As a long time PTQ grinder, I would say that I would be disappointed winning almost any economically viable prize other than the invite from a PTQ.
That said, the one reason I would want higher pay outs is so that a finals split is much more negotiable. Back in the day it was so simple: you hand one person the check and the other the blue envelope. Now the only real way to get a scoop in the finals from someone who is willing is basically collusion.
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Nice. I actually teach Microeconomics. And while your knowledge of a Supply/Demand graph from a text with reference to Competetion vs Monopolies has been noted, the issue that I have is WHAT IS THAT PROPOSED SLOPE?! Your'e correct, most people here are simplifying their statement. Ultimately, we (and yes, since we're all mostly saying the same thing, i'll be cocky enough to say we) are saying that since there are multiple factors that affect attendance with a greater "slope" (if you want to stay out of real world terms) that we could view the slope of non-qualifying prizes as near zero. Infact, i just quickly counted 3 people that did clarify their statements in this way, after you said something similar to them, and yet you don't respond to these people.
Basically some of the posters may not have knowledge of the terminology you're using, so you abuse them. Some people may be using hyperbole, so you abuse them. Ultimately, we're all communicating the same concept to you, i've tried to be as literal as possible to avoid you side-steppign the actual argument, and focusing on irrelevant semantics. We all are understanding each other, so we clearly are sharing the same message. While some peopels views might be different as far as how those other factors are tiered, NOT ONE PERSON has agreed that non-qualifying prize support would more than slightly increase their likelihood of attending an event, and would be significantly less of an impact than a handful of other factors. If your goal is to grow the game of magic, and the ptq system etc, why not focus on the factors that all of us ptq'ers are saying are more important to us?!
The ultimate point is that a system of TO Competition would produce more value for the consumer. The main entre to his argument has been looking at prizes, because I think the current PTQ prize structure is so egregious, and this fact is accessible to folks, but it's far from the only one, as I've described many times in this thread and in response to Glenn's article. Another possibility is lower entry fees, which as I said, is simply another way of adding value to the event, just like more prizes. Moreover, I think that the overall experience of PTQs would be improved.
I chose to focus on prizes because I thought that was an easy way that PTQ attendees would appreciate my argument, but perhaps a more fruitful way would be to have focused on entry fees. Lower entry fees, and you have more attendees.
Yet, I agree, one main issue is the slope: how much will a decrease in entry fee or an increase in prizes increase attendance? But you are asking me to give the slope, when I say: the answer to that can only be determined in an actual competitive market. As I said before: you can't know the real price of something unless you have a market to price it.
While the question of slope (i.e. exactly how elastic or the degree of elasticity) is relevant, our models of monpolistic or quasi-monopolistic behavior strongly suggest that PTQ TOs are not actually incentivized to maximize attendance where they would in a competitive market. To that extent, the question of slope is besides the point.
While the question of slope would answer the exact question of how many players would increase attendance per unit increase in prizes or unit decrease in entry fee, the main point is that PTQ TOs maximize profit by NOT maximizing attendance. To that extent, my main point is that we aren't maximizing our growth potential as we would under a competitive system. That holds true as long as the slope is not perfectly inelastic.
As a general rule, people in real life are not actually profit maximizing.
Right, so we can assume that TOs give away product because they are stupid or because they are rational and want to maximize profits. Eitehr one is a logical conclusion from the fact that TOs give out prizes. I do not think that TOs are stupid.
Increasing prizes from zero to some might have an appreciable impact on attendance. This does not mean that increasing prizes from some to some more will have a similar appreciable impact on attendance.
And it doesn't mean it won't. We have plenty of evidence, given the monpolistic pricing graph, to suggest it wil. As long as the demand is not perfectly inelastic (and it's simple to prove that it's not), a monopolistic pricing profit maximizer will not be interested in maximizing attendance where a competitive firm would, and will be exploiting the players on the upper left of hte demand curve by taking their consumer surplus.
Again, if that were true, then why to TOs, who are profit maximizing, give out product? If it has no impact on attendance, then there is no reason to do so, and yet they do.
Because they feel it's worth it to take a short-term loss to make a long-term gain for the game as a whole
And that's fine, but my response is: let's let the market work that out. Theory suggests that competition is better for consumers. While it might actually be the case that PTQ TOs price near or at where a competitive market does, there are good reasons, or at least some evidence/reasons, to think tha they don't. Moreover, all of the benefits of market competition would acrue under such a system, benefits that can't even be spelled out here.
Wouldn't the cost of that competition be lots of poorly run events? Isn't that far more detrimental to PTQ attendence than the mediocre prize payout that you are complaining about?
Which do you think would lead to A) greater player satisfaction and B) higher tournament attendance?
1) The TO adds $500 in product to the prize pool from where it currently stands,
or
2) The TO is allowed to add a qualification slot and give out a $500 travel voucher if attendance reaches a certain threshold? (For the record:Glen originally suggested 300 players, but I would propose this number to be 200).
- Ben Bleiweiss
I would think (2), without knowing how (1) would be distributed. However, my understanding of the situation was that people were concerned that adding another invite would increase WOTC's budget for the Pro Tour. I was trying to propose a solution that wouldn't increase or add more stress to WOTC's budget. In the first post, I tried to provide a solution to improve the PTQ experience and maximize Magic's long-term growth within that parameter.
TO's are maximizing acceptable prize allocations as outlined in my actual cost outline, based on real and actual business costs. There is little margin for error, and adding even 1 additional pack per player would result in an additional $2850 in costs (using my example, 150 (players) * 9 (events) =1350 packs /36 (packs per box) =37.5 boxes * 76 = 2850. This would drop their profit margin to far slimmer levels than most any business believes to be acceptable.
Therefore, TO's are not gouging the players, but providing them with prizes as possible without exposing themselves to undue risk.
So, while increased prize support MAY increase attendance, it doesn't do so in a manner that is neither a) capable of being supported given current operating parameters, nor b) necessarily guaranteed to improve any of the attributes you seek to improve.
Furthermore, as I stated previously, the risks appear to be far more grave than the minimal to nonexistent reward.
And that's fine, but my response is: let's let the market work that out. Theory suggests that competition is better for consumers. While it might actually be the case that PTQ TOs price near or at where a competitive market does, there are good reasons, or at least some evidence/reasons, to think tha they don't. Moreover, all of the benefits of market competition would acrue under such a system, benefits that can't even be spelled out here.
And that's fine, but my response is: let's let the market work that out. Theory suggests that competition is better for consumers. While it might actually be the case that PTQ TOs price near or at where a competitive market does, there are good reasons, or at least some evidence/reasons, to think tha they don't. Moreover, all of the benefits of market competition would acrue under such a system, benefits that can't even be spelled out here.
And I'm saying that the risks of changing to such a system would be bad for Magic in the short term, potentially so much so that it could cause severe harm and setbacks. In the long run, it all evens out, but in the long run, we (and more importantly, possibly magic) are all dead.
Yet, I agree, one main issue is the slope: how much will a decrease in entry fee or an increase in prizes increase attendance? But you are asking me to give the slope, when I say: the answer to that can only be determined in an actual competitive market. As I said before: you can't know the real price of something unless you have a market to price it.
There's nothing about a "competitive market" that makes its prices more "real" than anything else. The idea that you can't determine the outcome without creating the situation is rather silly. People's actions can be predicted within reasonable error margins by using both current behavior and stated preference.
Right, so we can assume that TOs give away product because they are stupid or because they are rational and want to maximize profits. Eitehr one is a logical conclusion from the fact that TOs give out prizes. I do not think that TOs are stupid.
False dichotomy. Not being rational does not mean being stupid; not being profit-maximizing does not mean being stupid; for that matter, not being profit-maximizing does not mean not being rational. In the convenient world of economic models, rationality is free. In the real world, it costs time, effort and sometimes other resources to be rational. Thus, people sometimes simply don't bother. This is not about stupidity. This is about people being able to make an instinctive evaluation that something isn't worth their time to even think about, so they just go with what seems "about right". It's a pervasive behavior and there's nothing wrong with it. It just doesn't always lead to the same consequences as what you'd get from the rational profit-maximizing behavior you're assuming.
