Points Required to Qualify for the World Championships: 500 CP for Masters? WHAT!
- Thread starter Glaceon
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Well I guess I will be done with Pokemon after Legendary Treasures.
At least as far as even bothering to build semi-competative decks.
Good job TPCi, driving away the people who actually pay for most of the cards.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Junior & Seniors are affected by this.
Since its usually mom & dad who take them to these things.
Since there isn't much else to do, they often get interested in the game as well.
So if you take those people away, there is going to be less "kids" as well.
Hmm, I guess I might just give my cards to the league.
Wonder if Legend of the Five Rings is still fun (haven't played in many years)...
At least as far as even bothering to build semi-competative decks.
Good job TPCi, driving away the people who actually pay for most of the cards.
I wouldn't be surprised if the Junior & Seniors are affected by this.
Since its usually mom & dad who take them to these things.
Since there isn't much else to do, they often get interested in the game as well.
So if you take those people away, there is going to be less "kids" as well.
Hmm, I guess I might just give my cards to the league.
Wonder if Legend of the Five Rings is still fun (haven't played in many years)...
Ness
Member
When it was announced last year that there would be a Last Chance Event at U.S. Nationals, I assumed TPCi realized 400 points was too high of a requirement for U.S. players. (Why else would such a tournament have been added at the last minute?) To then learn this season will have a point requirement 100 points higher while pretty much everything else stayed the same really surprised me. Does that mean TPCi wants a smaller World Championship? If so, why? Aren't larger World Championships better for the game? Isn't the chance of earning a Worlds invite one of the main things that keeps players attending tournaments all year long?
Pokemon.com does list that these numbers are subject to change, so nothing is set in stone yet. There might still be more we don't know. No need to panic yet, IMO, though I admit I am a bit nervous. Maybe someone from TPCi could chime in with any updates, or at least the thought process behind some of this?
Pokemon.com does list that these numbers are subject to change, so nothing is set in stone yet. There might still be more we don't know. No need to panic yet, IMO, though I admit I am a bit nervous. Maybe someone from TPCi could chime in with any updates, or at least the thought process behind some of this?
NoPoke
Active Member
UK: the only players to make 500 or more CPs in masters last year finished T4 at nationals where they got the magic 500 points. This change has made it close to impossible for UK masters to qualify without a very high finish at nationals.
I don't like this even though it isn't that much of a surprise. It always struck me as odd that players were awarded 500 points at nationals when the bar was 400. Now we can see why. I don't think this is provisional or likely to change either as I can see it being used as a fix for the late finish at worlds by cutting down on the number of entrants.
I don't like this even though it isn't that much of a surprise. It always struck me as odd that players were awarded 500 points at nationals when the bar was 400. Now we can see why. I don't think this is provisional or likely to change either as I can see it being used as a fix for the late finish at worlds by cutting down on the number of entrants.
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Arcanite
New Member
Yeah, it's ridiculous for UK players.
1) Basically can't qualify unless you get top 4 at Nats. There aren't enough tournaments for 500CP to be a viable requirement.
2) All of Europe gets 2 'Regional' events.
3)) Have to pay very large costs to fly to USA for Worlds
I never thought I'd say this, but ELO is better than this championship points structure.
1) Basically can't qualify unless you get top 4 at Nats. There aren't enough tournaments for 500CP to be a viable requirement.
2) All of Europe gets 2 'Regional' events.
3)) Have to pay very large costs to fly to USA for Worlds
I never thought I'd say this, but ELO is better than this championship points structure.
400 was hard already, but 500?! Makes pokemon become more of a fulltime job instead of a hobby.. Also makes every single tournament super competetive since people will be so desperate for points. At least we have the arena cups over here but since I cant attend 3 of them due to University, that doesnt really help me..
The format is terrible anyways and this kinda ruins my motivation to even play at all, bad decision
The format is terrible anyways and this kinda ruins my motivation to even play at all, bad decision
bullados
<a href="http://pokegym.net/forums/showthread.php?
There is a way to make this easier.
Increase the BFL on LCs.
