TO Handbook: PM me your Skype name to join the Handbook Skype Chat! Looking for DBAs

[Strong Badam]

omfg a texting program to text people their matches & stations? yeeee

 

[TheCrimsonBlur]

Dude instead of spending an hour announcing pools, finding players for every pool, and telling people what pool they are in, you can just text them their pool.

Just txt:
"YOUR ROUND 1 POOL @ TVs #1 & 2: (captain) Player 1, Player 2, Player 3, Player 4, Player 5"

Technology, man. The tournament would run itself.

 

[Scar]

I guess if we have phone numbers, why not? I think Google Voice can send out texts? We should definitely look into this lol

 

[ranmaru]

How about from people that just heard about it from word of mouth and such?

 

[Mogwai]

Dude instead of spending an hour announcing pools, finding players for every pool, and telling people what pool they are in, you can just text them their pool.

Just txt:
"YOUR ROUND 1 POOL @ TVs #1 & 2: (captain) Player 1, Player 2, Player 3, Player 4, Player 5"

Technology, man. The tournament would run itself.

smashers don't run tournaments well themselves, plain and simple. Some dude is always just off in a corner playing friendlies for 3 hours until someone tracks him down and gets him to play because lord knows we can't just DQ someone for not playing their matches (not saying any names but chances are you know who I mean). you can't just tell smashers what they're supposed to do and expect them to do it efficiently.

 

[Scar]

Ranmaru I'm interested in who they heard it from, whatever info they can provide will help IMO. It's possible that we'll see that the vast majority of new players come from a single source (be it word of mouth or smashboards or AiB), and then we can invest more there. I'm worried that there are nearly no new players, so we'll have to start some small initiatives to see if any of them gain traction.

 

[ranmaru]

Oh ok I will ask and I will let you know. : D

 

[Cactuar]

I actually think TOs could prepare better for tournaments by at least going through the steps of running one before actually doing it. Plan out the timing of each round. Make that timing set in stone. No best of 3 set should take longer than a half hour. If the result of that round for everyone who was supposed to play hasn't been reported, both players are DQd. If one of them has been with the TO after trying to play the other guy, he can go on in winners and the loser can go to losers. If both aren't there, remove both of them from the tournament.

Point is, if you make tournaments mechanical in progression, it is no longer the TO DQing people. It is the natural movement of the tournament DQing people. The TO could be as lenient as possible at all points in time for those players as well, provided he does everything following that progression. If those players can somehow come up with a method to resolve the set outcome in whatever time they have left before getting DQ'd, let them.

How strict a tournament is and how strict the TO are can be two separate ideas if you design them that way.

Spoiler

Note: This is an example of what I think TO's should do prior to running their tournament. They need to anticipate how many sets will be played, how many TVs are available to them, and how long each set will take.

I use half hour blocks of time because the maximum possible length of a set is 21 or 24 minutes in BO3. Obviously, LF, GF1, and GF 2 would take longer. Realistically, sets take maybe half that long on average. This gives a LOT of leeway, and eats a lot of unnecessary time because of it, but it gives a good framework for the mind of the TO.

WR or LR is Winner's Round or Losers Round. The numbers are how many sets get played in each round.

WR1|WR2|WR3|WR4|wF|||GF1|GF2
16|8|4|2|1|||1|1
LR1|LR2|LR3|LR4|LR5|LR6|LF
8|8|4|4|2|2|1

Everything is broken down into half hour segments. Each set takes 1 TV for a half hour. Tournaments can be run faster than this by making sets seamless and starting them right as the last one stops, but this is approaching it methodically and putting every set of the tournament into a block of time rather than at the next available TV.

Once you have this set up, you don't follow the time schedule shown, but rather the bracket position show.

