Preparing for round 1 vs WOTC/Hasbro

[janos_wuryon]

I see that the response to the forming of the Union has been outstanding. Now I know that the specifics of choosing rep's and deciding our agenda will take some time to hammer out in detail I do think that the founders of this movement need to be a bit totalitarian and decide what topics they will focus on when they go to KL to meet with WOTC. I believe that if there is no clear cut decision made on the specific topics of this first meeting then this movement could be buried by the wieght if its supporters. Already there are a dozen or more threads about all manner of issues. Lets focus our energies on coming to terms with our first agenda and defining our structure. I have made a few comments on how this could be done to make the proccessing of information go as smoothly as possible as have others. We need to have a few clean topics posted by those on top so that energy can be devoted to our first set of official union issues

[mercenarybdu]

There is a little something called Check and Balance.

Levy created this place as Wizards Public Affairs wasn't listening to too many of our concerns or doing enough about them. Then since most of the players don't all live in a single location he also created this place to assure that if there were sudden changes to the system, all of the players could discuss about it and assure that the company doesn't always have their way.

Totalitarian or not, the masses are meant to be heard nice and raw uncensored and unscripted.

I've done things for the Wizard Forums in the past to assure that the Legacy community was heard, and so I will help Levy and his gang do the same in assuring that public affairs are made clear from the masses and it's Pros of all assortments.

[janos_wuryon]

maybe I wasnt clear with this thread. I know the forum is going to remain open to all people with all different opinions. What I was driving at is that there should be some decision made on what is most important to address first and then there should be some dedicated space to the discussion of those topics. Also until there is a clearly defined structure within this group there may need to be some decisions made that are not open to debate. It is my experience that even well thought out threads, those with some real quality replies can degenerate into pointless and childish rantings. I simple want that to be curtailed here in regards to meeting with WOTC. We cant discuss every ones opinions with the WOTC folks at every meeting because nothing would be accomplished. That being said I think the most prevelant topics to address with WOTC are as follows.

1) the sudden removal of events from the OP world: I dont deny the right of WOTC to make adjustments to benefit themselves and to try and make the OP system better for everyone but to cancel a program and leave a void while they try to work it out is awful. this action leaves a bad taste in people's mouths. Change is fine but why kill a popular program before a replacement is enacted?

2.) Loss of amatuer prizes in GP's. If the point of the prize reastructuring was to make GP's more appealing to more people why remove the prize's that are the most obtainable for the newly interested Tourny players? A larger purse is great but I belive that most new players dont attend these expecting to get T64 but many do think they may be able to get into the amatuer money.

3.) The changes to the Players club system. While this mainly affects only the best of the best in a massive way it is still a bad move. Players work hard to acheive these levels of success. The club's appearence fee's and free travel make it possible for the dedicated player to attend many Gp's. The chance at prize money alone, without these perks, will inevitable diminish the prescence of hig level players at GP's. Even the Pro's are subject to scrubbing out at events. To invest the money and time to travel, say from japan to the USA with no guarantee will begin to make it prohibitive. This while seemingly a benefit to the non-pro actually creates a situation where the risk vs. reward ratio is so unfavorable many aspiring players wont try to play enough to get to level 6-8, thus harming the community as a whole.



I feel these 3 issues are broad enough to require some serious debate to establish a position that works for all players. Also there are many other worthy issues that are going to be just as complex to hammer out. If we do not establish a frame work for our first meetings with WOTC soon we may find ourselves going in to ask for changes that we really didtn want in the first place. Ill leave you with a little axiom I came upon years ago " Nothing gets done Right that doesn't get planned well"

[mercenarybdu]

I see.

Perhaps these should be the first few with a few others tossed into the mix at that first meeting with raw uncensored content.

There should be a thread to compile the main concerns of the players for programs and systems. Hmm....perhaps this should be the one to do so since you got the ball rolling on the first three critical ones. But then we would also have to account for the others that are on other threads.

MSS/JSS
States
Champs
other programs
replacements
improvements
public affairs
the advancement of Legacy on the mainstream scale
other suggested items

....these should be added to the list of the first three critical concerns.

[Eelco1972]

Hey,

@ Janos & pretty much everyone else: don't worry. Yesterday i was able to read a very extensive layout written by Frank Karsten of everything discussed on this forum so far. It's pretty much what you can expect from someone that brought the same dedication to writing a piece for the WotC website: it's pretty darn good. And long. But i guess that's a good thing, because he was able to distill it out of everything that's been said in this Forum, so i guess we did a good job in discussing the problems WotC might have and what our feelings are about it.

The representitives are discussing Frank's (and your/our) work right now and i'm pretty sure that around next week the exact text will be shared with everyone here. And be asured: not a single positive things discussed in every thread of this forum (and Frank's own mind) was able to hide from Mr Karsten and if you want an idea of what to expect i suggest you open the Frank Karsten archives at MTG.com and read some of his articles.