And it doesn't mean it won't. We have plenty of evidence, given the monpolistic pricing graph, to suggest it wil. As long as the demand is not perfectly inelastic (and it's simple to prove that it's not), a monopolistic pricing profit maximizer will not be interested in maximizing attendance where a competitive firm would, and will be exploiting the players on the upper left of hte demand curve by taking their consumer surplus.
Even in the world of economic models, a competitive firm is no more or less interested in maximizing attendance than a monopolistic provider. Any increase in attendance would be a side-effect.
The ultimate point is that a system of TO Competition would produce more value for the consumer. The main entre to his argument has been looking at prizes, because I think the current PTQ prize structure is so egregious,
Though you stated this first, I wanted to address it last because everything else feeds into it. The current prize structure is not "egregious". It's okay. There's no significant problem with it. Not a lot of people care about it to a significant extent - and people who primarily care about prizes have a better substitute in the form of the GPs.
You seem to be ignoring or discounting the cost to change. Changing the PTQ structure is expensive, in particular to Wizards directly. It takes time, effort, and money. The possible increase in attendance is simply not worth the resources Wizards would need to invest to even design a "competitive market" for PTQs, much less implement it. (Edited to add: ) And, as others have mentioned, you're discounting the importance of standardization. Wizards might (and, I would venture to say, probably does) care less about sheer attendance numbers than it does about ensuring that people have a fairly consistent experience across PTQs. One bad PTQ experience can do much more damage than a somewhat reduced player count would.
And I'm saying that the risks of changing to such a system would be bad for Magic in the short term, potentially so much so that it could cause severe harm and setbacks. In the long run, it all evens out, but in the long run, we (and more importantly, possibly magic) are all dead.
And I understand that perspective, I get that people are concerned that there could be harm, but that's an implementation question, which we've only touched on. I could come up with some ways to minimize these ricks, but Wizards is smart, and full of smart people I'm confident that they could shift to a competitive system and do it well. They could even do a trial run, just like China let Hong Kong be a free enterprize zone in the 1980s to test market economics.
There's nothing about a "competitive market" that makes its prices more "real" than anything else. The idea that you can't determine the outcome without creating the situation is rather silly. People's actions can be predicted within reasonable error margins by using both current behavior and stated preference
Actually, this is the chief criticism of communism by most economists: a centralized system actually has no efficient way of allocating resources, because there is no market to price goods. So, yes, competitive markets tell us what market prices look like.
False dichotomy. Not being rational does not mean being stupid; not being profit-maximizing does not mean being stupid; for that matter, not being profit-maximizing does not mean not being rational.In the real world, it costs time, effort and sometimes other resources to be rational. Thus, people sometimes simply don't bother. This is not about stupidity. This is about people being able to make an instinctive evaluation that something isn't worth their time to even think about, so they just go with what seems "about right". It's a pervasive behavior and there's nothing wrong with it. It just doesn't always lead to the same consequences as what you'd get from the rational profit-maximizing behavior you're assuming.
True, but step back from a moment from the keyboard, and the desire to reply and think about this:
Fact: TOs give away other prizes.
There are only a few possible answers as to why. They run these events over and over again. We can speculate as to why. But there are basically two main possibilities: 1) either they see value in doing so, or 2) they don't, but do it anyway. I think 1 is more plausible. Certaintly, we might say: well they see value because the competition does it, or they feel that they should. That's consistent with my view that they do it to increase attendance or promote retention. If they acted below industry standarsd, they would be criticized, or at least get flak.
Even in the world of economic models, a competitive firm is no more or less interested in maximizing attendance than a monopolistic provider. Any increase in attendance would be a side-effect.
Yes, that's true. I should have said: a profit maximizing TO sets prices/rewards at a place where they happen to not maximize attendance to the levels of a competitive market. Same point.
You know, its astonishing how many people have attacked Steve in both this thread and the SCG thread.
There's really nothing to his contention other than that making TO's compete with each other for the right to put on PTQ tournaments and their ensuring profit would probably lead to those tournaments being marginally more profitable for players.
He doesn't even say by how much (and personally I think it would be less than he thinks), but I think its hard for anyone to disagree with this as a generalized position. Competition is the fuel of economic refinement, and the idea that every TO has already 'maximized' all the profit margins around providing a tournament is laughable.
With that said, I think Steve overestimates the incentive TOs have to compete and optimize for some of the reasons mentioned in the thread - these tournaments aren't that profitable, especially given how rare they are. An extra profit of 3000 in a month is a neat idea, but only if you're doing the entire thing yourself. For people who own card shops or the like and are doing it as part of their business, it becomes relatively a much smaller part of their income with more associated costs (in employee time, etc).
Steve isn't suggesting there be so much product that people proactively attented PTQs for the product. What he's suggesting is that more people would continue to grind PTQs or show up at them if they recieved some more product that lead, in effect, to a subsidization of their attendance costs when they place well. People will not go to PTQs or participate in them because they win 2 boxes for 3rd place .. but winning 2 boxes might help defray their costs, whether in the form of sellable singles or through resale of the whole boxes to those who want to open them, or just through providing packs for entering future drafts and continuing to practice and improve. If that even added up to an additional 50-150 dollars saved due to the PTQ prize, it can be the difference in determining when PTQ attendance becomes 'too expensive' for players with financial difficulties with the cost of PTQ grinding.
I don't even think Steve is asking for a selfish reason: As a longtime eternal (especially Vintage) player who has won and placed well in many tournaments that provided significant value (power cards, etc), and who is a college graduate with a career and extra income from writing for SCG, I really doubt that Steve has a hard time affording the cost of attending PTQs if he wishes. His post is about people like me who, in fact, really have a hard time with the travel costs.
Steve, I have a few questions after reading the 11 pages of this thread...
1) You have said that you're advocating better prizes in PTQs to promote Magic's growth. How does pandering to the middle of the pyramid promote growth? A Pro Tour Qualifier presumes that you know the game, have a semi-competitive collection, and an interest to stop calling your Magic gaming time a "hobby" instead of a "career". If you're going to grow the pyramid, shouldn't growth happen at the bottom to support the upper echelons? Isn't this bottom space served by FNM?
2) As stated above the PTQ audience is a captive one. Assuming that the focus of the venue is around "Pro", high-level competition and a gateway to even higher competition; Greater rewards do not draw players that are competitive at this level. As stated previously by other posters.
3) You keep arguing Supply and Demand in a monopoly environment. Another poster has cited that some TOs do side events like the free draft to the first 32 that get dropped. This suggests that the TOs have taken into consideration the laws of Diminishing Returns and figured that making the Top 8 sweeter wasn't the best way to broaden appeal, but to spread out the prize pool... and you're passionately, vehemently advocating change that's already occurring.
And for the ad hominem to illicit a response:
I hope your card evaluation skills aren't like your Economic evaluations. It'd be a shame if both happened in a vacuum.
I am a longtime PTQ grinder. There have been some bad experiences with some TOs (Nebraska, Moy, Pastimes) and great experiences with a few others like Legion Events. Having some TO competition would probably make people like Pastimes clean up their act or allow someone much better at the job to step up. It would probably be unnecessary to force competition on someone like Legion because they are probably the best TO in the country.
Aside from that, there seems to be one point that hasn't been brought up yet. The non first place prizes, regardless of how insignificant they might be to me, keep the fish/dead money/donkeys coming back. There have been countless instances of players sticking it out at 1-3 to win six packs, not conceding their opponent into top eight because they can win six packs, etc.
While it might seem like six packs is nothing, it isn't to the person who wants a reason to believe that they didn't waste their day. It will give them an excuse to come back if they basically broke even.
