and what about magic online ?

[antoine ruel]

Once for all, sorry about the english mistakes, being french sometimes sucks.

This forum's goal being to try to save the pro tours, and to find answers so that people can still earn their lives playing magic the gathering, i would be glad to have everyone's opinion about cash tournaments which could be hold on magic online.

First, i have to assume that winning money (or tix) on magic online would be allowed, that wizards would eventually redeem tix into cash, and that MODO III would not be such a disaster as its older brother.

In my opinion, there could be 2 kind of tournaments:
-gp like : buy in like x tix and the required packs for a sealed or draft event (pokermode)
-pt like : only qualified people, with online qualifiers + level x and more (irl) qualified.


Here is my point of vue :

i don't know exactly what the pt price pool is, lets say 250000$, then everything around (rent the site, pay the judges, flight tickets, hotels,boosters, stupid t-shirts ...) raise wotc expenses >700000$.
With one less PT, it should be possible to organize one onlinePT /year, even paying level players the fees they would get on normal PTs. Wotc would still earn >400000 $ compared to a live Pro Tour.

I keep playing magic for several reasons : to travel, to see friends and have fun, because i love the game and because i could earn money from my passion. Online tournaments would be very bad for the friendship and travels, but they would probably be good for money.

Thing is i would be scared that those tourneys might replace the live ones over the years.
Even though the "play the game see the world" is what i based my life on, one online PT a year would still be good to keep up earning decent money from mtg.

Maybe all this is a nonsense, maybe it would be impossible anyway, it is just an idea and i d like to know what everyone thinks about it.

Antoine

[ZackH]

Antoine: I don't know if they'd ever do this. A few reasons:

1. Let's say I have never played the PT before, and I REALLY want to qualify, but cannot on my own. So I message floup saying: "Hey qualify my account and there is 100 tickets in it for you". Or even a friend, or a clan member who is better than me. IRL this can't happen, but on MODO, it could be anyone on the other side of the screen.

2. This is good for the pros, but not for WotC. The PT is run solely as advertising. When people go to www.magicthegathering.com to check how their favorite players are doing and perhaps read the blog/look at pictures, what will they see? They'll see some MODO screenshots and some text interviews. I don't think this would achieve their goals at all.

3. Play the game, see the world. Like you said, most of the reason we go to these events is to see the people we only get to see 5 times a year (now 4 times ), to see places we've never been to before. I for one know I'd have never gone to japan without winning a plane ticket in a PTQ. This is a minor consideration, because one online PT a year isn't that bad, and it might be a good way for WotC to save money.

Zack

[guivre1408]

i like this idea even if some conditions should be verified

1. keep the same number of GP/PT irl
2. remove all lags on modo
3. a new system for the clock because it remove some heavycontrol from the metagame

I also think that events on modo must be restricted a GP could bring in easily more than 2000 participants ... hard to finish in the money in these conditions.

The main advantage for WOTC is that with buy-in system + qualifiers like on poker they would have no fees and the money from the buy-in could be suffisant to pay first places

poor english sorry

[eunck]

I think that - if we like it or not - we are slowly headed into that direction anyway, with all its advantages and disadvantages. But this is not something that can and will happen in the near future. It will take a long time, probably years. There is already a wordls qualifier each year on modo and we heard first hints at some online ptqs, but nothing will happen overnight here.

[joshb]

a new system for the clock because it remove some heavycontrol from the metagame

What they probably should have done from the get-go is set up a delay on the clock. When it's your turn, you have 5 seconds or so to make a play before the clock starts ticking down. You could even set up some kind of time out option when you really need to go into the tank or something.

I think the only problems with PT/GP-style tournaments on MODO are wins via disconnection, clocking, possibly even bugs. It also can rule a lot of options out of the metagame simply because they're not convenient, such as Infinite Life combo decks and etc.

[mercenarybdu]

Could work but then it couldn't work at the same time....

Could:
cuts the costs
online
stack could be seen easily
finding cards are more or less easy
beats renting out a place
good times?

Couldn't:
Card issues
tech issues
manipulation of the system
bugs
HTML
keeping the servers from crashing
can't see the player's faces
cursing is more or less the norm if there isn't something to prevent such talk from going around
location location location
format availability (this is a big one)
keeping programmers on all ends of the world on active standby
How are you going to send in the check to the winner?
Trophies?


...these are pretty much the core things we have to factor if the community were to do such an event.

[morgop]

The only way that I could see online being used is if you set up the event at a store with MTGO. That way you could ID the individuals. But you'd still have to somehow match them up to their accounts. Wizards could do that through the stores- perhaps players would have to register a screen name with a particular store to participate. Events could be held on weekends with a ladder bracket or other mutually preapproved time- possibly over multiple weeks leading to a championship. That could possibly help stores too. Lots of loose ends, but in theory it might work.

[mercenarybdu]

The only way that I could see online being used is if you set up the event at a store with MTGO. That way you could ID the individuals. But you'd still have to somehow match them up to their accounts. Wizards could do that through the stores- perhaps players would have to register a screen name with a particular store to participate. Events could be held on weekends with a ladder bracket or other mutually preapproved time- possibly over multiple weeks leading to a championship. That could possibly help stores too. Lots of loose ends, but in theory it might work.

I'm putting this on the scale from the convenience of someone's home. The shop could do that but then still has to factor some of my list in.

[oliva50]

Learning magic online is a great news for magic lovers and like all I also become very happy to hear the news. From my childhood I've a hidden will to be a magician and when I know someone learn magic, I try to gather some secret about magic.

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