LCs will be candy relative to all of the other tournaments. They will be everywhere. Up here in Minneapolis, we should have at least 28 LCs before the Worlds Qualifiers are announced. Most will be in the same locations that BRs and Cities were before this. Before, we had a shot at 8 BRs. And I feel as though most areas will see similar increases in local level tournaments. A LOT more people will max out their LC BFL, and then will go beyond that to try and limit invites (as was done last year).
Maybe increasing the BFL on LCs from 6 to 10 or something like that would ease this process. That's an extra 60 CP available, and last season there were 15 players in the 440-499 range. And we don't know how many people truly maximized their BR points last season (I expect it to be lower than you might think).
Of course, I also agree that the CPs for US Nationals are strange at best. I'd like to see those altered as well, in the upward direction. I don't know how difficult it is to T16 US Nats, but I would think that it's more difficult than T4ing a Regional.
That being said, I seriously doubt that anything will be changed from this format. I think that TPCi likes its World Championships to be small events. I think they're pushing towards an MTG-like 16 players per age group eventually. And, given how late Day 1 went this year, I doubt they're going to do anything that will increase its overall size.
Increase the BFL on LCs.
LCs will be candy relative to all of the other tournaments. They will be everywhere. Up here in Minneapolis, we should have at least 28 LCs before the Worlds Qualifiers are announced. Most will be in the same locations that BRs and Cities were before this. Before, we had a shot at 8 BRs. And I feel as though most areas will see similar increases in local level tournaments. A LOT more people will max out their LC BFL, and then will go beyond that to try and limit invites (as was done last year).
Maybe increasing the BFL on LCs from 6 to 10 or something like that would ease this process. That's an extra 60 CP available, and last season there were 15 players in the 440-499 range. And we don't know how many people truly maximized their BR points last season (I expect it to be lower than you might think).
Of course, I also agree that the CPs for US Nationals are strange at best. I'd like to see those altered as well, in the upward direction. I don't know how difficult it is to T16 US Nats, but I would think that it's more difficult than T4ing a Regional.
That being said, I seriously doubt that anything will be changed from this format. I think that TPCi likes its World Championships to be small events. I think they're pushing towards an MTG-like 16 players per age group eventually. And, given how late Day 1 went this year, I doubt they're going to do anything that will increase its overall size.
I would like to echo everything Ross has said prior to this.
I am disheartened at the new changes. They make a competitive player's life a nightmare. I speak from experience, and probably on behalf of a lot of other competitive players, but I spent the majority of my free time last year chasing CP in tournaments, not only in my own area but in other areas that were somewhat difficult to travel to. I would not mind doing it again, certainly should it be 400CP once more, but when the system becomes 25% harder to achieve your goal, and you are just skimming it beforehand (final CP count just above 400), you have to wonder if TPCi truly understands the gravitas of what they are doing.
This will deter players from playing. This will backtrack on so much that people like the Top Cut have done for the game - they have promoted it successfully, and now TPCi seemingly intends to, in one fell swoop, obliterate a chunk of its playerbase through an unneeded CP requirement.
I think that the way to address the Worlds Day 1 issue (that of it going on until 1am) is not to increase the bar so very few make it over, but rather to put more of the Top Cut rounds in Day 2 (as has been done before). Especially given that the streaming could be done simultaneously for TCG and VGC - players are encouraged to take one or the other; streaming the whole day so people watching online see both makes less sense given this.
Another thing I would like to say is this - unless a player has points from a previous Worlds, it is even more unlikely that they will qualify now. This was unfair before but now it is ridiculous - another deterrent for newer players seeking to qualify. To a new competitive player, the 500CP bar is a huge warning sign that the game is not worth investing time, effort and money into (as the chance of qualifying now is extremely low).
I am disheartened at the new changes. They make a competitive player's life a nightmare. I speak from experience, and probably on behalf of a lot of other competitive players, but I spent the majority of my free time last year chasing CP in tournaments, not only in my own area but in other areas that were somewhat difficult to travel to. I would not mind doing it again, certainly should it be 400CP once more, but when the system becomes 25% harder to achieve your goal, and you are just skimming it beforehand (final CP count just above 400), you have to wonder if TPCi truly understands the gravitas of what they are doing.