4 TVs, 32 man bracket

|1|2|3|4|5|6|7|8|9
First Half Hour|WR1|WR1|LR1|WR2|LR2|LR2|LR3|LR4|WF+LR6|GF1|
Second Half Hour|WR1|WR1|LR1|WR2|LR2|WR3|LR5+WR4|LF|GF2|

8 TVs, 32 man bracket

|1|2|3|4|5|6
First Half Hour|WR1|LR1|LR2|LR4+WR4|LR6|GF1
Second Half Hour|WR1|WR2|LR3+WR3|LR5+WF|LF|GF2

As long as you set this up and think it through, you could just assign each TV a list of Bracket Matches based on the position of the match and regardless of who is playing the set. Players get replaced with the identifier of their starting position, and as a result they would know every TV they could end up playing on throughout the course of the tournament at the start.

 

[ranmaru]

I will try this out. Thanks dude

 

[Scar]

Ranmaru, when is your next tourney? Let's talk over chat before you host it to figure out a way to collect and report information (any ideas from anyone would be appreciated, but I'm strongly conisdering Google Docs).

 

[AlphaZealot]

Cactuar: that is how we operated for MLG. However anytime I've tried to convince people to assume 30minutes per set they always whine and say it is unrealistic. The variables between finding people, sitting down, setting up, counter picking, etc. easily make 30 minutes a smart assumption.

Way back at Getting School 2 Team Ben ran swiss style. It was fun. They handled the 100+ person event using 8 rounds of swiss where you could score either a 0, 1, or 2 based on the number of games you won in the set. To qualify for the bracket you had to score at least a 12, of which IIRC 22 people qualified (so a semi-janky bracket).

 

[Scar]

Agreed, 30 minutes may even look a little conservative in practice due to reasons listed by Mogwai and others. And regarding swiss, any more details? Was it fun for the players, or for the TOs? I wonder what skill level enjoyed it most/least.

What was janky about the bracket?

 

[MattDotZeb]

What kinds of features improve player experience?
I feel that having people play the most number of matches in a tournament setting helps to guarantee re-attendance & improvement for your community as a whole.

• Pay top5 in a Pro Bracket
• Run seeding pools followed by Pro and Amateur Brackets
• If time allows for it: Run Loser Bracket Pools***

In my experience running seeding pools prior to singles bracket and then forming Pro and Amateur brackets responds well with attendees, especially new players. The top X-amount go into the Pro Bracket, then the bottom X-amount go into Amateur Bracket. This is all automatic and free of charge.

15% of the main pot then goes to paying off the top3 of the Amateur Bracket, and the left-over 85% goes into paying off the top5 of the Pro Bracket. This way 3rd place in the Pro Bracket makes more than 1st place in the Amateur Bracket.

I suggest operating under 48/22/14/8/4/4 & 60/30/10


What are the pros and cons of having multiple games at a tournament?
Pros: Meshing communities. Having Smash get involved with other fighters is something I think we should continue; similar to what APEX had done.

Cons: Some smashers will dislike having another community present.
Allocating different TVs will be a challenge for some TOs.




***This is something you can do when you have a bracket with an entire round of losers filled in (Must be round 2, 4, or any other even numbered round).
Example:

Spoiler

In this you have 2 pools.
8, 3, 13, 15 = Pool 1
16, 1, 15, 6 = Pool 2

The person who gets 1st in each pool moves ahead 2 rounds.

Example:

Spoiler

Let's say that that 8 won Pool 1, and 16 won Pool 2.
Note:
The TO should create pool sheets and keep track of who places where in each pool for the sake of results.

You can do this once more by creating another pool with the remaining 4 players in LR4 and upon finishing the pool you are now in Losers Finals.

 

[pockyD]

we ran a 40-something person swiss tournament at a norcal local using pretty much pencil and paper, and it was still easy as pie

it's all about the TO putting in the effort, and the players being cooperative

and running multiple events contributes hugely to delays. i don't understand why we do it, and i can only assume it's because people are cheapskates

i'm pretty sure i'd rather pay an extra $30 to have double the setups and space at a national, as well as guaranteeing things run on time

 

[AlphaZealot]

Well with 22 people there are a lot of byes because you have to run a 32 person bracket, and the only fair way to break byes is based on points accumulated from the swiss portion of the tournament, which while completely fair, may not pass the eye-test. Really this is only an issue because spectators/people online don't understand seeding and think if a top player does poorly they should still be separated in a bracket as if they did well.