Magic is primarily a skill game. PTQs are competitive and there are a lot of jerks out there (hi!). Without these small prizes, what reason would a casual player have to PTQ again? They probably had one bad experience when they played a jerk, didn't win a lot, and had nothing to show for their efforts. They aren't going to better because they don't care, but as a community, we NEED those types of players coming back and donating their entry fees. Players might be replaceable to some extent, but it would be better if we kept the ones we already have around too.
Consider the SCG Open series. When they decided to add money to their prize support, they tacked it onto 17-32. Why not 2nd, which pays out an awkwardly low $600? Because that means that 16 more people leave the tournament happy, just by getting their money back.
As far as I care, the TO can give two packs to everyone who entered and pay additional prizes down to top 32. There are very few people per PTQ who don't care about the packs, so it won't affect them either way. I'd say over 50% are going to be happy to crack the two packs they paid $25 for, and they will probably come back, regardless of their record and experience.
Having top eight players get less than a box is somewhat annoying, but as long as that payout isn't top heavy, I don't really care. For example, having the 8th place finisher in a 300 man PTQ get 18 packs while first place gets the plane ticket and three boxes. That is absurd. First place already got what he came for, why give him $300 in product on top of it? Those boxes probably don't even factor into his happiness. First place should probably get less product instead of more.
Ari made a point that it's harder to make a deal in the finals, but I think that's in WOTC's best interest anyway.
In summary, t8 players should each get a box, first should get no product. Prizes should pay waaaay down to make the fish happy.
I would think (2), without knowing how (1) would be distributed. However, my understanding of the situation was that people were concerned that adding another invite would increase WOTC's budget for the Pro Tour. I was trying to propose a solution that wouldn't increase or add more stress to WOTC's budget. In the first post, I tried to provide a solution to improve the PTQ experience and maximize Magic's long-term growth within that parameter.
Steve, I went back to the original thread where this was posted, and as far as I can tell, I was the only person who brought up the concern about WOTC adding in people to the Pro Tour.
So let's follow this up:
Let's say we're in agreement that it is in the best interest of the player (for satisfaction and for retention) to add a second PTQ slot should attendance hit a certain mark (again, let's propose this number to be 200). Let's also just use tournaments in North America for these examples, because as demonstrated by other people on this thread, the system in other countries is demonstrably different than in the States.
Let's say that there are seventy-five PTQs run in the United States over the course of a season (this changes from season to season, but is close to the correct number). Let's say that currently, twelve out of these fifty get 200+ players. (16%) Which of the following would you say is more likely to increase attendance?
A) Tournament Organizers adding $500 in prizes to the prize pool? (Let's assume this is in Booster Boxes, as are the other prize payouts)
B) The promise that if attendance reaches 200 players or more, a second Pro Tour invite is added to the tournament, and a second $500 travel voucher is given out?
I would posit that greater player satisfaction is achieved through B) - the majority of players would be more willing to attend PTQs (and travel greater distances to attend PTQs) if there were a greater chance at qualifying for the Pro Tour.
I believe that the chance for there to be an extra invite at 200+ person tournaments would lead to a higher overall tournament attendance than would a guaranteed $500 extra in prize support at every PTQ, regardless of attendance.
I believe this directly correlates to the wants of the consumer in this regard, because they are voting on attending/not attending an event with their wallets - they would be saying that the PTQ invite is more of an incentive to attend an event than $500 extra in boxes, spread among the field.
Nobody set up a parameter for you regarding what WOTC would/would not be willing to do at the Pro Tour, except yourself. This was not in Glen's original article, and it was brought up by myself as a hypothetical in my forum response on StarCityGames.com.
If I were to make the case against additional players coming to the Pro Tour by adding slots to PTQs based on attendance, my argument would be that Wizards of the Coast needs to anticipate in advance the number of players attending any given Pro Tour, in order to book the correctly-sized venue, bring in the correct amount of staff (especially judges), and not have the tournament run an unwieldy amount of rounds.
So what I'm curious about is this: Given that the optimal solution for players is adding a second invite, why would you spend so much time and energy, across multiple websites, arguing against TOs being able to make a living? Jeff put together costs for an event that were much more realistic than yours, and yet I have not seen you acknowledge yet that your initial math was very far off from the economic realities that tournament organizers face.
I agree with Glen that the option to purchase a second PTQ slot based on attendance is a fantastic way to improve PTQ attendance and maximize player satisfaction at these events. I would just personally set the threshold a lot lower than him (200 instead of 300).
Actually, this is the chief criticism of communism by most economists: a centralized system actually has no efficient way of allocating resources, because there is no market to price goods. So, yes, competitive markets tell us what market prices look like.
And communist systems tell us what communist prices look like. "Markets make market prices" is tautological. Being a market price does not make it any more "real".
True, but step back from a moment from the keyboard, and the desire to reply and think about this:
Fact: TOs give away other prizes.
There are only a few possible answers as to why. They run these events over and over again. We can speculate as to why. But there are basically two main possibilities: 1) either they see value in doing so, or 2) they don't, but do it anyway. I think 1 is more plausible. Certaintly, we might say: well they see value because the competition does it, or they feel that they should. That's consistent with my view that they do it to increase attendance or promote retention. If they acted below industry standarsd, they would be criticized, or at least get flak.
Perhaps you should step back from the keyboard and the desire to reply and actually read my posts. I already said:
Increasing prizes from zero to some might have an appreciable impact on attendance. This does not mean that increasing prizes from some to some more will have a similar appreciable impact on attendance.
To answer the question more directly: they likely give out product because everyone else is doing it. They probably figure some players would be upset if they didn't give out any product at all.
In other words, I already addressed everything you just brought up. Yes, the impact of offering some prizes rather than no prizes probably is probably non-trivial. That does not mean that the impact of offering some more prizes is also non-trivial. Yes, TOs do things because other people are doing it. No, that does not mean that it's anywhere near the profit maximizing point, either for the monopoly case or otherwise.
I am a longtime PTQ grinder. There have been some bad experiences with some TOs (Nebraska, Moy, Pastimes) and great experiences with a few others like Legion Events. Having some TO competition would probably make people like Pastimes clean up their act or allow someone much better at the job to step up. It would probably be unnecessary to force competition on someone like Legion because they are probably the best TO in the country.
Do you think Nebraska, Moy and Pastimes put on bad events because there is no competition and PTQs are a monopoly, or because nobody in the region either has the resources or the ability to put on the events? Would the system be helped more by allowing for competition that may or may not exist, or by or by having stricter standards for companies running events?
I don't know what Legion's payouts are, but PES pays down to top32 if they get over 121 players (a virtual certainty for most of their PTQs). Is that sufficient to keep the fish in, or should it pay down further?
edit: Basically, Steve's argument is that competition is good and will improve tournaments. Which is true if every TO is maximizing their profits at the expense of the players. IE, they only give out 8 boxes because that is all they are forced to give out, or 16 boxes if they feel that 16 boxes will increase their profit over the long haul.
My contention is that his argument takes out the entire concept that a good deal of the people running these companies are themselves HUGE fans of the game and doing this and not making a lot of money. TOs like Legon sell sleeves and the like to improve their money, but they put in a lot of time/money into their events. Do you think Steve Port is maximizing every profit angle he could and exploiting the players, or running the best events he can in his region? I know there are TOs that do not give out anything close to reasonable prize support, or work to get judges that will run better events, but is the answer to these TOs to force everyone to attend events that are of a much lower quality than today, at least for the near future?
You know, its astonishing how many people have attacked Steve in both this thread and the SCG thread.
There's really nothing to his contention other than that making TO's compete with each other for the right to put on PTQ tournaments and their ensuring profit would probably lead to those tournaments being marginally more profitable for players.
He doesn't even say by how much (and personally I think it would be less than he thinks), but I think its hard for anyone to disagree with this as a generalized position. Competition is the fuel of economic refinement, and the idea that every TO has already 'maximized' all the profit margins around providing a tournament is laughable.
