Pokémon TCG: Sword and Shield—Brilliant Stars

Judge support being cut by Nintendo?

B

butterfly719

New Member
Can anyone solidly confirm or deny this? I want to get facts completely straight before opening up a discussion or sharing opinions about it.

My TO informed me that there would be no Judge support provided (by Nintendo) for the D/P Prereleases. That was all the info I was given. I'm not sure whether just his support was taken or if this was universal? Also not sure if this means Judge support is only being cut from Prereleases OR from all tourneys indefinitely.

Anyone have information to share on this? thanks!
 
butterfly719 said:
Can anyone solidly confirm or deny this? I want to get facts completely straight before opening up a discussion or sharing opinions about it.

My TO informed me that there would be no Judge support provided (by Nintendo) for the D/P Prereleases. That was all the info I was given. I'm not sure whether just his support was taken or if this was universal? Also not sure if this means Judge support is only being cut from Prereleases OR from all tourneys indefinitely.

Anyone have information to share on this? thanks!
Click to expand...

Hey Cheryl,

From what I have heard is the following (tho I cannot say that it is true with any positivity). POP/PUI supplies the support for the TCG. (Nintendo gave the support and running of the game back to PUI/POP).

I beleive as of the last set (PK) prerelease judge support was stopped. Which means for events TO/PTOs have to make a decsion on how many judges and if they are gonna give anything. Most TO/PTOs still give something to Judges however now it comes out of their own pocket and not PUI/POPs.
Hope That Helps,
Drew
 
Why does PUI think this is going to help? My TO has cut judges now because he can't afford to keep shelling out free boxes...at half the events he runs he doesn't even break even, let alone make any sort of profit. I thought PUI limited the judge support they gave in the first place, like only 2 boxes per tourney that the TO runs?
 
IMHO: this is something that should be brought up/discussed over on the POP boards and not here on a public forum as (again IMO) you'd be more likely to get answers from those 'in the know' there.

'mom
 
butterfly719 said:
Why does PUI think this is going to help? My TO has cut judges now because he can't afford to keep shelling out free boxes...at half the events he runs he doesn't even break even, let alone make any sort of profit. I thought PUI limited the judge support they gave in the first place, like only 2 boxes per tourney that the TO runs?
Click to expand...

I would say that since you are concerned about his financial situation when it comes to Pokemon, maybe offer to judge WITHOUT any judge support in return. I will tell you that from a PTO stand point, I would rather have a judge offering assistance and not asking for support rather than having a judge quizzing me about how many packs will he/she get for helping out, then refusing to help because it's not worth their time. Or having the same judge help out, THEN go off and complain to everyone that they didn't get enough judge support for helping out.

This is a very sore subject with PTOs / TOs because there are players (including Professors) that DEMAND a lot of support for their time (I'm not saying you're one of these Professors, lol). Bottom line is if you do a great job for your PTO/TO, they will reward you because they would like to be able to count on you again. Just don't EXPECT any specific amount.

Best of luck.
 
Last edited:
I remember back when I mentioned to a few PTOs that I wanted to help out judging some tourneys for them, I didn't even know about "judging support". When a PTO used me for the 1st time, I was surprised at the end of the event with the "care package" I received. I just wanted to help out. Was the "judge support" nice? YES!

Bottom line....when a person starts asking about how much do they get for Judging.....it may be time to ask why they want to know.

Being a new PTO, I have yet to cross that bridge yet. Hopefully, it wont be a problem. The people I anticipate using on my staff are folks that I know love the game and want to make it better! I will do whatever I can to take care of the folks that work with me.

Keith
 
Sorry, I don't think I provided enough background info on the situation.

See, the problem is, I think my TO feels bad/odd not giving something to a judge for judging and has cut the number of judges he uses in a tournament because he wouldn't be able to provide them all with something. Another fellow judge (who usually always judges a prerelease) spoke to him on the phone the other day, asking what Prerelease tournament he was going to be put on and our TO then told him that Nintendo stopped providing judge support and he was all set. He was going to use fewer judges. But my friend offered to judge without compensation...

