Dark Sphere Prerelease

[Daniel Royde]

I went along to the Dark Sphere Prerelease!!1!

A quick report

 

FACTS:

 

About 100 players doing one large 7 round sealed event.

 

The venue had plenty of space.

The venue was easy to get to (10 mins walk from Waterloo)

The TO was selling food and drink cheaply.

The sealed was cheap- £20

The prize support for sealed was top heavy- 36 packs for 7-0, 24 for 6-1 (3 people), 18 (i think) for 6-1-1, then 3 for 5-2.

Drafts were £12 for 4-2-1-1 swiss.

There was no 2HG. People signed up for it (inc me) but then all of the names on the list were crossed off. I'm not sure what happened there.

The tournament seemed to be well run (I wasn't paying much attention since I wasn't in it).

 

COMMENTS

 

I disliked it being one large tournament. Everybody is playing at the same time. I think that you get a less social atmosphere. More, smaller flights creates a more convention like feeling. I believe that this is good and encourages everyone to talk to more different people, which is fun and good for the community.

 

Small flights also mean that someone can turn up whenever they like and start playing relatively soon. This is clearly better for the players, but I also think for the TO: He can start the event earlier in the morning without losing the late arrivals.

This isn't possible with one big flight. Also with only one flight, drafts don't happen in the early afternoon.

 

Isn't it better for the TO if people can do more than one sealed deck?

 

Lack of 2HG and a bar meant that it wasn't really possible to spend the evening there- a big disadvantage.

 

IF the Wizards/Jason issue is never sorted out then I think that after a few prereleases Dark Sphere will be running events that are very similar to what Jason's were. With a bit of advertising I think the same player numbers can be reached.

 

Would it work if they were both allowed to run prereleases and compete with each other?

 

I do wonder one thing- how long will Dark Sphere be around for?  It seems as though most games shops don't last that long. I dislike the idea that if it closes down, then London would be left without a prerelease at all...

[Thom Richardson]

clear as mud, thanks for the info though

[Tom Reeve]

If they stop allowing booster drafts at prereleases I will probably never play in another prerelease event again.

[Glenn Goldsworthy]

the best thing I thought about prereleases was the 2hg

[Paul Hodgson]

Sounds like they're meaning you can have any combination of sealed, draft and THG events up to a total of 4.

[Kevin Blake]

I think what it's meant to do is give TO's the option of how they want to split their events.  For example in MK we rarely get a draft off the ground at pre-releases but we could always do with the option of running more sealed flights for flexibility, so for us this announcement is actually good news, if I'm reading it right.

 

 

 

[Kevin Blake]

Yeah, that's how I read it.

Paul Hodgson said:

Sounds like they're meaning you can have any combination of sealed, draft and THG events up to a total of 4.

[Raymond Wat]

but...why the restriction?

 

[Thom Richardson]

Draft doesn't mean 1 draft pod though does it? that would be insane.

 

This seems like it might be at least a small improvement on the present system.  ie, 2 sealed, 2hg + draft   is better than at present becuase of the extra flight.  and if MK don't get drafts to fire (becuase everyone there is mental apparently!) then they could run 3 (or even 4) flights.

 

 

 

[Kevin Blake]

Although we are 'mental' (you now how inbred we are in the provinces :)), the main reason we don't get drafts to fire is because we have, up until now, run back to back sealed events. Many of the players who might consider drafting also want to play in both sealed events and there is just not enough time in the day unless we get a lot of drops early in the first sealed event.

Thom Richardson said:

Draft doesn't mean 1 draft pod though does it? that would be insane.

 

This seems like it might be at least a small improvement on the present system.  ie, 2 sealed, 2hg + draft   is better than at present becuase of the extra flight.  and if MK don't get drafts to fire (becuase everyone there is mental apparently!) then they could run 3 (or even 4) flights.