This will deter players from playing. This will backtrack on so much that people like the Top Cut have done for the game - they have promoted it successfully, and now TPCi seemingly intends to, in one fell swoop, obliterate a chunk of its playerbase through an unneeded CP requirement.
I think that the way to address the Worlds Day 1 issue (that of it going on until 1am) is not to increase the bar so very few make it over, but rather to put more of the Top Cut rounds in Day 2 (as has been done before). Especially given that the streaming could be done simultaneously for TCG and VGC - players are encouraged to take one or the other; streaming the whole day so people watching online see both makes less sense given this.
Another thing I would like to say is this - unless a player has points from a previous Worlds, it is even more unlikely that they will qualify now. This was unfair before but now it is ridiculous - another deterrent for newer players seeking to qualify. To a new competitive player, the 500CP bar is a huge warning sign that the game is not worth investing time, effort and money into (as the chance of qualifying now is extremely low).
The problem with this is, if they are going to change the cp structure at tournaments, why release things piecemeal?
Pokemon might want to be like magic, but they'll never be like them if competitive players are swayed away from playing with recent changes.
I'm surprised that the tournament structure changes have not been mentioned in conjunction with this announcement.
Moving from large cuts to a Top 8 inherently makes it more difficult to win any given event. This is particularly true if the Swiss rumors are true. It has been whispered around that events will only get one or two more rounds, instead of 5+ more rounds. Simply moving from 8-9 rounds to 9-10 rounds is not enough to justify the small cuts, and makes the events that much harder.
Now consider that you have to win, not just cut or do well but actually win, MORE and BIGGER events this year.
It has been shown that only 30 NA players would have qualified for Worlds last season with a 500 standard, I fully believe that number would have been lower if the new tournament structure was in place last year.
These two events (tournament structure and higher CP) will make Worlds impraticable, if not impossible for almost everyone who does not 1) have residual points from Worlds or 2) Top 8 Nats.
Moving from large cuts to a Top 8 inherently makes it more difficult to win any given event. This is particularly true if the Swiss rumors are true. It has been whispered around that events will only get one or two more rounds, instead of 5+ more rounds. Simply moving from 8-9 rounds to 9-10 rounds is not enough to justify the small cuts, and makes the events that much harder.
Now consider that you have to win, not just cut or do well but actually win, MORE and BIGGER events this year.
It has been shown that only 30 NA players would have qualified for Worlds last season with a 500 standard, I fully believe that number would have been lower if the new tournament structure was in place last year.
These two events (tournament structure and higher CP) will make Worlds impraticable, if not impossible for almost everyone who does not 1) have residual points from Worlds or 2) Top 8 Nats.
LionheartEX
Active Member
I'm going to go out on a limb here and say that the points payout is not finalised.
Traditionally (in our country at least), Top 2 have gotten invites with only 1st getting a trip. Last season we were I think the 5th(?) largest Nationals.
This is relevant, as our cut off for an invite is 300 now - up from 200, but on the site, second place is only listed as 200 points meaning second place is not guaranteed an invite.
This seems strange to me. I feel like a lot of the values are yet to be adjusted and many are jumping the gun.
That said, 300 for our country is a very good number - any higher would suck, but I was able to get in this year with 1 regionals, 3 cities and 4 BRs - which, when you scale it to the amount of events that that players in the US needed to qualify, it was too easy to qualify for us and hardly fair on larger countries. 300 will mean we actually have to work for it.
In essence though, I honestly think that the points payouts aren't finalized like I said, and we should hold tight. If I'm wrong... well, balls.
Traditionally (in our country at least), Top 2 have gotten invites with only 1st getting a trip. Last season we were I think the 5th(?) largest Nationals.
This is relevant, as our cut off for an invite is 300 now - up from 200, but on the site, second place is only listed as 200 points meaning second place is not guaranteed an invite.
This seems strange to me. I feel like a lot of the values are yet to be adjusted and many are jumping the gun.
