No More Scholarships in Regional Level Events?

[Kenshin's Garde]

Ehhh, considering that Pokemon was fine even back when tournaments DID have an entry fee, I can see nothing but upside TBH. Also, Kenny's idea about the Grand Prix-ish events just makes the most sense...Nintendo can have their "visionary" main event structure, while a 3rd party or separate branch can run a more competitive, high-stakes tourny.

 

[Team Cook]

After reading the entire thread, I noticed two things regarding scholarships.

No one seemed to notice that Dave left the door open, so scholarships could come back.

No one has mentioned the lack of Juniors over the last three years. I hate to see scholarships go but I understand why they made the move (not saying they made the move because of this, it's only my opinion).

The majority of the scholarships were going to the two divisions that are losing players. It makes sense to move that money elsewhere, in my opinion. It's clear that keeping the scholarships weren't bringing in more players.

 

[Cyrus]

Team Cook's post makes a lot of sense. So if we assume that scholarships did little for junior/senior attendance, "and" assume that they had a positive impact on Masters, why not charge just the Masters a $5.00 entrance for scholarships/big prizes? P!P would be well served to start treating the Masters differently from other age groups when it comes to tournament incentives, and this would be a fantastic start.

I don't know if players are ready for >10.00 entrance fees, but $5.00 at big stages would be very appropriate.

 

[kwisdumb]

I don't really think the lack of Juniors argument works, though. If that's the case, then why do we still fight over how important kids are to this game? If we're de-emphasizing prizes because of their shrinking numbers, why don't we cater to them less in general?

Also, Dave did leave the door open to scholarships, but it seemed like it was pretty 50/50 in them ever returning, and this year seemed out of the question.

 

[Team Cook]

I don't really think the lack of Juniors argument works, though. If that's the case, then why do we still fight over how important kids are to this game? If we're de-emphasizing prizes because of their shrinking numbers, why don't we cater to them less in general?

Also, Dave did leave the door open to scholarships, but it seemed like it was pretty 50/50 in them ever returning, and this year seemed out of the question.

Let's think about the lack of Juniors for a minute. Seriously, look at the very small numbers in Juniors over the last three years. Then look at the winners of the Junior scholarships. I'm betting the same players are winning every single year, same goes for Seniors. Do we really think these players that are winning the scholarships every year are going to quit attending events? Nope. I've seen the same players already at almost every BRs.

As for Masters, how many Masters have quit because of this? Not very many, if any.

Here's a great question.

How many parents will think twice about traveling due to no scholarships? Not many, because those players that competed seriously for scholarships will go after the Championship points.

Now look at "no scholarships". TPCi didn't really lose anything by removing this. Not a bad move if you ask me but yes, I will miss them.

 

[ShadowCard]

why not charge just the Masters a $5.00 entrance for scholarships/big prizes?

Because at events where there is an entry fee--see Europe--the players say there is little to no additional prize support. See nnaann's post 3 above yours. RainbowGym has also said the same thing in other threads. Entry fees, at least in Europe, do not go for additional prize support.

Has anyone considered that TOs may welcome an entry fee to offset venue costs instead of buying additional prizes? Then we'd be paying and still get the same. We'd probably get better tables and chairs to play at or a larger room to play, but if Europe is an indication about how the system would work...

The people who are advocating for an entry fee, where do you think the money would go? It'll go to the TOs, not OP.

Let's think about the lack of Juniors for a minute. Seriously, look at the very small numbers in Juniors over the last three years.

They were practically giving away the scholarships. There was no competition for it.

 

[FunnyBear]

I'm all for the entry fee contributing to rewards. Honestly, if you aren't willing to pay $20-30 to enter a regionals or Nationals, then you really shouldn't be playing this game.

It's unfair to charge Juniors and Seniors so yes, this fee would be just for Masters, but there is no excuse someone can pay for multiple Yanmegas and Magnezones and Catchers and not be willing to pay $20 to support better prizes, and P!P should seriously consider this. It would really help to legitimize the competitive scene.

It absolutley is not unfair to charge children's parents for events they play in. As any parent can attest, you are always shelling out $20-$30 for swimming, soccer, basketball, pretty much everything. Parents are used to paying for their kids activities.

I do however have an issue with the overall concept that charging for tournaments would allow entry fees to benefit the top few players of each event with better prize support. I think entry fees should be implemented to create a better class of event for everyone. Imagine States or Regionals with
- free coffee and danish during registration
- a buffet lunch
- Event swag, hats, tshirts

The current state of affairs is due to OP being entirely part of Pokemon's marketing budget. The reason we do not have commercial organized competition, like in Chess and Magic, is that no one wants to compete with free events. Stop making them free, raise the bar a bit, and let the free market take hold.

 

[kwisdumb]

Let's think about the lack of Juniors for a minute.
Seriously, look at the very small numbers in Juniors over the last three years. Then look at the winners of the Junior scholarships.
I'm betting the same players are winning every single year, same goes for Seniors.
Do we really think these players that are winning the scholarships every year are going to quit attending events?
Nope. I've seen the same players already at almost every BRs.