Thank you for putting more eloquently and concisely than I had a major point Iv'e been trying to advance.
While I think that competition would produce better tangible consumer outcomes, like marginally better prize selection or entry fees, and thus lead to more growth, I also think it would produce intangible benefits. I can only speculate, but I think we might see more attention to market niches, demographics, and particular player profiles as PTQ TOs compete to cater to different crowds, including finding ways to attract older tournament goers.
I think, to some extent, we have a system right now that basically emphasizes 'making the trains run on time,' which is important -- I don't want to underestimate how important it is -- but I also think other things are important, and competition would make those things come out. Right now, the model is based on replacement, and not enough, in my view, on retention. I think competition would help that, or,as you put it, be an engine of economic refinement.
With that said, I think Steve overestimates the incentive TOs have to compete and optimize for some of the reasons mentioned in the thread - these tournaments aren't that profitable, especially given how rare they are. An extra profit of 3000 in a month is a neat idea, but only if you're doing the entire thing yourself. For people who own card shops or the like and are doing it as part of their business, it becomes relatively a much smaller part of their income with more associated costs (in employee time, etc).
Very possibly. Jeff made some good points. I tried in good faith to cost out those estimates in the original post, and I'm glad he tried to push us to a more accurate model. Even under his model, I think there would benefits to increasing the payout, particulary along the lines that Gerry T just suggeseted (which I'd wholeheartedly endorse).
Steve, I went back to the original thread where this was posted, and as far as I can tell, I was the only person who brought up the concern about WOTC adding in people to the Pro Tour.
Which I thought was an important point.
I believe that the chance for there to be an extra invite at 200+ person tournaments would lead to a higher overall tournament attendance than would a guaranteed $500 extra in prize support at every PTQ, regardless of attendance.
And, as I said, I agree with this. I would also think that an extra invite would be worth more than another $500 in extra money, without question, unless, somehow, that extra money was very deeply distributed. $500 isn't, in my view, alot compared to the value of an invite. So, I think you are right, (2) is clearly preferable.
I believe this directly correlates to the wants of the consumer in this regard, because they are voting on attending/not attending an event with their wallets - they would be saying that the PTQ invite is more of an incentive to attend an event than $500 extra in boxes, spread among the field.
Again, I agree. I think it would increase attendance, satisfaction, etc.
Nobody set up a parameter for you regarding what WOTC would/would not be willing to do at the Pro Tour, except yourself. This was not in Glen's original article, and it was brought up by myself as a hypothetical in my forum response on StarCityGames.com.
If adding another invite to PTQs is an option, I'm all for that too. I think it would do all of the things you suggest.
So what I'm curious about is this: Given that the optimal solution for players is adding a second invite, why would you spend so much time and energy, across multiple websites, arguing against TOs being able to make a living? Jeff put together costs for an event that were much more realistic than yours, and yet I have not seen you acknowledge yet that your initial math was very far off from the economic realities that tournament organizers face.
I definitely want TOs to be able to make a living. My argument, though, is that competition, I would think, would decide/determine what the market would bear. I started this thread because Patrick suggested that I write an article on the subject, and I thought a forum conversation would be the best vehicle for raising some of these issue. As I said, I think jeff raised some good points, but I would let the market cost out those components, and determine what's feasible, etc. Market competition might actually serve to reduce some of those costs, as TOs figure out how to be more efficient, etc.
Again, if that were true, then why to TOs, who are profit maximizing, give out product? If it has no impact on attendance, then there is no reason to do so, and yet they do.
Again, you do not believe that increasing prizes increases attendance. Even torerotutor concedes that this is not true.
Other users have immediately summarized why this is the case, though if you had examples of turnout for PTQs prior to additional prizes being offered (if such a time existed), you could try and see if there was any correlation between that introduction and PTQ attendance. However, based on a statement made earlier in the thread (10% attendance increase with better prize support that ultimately didn't warrant the loss to the TO I believe was the figure?), it seems like an increase from None to Some and Some to More has diminishing returns for the TO and event attendance.
That said, I'm going to politely bow out now as there are numerous arguments being made at this time and there is no room for us to go by bouncing this portion of the discussion back and forth without actual hard data.
Additionally, thank you for keeping me on task. I started getting caught up with Words and drifted a bit, so I appreciate you pulling me back in and forcing me to Use Words more better.
The ultimate point is that a system of TO Competition would produce more value for the consumer. The main entre to his argument has been looking at prizes, because I think the current PTQ prize structure is so egregious, and this fact is accessible to folks, but it's far from the only one, as I've described many times in this thread and in response to Glenn's article. Another possibility is lower entry fees, which as I said, is simply another way of adding value to the event, just like more prizes. Moreover, I think that the overall experience of PTQs would be improved.
I chose to focus on prizes because I thought that was an easy way that PTQ attendees would appreciate my argument, but perhaps a more fruitful way would be to have focused on entry fees. Lower entry fees, and you have more attendees.
Yet, I agree, one main issue is the slope: how much will a decrease in entry fee or an increase in prizes increase attendance? But you are asking me to give the slope, when I say: the answer to that can only be determined in an actual competitive market. As I said before: you can't know the real price of something unless you have a market to price it.
While the question of slope (i.e. exactly how elastic or the degree of elasticity) is relevant, our models of monpolistic or quasi-monopolistic behavior strongly suggest that PTQ TOs are not actually incentivized to maximize attendance where they would in a competitive market. To that extent, the question of slope is besides the point.
There you won Steven.
You won the argument, but didn't won the cause, and you will probably have to live with it if you don't win it in the near future.
They don't care if TOs are giving back only 20% of the entry fee as prizes. I insist, they don't care.
They still can afford $25 + food + (variable) gas + maybe hotel + $700 deck.
Players are alienatedly* comfortable, they will not support you in this cause.
To all the people wondering for some empirical manifest of the theory, I have good news, you do have a shot at some empirical data:
Go to ask to players (grinders, casual ones, fallen pros, whomever would play a PTQ in fact) which is better:
- Old system with NQTs being gigantic monopolyc* events, or the new ones, with players having at least some degree of options to choose from?
- Old system with Prereleases being gigantic monopolyc* events, or the new ones, with players having at least some degree of options to choose from?
* is that an English word? lol
PS: Oh yes, my grammar does suck, I'm sorry about that. I have an Engineering in Information Systems, and threw in 3 (out of 6) years of a full major in Biochemistry, and everything in Spanish (my native language), so let alone my lack of proper English.
Steve, I went back to the original thread where this was posted, and as far as I can tell, I was the only person who brought up the concern about WOTC adding in people to the Pro Tour.
So let's follow this up:
Let's say we're in agreement that it is in the best interest of the player (for satisfaction and for retention) to add a second PTQ slot should attendance hit a certain mark (again, let's propose this number to be 200). Let's also just use tournaments in North America for these examples, because as demonstrated by other people on this thread, the system in other countries is demonstrably different than in the States.
Let's say that there are seventy-five PTQs run in the United States over the course of a season (this changes from season to season, but is close to the correct number). Let's say that currently, twelve out of these fifty get 200+ players. (16%) Which of the following would you say is more likely to increase attendance?
A) Tournament Organizers adding $500 in prizes to the prize pool? (Let's assume this is in Booster Boxes, as are the other prize payouts)
B) The promise that if attendance reaches 200 players or more, a second Pro Tour invite is added to the tournament, and a second $500 travel voucher is given out?
I would posit that greater player satisfaction is achieved through B) - the majority of players would be more willing to attend PTQs (and travel greater distances to attend PTQs) if there were a greater chance at qualifying for the Pro Tour.
I believe that the chance for there to be an extra invite at 200+ person tournaments would lead to a higher overall tournament attendance than would a guaranteed $500 extra in prize support at every PTQ, regardless of attendance.
