| |
BGonline.org Forums
Directors need to speak up
Posted By: Keene In Response To: Directors need to speak up (Chuck Bower)
Date: Monday, 16 February 2015, at 4:17 p.m.
As ever, I have an opinion, and I'm going to share it.
There are some interesting points that have been made in this discussion, and as a Director, I am hearing them loud and clear. However, I should point out that:
1. The posters here are NOT representative of the average tournament attending player. The posters here are among the top tournament players, and most often are the ones that have many matches to play, due to progressions etc. Yes, I hear you - there's too many demands on your time.
2. Yes, tournaments cost money to run, they don't make much (if anything), and we do rely on the generosity of the players to accommodate that. Hotels cost, rooms cost, trophies cost etc.
3. Most players have a finite amount of money that they are bringing to a tournament, and thats what they are prepared to spend. The rake of the events is to extract the 5/10/15% from that total pool of cash and try and make that cover all the costs.
So, would I like to run multiple high dollar jackpots - sure. Will I get the players to play in them? Perhaps. Am I more likely to get more players playing in smaller dollar events, probably. The budget of average player probably extends to 'some' side events, and a limit of $xxx total. So if they spend it all in one event, then that leaves them idle for a period of time, at a tournament, with nothing to do and no money left from their budget. They don't want to enter the $200 jackpot with MCG, Neil and Ray all playing in it - that doesn't represent value.
On the subject of Last Chance - again thats about 'bang for your buck'. People want to have lots of play for their entry fee. I hear the message here - change it to double elimination / swiss etc - get the volume of play, remove the low prize pool and low match length LC. I hear it, will think on that. I am open to abolishing it in Wisconsin.
Registration fees - OK. However, if we charged a literal flat rate per player to cover all costs of the main events - thats going to be upwards of $50 per player. And the events will still be raked. Obviously this is not fixed, and it varies depending on what is being run. But when you consider something like a $250-$300 entry fee, $50 registration fee, 2 x $100 jackpots, 4 x $50 smaller events as just a general throwout of what someone might play, then suddenly their spare cash has almost disappeared. They are asking 'what am I getting for my registration fee?' The tournament experience might not be enough. Consider also the Novice division. Why would they want to play when it costs them $30-$50 to enter that division, and on top of that, its a $50 registration fee!! Thats too much. Consider the Advanced division, $50 registration plus $150 entry fee? Wow. May as well play Open in Novi for that.
I am harping on about costs, as they affect the players and the tournament. We all want a perceived value, we all want to do well, and nobody wants to go away for a weekend, get some bad dice, lose a bunch of money, and not have a good experience - however thats going to happen to some of the players.
In short. I want to provide a better experience to the players. I am listening here. Changes will be made. However, I do want you to come early, I need you to enter lots of side events so that I am only paying out my time, not from my wallet too (last year's Wisco event ran at a loss, despite the tremendous generosity of the players, lecturers etc).
Maybe the time is coming for a general restructuring of the Backgammon tournament in general. Maybe its not something we can do over 2 days. Maybe it needs to be 3 days.
I will continue to hear the players, and try to do the best that I can. I want you all to have a good time. Pleasing all of the people all of the time is a recipe for disaster. Ideal, yes, practical, no.
Keene
| |
BGonline.org Forums is maintained by Stick with WebBBS 5.12.