I think we'll not only see a drop in Jr attendance at bigger events, but that yes, some of those big name Juniors/Seniors will stop attending all together. Obviously we won't have real numbers until Regionals.

How many parents will think twice about traveling due to no scholarships? Not many, because those players that competed seriously for scholarships will go after the Championship points.

I personally know of a handful of parents who have decided to stop traveling to events, or are at least only willing to travel because they think some sort of scholarship will be brought back, because of this change.

Now look at "no scholarships". TPCi didn't really lose anything by removing this. Not a bad move if you ask me but yes, I will miss them.

Can't really say I agree with that at all. We can't judge how much they've lost before we get to events that actually have scholarships. Not to mention that all of the bad press is certainly losing something. No offense,
but I don't think you can say "They didn't lose anything by taking away prize support" without showing a pretty big bias.

Because at events where there is an entry fee--see Europe--the players say there is little to no additional prize support. See nnaann's post 3 above yours. RainbowGym has also said the same thing in other threads. Entry fees, at least in Europe, do not go for additional prize support.

Well...right. Obviously. Just becuase things are done incorrectly somewhere doesn't mean that they would be implemented incorrectly everywhere. No one is pushing for event fees that don't produce more prizes. This argument makes no sense.

Has anyone considered that TOs may welcome an entry fee to offset venue costs instead of buying additional prizes? Then we'd be paying and still get the same. We'd probably get better tables and chairs to play at or a larger room to play, but if Europe is an indication about how the system would work. The people who are advocating for an entry fee, where do you think the money would go? It'll go to the TOs, not OP.

Again, no one is saying that they wanna charge for events just to roll the dice and see what happens. We want to be charged for events if it means more prize support.

They were practically giving away the scholarships. There was no competition for it.

Completely disagree.

 

[Team Cook]

Yes, I agree 100% that Regionals will show us a lot. Now as for traveling parents, I can see them not traveling to two Regionals but they will at least travel to their nearest one.

I have faith in TPCi, this should be interesting.

Good luck to all and come visit me in Houston, Texas for our Regionals in April.

 

[GinoLombardi21]

Wow they took away scholarships? Looks like im not going now ..

 

[ShadowCard]

Well...right. Obviously. Just becuase things are done incorrectly somewhere doesn't mean that they would be implemented incorrectly everywhere. No one is pushing for event fees that don't produce more prizes. This argument makes no sense.

How is their system incorrect? If it was so incorrect, why would OP continue to allow it?

Consider that US events used to charge entry for premier events. Why did that practice stop?

Completely disagree.

Support your opinion, please. Attendance numbers continuing to fall in Juniors and Seniors support my opinion. Half of last year's Regionals could not get 32 juniors with that scholarship incentive. They played top 4 out of 5 swiss rounds to decide $1000 scholarships.

 

[kwisdumb]

How is their system incorrect? If it was so incorrect, why would OP continue to allow it?

Because OP isn't perfect, as showcased by this three page thread? I don't understand this at all.

Consider that US events used to charge entry for premier events. Why did that practice stop?

I have no idea as I didn't play back then.

Support your opinion, please. Attendance numbers continuing to fall in Juniors and Seniors support my opinion. Half of last year's Regionals could not get 32 juniors with that scholarship incentive. They played top 4 out of 5 swiss rounds to decide $1000 scholarships.

Sure, Juniors and Seniors numbers are falling. Is there any other industry that's thought process is "Hmm, a group we're marketing to isn't responding as well as they have in the past...let's give them less reasons to!"

Again, I just don't understand what you're trying to say. As far as I can tell, your argument is "OP is doing everything right, otherwise they wouldn't be doing it." If I'm mistaken I apologize, I just don't understand where you're coming from at all.

 

[nnaann]

Sure, Juniors and Seniors numbers are falling. Is there any other industry that's thought process is "Hmm, a group we're marketing to isn't responding as well as they have in the past...let's give them less reasons to!"

You're looking at this in the wrong way. P!P have already said that their budget is exactly the same from last year, so it's obvious that the Scholarship money hasn't disappeared, but is just being used in different forms.

Scholarships are a HUGE expense to give, and there is so many alternative ways in which that money could be used. If the attendences are falling, then obviously it shows that they're not a major factor in influencing young kids to play, and that the money is better spent enticing them in another form.

PTCGO is really starting to take off, and is a new investment by P!P this year. It's great for the game, teaches more people to play, gets them involved with the competitive side of the game, and hopefully eventually into attending leagues and tournaments. We have players like Ness and Pooka representing the program, and streaming live games on a regular basis. Everyone wants to buy codes, and are happy to pay a good price for it. There's no doubt about the potential of this, and is something everybody is really pleased with.

P!P aren't saying that they aren't responding, so they're going to give them less reasons to. They're saying they're not responding, so they're going to try another method which they (and I) believe will be much more effective in increasing attendence numbers. With a limited budget, in a difficult economy, every business will try to make their budget more effective if they think they can.