I believe this directly correlates to the wants of the consumer in this regard, because they are voting on attending/not attending an event with their wallets - they would be saying that the PTQ invite is more of an incentive to attend an event than $500 extra in boxes, spread among the field.
Nobody set up a parameter for you regarding what WOTC would/would not be willing to do at the Pro Tour, except yourself. This was not in Glen's original article, and it was brought up by myself as a hypothetical in my forum response on StarCityGames.com.
So what I'm curious about is this: Given that the optimal solution for players is adding a second invite, why would you spend so much time and energy, across multiple websites, arguing against TOs being able to make a living? Jeff put together costs for an event that were much more realistic than yours, and yet I have not seen you acknowledge yet that your initial math was very far off from the economic realities that tournament organizers face.
I agree with Glen that the option to purchase a second PTQ slot based on attendance is a fantastic way to improve PTQ attendance and maximize player satisfaction at these events. I would just personally set the threshold a lot lower than him (200 instead of 300).
- Ben Bleiweiss
Man, can't believe it but I am going to say I 100% agree with Ben here. Steve, you have yet to offer hard data proving that what people want are more booster prizes at a PTQ. And I don't mean quoting random ppl from a forum.
I also do not believe this to even be an economic argument as much as it is a finance/marketing issue. You want the TOs to compete, so they will need to add more money into their marketing budget to let players to know to come to theirs. So what if they get an extra 50 players from this? Any of that profit has been eaten up by the added marketing budget and they will be forced to give out the same prizes as before and nothing changes.
Your numbers for expenses of a TO are so far off that it is laughable. It automatically discredits 90% of what you have been saying. Glen and Ben are both involved with running PTQs and I would be willing to bet people will trust they know what they are talking more so than some Vintage player who who doesn't run any tournaments at all.
Why create competition when there doesn't need to be any. I have heard nothing but good things about PES, Legions, and SCG. Why make them have to fight for their right to have PTQs that they have been running successfully for years?
I would love to still see sort of hard, empirical data from you Steve that makes you think your point is even close to being valid.
EDIT: I also still don't see a monopoly by the TOs because people can still Q through GPs, Rating, and Pro Points, and Qing is the reason PTQs exist.
I just don't think you see all the trees in the forest Steve.
Allow me to clarify: I definitely want TOs to be able to make a living. My argument, though, is that competition, I would think, would decide/determine what the market would bear, in that regard. I started this thread because Patrick suggested that I write an article on the subject. As I said, I think jeff raised some good points, but I would let the market cost out those components, and determine what's feasible, etc. Market competition might actually serve to reduce some of those costs, as TOs figure out how to be more efficient, etc.
Steve:
So let's look at the ramifications of a fully competitive market, where organizers can run PTQs anytime and anyplace they'd like, in the name of market competition.
1) TO #1 announces a PTQ to be held on October 1st in Philadephia, with a $25 entry fee.
2) The next day, TO #2 announces that he will be holding a PTQ across the street from PTQ #1, with a $10 entry fee, on the same date.
3) A day after that, TO #3 announces he is holding a third PTQ in the same city, one block away, with NO entry fee, on the same date.
Let's say that TO #3 can eat the losses for a while, long enough to drive TO #1 and #2 out of business.
A) Would this system benefit players in the short term?
B) Would this system benefit players in the long term?
I would answer no to both. I would also say that my scenario is realistic, because it has happened in the past a few times, and has always ended up as a net negative on both TOs, and on the Magic community in that area.
So let's look at the ramifications of a fully competitive market, where organizers can run PTQs anytime and anyplace they'd like, in the name of market competition.
1) TO #1 announces a PTQ to be held on October 1st in Philadephia, with a $25 entry fee.
2) The next day, TO #2 announces that he will be holding a PTQ across the street from PTQ #1, with a $10 entry fee, on the same date.
3) A day after that, TO #3 announces he is holding a third PTQ in the same city, one block away, with NO entry fee, on the same date.
Let's say that TO #3 can eat the losses for a while, long enough to drive TO #1 and #2 out of business.
A) Would this system benefit players in the short term?
B) Would this system benefit players in the long term?
I would answer no to both. I would also say that my scenario is realistic, because it has happened in the past a few times, and has always ended up as a net negative on both TOs, and on the Magic community in that area.
- Ben Bleiweiss
Couldn't Wizards implement rules that curb such abuses? For example, simply set the dates/times of the PTQs, but allow the TOs to compete on other measures? So for example, Wizards can say: there are 6 Ohio PTQs this season, we will be divving them up among six different TOs. However, Wizards would set the dates, and require the TOs to sort out the details.
I definitely get your point, that competition can have downsides, but I would think there would be mechanisms or ways of ameliorating or addresing many of those concerns.
Do you think Nebraska, Moy and Pastimes put on bad events because there is no competition and PTQs are a monopoly, or because nobody in the region either has the resources or the ability to put on the events? Would the system be helped more by allowing for competition that may or may not exist, or by or by having stricter standards for companies running events?
Unsure. I'm not about to throw out ridiculous numbers or claims. It seems like Legion could take over Moy and PES could spread down into Indy.
If there was a little competition, the bad TOs would kind of be forced to fight for their jobs right?
If there were stricter standards, how would you regulate them? What kind of thing could you even enforce as far as running bad tournament where people are lazy, judges make bad rulings, the TO skims off the top or doesn't award prizes that they advertised, etc?
I don't know what Legion's payouts are, but PES pays down to top32 if they get over 121 players (a virtual certainty for most of their PTQs). Is that sufficient to keep the fish in, or should it pay down further?
I think Legion does a pack payout for your swiss record, and then additional packs for making t8. Could be a better system for roping in fish, since it sets tangible goals for them to shoot for, and they don't get upset by missing t16 or t32 on tiebreakers or something.
Just for the record, I am not advocating adding to the PTQ prize pool. I don't think that's necessary. You just have to spread it around so more people get a taste.
So let's look at the ramifications of a fully competitive market, where organizers can run PTQs anytime and anyplace they'd like, in the name of market competition.
1) TO #1 announces a PTQ to be held on October 1st in Philadephia, with a $25 entry fee.
2) The next day, TO #2 announces that he will be holding a PTQ across the street from PTQ #1, with a $10 entry fee, on the same date.
3) A day after that, TO #3 announces he is holding a third PTQ in the same city, one block away, with NO entry fee, on the same date.
Let's say that TO #3 can eat the losses for a while, long enough to drive TO #1 and #2 out of business.
A) Would this system benefit players in the short term?
B) Would this system benefit players in the long term?
I would answer no to both. I would also say that my scenario is realistic, because it has happened in the past a few times, and has always ended up as a net negative on both TOs, and on the Magic community in that area.
- Ben Bleiweiss
Even above that, if you introduce competition, and brought back something like bidding on PTQs, then the TOs are incentivized to maximize their profit.
Under the current system, if TO A runs awesome events and makes $1000-2000 per PTQ after everything is said and done, then they can have a good side business. If we create a bidding system where TO B can come in, outbid TO A by a good deal, then run poor events that make $3000-$4000 per event, the players lose.
Even if we somehow limit their ability to run events to only X PTQs per season, TO B can still run 3-4 PTQs a year and run poor quality events to make 3000-4000 per event. They may get a few less players than TO A, but they are making far more per customer.
Even above that, if you introduce competition, and brought back something like bidding on PTQs, then the TOs are incentivized to maximize their profit.
Under the current system, if TO A runs awesome events and makes $1000-2000 per PTQ after everything is said and done, then they can have a good side business. If we create a bidding system where TO B can come in, outbid TO A by a good deal, then run poor events that make $3000-$4000 per event, the players lose.
Even if we somehow limit their ability to run events to only X PTQs per season, TO B can still run 3-4 PTQs a year and run poor quality events to make 3000-4000 per event. They may get a few less players than TO A, but they are making far more per customer.