That said, 300 for our country is a very good number - any higher would suck, but I was able to get in this year with 1 regionals, 3 cities and 4 BRs - which, when you scale it to the amount of events that that players in the US needed to qualify, it was too easy to qualify for us and hardly fair on larger countries. 300 will mean we actually have to work for it.
In essence though, I honestly think that the points payouts aren't finalized like I said, and we should hold tight. If I'm wrong... well, balls.
Swordfish1989
New Member
I think they need to realize that while worlds is an exclusive event, the game and the company benefit more from a bigger worlds than a smaller one. It's something I learned in business school for years - if you make the goal appear to be unachievable you will not have people be motivated to try to achieve it - especially when they payoff is terrible. Pokemon isn't a popular sport like Football or Basketball, where dedicating yourself continuously could make you a billionaire, so you can't expect people to act the same way in tournaments. It's primarily a hobby, and no one who plays actually considers Pokemon a career. What that means is you can't expect people to drop thousands of dollars MORE on airfare and hotels (not to mention TIME) without the prospect of getting something more interesting. I mean, think about it, if Pokemon announced the new 500pt minimum but also told you the winner of worlds would get $50,000 in cash and all world's participants would get a minimum $2,000, would we even be complaining, or would we be clearing our schedules for the rest of the year?
What baffles me is why they would make a move that removes more money from the consumer's pockets that doesn't go to them. The more money we spend on traveling to events, the less money is left over to actually purchase cards and merch. Unless you're rich, you have a budget. Can you imagine how much more money they would make if they lowered the point threshold and released alternate formats like MTG's Modern and Legacy? And launched products that promoted it, like Modern Masters (for those unfamiliar it's a booster box containing amazing reprints that can be used in the Modern format)? Of course you'd always have people who only stick to one format, but the competitive people wouldn't. Imagine in this scenario, all States/Regionals were held at the same weekend, but two or three times (once for each format), and the points required to get into worlds was lowered. They'd make more, have some variety in this game, and people would, I think, be having more fun.
Well, that's my pitch anyway.
What baffles me is why they would make a move that removes more money from the consumer's pockets that doesn't go to them. The more money we spend on traveling to events, the less money is left over to actually purchase cards and merch. Unless you're rich, you have a budget. Can you imagine how much more money they would make if they lowered the point threshold and released alternate formats like MTG's Modern and Legacy? And launched products that promoted it, like Modern Masters (for those unfamiliar it's a booster box containing amazing reprints that can be used in the Modern format)? Of course you'd always have people who only stick to one format, but the competitive people wouldn't. Imagine in this scenario, all States/Regionals were held at the same weekend, but two or three times (once for each format), and the points required to get into worlds was lowered. They'd make more, have some variety in this game, and people would, I think, be having more fun.
Well, that's my pitch anyway.
Professor Dav
Master Trainer
As I mentioned in a post about a year or so ago, the introduction of the CP system was going to require multiple adjustments of the overall system until it was tuned to where we felt it needed to be.
Last year (2013 Season), we discussed what we thought the targets should be at length, and used the data that we had to make our best guess. Several of us, myself included, felt that 400 was too low, and we should set the target between 450-500 and assess the number of invites shortly after Nationals, and move the number down, if we felt the invite quantities were too low. Doing this would have obviously been viewed more positively by the player-base than going the other way.
However, because Worlds was scheduled in a much larger space than previous events, there was also a concern from management that it would feel "empty" and the entire team (not just OP, but events, marketing, PR) were tasked with doing everything possible to make it feel full.
With that, we decided we'd set the target at 400, and see what happened. This would give us good data to tune the numbers in the future, and would likely "over invite" from our previous events, which was fine. We were also aware that there would be complaints, such as those in this thread, regarding our readjustment of the targets when the time came. It feels like we are taking something away this year, rather than like we gave you something last year.
Were you at worlds, you may have noticed that the back of the tournament hall had a large pipe and drape section hiding part of the room. This was a pretty large amount of space, draped off to make things feel more cozy, and the hall feel fuller. This was done even though we had far more attendees than ever before. That's just how large that space was.
Our goal is, and has pretty much always been, 128 players per age division in attendance at Worlds, and there are a number of factors that have to go into how we're going to get there. This isn't just entirely about the number of invites awarded, it's about the location, the estimated attendance rate and invitations and how they work together.