It amazes me some of the simple things TO's could do that are missing at tournaments. For example

• Label the TVs in giant writing and on an elevated plain so it is easy to see. I did this at every local I've ever run, it is not hard to tape things to walls behind the TV and just print out in size SUPER BIG font "Station X" on a piece of paper before the event.
• If you are running a larger tournament, round it in rounds, and in addition to calling the matches, staple the current match ups on a wall somewhere so people can go there to check it. This also lets spectators know who is playing where.
• When you are running a large national do the simple math to figure out when pools will be so people know when they have to be at the venue. When you figure out a time, subtract a half hour from it just so they don't have the excuse of "getting there right when it was suppose to start". Using Apex as an example, you could immediately know what the rough time of each pool would be once the tournament started based on the number of setups, so people could then leave the venue and eat instead of complaining about not knowing when their match would be.
• Have a pool captain responsible for the pool, have this pool captain be a top player, and have it stipulated that no one advances from the pool unless the pool is entirely finished and the score sheet is properly filled out.
• DQ strictly and methodically (document the time). For pool play there should be an assumed time to get to your pool then you cannot leave until the pool is done. After [insert time, say 10 minutes] the pool captain should run over to the mic to do a last call for the person and another 5 after that DQ away. Even though it is pools and the person could technically still play, they should be DQd. Leeway here is a terrible idea.
• DQ people no matter who the heck they are. I've seen at many tournaments someone not get DQd just because they thought they were more or less too good to get DQd. When I ran MLG I did not let this happen and I took no excuses: you get the DQ at x time and that is final.
• My goodness if you are running a national pay your staff, but pay them AFTER they have completed their job. The budget these days for most nationals is something like 20-30k not even including prizes! After taking out 10k for the venue (lets pretend its this much) you still have a bunch left over to pay the staff wisely
• Pay the staff a flat rate and not a percentage
• Be smart with how money is kept and documented. It should ONLY be the responsibility of a single person, and if anything happens to it, it is that persons fault. If the money is changing hands between 2 or 3 people and something happens then there is no accountability. If the money needs to be distributed for some reason have a sheet with two signatures: the person who is ultimately responsible and the person who was given [insert amount of money].
• Obviously keep the money safe so no one Zelgadis's the money away
• Assume worst case scenario in all your planning. Assume not enough TVs. Assume the power might turn off unexpectedly. Assume you won't have enough money. Assume you won't have enough entrants. Assume you will have to many entrants. Assume sets last 30 minutes (or longer). Assume a late start time.
• If running a larger tournament make sure to have the number of people checking in entrants equal to the number needed to process those people within an hour. Stagger entrance time as much as you can and make earlier entrance an earned incentive (example: if you preregistered you can enter the venue at X time, if you brought a setup you can enter at X time, etc). If you have a 1,000 person event and it takes 1 minute to process each person, you will need at least 10 people processing entrants just to get the time under 2 hours.
• Do not have 500 people do seeding. If it is a national have 1 person from each region, max, plus the tournament director doing the seeding. TD's word is final. Decisions should be made quickly - if you are arguing over where to place someone you have already wasted more time than that placement was worth since you are likely just splitting hairs. At smaller events no more than 2 people should do the seeding. As the TO, give yourself the harder bracket or do a coin flip for your own placement with an observer to protect against bias. I gave myself M2K or other strong players at tournament's I've run in the past just to not have someone accuse me of bias (or, I should say, bias toward an easy bracket, bias toward a harder bracket is still bias).
• My goodness: power of 2 pools, for brawl try to keep the pools at 6 (ideal level)
• My goodness: advance at least 3 seeds from pool round to pool round because there is so little differentiation between having three 1st seeds and three 2nd seeds in round 2 pools.
• Make a room plan with where power outlets are, where tables will go, where TVs will go, make sure things are labeled so the biggest idiot in the room can understand it...and this rule of thumb goes for a lot of things
• Use a reliable computer program for bracket management if that is your choice. This needs to be a program that has been used 100 times and you know the ins and outs of. Save with a time stamp at the completion of every half round.
• In addition take a photo of the bracket when its first made and periodically just in case. Back up your ****.
• Have printed out before the tournament a template with the pools and a neat grid. None of that crap where you are drawing the grid lines yourself and you have to squeeze stuff in at the end of the page. Let me know if you can't figure out how to make these and I'll send you a excel file of it. Also tio can print these out I believe (depending on version).
• EVO organizers recommended doing everything by hand bracket/tournament wise (though this may explain why you can't find full results of any EVO...ever?). I've run up to 100+ person events with brackets done just by hand and I've done it with computers. With the right computer software the computer can be awesome, but is suffers hugely from user error (read: biggest idiot in the room syndrome).
• For larger events there should be a flow chart of what is expected and when and all staff should have access to it
• There should be an all staff meeting at the start of the event
• There should be a pyramid chart so the staff understands the hierarchy of the event. Commentators should know, for example, who has the ability to tell them who will be playing next on stream. Everyone has a job. Everyone needs to be accountable to someone.
• Staff should be wearing something that identifies them as such. If you can't afford to give your staff t-shirts have them dress up in a certain color or have them wear something that makes them look professional (e.g. suits or jeans and a button down, tucked in shirt).
• Do periodic cleaning runs through the venue. For larger venues: every hour have someone on staff pick up trash and take trash bags out to dumpsters. If you are in a hotel conference area they may provide this service for you, but don't count on it.
• Have a process/procedure for lost and found that all staff are aware of.