 

[ogremarauder]

Speaking as a proud Pokedad, I can say that the reason for dropping JR/SR attendance has got alot to do with parents. In this day and age with performance and arts programs being cut like crazy, there has been a decline in support for any extracirricular activity that isn't sports related. My kids aren't 'into' sports. Which I can tell you in our area of the country(southwest) means that we often don't have much in common with many other people in our respective demographics. Our family activity is Pokemon. Premier events are our version of swim meets or football night. Playtesting is our version of 'practice days'. I say these things to illustrate the fact that here, the only jrs we have come from parents who also play/judge/organize events. Non-poke parents by an large do not care to invest time or $$ into something they see as "mindless" entertainment. From experience, the only thing that enticed non-poke parents into investing was the fact that scholarships were part of the structure.Telling random parents that their kids can compete for scholarships was the ONLY reason they even considered allowing their kid to use saturday time to play a pokemon game. I feel that removing scholarships( at least at the jr/sr level) is just another stab at the health of the younger brackets.

 

[pokemaster1970]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Scholarships is the reason we play as well. This will be our last year playing, and then all my cards will be sold. The fact that they got rid of scholarships just makes the decision that more easy for us. Like Ogre just said, why would any new parent getting their kids into pokemon stay with it when there is no reward for it? Sure you may go to a few leagues in a year, but any parent who sees how much time and money you have to put into this game will just find more productive ways to spend the time and money for their kids.

 

[Raen]

^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Scholarships is the reason we play as well. This will be our last year playing, and then all my cards will be sold. The fact that they got rid of scholarships just makes the decision that more easy for us. Like Ogre just said, why would any new parent getting their kids into pokemon stay with it when there is no reward for it? Sure you may go to a few leagues in a year, but any parent who sees how much time and money you have to put into this game will just find more productive ways to spend the time and money for their kids.

I really don't understand this. First and foremost, Pokemon is a game. Games are fun, and I believe almost every Pokemon player plays because it's fun.

I also happen to thing competing is fun, so I go to tournaments. I also like winning, so I win whenever I can, because that's fun too. Prizes are nice and kinda fun as well, but I'm having an awful lot of fun anyway, so I can deal with not getting prizes. Do I want better prize support? Yes, I do. Would better prizes motivate me to attend more events? Most likely. But would better prizes make me have more fun playing the game? Nope, not really. I play because the game is fun, so prizes don't really factor into that.

Looking at Pokemon like an investment is silly. We aren't investing in cards to make that money back in scholarships, or to turn our time investment into monetary gain. We invest in cards because the game is fun. It's just like any other game we play. Do I buy video games because I want to make my money back? Of course not, I buy them because they are fun. Same thing here, and with any entertainment.

Tl;dr: Basically, if you play this game because you want scholarships and not because you enjoy the game, why are you playing in the first place?

 

[kwisdumb]

Although I don't disagree with the entirety of your sentiment, Raen, I do know a lot of players who don't play for fun.

Furthermore, for a lot of people it's not that this game isn't fun, it's that there are more fun things out there. Pokemon is not only fun but (at least in the past) was a way to earn scholarships. There's an inherent value there that, as we've been talking about in this thread, justifies this game and it's expenses/stresses for a lot of parents. If you take away that potential gain, then why not do something more fun, if you're going to lose value anyway? It's a balancing act.

 

[pokemaster1970]

Raen says: "Basically, if you play this game because you want scholarships and not because you enjoy the game, why are you playing in the first place? "

Didn't you answer your own question in the begining of your statement? And Pokemon is an investment. Anything you have to put time and money into is an investment. And I do make money off it, that's why I'm able to support my daughter and her gaming. But if there is no incentive to put that kind of time and energy into Pokemon, I can just use that money for another type of investment and move on. I'm sure you're some twentysomething who thinks she has the world by the ..... But real life will always bring you back down to earth.

 

[Ignatious]

I really don't understand this. First and foremost, Pokemon is a game. Games are fun, and I believe almost every Pokemon player plays because it's fun.

I also happen to thing competing is fun, so I go to tournaments. I also like winning, so I win whenever I can, because that's fun too. Prizes are nice and kinda fun as well, but I'm having an awful lot of fun anyway, so I can deal with not getting prizes. Do I want better prize support? Yes, I do. Would better prizes motivate me to attend more events? Most likely. But would better prizes make me have more fun playing the game? Nope, not really. I play because the game is fun, so prizes don't really factor into that.

Looking at Pokemon like an investment is silly. We aren't investing in cards to make that money back in scholarships, or to turn our time investment into monetary gain. We invest in cards because the game is fun. It's just like any other game we play. Do I buy video games because I want to make my money back? Of course not, I buy them because they are fun. Same thing here, and with any entertainment.

Tl;dr: Basically, if you play this game because you want scholarships and not because you enjoy the game, why are you playing in the first place?

Okay YOU play for fun. What about the new players who don't know it's fun yet? What about the players who DO see it as an investment? If you think that's silly I don't know what to say to you. That opinion doesn't change the fact that many players who regularly place well play for prizes. If prizes are not compensated in some way, I for one would rather spend time and money on a rewarding tcg.

 

[pokemaster1970]

MTG, here we come.........................