Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Entry Fee Pokemon Tournaments

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Chompy

Chompy

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I'm an established tourney host for Super Smash Bros., and I play that game along with Pokemon competitively. One thing I've really thought about recently is how drastically different the tournament scene works. With smash you can pay a $10 entry fee every time you go to a tournament in almost every (active) state. Pokemon on the other hand is free but all you get are cards. Not everyone would want cards to be the only thing for prizes.

What do you guys think of these rules for a entry fee



The events and everything else is fine but heres how I think the prize money should be handled. The judges will hand out the prize money to the top 3 players depending on how many players enter. Plus, you would only have to pay a $5 entry fee so no one would complain about entering in a $5 fee for the tournament. How we do it for smash is usually something like this

1st: 60%
2nd:30%
3rd: 10%


Thoughts?
 
Only Premier events (excluding pre-releases) are mandated to be free. Tournament organizers and gaming stores can (and often do) run Pokemon events with entry fees and prizes.

You're always free to apply to be a Pokemon TO yourself and start running such events.
 
yea thats nice but what does the store owneer get out of it if all the money goes to prize, if they did money for prize it'd be like, 50% goes to store owner

then
1st- 25%
2nd-15%
3rd-10%

in which case to get a decent pay out at 5 bucks a peace you'd need at least 20-30 people to enter so first would top out 25-38 dollars which isnt rly worth the risk to me esp when i know its that many people and pokemon is ridiculously based on luck so much now... i'd rather play texas hold em with 20-30 people instead with 10 dollar buy in and take my chances there at least it takes more skill that way and i'd have a decent chance...
 
Tournaments in Europe are not free, but that's ok, we are used to it and the TOs need to pay for the venue and stuff.

The trouble with using fees to give cash prizes is that in reality you are asking new players and players who aren't that good to pay money to the better players every time. They might get fed up with that after a while.

Besides, Pokemon is a children's card game and having cash on the line every time you play is maybe a bit too 'adult'. I don't think it would help SOTG much either.
 
DukeFireBird said:
the way I run things are the prize pool is ALL store credit, so the store wins.
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yeah, but no one wants store credit, unless its like you put in 5 dollars and 1st gets like 50 dollars worth of stuff after like only 10 people enter, if your gonna play for cash play for real money and not store credit b/c then if they players chose to put money back into the store they will, and not be forced to do that, but yeah playing pokemon for money prizes is definately not worth it, unlike MtG where there is more skill than luck.
 
Lets turn Pokemon into Magic and bring all of the overly competitive and smelly players to the scene.

Money would be nice and all, but the game caters to kids, not to adults who want money. Hence the reason the money given at regionals/nationals/worlds is Scholarship money and not simply money.

yeah, but no one wants store credit,
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And on the record, I would love store credit. I could buy myself quite an abundant amount of packs, or buy myself some WoW figures or whatever else my store has at that time. And in that way you're supporting your store as well, not just the Pokemon scene.
 
Qwachansey said:
I sure would love store credit to a store that sells Pokemon cards! What else would I buy...?
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idk, not pokemon stuff with the money you just made? certainly life isnt always about pokemon and what purpose does it serve to the people who already have everything they need, why would they want more cards/pokemon stuff? i'd take the cash and buy stuff the store doesnt sell.
 
Naki Feralkin said:
Money would be nice and all, but the game caters to kids, not to adults who want money. Hence the reason the money given at regionals/nationals/worlds is Scholarship money and not simply money.
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I think this game caters to an incredibly varied audience, from kids to adults, and that's something a lot of people really love about it.
 
Im goin to an "entry fee" tourny 2nite at my league. everyone pays $8. 2nd place gets about half the amount of packs 1st got, and 3rd gets about half the amount 2nd got, and 4th gets a promo card/old pop2 packs/random cards our league leader doesn't need etc. the store only takes a small amount usually.
 
At an event I went to, there was an announcement saying there would be a tournament for a card game I had never heard of (not Yu - gi - oh or Magic) with a $1000 cash prize. I seriously considered learning the game just to try and win. I don't think that could happen with Pokemon if you have under 100 people. But you know what? I don't care. I love Pokemon more than money, anyway! :)
 
Winning money will kill the game. That is EXACTLY why Yugioh is known for its "underhanded" or "dirty" player base: they have money as reward. Money on the line encourages cheating, stealing, and other underhanded methods.

Back to back posts merged. The following information has been added:

i like burdn of a day said:
the store only takes a small amount usually.
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Presumably they buy the winning packs from the store. So the store is probably making a LOT out of it.

tehmoe said:
idk, not pokemon stuff with the money you just made? certainly life isnt always about pokemon and what purpose does it serve to the people who already have everything they need, why would they want more cards/pokemon stuff? i'd take the cash and buy stuff the store doesnt sell.
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...or, use that store credit for cards, and the money that you would NORMALLY spend on cards on other things.

Store credit is a much better idea for reasons stated above.
 
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yoyofsho16 said:
Winning money will kill the game. That is EXACTLY why Yugioh is known for its "underhanded" or "dirty" player base: they have money as reward. Money on the line encourages cheating, stealing, and other underhanded methods.

Store credit is a much better idea for reasons stated above.
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Thats why we have judges in the first place, to make sure that there isnt any cheating going on and thats why everyone cuts their decks. So there isnt any stacking going on.


Dude why store credit? No one would really go into that specifc store because of location and plus other players would prefer to buy their cards somewhere else.

Also for my Smash Brothers Brawl tournaments, we also do venue fee for only $3 to the store owner for electricity, heat, etc...
 
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tehmoe said:
idk, not pokemon stuff with the money you just made? certainly life isnt always about pokemon and what purpose does it serve to the people who already have everything they need, why would they want more cards/pokemon stuff? i'd take the cash and buy stuff the store doesnt sell.
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This seems to be the underlying issue here. This is a KID's card game that some adults also enjoy playing. No one will be making a living by becoming a "professional" Pokemon player anytime soon. I'd be really surprised if PCL would allow "for money" tournaments in Japan at all (officially sanctioned tournaments, that is!). Adding that "stakes" element to the game will damage it's image (in my opinion), especially since it would turn into some "top" players basically stealing money from beginners.
 
CHOMPY said:
Thats why we have judges in the first place, to make sure that there isnt any cheating going on and thats why everyone cuts their decks. So there isnt any stacking going on.


Dude why store credit? No one would really go into that specifc store because of location and plus other players would prefer to buy their cards somewhere else.

Also for my Smash Brothers Brawl tournaments, we also do venue fee for only $3 to the store owner for electricity, heat, etc...
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Uhhh you don't think they have judges in Yugioh?

Fact of the matter is, people can cheat when a judge isn't sitting right there. It really isn't that hard, especially against a newer player, and it is a LOT easier for a judges job when people cheat less.

And not just cheating, but violence as well (they had to call police into Yugioh nats last year because there was a LOT of violence, fist fights over lost games, etc. That stuff is ridiculous).
 
Yu-Gi-Oh is clearly serious business. People die in the series.

...Just not in the 4kids series.

But no, I definitely prefer Pokemon to Yu-Gi-Oh. The strategy is better, the players are (generally) better, the monsters are ones that I know and seem less contrived...
 
Charging $1 for entrance at Nats.

That's should be like $1500 this year, $500 more in prizes for each division. What does it cost PUSA to produce a box? Like $10? Idk, but it would sure give some better/more prizes. And that's just 1 dollar.
 
I dont think big money prizes are a good idea because of the violence, cheating, and what yoyofsho16 said. I also think that nationals should be a dollar or two for PUSA.
 
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