 

[Scar]

AZ I'll read that soon, but @ Pocky's point I completely agree, NorCal wants to host a really large tournament (not Genesis series) and we were discussing Melee + Brawl and other FGC, but decided that Melee only would be best, because we have so much more freedom regarding time and setup constraints, which will allow for more side events and experimentation.

also @AZ I sent you a PM, don't know if you had time to read or respond to it but just FYI.

 

[pockyD]

• Have a pool captain responsible for the pool, have this pool captain be a top player, and have it stipulated that no one advances from the pool unless the pool is entirely finished and the score sheet is properly filled out.

Awful idea, as anyone who was at VLS should be able to attest

Ideally at any tournament of scale, a pool captain should NOT be a player in the pool; this allows them both to focus on the optimal match scheduling order (amazing how bad pool captains are at this, resulting in a long tail of single-tv matches at the end of the pool), as well as be unbiased if/when it comes time to DQ someone (as well as making them always available for questions, reports, bathroom requests, etc)

I'm not terribly opposed to having a 'tournament veteran' captain a pool, but how many 'top players' are willing to run a pool they're not part of? the captain should WANT to perform their duty, not be forced into it

• My goodness: advance at least 3 seeds from pool round to pool round because there is so little differentiation between having three 1st seeds and three 2nd seeds in round 2 pools.

This reminds of one Norcal smasher who saved up to fly across the country to Apex, defeated Cyrain, lost a single tournament match, and failed to advance from his pool

Thanks, apex!

 

[AlphaZealot]

There is no great way to designate pool captains given there is likely not enough money to pay the position. EVO gives pool captains free t-shirts and a few other perks, but I've have not seen a Smash tournament capable of this yet given tighter budgets. For MLG, it was paid staff, but again, not a regular tournament/regular funds.