That's why I don't think bidding is the answer. Bidding creates competition for a single good, and doesn't create competition that benefits a consumer. It's like Russian oil companies bidding for state monopolies after the fall of communism.;) that didn't help consumers much.
That's why I don't think bidding is the answer. Bidding creates competition for a single good, and doesn't create competition that benefits a consumer. It's like Russian oil companies bidding for state monopolies after the fall of communism.;) that didn't help consumers much.
How do you find TOs to run events that are more concerned with running good events instead of just profit? Attendance can't be the only factor - A very high percentage of people would attend a PTQ run by shaved apes where the top8 received two scaled fish and one unscaled fish with a bit taken out of it.
Meanwhile, any existing good TO has to now compete with a TO who is running lousy events and creating players who don't think that going to PTQs is worth it. A large number of newer players don't understand the difference between one TO to the next. They only know the PTQ brand and regions.
At some point, if you find out that only one TO in the region has the ability to run good events, have you really advanced the cause at all?
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That said, the one reason I would want higher pay outs is so that a finals split is much more negotiable. Back in the day it was so simple: you hand one person the check and the other the blue envelope. Now the only real way to get a scoop in the finals from someone who is willing is basically collusion.
The ultimate point is that a system of TO Competition would produce more value for the consumer. The main entre to his argument has been looking at prizes, because I think the current PTQ prize structure is so egregious, and this fact is accessible to folks, but it's far from the only one, as I've described many times in this thread and in response to Glenn's article. Another possibility is lower entry fees, which as I said, is simply another way of adding value to the event, just like more prizes. Moreover, I think that the overall experience of PTQs would be improved.
I chose to focus on prizes because I thought that was an easy way that PTQ attendees would appreciate my argument, but perhaps a more fruitful way would be to have focused on entry fees. Lower entry fees, and you have more attendees.
Yet, I agree, one main issue is the slope: how much will a decrease in entry fee or an increase in prizes increase attendance? But you are asking me to give the slope, when I say: the answer to that can only be determined in an actual competitive market. As I said before: you can't know the real price of something unless you have a market to price it.
While the question of slope (i.e. exactly how elastic or the degree of elasticity) is relevant, our models of monpolistic or quasi-monopolistic behavior strongly suggest that PTQ TOs are not actually incentivized to maximize attendance where they would in a competitive market. To that extent, the question of slope is besides the point.
While the question of slope would answer the exact question of how many players would increase attendance per unit increase in prizes or unit decrease in entry fee, the main point is that PTQ TOs maximize profit by NOT maximizing attendance. To that extent, my main point is that we aren't maximizing our growth potential as we would under a competitive system. That holds true as long as the slope is not perfectly inelastic.
Right, so we can assume that TOs give away product because they are stupid or because they are rational and want to maximize profits. Eitehr one is a logical conclusion from the fact that TOs give out prizes. I do not think that TOs are stupid.
And it doesn't mean it won't. We have plenty of evidence, given the monpolistic pricing graph, to suggest it wil. As long as the demand is not perfectly inelastic (and it's simple to prove that it's not), a monopolistic pricing profit maximizer will not be interested in maximizing attendance where a competitive firm would, and will be exploiting the players on the upper left of hte demand curve by taking their consumer surplus.
Because they feel it's worth it to take a short-term loss to make a long-term gain for the game as a whole
Wouldn't the cost of that competition be lots of poorly run events? Isn't that far more detrimental to PTQ attendence than the mediocre prize payout that you are complaining about?
I would think (2), without knowing how (1) would be distributed. However, my understanding of the situation was that people were concerned that adding another invite would increase WOTC's budget for the Pro Tour. I was trying to propose a solution that wouldn't increase or add more stress to WOTC's budget. In the first post, I tried to provide a solution to improve the PTQ experience and maximize Magic's long-term growth within that parameter.
And that's fine, but my response is: let's let the market work that out. Theory suggests that competition is better for consumers. While it might actually be the case that PTQ TOs price near or at where a competitive market does, there are good reasons, or at least some evidence/reasons, to think tha they don't. Moreover, all of the benefits of market competition would acrue under such a system, benefits that can't even be spelled out here.
And I'm saying that the risks of changing to such a system would be bad for Magic in the short term, potentially so much so that it could cause severe harm and setbacks. In the long run, it all evens out, but in the long run, we (and more importantly, possibly magic) are all dead.
You should read them.
"Rejoice, for bad things are about to happen"
Even in the world of economic models, a competitive firm is no more or less interested in maximizing attendance than a monopolistic provider. Any increase in attendance would be a side-effect. Though you stated this first, I wanted to address it last because everything else feeds into it. The current prize structure is not "egregious". It's okay. There's no significant problem with it. Not a lot of people care about it to a significant extent - and people who primarily care about prizes have a better substitute in the form of the GPs.
You seem to be ignoring or discounting the cost to change. Changing the PTQ structure is expensive, in particular to Wizards directly. It takes time, effort, and money. The possible increase in attendance is simply not worth the resources Wizards would need to invest to even design a "competitive market" for PTQs, much less implement it. (Edited to add: ) And, as others have mentioned, you're discounting the importance of standardization. Wizards might (and, I would venture to say, probably does) care less about sheer attendance numbers than it does about ensuring that people have a fairly consistent experience across PTQs. One bad PTQ experience can do much more damage than a somewhat reduced player count would.
And I understand that perspective, I get that people are concerned that there could be harm, but that's an implementation question, which we've only touched on. I could come up with some ways to minimize these ricks, but Wizards is smart, and full of smart people I'm confident that they could shift to a competitive system and do it well. They could even do a trial run, just like China let Hong Kong be a free enterprize zone in the 1980s to test market economics.
Actually, this is the chief criticism of communism by most economists: a centralized system actually has no efficient way of allocating resources, because there is no market to price goods. So, yes, competitive markets tell us what market prices look like.
True, but step back from a moment from the keyboard, and the desire to reply and think about this:
Fact: TOs give away other prizes.
There are only a few possible answers as to why. They run these events over and over again. We can speculate as to why. But there are basically two main possibilities: 1) either they see value in doing so, or 2) they don't, but do it anyway. I think 1 is more plausible. Certaintly, we might say: well they see value because the competition does it, or they feel that they should. That's consistent with my view that they do it to increase attendance or promote retention. If they acted below industry standarsd, they would be criticized, or at least get flak.
Yes, that's true. I should have said: a profit maximizing TO sets prices/rewards at a place where they happen to not maximize attendance to the levels of a competitive market. Same point.
There's really nothing to his contention other than that making TO's compete with each other for the right to put on PTQ tournaments and their ensuring profit would probably lead to those tournaments being marginally more profitable for players.
He doesn't even say by how much (and personally I think it would be less than he thinks), but I think its hard for anyone to disagree with this as a generalized position. Competition is the fuel of economic refinement, and the idea that every TO has already 'maximized' all the profit margins around providing a tournament is laughable.
With that said, I think Steve overestimates the incentive TOs have to compete and optimize for some of the reasons mentioned in the thread - these tournaments aren't that profitable, especially given how rare they are. An extra profit of 3000 in a month is a neat idea, but only if you're doing the entire thing yourself. For people who own card shops or the like and are doing it as part of their business, it becomes relatively a much smaller part of their income with more associated costs (in employee time, etc).
Steve isn't suggesting there be so much product that people proactively attented PTQs for the product. What he's suggesting is that more people would continue to grind PTQs or show up at them if they recieved some more product that lead, in effect, to a subsidization of their attendance costs when they place well. People will not go to PTQs or participate in them because they win 2 boxes for 3rd place .. but winning 2 boxes might help defray their costs, whether in the form of sellable singles or through resale of the whole boxes to those who want to open them, or just through providing packs for entering future drafts and continuing to practice and improve. If that even added up to an additional 50-150 dollars saved due to the PTQ prize, it can be the difference in determining when PTQ attendance becomes 'too expensive' for players with financial difficulties with the cost of PTQ grinding.