I realize that my TO's personal feelings are completely out of PUI's hands...I was just wondering if there was a reason behind changing this all of a sudden? I mean, they've provided it for as long as I can remember. And if it is cut only for Prerelease, why?
 
See, I feel kind of the same way.
I want to give someone fair compensation for what is usually a full, hard day's work.
I'm trying to figure out alternate compensation that also makes economic sense for me.
It's going to be tough with some locations.

Re: "Greedy Judges"

I volunteer quite a bit for school events and functions and scouting. I never get, not expect, any compensation for any of those things. But those are non-profit endeavors.

Pokemon TCG, however, is not a non-profit endeavor.
Sure some events and local tourneys, and all of league for that matter, are run "non-profit", however, the enterprise known as "Pokemon TCG" is in fact a business and from what I see, it's a business that makes a fair amount of money.

I have NO problem with those that put their time into helping a private corporation increase their bottom line by helping turn casual purchasers of cards into "gamers" who spend a significant larger amount on cards and also keeping those spenders in the game, spending money on new packs (Modified format, anyone?), expecting a moderate compensation for their time and effort in doing so.

This is not Cub Scouts, regardless of there being many parallels.
 
Last edited:
Well, if you are a professor and judge an event, you do get POP prof. points, which can add up to extra swag and the right to play in the prof's cup too!

But, I agree w/ 'Pop. If someone works for/with you, they ought to get something. We PTOs have to figure that one out on our own.

Keith
 
I'm curious as to what is the current ratio for staff to players at USA premiere events?
 
NoPoke said:
I'm curious as to what is the current ratio for staff to players at USA premiere events?
Click to expand...

It depends on the age division. Masters can get by with one judge for every 24 players is about right. Seniors need about 1 judge for every 18 players, and , I'll have 1 judge for every 12 players in the Junior Division (and they will be TIRED by the end of the day.)
 
At the recent SE Regionals in N Carolina, we had 1 judge per 14-15 players. Dunno how other areas worked out.

Keith
 
The total numbers were around 140 or so. We had 9 total judges, plus support staff on 3 separate computers (one each age group). It really helped to keep things running smoothly. Jeff and David were the co-hosts PTOs for the regional and we were lucky enough to draw (for judging purposes) PTOs from GA (Tymon), TN (I had been newly inked :biggrin:), MD (Tara), VA (David) and the Carolinas---Jeff. We had 6 judges doing deck checks at the start, with theme decks available for those newbies.

Keith
 
yep, we were about the same amount of players.
We also had a couple of support staff for the computers and registration, but for deck checks et al, it was the 4 judges.
 
MW Regionals had 2 Judges for each age division, plus two "roaming" judges, one person on the computer, one guy just going whatever needed, one person talking care of "league", and two PTOs experienced as Judges. And I still thought we were more than a little understaffed...
 
PokePop said:
yep, we were about the same amount of players.
We also had a couple of support staff for the computers and registration, but for deck checks et al, it was the 4 judges.
Click to expand...

And since I was in both places, I can say that the more who do deck checks, the better in the long run!! (Holon's voltorb vs Holon's magnemite, anyone??) Not to take anything away from DE--Dorian kept looking for additional judges up through the event, but none were to be found. But that was one tiring day!!
 
Yeah, we usually atleast have a HJ + 2-4 other judges to handle match slips for any given tourney. I think he's dropping down to 1 HJ + 1-2 regular judges now.

So I'm confused, has this definitely only been cut from Prereleases, or all tournaments?
 
I'm not in favor of judges handling match slips. When someone else is HJ/TO making that call, I'll support them. When its my call to make, I have the players walk them up (plus it gets them off the table, which is another good thing). When you have 2 judges to 80 masters, making them slip collectors prevents active judging, in my opinion. I hear we're supposed to do active judging at premeire events. Example, How can we watch a match for 'slow play' if we're collecting slips, hmm? The person assisting the computer entry person can check them, and hand them off. We ran all of Sierra Nevada Regional with effectively 5 judges AND managed to have like 150 players handle their own match slips over 6-7 rounds with no hitch.

So that answers Staff Ratios (No Poke) while I make my comment on judges running slips (or checking off matches on clipboards).
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top