I'm not terribly opposed to having a 'tournament veteran' captain a pool, but how many 'top players' are willing to run a pool they're not part of? the captain should WANT to perform their duty, not be forced into it

Ideally it is simply someone you trust. I mention 'top player' since they will quite obviously want to advance and they will not be allowed to do so without completing the sheet and making sure everyone plays their matches (and it is their own pool they are running, not a pool they're not a part of). They are also more easy to identify in a field of 64-128 pools where you may not know every single player or who is trustworthy.

I've done at my tournaments a small speech for the pool captains so they know how to run a pool quickly and how to properly record match results. This information can/should also be printed on the back of the pool sheet. In fact, FC use to print the exact order that the matches should be played.

 

[ranmaru]

Ranmaru, when is your next tourney? Let's talk over chat before you host it to figure out a way to collect and report information (any ideas from anyone would be appreciated, but I'm strongly conisdering Google Docs).

I'm tried applying for April 7th, but it was denied. So it's going to be around April. I'll let you know what date is confirmed tho.

But yeah we can chat, my aim is sumo449. I also use MSN and Skype if you need it. I'm not at home now but we can chat in like a half hour when I am home. Just let me know

EDit: I'm home

 

[Mogwai]

pools are gross, swiss is really highly preferable IMO, just would require dedicated TOing

 

[TheKiest]

I agree with all AZ has said.

I personally use other TOs to be pool captains or players from my gaming club (who are all close friends of mine).

Side event setups can be freed after Round 2 of losers in bracket, which eliminates half of the entrants by then plus allows you to use one - two less setups. Usually for side events (unless its a large side event), I only use 1-3 setups.

 

[Beat!]

Swiss really doesn't require that much extra work in order to function properly. Just make sure to always have a staff member ready to fill in the results (not difficult at all) and good software (there are loads of decent swiss programs for chess out there if you can't find anything else, so this shouldn't be a problem either), and it should work out fine.

Granted, it requires the players to report their results immediately after finishing, but I know for a fact that freaking 10-year olds can pull that off without trouble, so it REALLY shouldn't be an issue for young adults.

 

[KrIsP!]

-the TO doesn't profit from the venue fee, which i don't believe he/she should for running a local. free entry into singles/teams/the venue is more than enough incentive to run a tournament on tio...
-the venue owner asks for a set amount of money; not money per entrant

say a venue owner asks for $100 to rent a space to hold a tournament in. based on the amount of hype in the tourney thread/word of mouth, the TO roughly estimates how many people will be attending. say this rough estimate is 20 people. the TO will now calculate what i'll call the Deposit Fee by dividing the amount of money the venue owner wants by the amount of people he predicts will attend. $100 / 20 = $5 is the deposit fee for our theoretical tournament. this means that everyone who enters the venue is charged $5.

a couple of hours later, once everyone has arrived, the TO will calculate how much he's collected. say 35 people came; 35 * $5 = $175. this exceeds what the venue owner was asking for by $75. take this number, and divide it by the amount of people who came. $75 / 35 = approximately $2.14. at this point the TO returns $2.14, or for simplicity's sake, $2 to each entrant. now, everyone's only paid $3 for venue.

I see as going around or asking everyone to line up and retrieve 2$ is an unnecessary hassle, I realise that some people are strapped for cash and may like th eidea bu tpersonally I'd rather the TO keep th emoney and put it towards growing his own series, purchasing stream equipment, finding better venues, etc. Or get a bunch of food and drinks for the tourney or a fest at his hous eafterwards if possible.

I see what your saying but I just think that it isn't that hard to raise 5$ for a tourney if your attending something local and getting housing/being able to just go home. I'm sure a lot of people iwll disagree with me but I want to see the tourney itself grow too, so long as the TO isn't raising the vneue fee to pocket it doing osmething harmful to the community.

Amateur brackets have also happened at my events for $1 entry and I think it makes the experience much more enjoyable for those who get knocked out early.

I've always thought about free entry amateur brackets where the top player gets free single entry and possibly better seeding but how can you decide who an amateur is?