Hawaii, for example, always throws a wrench into things because there's much higher player attrition from the number of total invitations because of the expense and distance for travelers, particularly Europeans.
Past years, our invitation numbers were between 120-150 per age division (including LCQ, JP and KR and the winners from the previous year), and our high attendance from those years was about 133 (for any division). As the years have gone on, our attendance rates vs. invitations have steadily increased, leading to adjustments along the way. For example, when we stopped passing down ranking invitations from those that had already been earned at a National, or not earned by someone not opted in.
Our total percentage of attendees vs. invitations now runs at 80%-86% in total. However, our breakdowns by region are much, much different.
Our attendance by age division respectively (JR, SR, MA) was:
NA: 90%, 94%, 93%
EU: 74%, 63%, 88%
LA: 57%, 64%, 53%
APAC: 50%, 76%, 64%
It's worth noting that due to whatever reasons, connectivity, access, etc. that JR and SR players in LA and APAC have a very low account activation rate, which dramatically reduces the number of player eligible to receive invitations. So, for example, the 50% attendance rate for APAC Juniors was a total of 4 players of 8 invitations.
Given the location of this year's World Championships, we would anticipate that NA attendance rates will remain similar, EU attendance rates will increase, and that LA and APAC are likely to remain similar, or increase slightly. Our goal is to bring invite rates to a level similar with past years, which we don't feel is too low. At 500 CP, we'd have seen about 30 North American Masters last year. That's only 10 off of the invite rate of previous years, and it's not unreasonable to expect that 5-10 more players would earn invitations given that another 13 NA Masters were within 50 points of 500, and that a high rate of attendees would come from the 30-40 invitees. We saw 60 EU Masters in that range, and at an attendance rate of about 88%, we'd hope to see about 50 in attendance.
Numbers were adjusted for the Senior division similarly to bring the total attendance down slightly from 2013, with Junior attendance at 118 for 2013, we did not feel that any adjustment was necessary.
I understand that the above will not satisfy many of you, but I felt it appropriate to at the very least address this thread from the OP/TPCi standpoint so that you'd at least understand some of the reasons why this has been done.
Thank you,
Prof_Dav
Last year (2013 Season), we discussed what we thought the targets should be at length, and used the data that we had to make our best guess. Several of us, myself included, felt that 400 was too low, and we should set the target between 450-500 and assess the number of invites shortly after Nationals, and move the number down, if we felt the invite quantities were too low. Doing this would have obviously been viewed more positively by the player-base than going the other way.
However, because Worlds was scheduled in a much larger space than previous events, there was also a concern from management that it would feel "empty" and the entire team (not just OP, but events, marketing, PR) were tasked with doing everything possible to make it feel full.
With that, we decided we'd set the target at 400, and see what happened. This would give us good data to tune the numbers in the future, and would likely "over invite" from our previous events, which was fine. We were also aware that there would be complaints, such as those in this thread, regarding our readjustment of the targets when the time came. It feels like we are taking something away this year, rather than like we gave you something last year.
Were you at worlds, you may have noticed that the back of the tournament hall had a large pipe and drape section hiding part of the room. This was a pretty large amount of space, draped off to make things feel more cozy, and the hall feel fuller. This was done even though we had far more attendees than ever before. That's just how large that space was.
Our goal is, and has pretty much always been, 128 players per age division in attendance at Worlds, and there are a number of factors that have to go into how we're going to get there. This isn't just entirely about the number of invites awarded, it's about the location, the estimated attendance rate and invitations and how they work together.
Hawaii, for example, always throws a wrench into things because there's much higher player attrition from the number of total invitations because of the expense and distance for travelers, particularly Europeans.
Past years, our invitation numbers were between 120-150 per age division (including LCQ, JP and KR and the winners from the previous year), and our high attendance from those years was about 133 (for any division). As the years have gone on, our attendance rates vs. invitations have steadily increased, leading to adjustments along the way. For example, when we stopped passing down ranking invitations from those that had already been earned at a National, or not earned by someone not opted in.