I don't even think Steve is asking for a selfish reason: As a longtime eternal (especially Vintage) player who has won and placed well in many tournaments that provided significant value (power cards, etc), and who is a college graduate with a career and extra income from writing for SCG, I really doubt that Steve has a hard time affording the cost of attending PTQs if he wishes. His post is about people like me who, in fact, really have a hard time with the travel costs.
1) You have said that you're advocating better prizes in PTQs to promote Magic's growth. How does pandering to the middle of the pyramid promote growth? A Pro Tour Qualifier presumes that you know the game, have a semi-competitive collection, and an interest to stop calling your Magic gaming time a "hobby" instead of a "career". If you're going to grow the pyramid, shouldn't growth happen at the bottom to support the upper echelons? Isn't this bottom space served by FNM?
2) As stated above the PTQ audience is a captive one. Assuming that the focus of the venue is around "Pro", high-level competition and a gateway to even higher competition; Greater rewards do not draw players that are competitive at this level. As stated previously by other posters.
3) You keep arguing Supply and Demand in a monopoly environment. Another poster has cited that some TOs do side events like the free draft to the first 32 that get dropped. This suggests that the TOs have taken into consideration the laws of Diminishing Returns and figured that making the Top 8 sweeter wasn't the best way to broaden appeal, but to spread out the prize pool... and you're passionately, vehemently advocating change that's already occurring.
And for the ad hominem to illicit a response:
I hope your card evaluation skills aren't like your Economic evaluations. It'd be a shame if both happened in a vacuum.
Aside from that, there seems to be one point that hasn't been brought up yet. The non first place prizes, regardless of how insignificant they might be to me, keep the fish/dead money/donkeys coming back. There have been countless instances of players sticking it out at 1-3 to win six packs, not conceding their opponent into top eight because they can win six packs, etc.
While it might seem like six packs is nothing, it isn't to the person who wants a reason to believe that they didn't waste their day. It will give them an excuse to come back if they basically broke even.
Magic is primarily a skill game. PTQs are competitive and there are a lot of jerks out there (hi!). Without these small prizes, what reason would a casual player have to PTQ again? They probably had one bad experience when they played a jerk, didn't win a lot, and had nothing to show for their efforts. They aren't going to better because they don't care, but as a community, we NEED those types of players coming back and donating their entry fees. Players might be replaceable to some extent, but it would be better if we kept the ones we already have around too.
Consider the SCG Open series. When they decided to add money to their prize support, they tacked it onto 17-32. Why not 2nd, which pays out an awkwardly low $600? Because that means that 16 more people leave the tournament happy, just by getting their money back.
As far as I care, the TO can give two packs to everyone who entered and pay additional prizes down to top 32. There are very few people per PTQ who don't care about the packs, so it won't affect them either way. I'd say over 50% are going to be happy to crack the two packs they paid $25 for, and they will probably come back, regardless of their record and experience.
Having top eight players get less than a box is somewhat annoying, but as long as that payout isn't top heavy, I don't really care. For example, having the 8th place finisher in a 300 man PTQ get 18 packs while first place gets the plane ticket and three boxes. That is absurd. First place already got what he came for, why give him $300 in product on top of it? Those boxes probably don't even factor into his happiness. First place should probably get less product instead of more.
Ari made a point that it's harder to make a deal in the finals, but I think that's in WOTC's best interest anyway.
In summary, t8 players should each get a box, first should get no product. Prizes should pay waaaay down to make the fish happy.
Steve, I went back to the original thread where this was posted, and as far as I can tell, I was the only person who brought up the concern about WOTC adding in people to the Pro Tour.
So let's follow this up:
Let's say we're in agreement that it is in the best interest of the player (for satisfaction and for retention) to add a second PTQ slot should attendance hit a certain mark (again, let's propose this number to be 200). Let's also just use tournaments in North America for these examples, because as demonstrated by other people on this thread, the system in other countries is demonstrably different than in the States.
Let's say that there are seventy-five PTQs run in the United States over the course of a season (this changes from season to season, but is close to the correct number). Let's say that currently, twelve out of these fifty get 200+ players. (16%) Which of the following would you say is more likely to increase attendance?
A) Tournament Organizers adding $500 in prizes to the prize pool? (Let's assume this is in Booster Boxes, as are the other prize payouts)
B) The promise that if attendance reaches 200 players or more, a second Pro Tour invite is added to the tournament, and a second $500 travel voucher is given out?
I would posit that greater player satisfaction is achieved through B) - the majority of players would be more willing to attend PTQs (and travel greater distances to attend PTQs) if there were a greater chance at qualifying for the Pro Tour.
I believe that the chance for there to be an extra invite at 200+ person tournaments would lead to a higher overall tournament attendance than would a guaranteed $500 extra in prize support at every PTQ, regardless of attendance.
I believe this directly correlates to the wants of the consumer in this regard, because they are voting on attending/not attending an event with their wallets - they would be saying that the PTQ invite is more of an incentive to attend an event than $500 extra in boxes, spread among the field.
Nobody set up a parameter for you regarding what WOTC would/would not be willing to do at the Pro Tour, except yourself. This was not in Glen's original article, and it was brought up by myself as a hypothetical in my forum response on StarCityGames.com.
So what I'm curious about is this: Given that the optimal solution for players is adding a second invite, why would you spend so much time and energy, across multiple websites, arguing against TOs being able to make a living? Jeff put together costs for an event that were much more realistic than yours, and yet I have not seen you acknowledge yet that your initial math was very far off from the economic realities that tournament organizers face.
I agree with Glen that the option to purchase a second PTQ slot based on attendance is a fantastic way to improve PTQ attendance and maximize player satisfaction at these events. I would just personally set the threshold a lot lower than him (200 instead of 300).
- Ben Bleiweiss
Perhaps you should step back from the keyboard and the desire to reply and actually read my posts. I already said:
In other words, I already addressed everything you just brought up. Yes, the impact of offering some prizes rather than no prizes probably is probably non-trivial. That does not mean that the impact of offering some more prizes is also non-trivial. Yes, TOs do things because other people are doing it. No, that does not mean that it's anywhere near the profit maximizing point, either for the monopoly case or otherwise.
Do you think Nebraska, Moy and Pastimes put on bad events because there is no competition and PTQs are a monopoly, or because nobody in the region either has the resources or the ability to put on the events? Would the system be helped more by allowing for competition that may or may not exist, or by or by having stricter standards for companies running events?
I don't know what Legion's payouts are, but PES pays down to top32 if they get over 121 players (a virtual certainty for most of their PTQs). Is that sufficient to keep the fish in, or should it pay down further?
edit: Basically, Steve's argument is that competition is good and will improve tournaments. Which is true if every TO is maximizing their profits at the expense of the players. IE, they only give out 8 boxes because that is all they are forced to give out, or 16 boxes if they feel that 16 boxes will increase their profit over the long haul.
My contention is that his argument takes out the entire concept that a good deal of the people running these companies are themselves HUGE fans of the game and doing this and not making a lot of money. TOs like Legon sell sleeves and the like to improve their money, but they put in a lot of time/money into their events. Do you think Steve Port is maximizing every profit angle he could and exploiting the players, or running the best events he can in his region? I know there are TOs that do not give out anything close to reasonable prize support, or work to get judges that will run better events, but is the answer to these TOs to force everyone to attend events that are of a much lower quality than today, at least for the near future?
s
Thank you for putting more eloquently and concisely than I had a major point Iv'e been trying to advance.
While I think that competition would produce better tangible consumer outcomes, like marginally better prize selection or entry fees, and thus lead to more growth, I also think it would produce intangible benefits. I can only speculate, but I think we might see more attention to market niches, demographics, and particular player profiles as PTQ TOs compete to cater to different crowds, including finding ways to attract older tournament goers.