 

[Mogwai]

Re: money. I'm with Scar, as long as you're transparent about where the money goes, there shouldn't be an issue. If the TO is pocketing leftover venue fee and that doesn't sit right with you, don't come. But straight up, TOing well is ****ing WORK that you aren't getting paid to do, especially if we're getting grimy as a community and asking for our $2.14 back. I mean, ****, the expectation in the community is that if the TO were to ask for $5 of venue, but then only 15 people show up, he wouldn't go around asking everyone for $1.67, he'd take the $25 hit out of his own wallet because that was part of the risk he took when he estimated 20 people. But if we're going to hold the TO accountable for returning overcharge, it's only fair that the reverse would be true. You know what that means? That means if Pound 5 happens again, everyone should be ready to drop an extra $50-100 apiece (or however much it would've been) on making sure we cover the venue fee and still have prizes.

Real solution is that TOs should not be grimy about the fact that they might make a profit on a venue fee and call a spade a spade there, while the community should not be grimy about two ****ing dollars going towards someone actually taking charge and organizing the damn tournament that's about to give them hours of entertainment.

 

[AlphaZealot]

For my 32 man locals I always ran pools. Top 4 made it to the bracket (16-man bracket). The remaining players who did not make it out of pools entered the consolation (read: amateur) bracket. The $1 entry just made it so people had something to play for and also something to lose, so it wasn't just a smashfest. Basically the AM bracket should only be run once people are eliminated from the regular tournament, it should be done in a way that doesn't pay out more than the least amount earned by someone in the main tournament, and it should likely not be announced pre-tournament so no one can manipulate themselves into winning the AM bracket intentionally.

Hax's post is a terrible idea. A TO should be allowed to profit. Profit should be encouraged. Running a tournament is hard work, requiring, just for a local, 12 hours of labor + hours of preparation time + out of pocket expenses ranging from pens, paper, printer ink, poster board, TVs, outlet multipliers, surge protectors, tape, badges, etc. If your only reward was "for the good of the community" then there would probably be few or almost no tournaments, since frankly this community is often disrespectful toward TO's and venue (leaving trash everywhere, disappearing, not thanking the people who put in work, you name it). The TO assumes all the risk, and should get whatever reward they can. I ran my locals letting everyone know I didn't pay any entry. Even with this windfall I would still finish 'negative' after the costs of running a tournament were taken into account.

Tournaments separate the cost into different fees these days for a reason. The 'venue' fee can go wherever the TO wants it to, and no, he doesn't owe you an explanation unless the tournament is run terribly or something equally crazy happens (and even then, it just means don't support that TO anymore - not that the TO did something wrong by charging you). The 'entry' fee is for the winners and shouldn't be touched. Back in the day it use to be one flat fee. Tournaments like FC6 occurred or OC3 though, and the payouts seemed lower than what the flat fee would dictate, so people complained and wanted to know where the money was going. After these events the fee's became separate so you knew X was going to the host for whatever they wanted (don't be confused by the word 'venue') and X was going to the winnings.

 

[Omni]

Hax's post is a terrible idea. A TO should be allowed to profit. Profit should be encouraged. Running a tournament is hard work, requiring, just for a local, 12 hours of labor + hours of preparation time + out of pocket expenses ranging from pens, paper, printer ink, poster board, TVs, outlet multipliers, surge protectors, tape, badges, etc. If your only reward was "for the good of the community" then there would probably be few or almost no tournaments, since frankly this community is often disrespectful toward TO's and venue (leaving trash everywhere, disappearing, not thanking the people who put in work, you name it). The TO assumes all the risk, and should get whatever reward they can. I ran my locals letting everyone know I didn't pay any entry. Even with this windfall I would still finish 'negative' after the costs of running a tournament were taken into account.