Eelco van Ruth

[janos_wuryon]

I didnt realize that such a compilation had been created. Im glad to know that there is some structure behind this forum. As for the issues I did not specifically address I think the loss of programs as a general topic is one of the most important. I mentioned that in my 2nd point. Also not to stray but is there been any thought given in other threads or docs about what to do if WOTC does not begin to work with us to enact change that helps both sides and all involved parties?

[turboeli]

About promoting Legacy more with PTs and GPs:

As far as I see things, there's a big problem with Legacy as a Premiere level format. That's the issue of card availability. If you live in Brazil, Malaysia, Hong Kong, or Japan, you never had a shot at opening the dual lands that Legacy thrives on. Mishra's Workshop or Illusionary Mask? Forget about them. You have to import tons of the staple commons and uncommons from everything that, in the case of Japan, predates Visions. And for the most part, the stores in those countries don't have lots of those cards in stock, so the players are pretty much forced to use the Internet in English to get access to the cards.

This dynamic was demonstrated at Worlds 2007. Lots of people from Japan, Asia, and other regions had tons of trouble acquiring the cards they needed for their decks. And that's knowing that they're competing. For each player from those regions who attended worlds, there are two or three hundred or more PTQ players who have to have lots of money and the appropriate skills to acquire the cards.

At least when you're dealing with Extended, all the cards have been in print in all of the languages except for Russian. That's one big advantage Extended has over Legacy that cannot be underestimated.

If there's a Legacy GP in Europe or North America every year, that's enough support in my book.

[mercenarybdu]

About promoting Legacy more with PTs and GPs:

As far as I see things, there's a big problem with Legacy as a Premiere level format. That's the issue of card availability. If you live in Brazil, Malaysia, Hong Kong, or Japan, you never had a shot at opening the dual lands that Legacy thrives on. Mishra's Workshop or Illusionary Mask? Forget about them. You have to import tons of the staple commons and uncommons from everything that, in the case of Japan, predates Visions. And for the most part, the stores in those countries don't have lots of those cards in stock, so the players are pretty much forced to use the Internet in English to get access to the cards.

This dynamic was demonstrated at Worlds 2007. Lots of people from Japan, Asia, and other regions had tons of trouble acquiring the cards they needed for their decks. And that's knowing that they're competing. For each player from those regions who attended worlds, there are two or three hundred or more PTQ players who have to have lots of money and the appropriate skills to acquire the cards.

At least when you're dealing with Extended, all the cards have been in print in all of the languages except for Russian. That's one big advantage Extended has over Legacy that cannot be underestimated.

If there's a Legacy GP in Europe or North America every year, that's enough support in my book.

There still is a lot to do for that format as there has been a lot of outrage from that community that the company isn't doing enough to understand, play, and comprehend the format. There are a lot of people out their willing to cover the format and tell you a thing or ten about it accurately complete with video coverage of how the decks work.

FNM and PTQ formats already have their fair share of video coverage along with constantly up to date data in less than just a few minutes from Wizards and it's staff. But then when it comes to Legacy and Vintage, the community in those sectors have to wait a day or more just to gain a hold of data from the same crowd. In addition to that, it isn't even accurate, the writer has no clue of what the format is all about 9/10, and if you read the World Coverage from 2007 it was insulting with bad reviews to top it off after the events from all who went to examine the overall result.

Wizards is yet to do a better job on those formats complete with video coverage as it also shows from the Eternal Championships with little known about who made it through the bracket to make top 2.

[Eelco1972]

Perhaps it's nice to try and keep the threads a little bit more on topic.
Especially certain people active in this thread tend to direct pretty much every topic discussed into a discussion about certain formats (i won't name names and specific formats, but i'm sure i'm not the only one that knows who and what i'm talking about) and i don't think that's (always) necessary.

So help me out a little to keep it all on topic, please.
Thanks.

Eelco

[gleemax]

i hope we get to see the text they're preparing soon. KL is really close and i think its important for everyone on this board to be able to read and comment on the article before it's presented to wizards. As much as you guarntee it contains all relivenet opinons/complains/suggestion, I'd like to see it for myself as I'm sure others would too.

[mercenarybdu]

i hope we get to see the text they're preparing soon. KL is really close and i think its important for everyone on this board to be able to read and comment on the article before it's presented to wizards. As much as you guarntee it contains all relivenet opinons/complains/suggestion, I'd like to see it for myself as I'm sure others would too.

I hope to see a full video recording of the whole meeting raw. Because I don't like to see just text as it is being done in real time like everything else.

[uniKk]

a COMPLETE coverage from KL (in written form or better) is absolutely necessary! (at least to showcase wotc/hasbro's stupidity)

afaik, all that wotc announced to do about it, was to give a written "summary", which is less than useless and totally inaccurate , considering the current situation.

so, where can i find the compilation of the arguments FrankK was said to post?

where can i vote for the most important ones, respectively, is there a consensus about them already?

who are gonna be the reps at KL?

thank you, k

note: WE players have made the game big. the way wotc treated us this time, is unacceptable to me. now they want to explain themselves in an hour of Q&A!? bullshit! i want confessions that mistakes have been made and a change of their policy! period.