Our total percentage of attendees vs. invitations now runs at 80%-86% in total. However, our breakdowns by region are much, much different.
Our attendance by age division respectively (JR, SR, MA) was:
NA: 90%, 94%, 93%
EU: 74%, 63%, 88%
LA: 57%, 64%, 53%
APAC: 50%, 76%, 64%
It's worth noting that due to whatever reasons, connectivity, access, etc. that JR and SR players in LA and APAC have a very low account activation rate, which dramatically reduces the number of player eligible to receive invitations. So, for example, the 50% attendance rate for APAC Juniors was a total of 4 players of 8 invitations.
Given the location of this year's World Championships, we would anticipate that NA attendance rates will remain similar, EU attendance rates will increase, and that LA and APAC are likely to remain similar, or increase slightly. Our goal is to bring invite rates to a level similar with past years, which we don't feel is too low. At 500 CP, we'd have seen about 30 North American Masters last year. That's only 10 off of the invite rate of previous years, and it's not unreasonable to expect that 5-10 more players would earn invitations given that another 13 NA Masters were within 50 points of 500, and that a high rate of attendees would come from the 30-40 invitees. We saw 60 EU Masters in that range, and at an attendance rate of about 88%, we'd hope to see about 50 in attendance.
Numbers were adjusted for the Senior division similarly to bring the total attendance down slightly from 2013, with Junior attendance at 118 for 2013, we did not feel that any adjustment was necessary.
I understand that the above will not satisfy many of you, but I felt it appropriate to at the very least address this thread from the OP/TPCi standpoint so that you'd at least understand some of the reasons why this has been done.
Thank you,
Prof_Dav
losjackal
Technical Administrator
Re-reading his post, over-inviting was NOT a concern, they were welcoming it...which resulted in a tournament in Vancouver with 178 players instead of the typical target of 128, because they had a big convention space to fill as best they could. So the LCCP appears to have been held for that same reason, rather than Jason's presumption that it was held because 400 CP was too hard to achieve.
This. I would love to hear some thoughts on not adjusting the CPs for events whatsoever, either. I thought this was going to be changed a couple years later. For example, 9th at U.S. Nationals being 80 points vs. 9th at Regionals being 50 points is absurd. There's like 15-20 Regionals. The proportion in CPs are still way off.
King Piplup
Active Member
Is there any data regarding the rate of players in that 500+ group last year that had 500 points from Nationals/Worlds or had CP from Worlds 2013 (at least those players who it impacted to get over 500) vs the number of players that had no help from the 500 @ Nats or Worlds?
Professor_Dav, some of what you said is valid and makes sense, but you miss the BIGGEST, BY FAR, issue with the system: 20 (Yes, TWENTY!!!!!) of the people with over 500 points last year in NA got those automatically through Nats qualification, ect. The rest of them had points from Worlds 2012 (or, at least, most of them)
What you have done here is made it nearly IMPOSSIBLE for someone who did not qualify for Worlds last year to qualify for Worlds outside of getting lucky and making Top 8 at Nats.
You guys screwed up. Now fix it, please. If nothing else, remove Worlds CP and reduce the requirements to 450. This gives us all a fair shot and would keep you numbers roughly the same.
Of course, if you don't care about the players and ONLY care about your number, that would be unnecessary. That's how it feels to me right now.
- - - Updated - - -
In Pooka's article on The Top Cut ( http://thetopcut.net/2013/09/12/thoughts-on-new-championship-point-system/ ) he cites 20 people with auto-invites.
What you have done here is made it nearly IMPOSSIBLE for someone who did not qualify for Worlds last year to qualify for Worlds outside of getting lucky and making Top 8 at Nats.
You guys screwed up. Now fix it, please. If nothing else, remove Worlds CP and reduce the requirements to 450. This gives us all a fair shot and would keep you numbers roughly the same.
Of course, if you don't care about the players and ONLY care about your number, that would be unnecessary. That's how it feels to me right now.
- - - Updated - - -
In Pooka's article on The Top Cut ( http://thetopcut.net/2013/09/12/thoughts-on-new-championship-point-system/ ) he cites 20 people with auto-invites.
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