Tournaments separate the cost into different fees these days for a reason. The 'venue' fee can go wherever the TO wants it to, and no, he doesn't owe you an explanation unless the tournament is run terribly or something equally crazy happens (and even then, it just means don't support that TO anymore - not that the TO did something wrong by charging you). The 'entry' fee is for the winners and shouldn't be touched. Back in the day it use to be one flat fee. Tournaments like FC6 occurred or OC3 though, and the payouts seemed lower than what the flat fee would dictate, so people complained and wanted to know where the money was going. After these events the fee's became separate so you knew X was going to the host for whatever they wanted (don't be confused by the word 'venue') and X was going to the winnings.

Couldn't agree more.

 

[pockyD]

If you separate venue fee and entry fee, then any 'free' entry you allow should be paid out of the venue fee rather than being purely free... the whole goal of separating the two is to allow for easy calculation of the prize pool based solely on the number of entrants, and by not making up for the missing entry fee(s), you're defeating that purpose

 

[Strong Badam]

Re: Printing pools in TIO

Never got this to work. Just kinda does nothing. Any tips? This would help a LOT; I've spent 20+ minutes taking screencaps and cropping pools to print at my events.

 

[AlphaZealot]

I just use blank excel sheets that have a grid and is appropriately spaced, then use myself + one other person to write the pools by hand.

 

[KrIsP!]

I just use blank excel sheets that have a grid and is appropriately spaced, then use myself + one other person to write the pools by hand.

like...with a pen?

 

[allshort17]

I have a question for TO's of mainly local tournaments and a practice that could work for some?

Why does no one do what Alabama do for tournaments?

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=307742

Just some notes about it.
*It's $30 dollar to prepay and get admission to all tournaments of the current season
*Pay before the season starts and get free pizza
*Has it's own ranking system
*Have already hosted 7 tournaments under this and they have 6 more planned for next season
*All use the same ruleset
*On average, brawl singles gets 30 entered based on 7 tournaments, brawl doubles gets 7 teams based on 3 tournaments, and melee singles gets 17 based on 5 tournaments.

What I see this creating is:
*A way for players to cheaply pay to get in and guarantee a spot at multiple tournaments.
*A group for newer players to join. This encourages them to come back because they feel they are part of something.
*A way for all TO's to organize tournaments so they don't happen on the same day and too close together time and location wise.

Keep in mind, this is Alabama. They really don't have a big scene to pull numbers from. But, the numbers they do get are pretty good number for their condition. Could this work for other regions and have any others tried it?

 

[TheKiest]

What was said above.

Columbus had a Series ran by AZ called "Wings and Brew" which pretty much did this.

 

[ranmaru]

Questions about that:

1. How do you secure enough for the pot with that?
2. Does this bring in fresh new players, or is it people that have at least been to a few tournaments to know what they are getting? (Like would a new new player put up $30 for 6 tournaments while not knowing how'd it would go for him)

Other than that, seems cool. : D

 

[ranmaru]

Also what if a new player like... missed the deadline or thought it was just a NORMAL tournament. Would it be ok for some to pay like regular prices? :3

 

[allshort17]

Questions about that:

1. How do you secure enough for the pot with that?
2. Does this bring in fresh new players, or is it people that have at least been to a few tournaments to know what they are getting? (Like would a new new player put up $30 for 6 tournaments while not knowing how'd it would go for him)

Other than that, seems cool. : D

About the pot I don't know how it works. However, there are leaders of the organization (Cam and TheReflexWonder) that you can ask about that.

As for the new players, it does because Alabama does a great job of setting up Smash Bros clubs at colleges. So, if a new player is uncomfortable then he or she could just easily ask an experienced member of the club. However, people inevitably will try to jump in without knowing what to expect. But, that's something you can't prevent. To answer the other question. You can pay the normal fee of $25 per tournament if you don't sign up. I believe though that if that does happen and you want to sign up you can do so at the tournament still for $30.

 

[MattDotZeb]

Re: Printing pools in TIO

Never got this to work. Just kinda does nothing. Any tips? This would help a LOT; I've spent 20+ minutes taking screencaps and cropping pools to print at my events.