[morgop]

According to the e-mail that was sent out, there will be only one hour to discuss the changes with the powers of WOTC. That’s nowhere near enough time to lay out a plan to them. Questions should be formulated in advance that gets to the heart of ‘why’ so that the union can assemble afterward and formulate strategies to help Wizards achieve a mutually beneficial business plan. Those who are attending the meeting should discuss the situation with other players so that we can make the most of the time we have been granted.

Here are the key issues I see: Communication format & timing, # of PTs/GPs/PTQs, PT format support, locations supported by PTs/GPs, overall payout structure (including airfare), PT invites passing down at PTQs if otherwise-qualified players win, stabilizing PT payouts through the end of following season, JSS-type programs, long term stability and transparency of WOTC’s business plan.

It will likely prove impossible to get all of that, but all of these are important facets of the issue at hand.

One more point of focus in KL is legitimizing the union in WOTC's eyes. Without leverage, there's little point in getting organized other than to make ourselves feel better for ranting. WOTC will not likely act on resolutions for speculative issues. They ARE likely to allow the union to help to address factual issues where we show that we can have an influence.

Communication is an example of this- where Raph indicated that WOTC would use the union as a vehicle for communication (note that doesn't necessarily mean communicate in advance). They can see the value to them, therefore they use us. We have to do the same in other areas or this is all pointless.

[gleemax]

i hope we get to see the text they're preparing soon. KL is really close and i think its important for everyone on this board to be able to read and comment on the article before it's presented to wizards. As much as you guarntee it contains all relivenet opinons/complains/suggestion, I'd like to see it for myself as I'm sure others would too.

I hope to see a full video recording of the whole meeting raw. Because I don't like to see just text as it is being done in real time like everything else.

Yeah, I don't know if Hasbro will allow camera's in the room, or if they do they might be more tight-lipped about their problems. Companies don't want word to get out they're cutting costs becuase they're doing bad, it makes stock prices drop and stuff.

Also, I was looking to have the "summary" that is going to be presented to wizards posted so everyone can come to a consenus about what the union is presenting. I have a feeling that it's not finished and that we won't have time for the commuinity to share their opinons on the document. Future "summaries" need to be finished and posted ahead of time so everyone can feel they had time to speek up. My fear is the this summary will not contain some aspects that alot of people want it too and this will lead people to stop supporting the union. If the union is to truely succeed, it must be a true consenous and voice of the players. Not communicating what your planning to say in a timely manner doesn't make arguments against WotC's communication issues very strong. It's the whole kettle calling the pot black thing. We need to show wizards that we can effectivley communicate large annoucements such as this among ourselves to prove that they can do it too.

Also, I understand and agree that not everything said in this forum should be included this time. You'd be pretty ignorant to assume WotC doesn't or hasn't viewed this board. If the fear is that releasing the document may result in showing wizards our hand, why don't you simply use the mailing system to send it as an attachment to everyone. I doubt wizards employees have joined or posted here, viewed yes, but joined and upped our numbers? no.

[mercenarybdu]

i hope we get to see the text they're preparing soon. KL is really close and i think its important for everyone on this board to be able to read and comment on the article before it's presented to wizards. As much as you guarntee it contains all relivenet opinons/complains/suggestion, I'd like to see it for myself as I'm sure others would too.

I hope to see a full video recording of the whole meeting raw. Because I don't like to see just text as it is being done in real time like everything else.

Yeah, I don't know if Hasbro will allow camera's in the room, or if they do they might be more tight-lipped about their problems. Companies don't want word to get out they're cutting costs becuase they're doing bad, it makes stock prices drop and stuff.

Also, I was looking to have the "summary" that is going to be presented to wizards posted so everyone can come to a consenus about what the union is presenting. I have a feeling that it's not finished and that we won't have time for the commuinity to share their opinons on the document. Future "summaries" need to be finished and posted ahead of time so everyone can feel they had time to speek up. My fear is the this summary will not contain some aspects that alot of people want it too and this will lead people to stop supporting the union. If the union is to truely succeed, it must be a true consenous and voice of the players. Not communicating what your planning to say in a timely manner doesn't make arguments against WotC's communication issues very strong. It's the whole kettle calling the pot black thing. We need to show wizards that we can effectivley communicate large annoucements such as this among ourselves to prove that they can do it too.

Also, I understand and agree that not everything said in this forum should be included this time. You'd be pretty ignorant to assume WotC doesn't or hasn't viewed this board. If the fear is that releasing the document may result in showing wizards our hand, why don't you simply use the mailing system to send it as an attachment to everyone. I doubt wizards employees have joined or posted here, viewed yes, but joined and upped our numbers? no.

Okay then how about a recording without the cameras like what they do in the Supreme Court on large debate cases alongside the summary. How about that? If not then it will just be a summary with something for the forums to debate over until the cows come home many times.

[Eelco1972]

I'm taking it up with Raph to see if we need to post Frank's summary here. I don't really see the point, because Frank took the content from the complete forum and added thoughts the he personally was able to come up with (in discussions with other Pro's). But everyone is right saying that they feel like reading it before KL; even if it is just curiosity, it's going to be about a subject that obviously is very important for everyone here.

Eelco

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