I think, to some extent, we have a system right now that basically emphasizes 'making the trains run on time,' which is important -- I don't want to underestimate how important it is -- but I also think other things are important, and competition would make those things come out. Right now, the model is based on replacement, and not enough, in my view, on retention. I think competition would help that, or,as you put it, be an engine of economic refinement.
Very possibly. Jeff made some good points. I tried in good faith to cost out those estimates in the original post, and I'm glad he tried to push us to a more accurate model. Even under his model, I think there would benefits to increasing the payout, particulary along the lines that Gerry T just suggeseted (which I'd wholeheartedly endorse).
Which I thought was an important point.
And, as I said, I agree with this. I would also think that an extra invite would be worth more than another $500 in extra money, without question, unless, somehow, that extra money was very deeply distributed. $500 isn't, in my view, alot compared to the value of an invite. So, I think you are right, (2) is clearly preferable.
Again, I agree. I think it would increase attendance, satisfaction, etc.
If adding another invite to PTQs is an option, I'm all for that too. I think it would do all of the things you suggest.
I definitely want TOs to be able to make a living. My argument, though, is that competition, I would think, would decide/determine what the market would bear. I started this thread because Patrick suggested that I write an article on the subject, and I thought a forum conversation would be the best vehicle for raising some of these issue. As I said, I think jeff raised some good points, but I would let the market cost out those components, and determine what's feasible, etc. Market competition might actually serve to reduce some of those costs, as TOs figure out how to be more efficient, etc.
Other users have immediately summarized why this is the case, though if you had examples of turnout for PTQs prior to additional prizes being offered (if such a time existed), you could try and see if there was any correlation between that introduction and PTQ attendance. However, based on a statement made earlier in the thread (10% attendance increase with better prize support that ultimately didn't warrant the loss to the TO I believe was the figure?), it seems like an increase from None to Some and Some to More has diminishing returns for the TO and event attendance.
That said, I'm going to politely bow out now as there are numerous arguments being made at this time and there is no room for us to go by bouncing this portion of the discussion back and forth without actual hard data.
Additionally, thank you for keeping me on task. I started getting caught up with Words and drifted a bit, so I appreciate you pulling me back in and forcing me to Use Words more better.
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There you won Steven.
You won the argument, but didn't won the cause, and you will probably have to live with it if you don't win it in the near future.
They don't care if TOs are giving back only 20% of the entry fee as prizes. I insist, they don't care.
They still can afford $25 + food + (variable) gas + maybe hotel + $700 deck.
Players are alienatedly* comfortable, they will not support you in this cause.
To all the people wondering for some empirical manifest of the theory, I have good news, you do have a shot at some empirical data:
Go to ask to players (grinders, casual ones, fallen pros, whomever would play a PTQ in fact) which is better:
- Old system with NQTs being gigantic monopolyc* events, or the new ones, with players having at least some degree of options to choose from?
- Old system with Prereleases being gigantic monopolyc* events, or the new ones, with players having at least some degree of options to choose from?
* is that an English word? lol
PS: Oh yes, my grammar does suck, I'm sorry about that. I have an Engineering in Information Systems, and threw in 3 (out of 6) years of a full major in Biochemistry, and everything in Spanish (my native language), so let alone my lack of proper English.
Man, can't believe it but I am going to say I 100% agree with Ben here. Steve, you have yet to offer hard data proving that what people want are more booster prizes at a PTQ. And I don't mean quoting random ppl from a forum.
I also do not believe this to even be an economic argument as much as it is a finance/marketing issue. You want the TOs to compete, so they will need to add more money into their marketing budget to let players to know to come to theirs. So what if they get an extra 50 players from this? Any of that profit has been eaten up by the added marketing budget and they will be forced to give out the same prizes as before and nothing changes.
Your numbers for expenses of a TO are so far off that it is laughable. It automatically discredits 90% of what you have been saying. Glen and Ben are both involved with running PTQs and I would be willing to bet people will trust they know what they are talking more so than some Vintage player who who doesn't run any tournaments at all.
Why create competition when there doesn't need to be any. I have heard nothing but good things about PES, Legions, and SCG. Why make them have to fight for their right to have PTQs that they have been running successfully for years?
I would love to still see sort of hard, empirical data from you Steve that makes you think your point is even close to being valid.
EDIT: I also still don't see a monopoly by the TOs because people can still Q through GPs, Rating, and Pro Points, and Qing is the reason PTQs exist.
I just don't think you see all the trees in the forest Steve.
Steve:
So let's look at the ramifications of a fully competitive market, where organizers can run PTQs anytime and anyplace they'd like, in the name of market competition.
1) TO #1 announces a PTQ to be held on October 1st in Philadephia, with a $25 entry fee.
2) The next day, TO #2 announces that he will be holding a PTQ across the street from PTQ #1, with a $10 entry fee, on the same date.
3) A day after that, TO #3 announces he is holding a third PTQ in the same city, one block away, with NO entry fee, on the same date.
Let's say that TO #3 can eat the losses for a while, long enough to drive TO #1 and #2 out of business.
A) Would this system benefit players in the short term?
B) Would this system benefit players in the long term?
I would answer no to both. I would also say that my scenario is realistic, because it has happened in the past a few times, and has always ended up as a net negative on both TOs, and on the Magic community in that area.
- Ben Bleiweiss
Couldn't Wizards implement rules that curb such abuses? For example, simply set the dates/times of the PTQs, but allow the TOs to compete on other measures? So for example, Wizards can say: there are 6 Ohio PTQs this season, we will be divving them up among six different TOs. However, Wizards would set the dates, and require the TOs to sort out the details.
I definitely get your point, that competition can have downsides, but I would think there would be mechanisms or ways of ameliorating or addresing many of those concerns.
Unsure. I'm not about to throw out ridiculous numbers or claims. It seems like Legion could take over Moy and PES could spread down into Indy.
If there was a little competition, the bad TOs would kind of be forced to fight for their jobs right?
If there were stricter standards, how would you regulate them? What kind of thing could you even enforce as far as running bad tournament where people are lazy, judges make bad rulings, the TO skims off the top or doesn't award prizes that they advertised, etc?
I think Legion does a pack payout for your swiss record, and then additional packs for making t8. Could be a better system for roping in fish, since it sets tangible goals for them to shoot for, and they don't get upset by missing t16 or t32 on tiebreakers or something.
Just for the record, I am not advocating adding to the PTQ prize pool. I don't think that's necessary. You just have to spread it around so more people get a taste.
Even above that, if you introduce competition, and brought back something like bidding on PTQs, then the TOs are incentivized to maximize their profit.
Under the current system, if TO A runs awesome events and makes $1000-2000 per PTQ after everything is said and done, then they can have a good side business. If we create a bidding system where TO B can come in, outbid TO A by a good deal, then run poor events that make $3000-$4000 per event, the players lose.
Even if we somehow limit their ability to run events to only X PTQs per season, TO B can still run 3-4 PTQs a year and run poor quality events to make 3000-4000 per event. They may get a few less players than TO A, but they are making far more per customer.
That's why I don't think bidding is the answer. Bidding creates competition for a single good, and doesn't create competition that benefits a consumer. It's like Russian oil companies bidding for state monopolies after the fall of communism.;) that didn't help consumers much.
Is it just me or do TOs kinda get boned on sealed events, $30 entryfee 6 packs per person + prize support?
How do you find TOs to run events that are more concerned with running good events instead of just profit? Attendance can't be the only factor - A very high percentage of people would attend a PTQ run by shaved apes where the top8 received two scaled fish and one unscaled fish with a bit taken out of it.
Meanwhile, any existing good TO has to now compete with a TO who is running lousy events and creating players who don't think that going to PTQs is worth it. A large number of newer players don't understand the difference between one TO to the next. They only know the PTQ brand and regions.
At some point, if you find out that only one TO in the region has the ability to run good events, have you really advanced the cause at all?