Pools are extremely easy to make by hand. I don't rely on TIO for pools because it takes longer than making them by hand.

 

[Juggleguy]

lol @ printing pools from tio

just print off some of these
https://docs.google.com/document/d/...FKPEAChd8pOjjY/edit?authkey=CNyXl4MC&hl=en_US

 

[*Cam*]

Questions about that:

1. How do you secure enough for the pot with that?
2. Does this bring in fresh new players, or is it people that have at least been to a few tournaments to know what they are getting? (Like would a new new player put up $30 for 6 tournaments while not knowing how'd it would go for him)

Other than that, seems cool. : D

Before I start, I want to point out that I did not namesearch myself; I searched for "alabama." You can't even search for a 3-letter name

1. The pot is set at $125 for first, $60 for second, $25 for third, and $10 for fourth. We have a pretty good handle on the size of our community, and it really only takes about 40 signups. We had 60 signups for season 1.

If we are severely short on money, then we just cancel the membership fees/set pots and refund everyone. Then we still hold the tournaments with normal entry fees. No harm, no foul. However, we haven't had to do that because we get a lot of extra money from non-members coming to just one tournament and paying normal tournament fees. We used the leftover money from this season to purchase some official capture cards for the League.

2. Allshort answered this pretty well already, but I'll expand on it. We have 3 college clubs right now that are drawing in new players, and each of these locations has its own respective tournament. New players tend to show up at the tournaments held in their cities. About 1/3 to 1/2 of them will enjoy it and decide to go to more. They then pay for the membership either for the current season or wait for the next season so they get more bang for their buck.

Like Allshort said, we have experienced, tournament-going players running each of the clubs, so they make sure their members aren't in the dark about the tournament scene. We introduce them to smashboards too.

We also plan to have an amateur bracket this season, so even if new players get knocked out of pools, they can still compete.


Allshort made a couple of errors in his summary, so let me correct them.

First of all, we offered free pizza for season 1, but we realized that was an unsustainable business model. For season 2, we offer very cheap pizza for the players, but we can't make it free anymore.

Also, our first season only had 5 tournaments, not 7. Everything else looks right.

We also make a point of saving every bracket replay and uploading it to youtube. This system is still a little rough, but we are gradually working out the kinks. We got it to work for 3 of the last 5 tournaments. HASL II vids are being uploaded as we speak.

 

[Chronodiver Lokii]

I've always found 5 dollar venue with discounts for partial setups (even if you don't use all of them), full setups are wavered to be good.

Side events, Side events, Side events. This is my gracing factor. Every tournament has pools these days. What do the other people do while the bracket is made? Just watch? They can do that at home due to streams. Something else needs to be added. Something creative.

I've done events from FFA Brawl Items bracket to 3rd Strike to Back Alley Bop-it. These are what keep people coming to my tournes.

Kiester for best TO!

 

[KrIsP!]

Why does no one do what Alabama do for tournaments?

http://www.smashboards.com/showthread.php?t=307742

I have always thought about regional zones coming together and starting groups to host tourneys instead of many individuals in order to help stabilize the scene and support the regional zone. This is a cool idea. I've been thinking, for example, that a group could hold monthlies which are hosted by whichever TO is available from the group, they charge 1$ extra/sell water and stuff to raise funds for their bigger tournies and from there they can share possible sponsors, streaming equipment and have some reliable help with holding the tourneys. A season's pass could also help raise money and get the scene hyped/encouraged to enter more tourneys. I like what Alabama is doing.

Edit: Reading more into this, while I like the intial idea I think it won't work most places. The idea of a membership with tourneys planned I think should only cover venue fees and pots should not be set. As well, from there you could gain money from the memberships for the tourney but no one would pay for it if their only going to a few so it should strictly be a way of captializing on the community and expanding rather than having a set bar so you can't go under(or over)