake of seeing who won, which isn't a big motivator).

Perhaps you could alter your idea somewhat to go with the following:

• A player who has defeated 2 other players (1 match each) is entered into the semifinals. After each match has been played, the players must report the result to the TO.
• Only the first x number of people (4 or 8, depending on the total number of people who show up) who manage this are allowed to enter - anyone winning after this is refused.
• The semi-finals are played as a knock-out, with randomly-chosen pairings. Meanwhile, everyone who hasn't gotten into the semi-finals can play more matches, perhaps for a sort of "underdog" title. I'm not as sure how the underdog challenge would work, though.

It maintains the idea of Duelist Kingdom (beat a certain number of people to gain entry to the finals), while keeping things interesting for everyone else. Obviously the underdog prizes would be lesser in value (and in number, depending on your funds - perhaps only the underdog winner and underdog second place would get a prize).

As for prizes, perhaps have the top 4 players get prizes. The 3rd and 4th places play between themselves to decide who gets those positions. You should charge a small entry fee per person, which will not only cover room hire (if you need it) but also pays for the prizes (perhaps you could pop out during the tournament to buy them). Remember to have several of the prizes be worth more than the entry fee. Perhaps you could give every participant a booster pack of some set for taking part (if you have enough money), with the victors getting tins or Structure Decks or something. Perhaps line up all the prizes on display, and the winner gets first pick, followed by the second and so on (in which case, make sure they're all about equal value).

It all really depends on the number of people you expect to get. I'd advise that you figure out rough numbers beforehand, so you know vaguely what to expect.

Just some of my musings, based on absolutely no experience of tournaments (well, one Sneak Peek event).

 

[DarkLogicianOfCaos]

I like the Duelist Kingdom motif. Everyone gets a star chip and they wander around looking for an opponent. Hard to govern, but fun as an idea. It's sort of a paintball/laser tag kinda thing. "Hey, you with the star chips! I challenge you to a duel. Let's find us a 'duelist bench'". I actually had a dad hire me to run his son's YuGiOh! bithday party. It was really cool. We had a couple of youths that never played before, so it went a little long with me teaching them. Basically I paired them up and spent a lot of my time teaching as they went. The rest of the group played round robin, best of one, so more games with more opponents. Everyone had fun. But getting a bunch together ad hoc, well, that'll be a challenge. Unless you have a target or a draw, like something that the community is already doing (afternoon in the park, Christmas party, Shidig/hootenanny/barn raising, etc.) and you petition to have a part and be added to the schedule it might be tough. That's why so many hook up with stores: you have a cutomer base, a place to announce and schedule, a meeting place, etc. All those things need to be handled. I have helped schools get YuGiOh!/Gaming clubs going (one day I hope to have intermural/UI YuGiOh! competition--yeah, dream on), but, again, I started with a place that has its own customer base, announcement system and place to meet.

Let's look at this from a marketing strategy. We have the "product"--YuGiOh! Tournament. I guess the first thing you need to determine is your customer base. Who are you trying to attract? Smaller kids (with parents)? Middle School? High School? Any and all? What is their interest levels? In what and how much are they interested in the game and what aspects? What would be certain to draw them (prize support, food, free T-shirts to identify them as players, stuff to buy, training in play concepts, a nintendo wii to the winner, meeting Yugi Moto)? What would they consider to be worth the coming out to the event?

Then look to your format, location, schedule, method of advertisement, etc. (based on projected numbers determined by those interested divided by 2). If you have a PTO in your area they can help you out on putting something together from scratch. I say PTO because they have demonstrated their experience to organize enough for UDE to trust them with these big events, and because they will in no way be threatened by your venture like a TO might, in fact, they have a vested interest in its success as it may drum up more interest in the game (especially if you add a little advert for the next Regionals/Jump.

Anywya, that's my twopence. 1. Know your audience. 2. Plan from there.

 

[JohnyHungry]

Ok so everything i wrote before hand is gone, wayyyyyyy gone, ok so lets put it like this. I have everything else except how to do the tournament all figured out. Even, I have this idea that after the tournament to have something where every certain day of the week through out the year us duelist can meet up and just duel for a certain amount of time.


Anyway, back to the way of havin' the matches... the total people I could kinda expect to show would be 12, soooo i was thinkin' of just stickin' with a traditional format, 1 faces 6 winner advances, and all that jazz. At the same time that sounds like it would be boring, cause what if someone wanted to particularly duel this one duelist... offset people get bored really don't wanna compete anymore even if the prizes are what they are.
Also with that format though it would give us chances to have better judgeing only 6 duels, then 3 duels, and that eliminates it down to 3 people... at this point thats an odd number of duels and well that dont work out in the end.

My second idea is this... still sticking with the duelist kingdom type thing. each person is given an x amount [maybe 4, assuming 12 ppl] of these wicked crazy eyeball things i found the other day at a Walgreen's bikin' to my gfs. Each duelist competes to collect 12 of the eyeballs making it only 4 ppl capable of advancing to the semifinals which will be done in traditional style to decide the winner of the tournament.

sooooo, what do ya think?